New 5ac Homesteads and Questions

So Ted, what's the location? Eastern Washington is a big area. You mentioned a fifth 5 acre parcel, is this going to turn into another Eastern Washington surburbia?

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bare - Just outside of Omak. This chunk is 4 parcels only but we are working on others in both W and E Wa.

quntmphscs - Thank you. Yep, they are small but altogether adequate and upgradable.

annethcz - Thank you. All you have to do is move W about 2K miles and we can put you in one.

Ted

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I just bought 5 acres 50 miles south of seattle for $53,000 and had a 2,776 sq.ft. 5 bdrm. 2.5 bth 2 car garage house built for $120,000 with tax. septic $6,000 well $6,000 giant wood stove $2,000 and alot of misc. costs. all together $220,000. Nice land lots of trees fertile soil, no designated wet land. I cant believe prices are so high in wyoming.

In Western Wyoming yes! 11.5 acres on a hill bordering our property. No year round road(yet) to it, sold three years ago for 170,000.00 and just sold again this summer for 335,000.00. No home, no improvements. It does border national forest, and you can ride right into the mountains.

You can go down the road and get 10 acres in the valley with no trees and rocky soil for less than half that. It is all about location! Close to Jackson hole.

Hi!
I live in SE Ky. and I just bought 4.5 acres of ground for $29,900.00. It's unrestricted and I've built a 3 stall horse barn (we have 3 horses and some rabbits for meat). We're constructing a home (I'm contractor and laborer). It will be about 2400 sq. feet and cost just under 100K. It sounds like a lot ($130,000.00) until you consider it's appraised value will top 200K when it's finsished due to it's premium location near town and schools and a federal penitentiary (employees there are salivating for our place).

Your idea sounds great to me if I was retired and didn't have 3 kids at home. 85-95K for a finished parcel with the amenities offered sounds like a reasonable deal to me. Of course, I'm a fan of KY. basketball and would not fare too well in washington state.

Good luck with your business venture.

Not when you consider Teton County has the highest average income for any county in the U.S. The prices Painterwife is talking about is becoming common for anything close to Yellowstone Park. To many people moving in there from outside the state for me.

Something like this won't appeal to someone really wanting to have the homestead life. Like many have said, part of the "homesteading" mentality is that you build a small house with your own hands and with materials you can afford. We don't like any rules, which is why we don't usually buy where there are any. Few of us have a lot of money either. We are on a shoestring and part of wanting to get to land is to be free of debt and cut monthly expenses. Figuring about $100 sq ft for the house (and at today's prices, that is nothing fancy), that gives you $100K just for the house. Then, even at $5-$10K for the land, you are up another $25K-$50K. Add in for the fencing and outbuildings, and there is no way you can do this for less than about $200K and then you won't make enough money to make the work and aggrevation worth it. Considering that the average American makes less than $600 a week and can therefore only afford something half this price at most and with interest rates on the rise (7 increases in the last year)

So, with that in mind, you are trying to build a McFarm-----a mini ranchette priced for a person with an income in excess of 6 figures. It will appeal to the attorney in town, who getting older, wants a hobby since cutting his hours, or the Executive with some big Fortune 500 that is retiring with a very, very nice nest egg. The disadvantage then is the small house, and chances are, other than a few chickens for "show" in the garden, they aren't into animals either. They travel too much. You would be better off making the houses appealing to this client. To this person a 3/2 or 3/3 or 2/2 of about 2400 sq ft would appeal. They would be "downsizing" by going with a "smaller" home of 2400-3000 sq ft and would be looking for something like you find in THE NOT SO BIG HOUSE.

3 - What do you see as negatives?

I am having more and more trouble selling 3 bedroom houses these days and not even a nibble on 2 bedrooms. Four bedrooms seems to be becoming the "ideal" for a family. I can't imagine imagine living in less than 2000+. (Currently live in 3200.)

That may be very much a regional thing though as I recall looking at houses further north on realtor.com and they seemed TINY, like whole towns with nothing more than 1800 square feet ....and here that's pretty much considered "miminal" for any home (and if covenants, covenanted miminum), even for a couple with no kids. Most new construction, rural (not jam-packed low income housing neighborhoods which run 1400-1600 sq.feet.) is 2200+ square feet. I live in the deep south though where heating isn't what it is in the north.

Why not sell the lots and let people find a builder?

Now that is amazing as new construction here is running $95 a sq. foot. That would make your house a $263,720 house without land or lot.

1. Price depends on location, so no idea - none at all. I see very similar farm sites sell $38,000 - $265,000 'here' - on gravel, tar, close to town, away from everyone, etc. A very local question.......

2. I see folks who like the idea, without the work, trying this appoach to a homestead - nice sounding package deal for those buyers.

3. The house is small, it would need to look very easily exapandable to another bedroom/ den at least. As a homesteader, need to keep some records, do a home business, computer room.... Don't seem to have that computer/ den/ extra bedroom available??????

Solar - I would have lots of questions on a pre-plunked down system. My farm house was built in 1926 with a gas engine & bank of battires in a basement room. Was the cool thing back in those days. Well, no one could wait to plant the power poles fast enough when REA came through. Your own power sytem is a lot of work & has limitations. Many people choose that lifestyle, but it would _greatly_ limit your buyers to a small segment.

Myself, I would not like the pre-package deal as others have said, I would want to grow my own homestead. But that doesn't mean I'm the only type of person, you should find those that are looking for this type of deal. A negative to many homesteader types.....

4. I see a total pre-package farmette selling to richer folks who want it all right now, and so I'm having a hard time seeing your market - That house needs to be able to expand with young families quite easily. While the house is big enough for some, I'm not sure it is big enough for your market?

5. Some will think too big, some too small. Where I live you need 2.5 acres for a house, you need 10 acres to have horses for the most part.... If zoning is a non-issue _there_, then 5 acres would be about right I would think.

6. Here is the scoop on HOA: I will run screaming from any property that has such..... Would _not_ buy into such a place. Also, as I'm looking at properties, it would be a red flag, like, oh, are there such problems around here that they need such a thing? Hummm, maybe not the place to move to....

Now, you see, after living there, _then_ if a neighbor from heck is next door, I might end up taking the paperwork from door to door to _get_ a HOA......

But, by then it is not your concern. You want to make the sale, and _that_ will be easier with no HOA garbage lessening the value of the plots.

Tell me what to do with the land I want to buy, will you.......

7. Where I live (a rural county with agriculture the primary business, one of the top 5 ag counties in my state) the government highly regulates what you can & can't do for livestock, so I have no idea what you mean by this question - your 'rules' would be blown away by the county at the drop of a hat, so..... Of no value 'here'.


My simple take on it.
--->Paul

I like your idea and wanted to add was why not add a loft to your house and people can put and extra room of their choosing up there. Not to much extra cost, you would have to pour an 8" foundation instead of 6" and do a high pitched roof. No premade rafters. Hope you included a spot for w/d.
We built our own 860 sq ft house in Central Wa. and love it, with the cost of heat and taxes, were glad we went small. We have 4.33 acres and we have enough room for 2-3 head of cattle ( got to feed hay in winter) and we have had 3 pigs and chickens. I have raised beds for gardening.
Best Wishes!!

I would suggest making each house different. Otherwise, it will look like a subdivision. Now, that doesn't necessarily mean that you need to have the houses be completely different, but something that sets each apart from the others near it would be good. I would also suggest adding a third bedroom. Since a lot of the people who might buy these probably have kids or are planning on having kids, having three bedrooms would be a huge plus. The square footage of the house seems fine, as long as it's designed properly. You might want to check out www.countryplans.com for more plans.

Your plan sounds ambitious and if you have the ability, not only could it be rewarding, but profitable. I wish you luck; getting ideas from people here is very wise in my opinion.

I won't respond item for item down the list; but I'll speak from my perspective and experience. The price would have to be within reason for the area and would depend upon employment opportunities/income capabillities. The house and layout on the land would be the decision maker. I'd want the house in the center of the 5 acres, to keep neighbor intrusions as far away as possible. 5 acres really isn't a lot of land when you end up with neighbors moving in who, for example, store their "treasures" (junk to you) on the property line that adjoins your property.

Our home is 1,650 SF (much less than our last home) and build in the center of the 40 acres it came with. The house, surrounded by forrest on all sides by the south, is a berm home with 6 huge skylights (3 open) in the LR and 2 small ones in the kitchen; the skylights also have blinds you can pull). There's a fireplace that is ducted thru the house like the gas (propane) furnace is with a blower system on it, and it DOES heat the house very easily. The passive solar heat we gain in the winter will raise the house temperature 20-25 degrees at times. The natural lighting is incredible and a real blessing.

We are on well water, we have a pole barn, a small section of which has a cement floor and is insulated for a workshop. We have tiered garden space, holding the land in position around the house so it doesn't wash away thru the years. This is an excellent way to garden.

People can use a barn for anything... ANY outbuilding is an advantage and I would recommend a fence on the side for it. Instead of making a building a "chicken coop" you could just call them "utility buildings" and let the buyer do with them as they wish. Offer ideas and if they decide they want to raise chickens, you could offer to build the insides of the coop if they want it. In other words, don't encourage they raise certain animals... let that be up to them and how they want to use the outbuildings.

We don't have enough storage space in the house so we've had to utilize the attached 1 car garage for storage and a pantry. The livingroom and den are very large, but they made the 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms (one's a half bath/utility room) very tiny. The LR, den and kitchen/dining area are open (minimal wall space) to allow all rooms as much natural lighting as possible and help heat/cool the house more naturally.

We put in a 2 acre pond and stocked it with fish and recently purchased an adjoining 80 acres.

I hope to get us set up with an alternative energy plan - using windmill(s) and some solar power. We need to dig a root cellar. And I'd LOVE to put in a cistern system. I may even do that down at the barn too, if I live long enough, LOL.

We are blessed with great neighbors, but they're all far enough away that we can't see them and they can't see us. I've owned property before that was part of a property owners association; I'll never get involved with something like that again... forget it. There are too many idiots in the world... why let more of them be part of our life, LOL.

If your 960 SF homes have a basement, it might be adequate... if the attic would be substantial... maybe that would be sufficient too. Is there no way possible to add a half bath? I honestly think 960 SF is awfully small. If you're determined to keep it small... make sure it's designed so one could add on if need be.

Would it be possible to have a wrap around porch that's covered? That is such a huge advantage to a home.

So best of luck to you... sounds like you're wisely looking at all the options. Keep us posted on what you do.

Seems good to me but == 3 bedrroms better!!