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Hi all, I've been reading the 'Homesteading Questions' board for about a month now and have noticed that there are several folks on here who live in East Texas.
Can anyone give me advice on where to find reasonably priced land in East Texas? Since we are from Houston, Highway 59 is sort of our reference point. We think we would like to be at least as far north as Moscow/Diboll, but no further north than Nacogdoches.
I'm also curious about the characteristics of the different counties in the area, especially as far as any land use regulations and permitting goes?
As a bit of background, the plan is for my wife and I, along with her family (mother, brother, sister, and niece) to share the property - but with separate buildings so that we can get out of each other's hair when needed.
My wife has an internet bookstore and her mother and brother draw SSI disability income, so we are pretty confident that we will have enough cash coming in to take care of basic, basic, expenses. I'm confident that I can bring in some sort of income, worst case would be working temp in Houston for a few weeks at a stretch.
I think I'll be able to raise a grubstake of around $70k by selling my house, which is in Houston's Inner Loop. I'd like to be able to pay cash for the property and still have enough left over to develop water, septic, and solar.
So far I've only looked at prices for around the Nacogdoches area. I've seen listings for property at $1000/acre, but the writeups emphasize good hunting with hogs and deer. That doesn't put me off, but does make me wonder if the property is subject to flooding, or might be swampy. Any listings that show houses or utilities seem to start at 80k and go up fast. Like everyone else, I'd like to have lots of acreage, but from reading the posts it seems like you only 'really' need to work a few intensely used acres for homesteading. Still, I'd like to have at least ten acres - a really big wood lot would be nice too, but I also suspect that, especially in the Big Thicket area one can get wood pretty cheaply.
I'm very interested in building a cordwood structure and smaller earth-sheltered structures.
Are properties cheaper in some of the more south eastern areas, like Polk county?
I'm looking forward to hearing what you folks already there have to say!
John
Can anyone give me advice on where to find reasonably priced land in East Texas? Since we are from Houston, Highway 59 is sort of our reference point. We think we would like to be at least as far north as Moscow/Diboll, but no further north than Nacogdoches.
I'm also curious about the characteristics of the different counties in the area, especially as far as any land use regulations and permitting goes?
As a bit of background, the plan is for my wife and I, along with her family (mother, brother, sister, and niece) to share the property - but with separate buildings so that we can get out of each other's hair when needed.
My wife has an internet bookstore and her mother and brother draw SSI disability income, so we are pretty confident that we will have enough cash coming in to take care of basic, basic, expenses. I'm confident that I can bring in some sort of income, worst case would be working temp in Houston for a few weeks at a stretch.
I think I'll be able to raise a grubstake of around $70k by selling my house, which is in Houston's Inner Loop. I'd like to be able to pay cash for the property and still have enough left over to develop water, septic, and solar.
So far I've only looked at prices for around the Nacogdoches area. I've seen listings for property at $1000/acre, but the writeups emphasize good hunting with hogs and deer. That doesn't put me off, but does make me wonder if the property is subject to flooding, or might be swampy. Any listings that show houses or utilities seem to start at 80k and go up fast. Like everyone else, I'd like to have lots of acreage, but from reading the posts it seems like you only 'really' need to work a few intensely used acres for homesteading. Still, I'd like to have at least ten acres - a really big wood lot would be nice too, but I also suspect that, especially in the Big Thicket area one can get wood pretty cheaply.
I'm very interested in building a cordwood structure and smaller earth-sheltered structures.
Are properties cheaper in some of the more south eastern areas, like Polk county?
I'm looking forward to hearing what you folks already there have to say!
John