[Terri]

My husband's Uncle said it best: "Every time you fill the tank of your car, put an equal amount in savings. That way when you need a new car the money will be there. And, if you do not have enough money to do this, stay home. Every time people go to town they spend money.".

Now, my Husband's Uncle was a farmer, so when he was staying home he was working, and most of us need to drive to work. Still the advice was sound, and it directly led to us being able to buy 5.7 acres of rolling land with a creek on it.

My own variation was to put a car payment in the bank, even though the pickup was paid off. At that time we had never gone more than 2-4 years without life kicking us in the teeth, and it was not easy to put a car payment in the bank but I did my best. I knew that one of our old cars would die on us at any time, and that we would need the money in order for both of us to have cars to get to our jobs.

Only, my old vehicle did not break down in a major and expensive way when I expected it to. And. life did not kick us in the teeth for a few years, either, which was a very pleasant surprise indeed!

At 200,000 miles the old Silverado only needed a few hundred dollars for repairs. And, at 250,000 miles it was still running. And, I had tried my darndest to put $150 a month in the bank, to which I had been adding whatever part of the tax returns we could spare, plus the contents of the penny jar. And, we now had $10,000 in there. This was starting to look interesting!!!!!!!!!!! Also, as I had mentioned, for the first time in our married lives life did NOT kick us in the teeth for a while!

BUT, bare land needs a higher down payment, and that is *IF* you can find a bank to finance you. (I know now that the smaller local branches will finance a loan, but I did not know this back then ). Still, looking at land made a pleasant weekend diversion, and for the last 3-odd years I had been looking at "for sale" ads plus the odd drive in the country. Many weekends I would load up the car with toys and junk food, get the kids in the car, and we would be gone for 2-3 hours. A McDonalds lunch was often involved. And I found no useable land I could afford.

Until I found something that I COULD afford, and DH saw it and pointed out that it lay directly between 2 cities and that it was therefor a good investment and that the value would go up. (DH is a dyed in the wool city boy and he LIKES it that way!)

The way I had found the less expensive land was to go on-line. While we did not buy the land advertised, the entire area was inexpensively priced. I ended up driving around and looking at realtors signs. And, this particular parcel had 2 fairly major problems that brought the value down to where we could afford it. The first problem was that they were showing the land to people from a nearby small city, and it would not have piped in water available for the next couple of years. And, people who had had wells dug found out the water quality was very poor and not fit for people to drink.

The other problem- which at the time I considered to be a bonus- was that there was a reasonably reliable creek on the property. Hot dog! I could get a pump and pump the water uphill to crops and water troughs and-and-and...

OK, the creek was close to the road and I would have to cross it to reach most of the land. Well, I was figuring on a foot bridge that would support a riding lawn mover, or a tiller, and I figured I could deal with the creek.

As it turns out the tiny creek becomes a torrent that is 30 feet across when we get a hard rain, but I did not realize that then and that only happens 2-3 times a year. And I *DID* get a bridge that worked: I will explain more later. *

SO! The realtor knew what bank was willing to loan on bare land. The bank wanted $6000 down and payments of $160 a month, and I was used to saving $150 a month, so we could do that. And, payments would change according to what the prime interest rate was, and the prime interest rate had been going up for decades. Take it or leave it: the bank did not like loaning on bare land and they offered only the one option, take it or leave it. And taxes were only $150 per year.

We took it.

THEN our land taxes doubled as the property had sold for more money than they had expected. Oh, OK. Also about that time the prime interest rate dropped and so did our monthly payment. Well that balanced things out!

And then life kicked us in the teeth again. Of COURSE it did! The very week we closed on the land I got sick with Multiple Sclerosis, and treatments have only been somewhat successful. I have only been able to do a little bit of what I dreamed to do with the property. I did do some, and I did get a bridge up. I am also getting into permaculture, which deals heavily with perennials.

*About the bridge over the little creek: the one that turns into a raging torrent a couple of times a year? I knew I could not build a bridge that was 30+ feet long to bride the creek when the water was high, so instead I built one that would fall apart but be able to be easily put back up. Basically I bought pressure treated 4x4s and drilled holes in the ends of each board. I dropped them over the creek at a narrowish spot and ran heavy chains through the holes at each end, which I then looped around sturdy tree trunks. I secured the chains with carabiners, such as what rock climbers use. The carabbiners cost about $15 each, and the entire bridge cost about $150. When the creek floods some of the 4x4's slide off the bank, but when the creek gets low I just lift them back into position.

Or at least I did for some years. That part of the bank is a bit wider now and I really ought to remove the bridge, but I never did get around to it. We are more prosperous now that the kids are grown and the land is almost paid off: we are considering hiring someone to make us a crossing over that creek. That area has since been declared a flood zone, and it is nothing we can handle ourselves.

 

[Terri]

I am really impressed with all of the different ways that people have been able to buy land!

 

[Terri]

There is a more accurate way than "full disclosure of finances" The following is what the schools in this nation do not teach their students.

BECAUSE each household has different needs a different amount to live on (a single person can live in a studio apartment while a family with 10 lively kids should not), it is not the full finances that counts but THE AMOUNT OF MONEY YOU CAN DO WITHOUT!

As I shared in an earlier thread, for my family that was $150 per month. That was how much I had after I cut our expenses to the bone, cooked from scratch more and got books on inexpensive cooking from the library, and reduced my driving by consolidating my errands so I drove less. And, when we did buy land and the payments were $160, which is slightly greater than the $150 that I had been putting into savings each month, I got SERIOUS about saving gasoline, which made up the difference, rather than dip into the money we still had in savings. It had taken me a long time to save that money, and since there was 250,000 miles on my vehicle I kew I would need the cash soon.

By the same token, if a spouse decides to work in town to save up money more quickly, the expenses of having a second person on the work force must be taken into account. One of those greater expenses of having 2 people working will be a higher food cost, as now that (possibly) 2 people are working the scratch cooking may take a lower priority than helping kids with homework, sitting down and paying bills, etc.

Getting everything done efficiently is a popular topic of conversation at homesteadingtoday, and for good reason!

So, AFTER you have figure out the costs of what you feel you need- for me that included eating well, with *MEAT* and salads and such and for DH that included cable TV, - THEN you know how much money per month you have to use on what you want to do, such as buying land. Many people who go with land contracts manage without a down payment, but I do not trust land contracts. Instead I put that money in a separate account, and added in pretty much EVERY bit of stray cash that came our way, including the contents of the penny jar. I was saving it for a down payment on land, so I was motivated

 

[Terri]

I live in the breadbasket of the nation and my land is *VERY* good, in every aspect. Also it was not expensive. But, to buy land like mine, for the price I paid, you WOULD have to move.

 

[Terri]

Yeah but that would be moving JUST for the land, no? For most people the equation is cost, climate, work, amenities, doctors, schools, commute, landscape, views, LAND, so on and so on.

It covers everything. My house in town on an acre is worth $75,000 and then I have 5.7 acres farther out. My home has 3 bedrooms, a chain link fenced yard, a quiet neighborhood, etc.

I use roadrunner, though Google Fiber is trying to move into the area. The crime rate is low which is a big reason why we bought it. We actually have 2 parcels of land: the one we live on was 20 minutes to my work and less to town: the other one is 5 minutes to a smallish town. I have MS and my doctor is one of the finer neurologists in the nation, and he is 30 minutes away. My school district is one of the best in the state and Kansas ranks in the upper middle for the quality of the schools in the nation. I am not sure what amenities you want but Kansas City is not far away and it is pretty quick to get there by the interstates. Views. Well, Kansas is flat but there are nice bluffs not that far away. And, between us and town there is a park that has been called "The jewel of the Johnson county parks" and with very good reason as it is VERY large and the lake offers great fishing and boating. PArt of the lake is against forested bluffs and that part has been left wild except for a hiking trail.

When we bought the 5.7 acres it was a 20 minute drive to a town with enough work to offer and it cost us $29,000. It was cheaper because we knew piped in water would not be available for 3 years and a creek crossing was needed before a house went in: this dropped the price by maybe $5000 total or a bit more.

I grew up in California where land is both high and of very high agricultural quality, but almost all of it is priced as housing land. I did have to move to find something more affordable.

If you do not want to pay the prices in your area for good land with all the amenities, you might have to move to find better.

As for Salatin you are correct about him not saying what he paid for the farm or what he paid on rent. At the time it irritated me but I CAN understand not wanting to talk about personal finances. I ALSO decided that it did not matter, as when we cut our spending to what we were comfortable with we had $150 per month to play with and regardless o what Salatin had that was what WE had.

So, I got out the pencils and the papers and I put those college classes in ag management to work. Using my current base of knowledge I should be able to break even working land with payments of $150 per month, with my marketing skills being the restricting factor, and the land would grow far more than I knew how to market. So, while I looked for land on weekends I also sold baked goods at the Farmer's Market to increase my marketing skills.

Then I put a down payment on land with the money I had saved up at $150 per month and that was the week I got sick. Oh, well!

The land you describe Is out there, but I am pretty sure you would have to move to the areas that have it. I am aware that land in both Virginias as well as Florida is expensive.

 

[Terri]

I guess I never felt the need to know how much an author spends to feed his family of 14, because I do not have that many kids so it is largely irrelevant what the authors spend on living expenses. IMHO.

The only numbers that really interest me is the costs and such involved in the homestead, and not what he spends to maintain his lifestyle unless it is somehow related to the homestead. For example, one lady who was selling eggs, firewood, and vegetables would include in her income the old hens from her laying flock, which I thought was fair. She had a flock of 50 hens, which comes out to 1 stewing chicken per week. I was content that she showed what it cost to support the flock, how much cash she brought in, plus the value of 50 stewing hens.

She had a well thought out plan: she bought wooded land. As she cleared the woods with a chainsaw she sold the trees as firewood, which she delivered to the buyer. The cleared land was put into vegetables, which she sold at the farmer's market along with the furniture she repaired and the eggs. She had the benefit of selling at an indoor farmer's market, which meant she could sell year round.

She did give the gross income, but she did not give hard numbers for her living expenses, though as she was a single woman and she said she used the vegetables and wood that were too ugly to sell, her living expenses were probably very low indeed, especially as she paid off her small home by working in town until her debts were paid. I do know she could only afford very cheap land, and that the home she had built was very small.

There is always a reason that cheap land is cheap. In her case the forest was far too young to cut for timber and far too large to easily clear, as the tree trunks were 4 inches in diameter. So she cleared her land a bit at a time with a chainsaw, and sold the wood as firewood. Bent or funky wood she used herself in her wood burning stove. The fact that she frugally uses what she cannot sell tells me that her living expenses are very low. In my case my land was cheap because drinkable water was not easily available, and because the creek that I intended to water my berries with would have to be crossed before a house was built.

I decided that for the $5000 reduction in price when compared to similar properties I could live with buying a pump at harbor freight to irrigate with, and then I would not need water until piped in water was available. .

As for equality, there is no nation on earth that can offer true equality to its citizens. That means that some of us have to work harder than others. That's life.