Land in New York State

Mary in Minn said:

I am considering moving to the Finger Lakes or Southern Tier area of NYS. Are there any areas with both good soils and reasonable land prices? I have checked out realtor.com; are there any other good sources of land listings? Which areas of NYS have the lowest taxes?

Thanks for any help you can provide.

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Hello Mary,
I live in NE PA about 1 mile from NY state so I think I can talk a little about this. I believe land is relatively inexpensive in the southern tier area near me ( Rte 17 corridor between Binghamton and Hancock) but New York taxes are some of the highest anywhere and you seem to pay a lot and recieve very little for them. Also the soil in the area is extremely poor in general. Very heavy clay for the most part with lots of shale and bluestone rock in huge chunks. If you are just needing pasture and are willing to do the raised bed thing you are OK but MAN if you want to put up a fence you better get a post hole digger on a tractor to do it. There is some good soil in the bottomland of the Susquehanna and the soil up in the finger lake region is a lot better, Cornell is the state Ag college after all, but land up that way is more expensive of course. I would definitely think it is possible to find something affordable but not perfect. There is no perfection.

i wanted to bump this up for more input from folks. our daughter went to alfred university in alfred new york, southern tier, i believe stuben county. we always liked it up there. we also liked what we saw north of williamsport, pennsylvania, especially tioga county.

for anybody around the pa./new york border in these counties, what has it been like for the past couple of years? we haven't been up there since our daughter finished at alfred, a couple of years ago.

we're getting close to retirement and would like a place more secluded than where we are in southern pa. ten years ago, we were rural, but in the surrounding 5-7 miles there have been several developments, with anywhere from 300-700 new homes and townhomes each.

we are getting to the point where the encroaching developments, and attitudes of suburban wanna-be country folk, the ones who ask you to please get rid of your rooster crowing at 5 in the morning.

anyway, would like to hear from you folks up in tioga and stuben counties. we attend a local conservative mennonite church, so any close proximity to these communities would be a plus.

thanks so much.
debbie

We, too, are currently looking for property in the area you suggest. While I have seen some pretty cheap land, after having looked at alot of it in NYS personally lately, i can say cheap land is generally cheap for a reason. Overall, however, I would say you could get land for about $1000-$2000/acre, although much is $2500-3000. Developed properties are fairly reasonable if you want to be out far. We would have no trouble finding a property to suit our needs and budget if I did not have to be tied to having cable or DSL internet for my job.

All that said, however, properties everywhere in NYS are becoming pretty expensive for anything with land to it. Just 2 days ago, we were out in Seneca and Schuyler counties looking at properties. Absolutely beautiful area with lots of amish but prices are just outrageous for what is being offered. One place we looked at was 27 acres with a large modern home with beautiful views in Schuyler county for $180K. Well, after the real estate agent build up we got there and it was on the side of a hill (the northern slope no less!) and the entire 27 acres was sloping directly north very steeply The water had horrible sulphur problem, also.

As far as taxes go, yup, they are absolutely outrageous in NYS. Generally, the properties we have seen (anywhere from 8-20+ acres with homes) taxes have been anywhere from $3000 to as high as $8000 depending on the district and county you are in. When we first starting looking at properties, DH asked if the first digit was a typo or something! :shrug:

I live in Chenango County which is one of the poorest in the state. My taxes are really low compared to everyone else that ever posts on this board. I'm not sure if it is because we are in Chenango County or because we are off the grid. But I'm not going to ask anyone.

What I did was to look for properties that nobody else wanted. Our house was a hunting camp, no electric, no phone, no running water, on a dirt road in the state land. So we got it pretty cheap with owner financing too.

My girlfriend recently bought a house (big two story one with 4 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms) on 5 acres, with a real nice pond on a dirt road for $70,000. She did have to put a new furnace in it. It had also been used for hunting camp for many, many years. Most of her neighbors are hunting camps, as are mine.

This is an area of farmland, the dirt is good and very good for gardens and livestock. I have lived in several different states in my life, traveled the whole country in a over the road truck. But no place was prettier than the green mountains and thick trees of PA & NY. Even now, I go out to my backyard and it is so green, it almost hurts your eyes. In the whole time we have lived in this house (7 years now), even in times of drought for other parts of the state, we haven't had one. We use a handdug well for water and have never had it low or muddy.

I have discovered you can look for years for the "perfect" homestead, or you can buy what you can afford or find, and make that the "perfect" homestead for you and your family.

Here is a link for our local pennysaver, which has many ads from realtors:Norwich Pennysaver.

katlupe