Promise Acre: Our Journey

[farmerjan]

Looking at a piece of property costs only some time not money. Maybe this is a way to open some dialog about what you both want to accomplish in the future. You might hate it once you see it up close....but it might give him some thoughts of "possibilities" for both of you and some room for his "pullin tractors" . One other thing , 11 acres hay can be a blessing or a curse with the investment in hay equipment and such if you don't already have it....and it has to be made when it has to be made so camping might not be as easy to get away for. And then if you get that serious about makin hay then you HAVE to have storage or it is a big waste of time. 11 acres will make a fair amount of hay and there will be m ore than one cutting too.....

 

[promiseacres]

Well we've looked at 2 properties last year... because the right properties are few in our area we decided to refinance our current house last fall, went to a 20 yr, knocked off 4 years on the mortgage. So the conversation is open.... or so I thought as I thought we planned on continuing to keep our eyes open. We even got preapproved for a mortgage.
We have hay equipment.... for some crazy reason DH has dreams of being a hay farmer.... we both have dreams of being more self sufficient. Thought of many opportunities such as making more hay (we currently bale about 12 acres, in 3 fields.... not super far but am guessing two of the fields are 10 miles apart, & no barn to store makes that difficult ), cutting and selling firewood, even getting a crop scouting business going....

Property does have buildings, 1 sounds decent condition.... it's in God's hands. Praying for peace. Hoping it's going to haunt DH like it haunts me..... I didn't even "find" it my sis sent the link after I was whining about no barn....

 

[farmerjan]

Okay, you have hay equipment and know what that is all about so that's good. If he wants to b e a hay farmer then he should know of all people that having storage is AN ABSOLUTE NECESSITY. I am surprised that he is willing to watch HIS HARD WORK get rained on and ruined...... We are fanatics about getting the square bales in under cover and also cover a good number of our pure orchard grass round bales with tarps for winter storage.
Good luck.... is he worried about taking on a bigger debt?

 

[promiseacres]

Somewhat... he thinks simply moving is too much hassle.... and he likes our area so any new property has to be perfect... without much work. His idea of perfect is an updated house, barns, garages, fences, 10+ acres, under $100,000, within 10 mIles of his current job. My idea is a house (livable) basement, buildings and 8 + acres, reasonablely priced a place we can make our own & would stay in until it's paid off, we're in our 30s, so still young enough to do that.

 

[promiseacres]

Oh and his current solution to a barn is to take down and rebuild our current 18 x 30 detached garage.... which has wind damage and is off square... and full of his junk...

Unfortunately our current property gets very wet and most everything is off square, fence posts heave and move...
and we are on a corner with lots of road frontage so right now there's a dead deer in our yard....it was hit this morning, hoping the county picks it up very very soon.
One thing to be thankful it's gone! But still hate living on the busy road.... can't let my chickens run, our mail has been stolen...

 

[misfitmorgan]

Here they assess properties at half of the value. So whatever the county says it is worth you have to double to get the actual price it is worth to buy/sell at.

Hope it all works out for you!

 

[promiseacres]

Unfortunately my dad who lives in the same county assessment is very close to his last appraisal.

 

[promiseacres]

And just found out its set to close next week..... crying for a bit then getting back to reality...

 

[CntryBoy777]

Oh well.....wasn't meant to be....there's a better place out there.

 

[Bruce]

Sorry this one is gone.

For the future, if DH wants to be a hay farmer, perhaps he needs to look at a given property as "how would I transition from driving (30 minutes??) to work 5 days a week to walking out the front door and already being at work 7 days a week? I used to work with a guy who had a good size farm and worked a full time 40 hour job. I'm sure he was driving 45 minutes to work. Don't know how he did it. He quit the "paying" job in his mid 40's some 11 years ago and became a full time organic farmer.