Rural Land Homesite

[JR]

That's a great plan! My grandparents traveled for many years when they retired and took me along with them during the summers when I was out of school. Some great times for sure. Retirement *is still a long ways off for me but we have discussed travelling as a real possibility. *It's something I would love to do if health allows.*

I'm sure your aware of all the snowmobile clubs around Chatauqua. And ice fishing! There is definitely no shortage of things to do in that area regardless of the season. I know I said it already but it really is one of my favorite areas.*

 

[Cooper_D]

Sounds like a great plan!

If the current owner keeps cutting hay on the 12 acres that is land you don't have to mess with.

Or you could start looking now for a tractor, cutter/mower, conditioner, hay rake, baler, barn to store & trailer to haul it.

On second thought let him do it while you breath in the smell of fresh cut hay.

Call the local Dept of Ag to find what others are getting for land that is rented to farmers for making hay.

I wish you and your wife the best in your new adventures both on and off the road.

 

[RUSSELL5000]

WayneM, you have a good point on health care. I have not considered, and will need to think on. This area is not far from Buffalo. Erie, PA itself has had everything we have needed, but is also a two hour drive from each of Buffalo, Pittsburgh, and Cleveland. There is a woman who lives across the street from me now who has been battling leukemia, and she makes periodic journeys to Cleveland due to the unusual issues she is dealing with. I kind of assume that if you want to be in a rural area you are going to have to journey for health issues. What will be in the future is what will be; my wife and I are trying to take care of ourselves to last over the long run, but you never know. My thinking is to keep everything working and moving - it is better to wear out than rust out. And yes, snow is a whole different thing if you have to figure out how to play in it versus work in it!

JR, I want to do a long trip up through Canada and Alaska, moving with the weather, say six or seven months. The other thing I want to do is take my sailboat across Lake Erie in September, through the New York canal to the Hudson river, and down through the intercoastal waterway to Florida, and then back again the following spring. I guess those are the two retirement dream items. The other thing I would really like to do is go and volunteer at places. There are innumerable options through Christian service organizations as well as on public lands. I don't think I have any delusions about changing the world, I just think it would be great to do something for the little corner of it I am standing on.

Cooper_D, an ideal solution would be if the current person would keep haying. I don't think I would do anything like that in the short term; I think I would just let the woods take over. I think it would be better if someone were to continue to work the land.

My wife thinks I get ahead of myself sometimes, but I have noticed that chunks of five years of time have a way of slipping by in the blink of an eye. I am almost 60 years old and I swear I was only 30 years old a week or soago.


I saw a new ad for land that came out today - a beautiful 219 acres. You could say that is just a little more than I can afford. :{:-laf:-laf Oh well, dreams are free!

 

[jhenderson]

If the guy mowing it now is taking good care of it I'd ask him to continue. Around here most of the deals like that give the land owner little or nothing but the farmer mowing is expected to do soil samples and lime and fertilize yearly. The idea is to leave the land better than you found it. Miss a year or two mowing and the weeds come, quickly followed by the brush. That means work to get it back to being productive.

 

[RUSSELL5000]

Just thought I would [post an update here and a question. The 12 acre parcel we were interested in went. We have continued to look since.


One thing I have noticed is how often I see a parcel which looks like someone has the objective of turning it into a landfill. Quite a few times now I have gone to look at a parcel and while the general area seems quite rural (mostly agriculture use with a few homesites scattered in) I am amazed at how many times there is a homesite which is just filthy. I am not referring to old farm equipment or machinery, a broken down barn, or even an old car. I mean piles of garbage, discarded furniture, plastic bags of rotting clothes, and so on and so forth. Is this common everywhere or is it a northwestern Pennsylvania, western New York thing?

 

[Wayne M.]

My hunt also continues. And where I'm looking (central pa) I see this sloppiness too. It varies within a section. Economic depression? There will be a miles long stretch of road and it'll go from farm parcel- nice n neat to wooded lots of varying condition to cars flipped over and washing machines and refrigerators on the porch.
Wife not too happy.

 

[mwilson]

My hunt also continues. And where I'm looking (central pa) I see this sloppiness too. It varies within a section. Economic depression? There will be a miles long stretch of road and it'll go from farm parcel- nice n neat to wooded lots of varying condition to cars flipped over and washing machines and refrigerators on the porch.
Wife not too happy.

Same way up here.......

 

[jgillott]

Western PA is the same also.

 

[Wayne M.]

Why is this? Is it a poverty thing? Or just human nature?
When I first explored Vermont criss crossing rt 7 and 2, I saw it there as well 20 years ago.

One of my co workers who's retired maybe 2 years now took a gamble and bought a 4 family house up in central NY- Utica I think, and he went about turning it around for renting to the SUNYcollege kids up there.
Well he got legal, the town involved, and invested a bunch of money. The result is a positive cash flow, the section 8's gone, mostly college kids in, and the police there are telling him that he effectively moved the good/bad border in the town.

To relocate and make big changes is a bold move.

 

[BigPapa]

I live on a rural road in TN that has a pretty long stretch with no houses that runs beside a creek. I don't drive that stretch very often anymore but it seems like every time I do someone has dumped an old TV, mattress, couch, or just bags of trash. I don't understand it. It's not a 2 miles from the county landfill and it costs $5.00 to dump a pick-up truck or small trailer load of pretty much anything.

 

[RUSSELL5000]

I looked at a parcel this past Saturday. It had recently been logged. Google earth showed the area prior to logging. The price was quite low, and I figured that since it had been logged it would look really bad, but might be worth it; be able to get a larger piece due to the low price.

Well, there were lots of skid trails and piles of slash, but a few large pine trees were left and quite a few trees that were around 15 to 20 feet tall (I only can tell two or three tree species when the leaves are off, so I assume the ones that were left have minimal value). The land did not look anywhere near as bad as I expected.

On the other hand, people had been dumping for a long time. There were piles of tires all along the road, lots of couches, lots of old cathode ray TVs, and quite a few bags of trash. Makes one wonder what has been dumped on the ground that has soaked in. I estimated there were at least 200 tires. There was one pile which has filled a ravine in, so no way to tell how many there may actually be.


Poverty I can see in terms of a weathered house, poorly repaired, etc. I can't see any explanation for the garbage piled outside a door.

 

[kcv67]

We see it in Montana too. Million dollar house next to trailers with tires on the roof and 4 or 5 junk cars. We drive past some places you describe on the road to our house. Our close neighbors are great and have nice places they keep up.
Just because you are poor doesn't mean you can not clean up

 

[Wayne M.]

"On the other hand, people had been dumping for a long time. There were piles of tires all along the road, lots of couches, lots of old cathode ray TVs, and quite a few bags of trash. Makes one wonder what has been dumped on the ground that has soaked in. I estimated there were at least 200 tires. There was one pile which has filled a ravine in, so no way to tell how many there may actually be."

this is is on your subject property?

 

[RUSSELL5000]

Wayne,

The junk was on the 36 acre parcel for sale. A dirt road bordered the parcel with a ditch that was quite deep in some places. There were two "driveways", which were areas with culvert and large diameter gravel. These driveways facilitated the logging. It looked to me like people have just been stopping in the road and pitching stuff out and down in the ditch.

Price was about $900 per acre with all rights transferring. The dirt road is not maintained from Dec. 1 to Apr. 1. Took some 4WD and patience. Wife was skeptical; saw all the trash and said not only no but h### no.

Was certainly rural. Probably be really good hunting coming up.

 

[jhenderson]

A couple of points to be made. Some things never change. Most of the land I log has been inhabited at an earlier time. Every cellar hole has an accompanying dump. Usually within 100 ft. The difference is 100 years ago there were no plastics or electronics to be disposed of. What I find are old bottles, broken crocks, tin, cast iron, etc. We now have municipal waste facilities. The problems are expense and availability. Some charge for certain waste such as electronics or large pieces like mattresses. My local facility is open Wednesday, Saturday, and Sunday. Unwanted items hit the back roads mostly on Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. It's not right. It's just the facts.

 

[Cooper_D]

Sadly it happens everywhere we have a lane between 2 sections of corn field and one night someone dumped a pickup truck full of trash there.

I had sheriffs deputy out and we found a lot of letters in trash but they had different names/addresses so he wouldn't go after any one person so he left.

After I dug through it I figured someone's father had passed and the kids cleaned out apartment overdue bills and all and dumped it on me.

If people are used to dumping trash on the lots you want to buy they will continue to do so if you are not there 24/7 to catch them.

 

[mwilson]

If people are used to dumping trash on the lots you want to buy they will continue to do so if you are not there 24/7 to catch them.

This ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ right here......and yes they certainly will..and you will then become the local PITA out of towner for trying to stop them after you buy it.........pass on it and keep looking.

 

[Wayne M.]

This really is an epidemic, even in the city. We just built a surveillance van just for this purpose. We have a whole citywide unit who are garbage men given peace officer status to catch dumpers. Another taxpayer drain.
It all boils down to people not caring about others property (literally) I guess the answer is a ranch style fence or some other defining border along the frontage?
what really miffs me is when people will do this to themselves on their own premises while living there. There's a difference between clutter and a junkyard.

 

[jgillott]

what really miffs me is when people will do this to themselves on their own premises while living there. There's a difference between clutter and a junkyard.

You just described my neighbor. Really nice people but they have probably 50 junk cars and numerous pieces of broken farm equipment on their property. You would really have to see it to believe it. They have no yard, just junk.

 

[jhenderson]

Around here those vehicles and equipment are known as having been " pasturized" .