City folks, buy a farm!

[PaulB47]

I'm not an advocate of getting a mountain redoubt in Harney County. The entire Willamette and Tualatin valleys are surrounded by small farms of the subsistence variety. I once had a 90-acre farm in a little valley north of Sheridan, used to be a dairy farm but now lying fallow - still kicking myself for getting rid of it.

Anyway here's the point. People are usually in the cities because that's where the jobs are. Jobs usually mean you have money (more than rural folks anyway). Going together with some folks means you have enough accumulated to buy some little farm 30 miles out of the city. It's not too hard to go 30 miles even in the worst of conditions, and being on a subsistence farm with your buds is probably a lot better than being in a city when things go to Hell. Anyway it is good to have options!

It also gives you a place to hang out before SHTF. Go shooting, cut some firewood, build a yurt or little shed, restore a beater truck, have fun.

I'm not talking a high maintenance place. You want something where you won't feel guilty if you don't get out there that often.

This idea is so obvious I wonder why more city folks don't get together and give it a try. Maybe 4 or 5 couples should be ideal. Yes there can be conflicts, but I have some advice on avoiding that if anyone is interested.

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[Certaindeaf]

Would I have to buy the leader a Rolls?



lol

 

[The Heretic]

Would I have to buy the leader a Rolls?

View attachment 270239

lol

Not everybody is going to get that joke.

 

[IronMonster]

Most folks are in no shape to buy a farm, or anything for that matter.

 

[Charliehorse]

Would I have to buy the leader a Rolls?

View attachment 270239

lol

Let's try this again and see if the NWF app will work this time.

 

[jbett98]

At first glance, I thought the cars were lined up for Evel Knievel to jump over

 

[PaulB47]

You have to buy at least 20 of them.

Most folks are in no shape to buy a farm, or anything for that matter.

That's the point of going in with others. Might not buy a farm, but maybe buy a fifth of one.

Oh, well, just an idea. Have to admit most times this has been tried, it's been a bust, that I know of. I suspect it performs better when the only other alternative is starvation.

 

[IronMonster]

25% of Americans have a negative net worth 50% have less than $5000 in the bank. Half of all people who reach retirement age have less than $25,000 saved for retirement.

A fifth of a farm? Most folks would be lucky to be able to afford a 500th of a farm.

It would be different if you could make a living farming, but the days of being able to make a living with a 40 acre farm are long, long gone.

 

[PaulB47]

Just a quick search turned up this:
http://www.landandfarm.com/property/Land_Lebanon_OR-2152218/

60 acres for under $100k, so a share would be under $20k. Yeah, many can't afford that, but some can.

This is the survival board, right? What's the alternative for city folks, get in the soup line?

I was not talking about "making a living" off a farm (whatever that means), I was talking about surviving. My grandparents did pretty well in the first Depression, on an 80 acre dairy farm. Never had to stand in a soup line.

 

[IronMonster]

yeah but they knew how to work a farm and lived a different life.

Im not saying its a bad idea. I'm saying not many folks, even ones who wanted to could make it work or afford to try. Especially if it involved half a dozen partners.

Its a great dream

 

[PaulB47]

I'm still wondering what your suggested alternative for city people is...

 

[Koda]

I'm still wondering what your suggested alternative for city people is...

water, rice and beans.... to prep. You dont need to have a self sustained farm to live thru a SHTF situation.

 

[Cigarlvr313]

Do you have any idea how much it costs to make that land "usable"? I know this is on the "high side" but I spent 25K last summer drilling one well..........

 

[Sgt Nambu]

Do you have any idea how much it costs to make that land "usable"? I know this is on the "high side" but I spent 25K last summer drilling one well..........

Ouch!

 

[Cigarlvr313]

How about some power to get it out of the ground?.............the list goes on.........

 

[Cigarlvr313]

and on..........lol

 

[The Heretic]

Just a quick search turned up this:
http://www.landandfarm.com/property/Land_Lebanon_OR-2152218/

60 acres for under $100k, so a share would be under $20k. Yeah, many can't afford that, but some can.

This is the survival board, right? What's the alternative for city folks, get in the soup line?

I was not talking about "making a living" off a farm (whatever that means), I was talking about surviving. My grandparents did pretty well in the first Depression, on an 80 acre dairy farm. Never had to stand in a soup line.

Sorry, but without looking at the land in more detail, land, especially in the Willamette Valley, that cheap, has to have some kind of problem with it (I am guessing that particular land is right along the river and floods frequently).

Most arable land within that Willamette Valley would go for at least $10K an acre, or not less than $5K. My land (20 forested acres - not farmable), currently has a value of between $17K and $20K because it is within 30 miles of Portland and desirable for putting a house on it (I currently live in a house on it, but a much nicer house could be built on this land).

I am looking at buying land further out when I retire, and most of that land, well outside a reasonable commute distance to most jobs, has asking prices of $10K at the low end, with no power and no well and no septic - just land - some cleared, some thinned forest, some brushy forest (no timber value).

Farms that have been cleared and worked, even left fallow, tend to go for more as they often have a well, sometimes a livable house with septic.

Of course it all depends on location, location, location.

As mentioned though, most of these kinds of arrangements don't work out. One or more people put a lot of work into it, the rest come out once or twice a year and play, then get bored and want to sell their share. All kinds of problems happen. Even within a family not everybody wants to keep a farm, even when all of them know how to farm and grew up on it - I know this from immediate personal experience.

Also, a working farm is a LOT of work. Buying a farm or just fallow land and leaving it alone without a lot of work, isn't going to help a lot if SHTF - it takes years of hard constant work to make land self-sufficient. If SHTF and you moved to arable land - it will take years before it can support a single family, much less multiple families.

Then there is the issue of how willing and able the partners are to work the farm. Not everybody is able, has the knowledge - and even fewer are willing to put in the amount of work necessary to farm land, even when their lives depend on it - many will just let others do it, making at best a token effort and then feeling that they are entitled to literally reap the benefits of other's hard work.

I will say however that if a person was to be an absentee landowner, that they should buy a farm that is a going concern and lease it out to the local farmers and let them keep it going and producing.

 

[The Heretic]

Do you have any idea how much it costs to make that land "usable"? I know this is on the "high side" but I spent 25K last summer drilling one well..........

Actually, it isn't on the high side - I've seen people spend a lot more to get a good well on their land. It just depends on the land and where they can drill and what is down below.

I am lucky that my well is only 120' deep and the water level was found at 60' (pump is at 80'). My neighbors had to go down to 400'+ through basalt rock, and one recently had to have his pump dropped further down because his water level dropped 30'+ in the last 20 years.

There is a huge difference in cost between a well drilled to about 100' and one drilled down to 400'.

 

[308]

water, rice and beans.... to prep. You dont need to have a self sustained farm to live thru a SHTF situation.

Exactly. Bob's Red Mill in Milwaukie has all of the staples and storage containers one could need. A person does not need $20000, they need $40...and that $40 will get them a 25# bag of rice and an awesome re-sealable food grade container to throw it in.

But do they do this....probably not. It's more fun to imagine one is the main character in Patriots Surviving the Coming Collapse.

 

[PBinWA]

I don't want to see any more city people living in the country. Please stay where you are.