[AT] In the market for a rural place

[Dean Vinson]

John, your son-in-law's desire for "rolling, treed and tillable farmland" is
right in line with my own, and I sure understand about the proximity and
price issues too. 

Having grown up on my dad's wonderful little place with a classic rough-hewn
oak bank barn (see http://www.vinsonfarm.net/photos/barn_winter.jpg), I
wanted one of those too.  And a red brick farmhouse, set back away from the
road, which by the way would be a two-lane country road beyond earshot of
the interstate but conveniently inside cell phone and high-speed internet
range.  The realtor suggested I might be narrowing the options down just a
bit much.

It's pretty common around here (southwest Ohio) for farmland auctions to be
split up as you describe, but not all of them are.  The one I went to a
couple months ago (and regretted not coming better prepared) sold in a
single 65-acre parcel at the seller's request, since they hoped it would
remain intact as it had been for the many decades they'd owned it.  Nice to
see.  But it seems more common that farms are split up into the original
house, barns, and maybe 20 or 30 acres, plus another big parcel of tillable
land only, plus one or two small lots for folks who just want some land in
the country on which to build a house.  

I've enjoyed the process of learning more about the surrounding areas.
Despite having lived here about 18 years, it turns out there are whole
bunches of roads I'd never previously driven, whole areas that never seemed
to be on the way to wherever I was going.  So it's been fun to get out and
really pay attention for a change.

Dean Vinson
Dayton, Ohio

-----Original Message-----
From: at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com
[mailto:at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com] On Behalf Of John Slavin
Sent: Wednesday, October 30, 2013 2:01 PM
To: AT at lists.antique-tractor.com
Subject: Re: [AT] In the market for a rural place

My son-in-law and I were having a conversation about this topic a couple
weeks ago.  He's career navy and will be retiring in a few years and was
just thinking outloud about some farmland.  He has some rather specific
needs and wants a mix of rolling, treed and tillable farmland.  It is not as
easy as a city person might think to find land with all the attributes you
want within a certain proximity of the place you want to live, at the price
you want to pay.  It's the old, you can have two out three deal.  

Plus, I have been observing that some auction houses in particular, and to a
lesser extent realtors, are splitting out the tillable farmland from the
rolling ground, so instead of 40/80 acre tracts, or combinations thereof,
you end up with gerrymandered metes and bounds tracts of prime farmland or
rough land sold separately from each other.  Makes sense, given how
expensive land has gotten, but makes it more difficult to buy a farm with a
combination of land use types. Just the other day I saw a farm that had been
together for generations split up.  The bottom ground and flat upland was
sold to out-of-state investors.  The hill and rolling upland (that the
investors might perceive as junk) was sold to a completely different kind of
buyer.

John

John C. Slavin
jslavin at marktwain.net