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[bob ford <bobford79 AT yahoo.com>]

Lynn, clear live water is very important to me.  I guess, like you, I'm at an 
age where I want what I want. And, I want  water.  The good thing about 
northern AR / So. missouri is the abundance of beautiful , live , clear 
water.  The fact that the Ozarks makes it a bit more difficult to get to is a 
plus.

I don't want a "farm". I know my limitations, and I am not up to being a 
full-scale (even small) farmer. I want to grow most of my vegetables and grow 
or otherwise harvest most of my meat/fish.  There are only two of us, even if 
both live full time , in the wild.  Maybe that would be partial subsistence 
farming, but not a real "farm" like yours.  I have no progeny.  I'm not 
trying to leave a legacy, other than being a good steward of the land.  

James is right , though.  I can keep putting this off for-ever.  I 'm in the 
process of trying to arrange a final pay-off to an acronymed gov't agency, 
afterwards, I really will no longer have excuses.  We won't be as finacially 
capable as we were before, but that just means I have to build a smaller 
shack/house on a smaller piece of ground.  I'm still thinking that having a 
tiny house in town, for her, would not be a bad idea.  Homes, even in town, 
in someozark towns can cost less thana car.  It is really strange, you can 
look at a small town in Mo. and the will have a 2 million dollar house and a 
15, 000 house, both in the same tiny town?

...............bobf


--- On Sat, 10/25/08, Lynn Wigglesworth <lynnw1366 AT hotmail.com> wrote:

> From: Lynn Wigglesworth <lynnw1366 AT hotmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Homestead] Music was  Newsweek -
> To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
> Date: Saturday, October 25, 2008, 8:33 AM
> bob ford wrote:
> 
> > I'm curious, how to you come to pick
> "place"?.  I've looked and bought and sold in
> different areas of the country, never can find just what I
> want.  
> 
> I'm not Bev, but I can tell you how I picked my place.
> First, I knew the 
> area of the country I wanted. It was a large area, from
> West Virgina up 
> to Maine. I wanted real seasons and a relatively cool, not
> humid summer 
> (that eliminated the south and much of the coast). I
> pictured the 'look' 
> that I wanted...rolling green hills. Lots of pasture and
> farms, with 
> lots of trees between farms. My family had vacationed in
> upstate New 
> York for years, so I knew that much of the Northeast fit my
> vision. Then 
> I looked at land prices and taxes and general cost of
> living.
> 
> Northern Pennsylvania was a good fit for me. New York has
> high taxes. 
> Vermont has high land prices. If I moved to Maine, it would
> be near the 
> coast, and that's expensive. I looked at lots of areas
> online, then we 
> came up here for weekends and just drove around, over 3
> counties. I saw 
> this place and saw (in my minds eye) the kind of farm I
> wanted. Everyone 
> else saw a rundown farm that had everything of value sold
> at auction. I 
> bought the newspaper from the local town, had it mailed to
> me in Philly, 
> and read it for almost a full year before we bought. After
> reading a big 
> city paper, a rural newspaper was delightful. Who shot the
> first buck of 
> the season, who caught the biggest fish. No murders or
> serious crime. 
> Someone breaking into an unlocked car made the headlines.
> 
> The fact that, after a year, my farm was still available
> was a clue to 
> the economy (it had, in fact, been on the market for 9
> years). Houses in 
> town sell quickly, but farms are a white elephant. I knew
> this wasn't a 
> property I could sell easily, but I have no intention of
> ever moving, so 
> it doesn't matter to me. By coincidence, this farm was
> going to auction 
> for back taxes/mortgage just as we wanted to buy it. The
> government had 
> somehow ended up owning it (farm mortgage, I think). We got
> a lawyer who 
> negotiated us a great deal; the government was happy to
> take pennies on 
> the dollar since they'd get cash, and we got it for
> about half the going 
> rate for bare land (with a house, barn, and lots of
> outbuildings). We 
> put every cent into paying down the (small) mortgage and
> making 
> emergency repairs (new roof on the house, structural work
> on the barn). 
> When my ex bailed out, the farm was accessed at double what
> we paid for 
> it, so I had to pay him half of that price. So here I am
> with a 
> falling-down farm :-)
> 
> 
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