Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

market-farming - Re: Making a living

market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Market Farming

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: Lynn Byczynski <growing4market AT earthlink.net>
  • To: market farming <market-farming AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: Making a living
  • Date: Tue, 09 Jan 2001 10:57:02 -0600


Crystal,
Regarding farm taxes: You can write off all farm-related expenses and you
can take a loss on the farm three years out of five and deduct that loss
from your husband's income. If the loss exceeds his income (say you buy a
lot of equipment) you can spread the loss back over five years, and get a
refund on taxes already paid. The tax laws are really pretty kind to us poor
farmers. I recommend the book Small Time Operator, by Bernard Kamoroff,
written for any self-employed person but pretty much applicable to farming.
Also, Farming for Dummies (How I hate that title!) has a chapter on farm tax
law. If you're going to be filing a schedule F, I think it makes sense to
take it to a tax preparer - one who does lots of farmers - at least one year
to see all the things that you can do.
--
Lynn Byczynski
Growing for Market
news and ideas for market farmers
PO Box 3747, Lawrence, KS 66046
800-307-8949
http://www.growingformarket.com

> From: "David & Crystal" <consalvi AT midmaine.com>
> Reply-To: "market farming" <market-farming AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
> Date: Tue, 9 Jan 2001 08:40:42 -0500
> To: "market farming" <market-farming AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
> Subject: Re: Making a living
>
> Thank you for your responses to my question about how many are making a
> living by farming. Not to offend anyone, but it seems like most of you are
> not making a living through farming, but by being food processors, bakers,
> etc... which maybe what is necessary, but I find it depressing. Don't get me
> wrong, I'm very glad for those of you who have found a way to making money
> and keep farming.
>
> Maybe I'm short-sighted in my thinking, but I do not want to cook and
> process food, I have more than enough of it to store food and cook food for
> my own family, if I did, I could open a restaurant or something. And I don't
> want to be an employer. Maybe my list of "I don't wannas" is too long, but
> we didn't move out here to have to deal with government hassle and people
> around the farm all the time. Even if I wanted to, my house would not pass
> Maine's inspection, we live very simply, no hot water, very limited
> electricity, and a very small 600 sq ft house with 2 young children so that
> my kitchen could not be partitioned off. Not too mention that we do not have
> the money to upgrade or afford the liability insurance -- my dh's off-farm
> job makes $8.00/hr. It's one of those catch-22s, since dh works off the farm
> fulltime year round, it limits the amount we can grow. If he could quit, we
> could grow a lot more and probably make a good living, but how to pay the
> bills in the meantime?
>
> Also, we live very very far away from an upscale suburban/urban area
> (minimum of 4 hours drive). And there are very few people around that do any
> type of farming so that it would be pretty impractical and expensive to set
> up a community kitchen. I've considered approaching the blueberry growers
> who have a coop kitchen, but it's 1 1/2 hours away. I've also considered
> talking to the local technical college to use their kitchen when they are
> not using it. Maybe that's an idea for anyone out there that wants to
> process food.
>
> We do a CSA which we charge $190 per share for approx. 2 1/2 gallons of food
> from around mid-June to our first hard frost, usually somewhere in mid-Sept.
> We will be setting up a greenhouse and will try to grow food almost year
> round (ala Eliot Coleman style) and build a root cellar. We could triple our
> income just by offering year round shares since our summer growing season is
> so short. We would have a lot of shareholdres for a winter share since we
> cannot get good veggies during the winter from the regular food store and
> the "health food store" does not sell veggies.
>
> I think, like someone else on this list mentioned, I'm just burned out on
> all the work involved for so little money. I am interested in if anyone
> knows of any good info on doing taxes for a farm. We have always done our
> own and a friend had mentioned that if you farm, almost everything can be
> written off. Anyone have any good sites or books about it?
>
> I hope I haven't sounded too negative.
>
> ~Crystal
> Crystal Dawn Farm
> Perry, ME
>
>
>
>
>
> ---
> You are currently subscribed to market-farming as:
> growing4market AT earthlink.net
> To unsubscribe send a blank email to
> leave-market-farming AT franklin.oit.unc.edu
> Get the list FAQ at:
> http://www.ibiblio.org/ecolandtech/documents/market-farming.faq
>





Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page