Building a Farm

[bwoods11]

I love to hunt, but if I had to stay off my land for 11 1/2 months a year to do so, I would probably give up hunting. My land to me is my passtime. Some people like video games, some like to go to the bar and drink, I like to go play in dirt, cut trees, plant trees, ride ATV, shoot guns, play outside with the dogs, and have a good campfire in the evenings. If I could only hunt it, I would probably just do tall fence pay per hunt thing, it would be cheaper, and I am sure I would shoot bigger deer.

I’m not saying you should stay off it for 11.5 months . It just works out that way—with the 5 hour drive. I have farms in Minnesota that I use much more often. My neighbor has 400+ acres in Minnesota and he is out on his place every day, walking and driving his side by side. . The deer are not really scared of him? Grizzly Adams type .

I see both sides if the argument. I know some bucks/deer avoid humans because of paranoia. It depends on the buck !

 

[PatinPA]

I’m not saying you should stay off it for 11.5 months . It just works out that way—with the 5 hour drive. I have farms in Minnesota that I use much more often. My neighbor has 400+ acres in Minnesota and he is out on his place every day, walking and driving his side by side. . The deer are not really scared of him? Grizzly Adams type .

I see both sides if the argument. I know some bucks/deer avoid humans because of paranoia. It depends on the buck !

I think it depends on the property and the location too. If you're surrounded by properties like yours, an increased presence is not going to be good. At least at first. The farm next to me has been actively using it for 20+ years now. The deer have been conditioned to the activity. Two of the bigger buck I've ever had on my property, I drove right up on them bedded while checking cameras. The one spooked but was back within days and the other never even got out of his bed and even let me take a pic of him.

 

[Angus 1895]

For some reason mule deer are liking to hang out on the place They ain’t near as spooky as the white tails!

 

[SwampCat]

The biggest buck I have ever killed, I was sitting 31 yards from the guardrail on a busy US Highway. My son killed a decent ten point from the same spot, three days before and then drove his Polaris Ranger in there to retrieve it. I was afraid it might run the bigger deer out of the area, but he showed back up three days later when I killed him.


I think a lot of times, human activity bothers us humans more than it does the deer. Now hogs, that is another story. I saw 33 deer on my place while I was driving around on my ranger setting traps this afternoon. I have not seen a hog since last turkey season - yet I get pictures of them every night.

 

[bwoods11]

Now may not be a great time to buy land, it’s high (terrible inflation) however the amount of government money for programs is also high.

There are scenarios where you can turn a ditch, drained wetland or simply marginal tillable into income/hunting.

Watch for those parcels. They can be a gold mine. I’ve bought farms where the CRP, tree money, wetland money and easements have added up to more than I paid for the farm !

It makes no sense on paper, but that’s our government for ya.

 

[Turkish]

No expert but I'll summarize 25 years and having bought & sold 13 properties ... pay off the mortgage on your 1st property as fast as you can, less than 10 years is best. Once you are debt free, you can use the existing property value as your down payment.

Make sure you can cash flow the new properties difference between purchase price & down payment without extending yourself too far financially. Then repeat process above.

If you do it right, at some point you may not need bank financing to purchase the next property. We have not taken out financing for the last 4 properties we have purchased.

Can you explain this in more detail? Are you referring to land bank, farm credit financing programs where they let you float the down payment while you sell land you already own?

 

[Tree Spud]

Can you explain this in more detail? Are you referring to land bank, farm credit financing programs where they let you float the down payment while you sell land you already own?

Somewhat like that but my primary focus is to eventually eliminate financing altogether.

Most people over leverage themselves by focusing on what payments they can afford nearly finance everything they own. At some point their debt is huge. For example, you buy a house and put 5-10% down. If you take out a 30 year note to finance, it will be many years of paying more interest than principle and even more years before your equity exceeds your mortgage.

My suggestion is, based on my experience, is to be able to pay as much as 50% in a down payment, then set-up a 15 year note and payoff in less than 10 years. A finance program like you describe allowing you some time to sell your existing property may be viable. The only concern may be that financers are leery in vacant land as it is hard to value.

At some point eliminate all your debt, contribute to your investment/retirement fund, and start building cash reserves. If you have enough cash, you can put a max down payment and then use the sale of your existing property to pay off the remaining balance on the new property eliminating financing except for maybe a short term bridge note.

 

[buckdeer1]

The Land Podcast is a pretty good podcast and has alot of guys that explain how they use rental,timber harvest etc. to pay for land

 

[Turkish]

Somewhat like that but my primary focus is to eventually eliminate financing altogether.

Most people over leverage themselves by focusing on what payments they can afford nearly finance everything they own. At some point their debt is huge. For example, you buy a house and put 5-10% down. If you take out a 30 year note to finance, it will be many years of paying more interest than principle and even more years before your equity exceeds your mortgage.

My suggestion is, based on my experience, is to be able to pay as much as 50% in a down payment, then set-up a 15 year note and payoff in less than 10 years. A finance program like you describe allowing you some time to sell your existing property may be viable. The only concern may be that financers are leery in vacant land as it is hard to value.

At some point eliminate all your debt, contribute to your investment/retirement fund, and start building cash reserves. If you have enough cash, you can put a max down payment and then use the sale of your existing property to pay off the remaining balance on the new property eliminating financing except for maybe a short term bridge note.

Ok. I gotcha. That’s the model I followed. I can’t say it’s working out to plan for me so far. A better financial decision would’ve been to only pay cash for the minimum down payment and put the rest into an index fund.