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To answer MrsApt's questions, I have a small fraction of an acre, yes it has a home on it (two bedrooms plus loft, two and a half bathrooms, two-car garage), no there is no water source, and no I can't grow food on it.
Sounds great. You still have bargain imho. A 2 car garage is great, with enough bathrooms and bedrooms.
Our house he is building is just 2 bedroom 1 bath but there is just 3 of us. We don't need much
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If one lives in a remote location, then having "Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson" as friends may be doable, but I value our police department for making the community safer so that I am less likely to ever need to use my friend (Mr. Colt). Besides, who stays home 24/7?
Location: where you sip the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica
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Originally Posted by TheBlasphemer
...... The Producers of the world are smarter than you, and they work harder too. Sure, it's nice to turn on the water and get hot water on demand, but what happens when those conveniences suddenly disappear, and all that you have left to drink is the tank of water in your toilet? The conveniences of life breed contempt for those that provide them, as well as a level of stupidity that can only be cured by discovering what life is like without them. We need our guns. We need our bibles. We don't need you, the President or the government. All of you need us, and without us you would all starve, kill each other, or both. It's important for people to understand who is in charge here, and who needs who.
You're not much of a history buff, are you? That's probably because of your reliance on a book of ancient myths and legends. Liberal politics began among the Producers, the poor farmers and industrial workers who just wanted to live a decent life. Conservative politics was until recently known to be the tool of rich people.
The fact that modern conservative Republicans are about evenly matched in numbers with Democrats is only because of the development of sophisticated propaganda techniques that make the producers (ordinary workers, the 99%) think that what's good for the wealthy and the corporations is what's good for everyone. In actuality, both sides are equally important and there should be a good balance for a nation to function properly.
So at any rate, let's skip the left/right debate for this thread, and get down to rambling about self-sufficiency and simplicity.
Whether I think of my property taxes as $2850 per year or $237 per month seems irrelevant to me; either way it's a small amount considering what I get for them. I disagree that I have a "truer sense" of how much of my income goes to property tax when I look at the monthly amount; it seems to me it's the same sense because it's the same percentage.
To answer MrsApt's questions, I have a small fraction of an acre, yes it has a home on it (two bedrooms plus loft, two and a half bathrooms, two-car garage), no there is no water source, and no I can't grow food on it.
If one lives in a remote location, then having "Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson" as friends may be doable, but I value our police department for making the community safer so that I am less likely to ever need to use my friend (Mr. Colt). Besides, who stays home 24/7?
Your property taxes are roughly 3X more than mine.
We have a county sheriff deputy drive through here once/week. Our state Forest Rangers and Game Wardens are a bigger presence than the sheriff deputy is. There is a county library we can use. Our road is plowed with every snow storm and repaved when needed. Children are bused to the nearest schools. The county provides trash pickup.
While all of that is indeed true, those aren't the services we were talking about, remember?
The contention was that its almost impossible to find a lawyer, doctor or mechanic unless you're in a city.
6000 people, with a university no less, was a tiny town that didnt have more than a couple of basics available...
Please let's stick to facts. Alpine does not have more than a few basics available, I already posted about it. It has one grocery store, one feed store, two dentists, two lawyers, 3 mechanic shops.... (this is from their chamber of commerce web page, from googling AND FROM ACTUALLY SPENDING TIME IN ALPINE, unlike you).
Hardly a bunch of choice and hardly competition enough to drive prices down like it would in an urbanized area. If you live in Terlingua, TX, all THAT would be one hour away. Hardly an even better choice. Cost of land in Alpine is $10-15K/acre by the way, it is considered pretty rural. Property taxes are pretty low.
Also, don't forget that many more people in the city will not need to own a car anymore nor pay for its maintenance or gasoline - public transit and companies like Uber or Zipcar make it easy for folks not to own vehicles or waste time tinkering with them and paying for maintenance. Living rural, on the other hand, people are slaves to their transportation - the farther you are the more critical it is for you to a) know how to fix your own and b) to have a backup vehicle. Of course, gas and diesel do not come for free either.
Around here, it seems that when a town is bigger like that, big enough to have restaurants and stores, the residents demand more municipal services. So the towns hire PD and FD. Their municipal budget goes up and their taxes go up. In a 100 mile radius around my town are many perfect examples of this. As the towns 'grow', the residents make huge demands that their taxes go up. Towns start putting in municipal water/sewer, all sorts of 'services', in each case it is the residents demanding these services and obviously the mil-rates go up to keep pace with the increased spending.
The town to our immediate West has a volunteer FD, no cellphone coverage but a FD. Their mil-rate is exactly double our mil-rate. For every dime I pay in property taxes, they pay 2. Their fireman are very proud of it, I have been told many times that in house fires so far they have never lost a stone foundation.
The town to our South has a FD, a PD, and a Rec Department, their Mil-rate is just a hair over three times our mil-rate.
If all a FD can do in a house fire, is to pour water on to prevent the stone foundation from burning, I prefer to not have a FD [and save cash in my tax bill].
I have not tracked land prices as close, but I am fairly certain that land prices follow the same general pattern.
Bigger towns with more services, mean higher taxes and higher prices.
I suppose you don't have home owners insurance either, then. I can't see an insurance company writing a policy for a home that is not within a fire district.
I suppose you don't have home owners insurance either, then. I can't see an
insurance company writing a policy for a home that is not within a fire district.
There are many reasons for it, but I don't have a homeowner's policy on my house. I owe nobody a nickel for it, and can't see spending over $1,000 per year to some damn insurance company. There's no 'fire district' where I live, either...we can put out our own fires for less than that price. Some people move to the great North Woods to save money, and some of us move there to get away from the polluted air of conventional thinking.
It is not uncommon for folks in remote locations (where property is largely uninsurable, anyway) to not carry a homeowner's policy. I believe that's how many rural volunteer fire depts got their start.
There are many reasons for it, but I don't have a homeowner's policy on my house. I owe nobody a nickel for it, and can't see spending over $1,000 per year to some damn insurance company. There's no 'fire district' where I live, either...we can put out our own fires for less than that price. Some people move to the great North Woods to save money, and some of us move there to get away from the polluted air of conventional thinking.
It is not uncommon for folks in remote locations (where property is largely uninsurable, anyway) to not carry a homeowner's policy. I believe that's how many rural volunteer fire depts got their start.
Prepping is sort of an insurance policy for when things go bad.
I find it interesting that you do not have an insurance policy on your own dwelling, even if it is paid for - in case it was lost as a result of an event, you would get everything you put into it back. Otherwise, you would have wasted all that money and effort...
I agree with those that say it isn't really complicated, but it is hard work. The REAL Amish in my region work VERY hard from when they are 6-7 years old until they die. I say "real Amish" because most all in my area live off grid completely and don't accept a ride in a car, nor deal with anything modern. Sure there are Mennonites and others that look like Amish, but they are not Amish. Plowing a field with horses and working with your hands daily and canning food enough for winter is not easy, not to mention the countless other difficulties they face, but they make it look sort of easy, other than how physical they need to be daily.
I find it interesting that you do not have an insurance policy on your own dwelling, even if it is paid for - in case it was lost as a result of an event, you would get everything you put into it back. Otherwise, you would have wasted all that money and effort...
Every year that goes by without a fire, is another $1,000 we save for possible repairs.
And we also have another residence where we can stay, if we need to. That redundancy is critical.
Every year that goes by without a fire, is another $1,000 we save for possible repairs.
And we also have another residence where we can stay, if we need to. That redundancy is critical.
Yes but your house must be worth more than a couple of thousand $$$, no? If so, I can see how your decision would make sense. Otherwise, it never makes financial sense not to have insurance. Why would your policy be $1K? Our 1400 sqft concrete home in FL (in a hurricane zone) tht I am guessing if much more worth than yours to replace, only costs $900 to insure yearly. What could possibly make your home in Maine cost more to insure?
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