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There's lots of land around New Mexico (eg. around, say, Deming) that's super cheap. Like a few acres for $1500 kind of cheap.
Here's my thought process:
One of the sports I enjoy partaking in is dog Agility. If you're not into dog sports, you don't necessarily know what it is, but YouTube gives a fairly good idea. Anyway, for the purposes of this post, suffice it to say that I need about 100'x120' or so of flat, sandy land.
Finding said land is REALLY hard if I need it to be accompanied by a house. I can find plentiful fantastic houses in/near the cities with almost no property (certainly not enough for Agility) or I can find the occasional farm with enough land, but a house that doesn't exactly fit my image of a New Mexico Dream Home.
To find the house AND the amount of property together, in/near the city, is extremely expensive.
But what about choosing a (cheap, nice) house near the city, exactly what I want but without regard for the property size... And then grabbing a couple of unserviced acres of flat desert somewhere for a couple thousand bucks? I can save hundreds of thousands of dollars if I don't need my 100'x120' of flat land to be near the city.
Question:
What's the catch with this land? Am I missing something? Or is this a viable plan? Is it safe for us to go out to a property somewhere east of Deming or between Las Cruces and El Paso 2-3 times a week to train my dogs, or will we need to worry we would get robbed? Is it safe to leave stuff (Agility equipment) out there, in the semi-remote but still reachable by car areas, or will it get stolen and used for firewood? LOL
Right now, I drive 1.5 hours each way, 3 times per week, to PAY someone to let me train on their Agility equipment for an hour or so. It's often snowing. In contrast, Deming (east parts) are closer to where I'd be living if I got a place in Las Cruces, it basically never snows, and the land would be practically free (unless I am missing something, and as long as my stuff would be left alone and not stolen.)
They appear reasonably accessible for a car, are about an hour or so along the highway from Las Cruces (and I'd certainly look at closer options when the time came, but in the interest of just attempting to recreate what I'd be leaving behind, which is a full Agility course within 1-1.5 hours) and seem like it's viable? I dunno?
Thoughts? Probably this is stupid, but I can't fathom that I'd be the only person in the world to say "hey, instead of paying $500K for a nice house and acrage, I can pay $200K for a nice house, then buy some acreage for $1500!"
Thanks!
Last edited by AikenHorses; 10-11-2014 at 07:40 PM..
If you want a few dozen acres real cheap there are any number of places. I am sure in New Mexico and also in Northern Nevada and even down south a ways. Say Esmeralda County NV. They almost pay you to take the land as long as you pay the property tax.. And no hassles you can do what you wish.
Watch out though. The hooker is always the same in the desert west. Where are you getting your waqter?
Deal with it a bit and you may find a formula. Say live in Sedona and get property a half hour out.
I think though you may be able to do that any number of places. If you don't need water it is very easy to find cheap property.
No water, no electricity, no gas, no phone required. For this idea to work I would literally just need a piece of flat land that is:
a) Within an hour or so of home in any direction. Sure it would be ideal if it was somewhere along the highway we already travel regularly for work, but even if not, I am already driving that far out of my way now so it is still workable.
b) No time limit to build, or restriction on what I can do with the land that would impact me. All I want to do is make an appropriately sized clearing, put up a rudimentary fence, and leave my Agility equipment there for use a few times per week.
c) Safe from people. Both while I'm there using the property, and while unattended. People don't generally have a use for Agility equipment, but who knows why people steal or vandalize what they do... Nevertheless, people do seem to have tracts of farmland and equipment out there without it being bothered.
d) Accessible by car. Dirt roads are more than fine, but they should at least EXIST and be passable for a car.
I feel like you didn't read my post(s) on this thread at all, which is unfortunate because I sincerely value your opinion as an experienced member of the forum. Maybe if you get a chance to take another crack at it? I'd greatly appreciate it. :-)
Last edited by AikenHorses; 10-11-2014 at 10:43 PM..
There are usually several reasons the land is cheap.
1) It's remote, even inaccessible by car
2) There's no water or utilities available.
3) There are restrictions that don't allow building on it.
Your use only requires access, so I think you'd have your pick of any number of pieces of land that are unsuitable for homes but would work well for your purpose. Theft or vandalism could happen anywhere, I don't have any recommendations on that front. The occasional problem may still be worth saving $300k.
I suppose the other catch is that if you ever decide to sell the land nobody's going to want to buy it, but that's not a huge loss if you only put $1,500 into it.
There is no catch, but there are reasons the land is cheap, and those are based on basic supply and demand. Rural land out here is often not particularly desirable or useful and there is a lot of it.
If there are any CC&R's on those lots, the realtor should be able to supply them for you - those are required to be recorded at the county recorders office now. I doubt there is any county or town restriction on the type of use you're considering.
No one is going to rob you, but equipment left unsecured could vanish or be vandalized. Your dogs will likely get lots of sand burs in their feet, and snakes may be a problem depending on time of year and time of day.
I don't think those lots are all that far from town. There is a lot of open space around towns, but subdivision projects like those lots are in are usually right near town. If you lived in Deming it wouldn't take you an hour to get there, more like 10-20 minutes.
One thing that hasn't been mentioned is the wind effects on lots such as those you refer to. It's no fun being in sandy desert areas during wind storms that exceed about 20mph, which occurs regularly from late Oct to early June. Worst is in the spring "dust storm" months from Feb to May when it "occasionally" gets bad enough for blowing dust/sand to close down IH-10 between Las Cruces and Lordsburg (usually in the Deming vicinity).
Someone mentioned sand burrs - which are locally known as "goat heads." They make going barefoot or riding a bicycle in the sandy desert regions a real challenge, and animals regularly have problems with them, especially dogs. When they get in between the pads of a dogs paw they are hard for the animal to remove by biting at them.
As for leaving anything unattended on lots in the southern desert region, that can be problematic if there are no other people regularly around. The area bordering Mexico is especially prone to trashing/vandalism by illegal entrants who cross the more deserted areas regularly.
That having been said, there is no shortage of cheap acreage for sale in the Las Cruces - Deming corridor. Land between Las Cruces and El Paso is pricier if it's in the flat irrigated area of the valley. Or as has already been mentioned, if it's been subdivided already for development.
After sleeping on it, we're going to really explore this opportunity when we go down there.
Another thing my husband suggested was buying a piece of land with crop on it (i.e. Pecans, some pecan orchards are very small relative to grazing land so a good size for us) it would certainly be much more expensive, but would generate income and could be considered "investment" if it is similar to how it was in Florida for him when having orange trees literally meant people came by and paid you and you did very little.
In any case, all of these options are much cheaper than leasing a 10,000 square foot industrial lot or building, which is how my thought process started yesterday morning. Apparently industrial leases are not much cheaper down in El Paso than up here! LOL
Pecans, peanuts and pistachios are grown in southern NM. But, I expect you'd need serious irrigation for pecan trees (or other nut plants). NMSU: Estimating Water Needs for Pecan Trees
NMSU has a lot of info on NM agriculture.
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