Self employed artists seeking refuge from the sun

[pdxMIKEpdx]

I hate to say this but someone has to.

You are not going to find everything you want for what you want to spend.

Beautiful views, land, culture, creativeness, nice house, good schools, safe liberal neighborhoods, close to medical care, no "rednecks", etc.

And, it sounds like you want it all on a budget.
You are going to have to make some compromises.

To be truthful, you and about 10 million people are looking for the same thing.
That era is long gone in Oregon.

[StealthRabbit]

Originally Posted by La Valentina

Hello,
...
We are looking for a town of 60,000 to 100,000 people, where we can buy a home on 1-5 acres for 250,000
With creative people, good schools, etc. ... opportunity to buy a few cheap fix up properties or apartment complexes would be good.
Thank you in advance for your advice.

I would look in 20 mile radius of Portland perimeter and similar.

You can find it (1-5 acres with home / shop / view under $250k). You need to be real creative in your search, and avoid anything that is already listed / on the market. (I.e. you need to dig up your own props). I have acquired 6 view rural homes on acreage within 16 miles / minutes of PDX. Most expensive was $138k. I just turned down 3 that were under $100k in the last 3 months.

Hint: 2 of the 3 were mobile homes on acreage. 4 hours on a bulldozer will take care of a trashed MH, and make a prepared site. (I build a BIG shop with an apartment inside and RV site outside), then I sell / rent with option... to people that want to live in the shop while they build their 'dream-house'.

[patches403]

Originally Posted by pdxMIKEpdx

I hate to say this but someone has to.

You are not going to find everything you want for what you want to spend.

Beautiful views, land, culture, creativeness, nice house, good schools, safe liberal neighborhoods, close to medical care, no "rednecks", etc.

And, it sounds like you want it all on a budget.
You are going to have to make some compromises.

To be truthful, you and about 10 million people are looking for the same thing.
That era is long gone in Oregon.

This^^^ For your budget vs. what type of property you want, Western Oregon's probably not your place. Anywhere you can afford a decent house on acreage is going to be a distance outside of town and you will mostly be living around regular working people and quite a number of rednecks, not creative types.

If you're willing to be in the country with not the best rated schools, Oregon has places where you could afford the type of property you're looking for, but you will have to drive a distance for services and you will be dealing with rural school districts.

Have you looked at Spokane Washington or Coeur d'alene Idaho? More sunny than Western Oregon, but not as sunny as Arizona. I'm just guessing on housing prices, but I'm sure they're lower than Western Oregon. Also, cities in Washington such as Yakima, Richland/Kennewick, Chehalis/Centralia, Longview/Kelso or Wenatchee might fill the bill for your price range and weather desires and maybe some of your other items as well. Walla Walla might be up your alley with a lot of creative types, but is probably out of your price range and may not have the medical and other services you desire.

[patches403]

Originally Posted by StealthRabbit

I would look in 20 mile radius of Portland perimeter and similar.

You can find it (1-5 acres with home / shop / view under $250k). You need to be real creative in your search, and avoid anything that is already listed / on the market. (I.e. you need to dig up your own props). I have acquired 6 view rural homes on acreage within 16 miles / minutes of PDX. Most expensive was $138k. I just turned down 3 that were under $100k in the last 3 months.

Hint: 2 of the 3 were mobile homes on acreage. 4 hours on a bulldozer will take care of a trashed MH, and make a prepared site. (I build a BIG shop with an apartment inside and RV site outside), then I sell / rent with option... to people that want to live in the shop while they build their 'dream-house'.

Sure, you can find 1- 5 acre lots with no livable dwelling for 100K. The problem is that unless the OP is willing to build their own home with their own hands, or they're willing to spend years living in a garage/shop, or they're happy with living in a house under 1,000 sq ft, they can't get a lot of that size plus a livable home for 250k in the Willamette Valley. The national average cost per square foot to build a home is $125 and Oregon is probably even higher than that. For a 2,000 square foot home, their price is now up to $350k, which is well over their $250k budget.

Not to mention that at 10 - 20 miles outside of Portland Metro/Salem/Eugene, they'll still be looking at mostly rural school districts with less than stellar ratings. The best school districts in Western Oregon are mostly inside city limits where the OP's budget may not even get them a detached single family home. Plus, if they're looking to live around creative types, those folks are mostly found within the city limits of Portland and Eugene. Once you get more than 5 - 10 miles out in the country around here, it's mostly average working folks, farmers and more than a few rednecks.

[bler144]

The acreage desire vs the UGB (and cost) is a significant hurdle, but that's been addressed several times.

I'm not sure the OP has a good view of OR - though I won't be as harsh as pdxMike, I think it's great you know what you want, but it's really not a good reflection of what OR has to offer.

But for the sake of argument, let's assume it's doable and start with size. There are 8 cities in OR that fit the 40-100 range: Medford/Bend/Beaverton/Hillsboro in the 70-100k range, and Tigard/Albany/Corvallis/Spfld in the 48-60 range.

3 of those are in the Portland metro. 1 is a college town. On cost you can probably cross those 4 off - 250k for a SFH is conceivable, maybe, but realistically you're talking 1/8th-1/10th acre, not 1-5 full acres.

So you're left with Medford, Bend, Albany, and Spfld. Albany probably isn't at all what you're looking for. Bend probably too pricey for what you want, though I haven't looked in a while.

So I think you're down to Medford and Spfld, neither of which is probably exactly what you want, but they both have some amenable areas and are proximate to areas more like what you want (Eugene and Ashland). I suppose you could argue Albany is proximate to Corvallis, but it's still really primarily a mill town.

So, um, good luck!

[pdxMIKEpdx]

I didn't mean to come across a harsh, but wanted to be realistic.
It seems like people watch a movies like Kindergarten Cop, Overboard, or Short Circuit and dream of an Oregon that has long since disappeared.

I didn't say it wasn't possible, but I did say compromise (and creativity) is needed, as has been shown in many posts in this thread.

There was a guy named Skinem on this forum that once posted this:

By the way, I'm looking for a 6 figure job in an area that's not too cold, not
too hot, sunny except when I want it cloudy, in the mountains yet flat and not
too much snow except when I want to go skiing by the ocean but no rain but not
desert, rural with no neighbors yet convenient to mass transit, the theater,
first-class health care, museums, symphony, ballet, health food stores, good
ethnic mix, safe yet not vanilla, eco-friendly without the crunchy types,
conservative and liberal with health-conscious freedom-loving religious yet
non-judgemental accepting of agnostic Wiccan/Druid/Baptists and willing to join
in, friendly yet keep their nose out of my business people who are accepting of
people just like me but doesn't have any kind of people I don't like and is
perfect in each and every way.

Every time I see a post from someone that expects way too much something for almost nothing (and expects Oregon to be really backwoods and cheap), I am reminded of that quote.