Relocating to West Coast

[Thom52]

Acreage for $700k is quite doable if you are willing to look inland a bit.

Bend Oregon has Central Oregon's main hospital, albeit getting the jobs can be pretty competitive, and salary is relatively low.

I am always tantalizing my sister that has a couple acres in California Bay Area with the major upgrade in acreage and house they could get in Central Oregon if they cashed out their house there. Unfortunately she and her husband are locked into Prop13, their job/business connections, and inflated salaries down there.

Just a quick random search on Zillow brings up this 10 acres for $600k with a nice house already on it, just a short commute from the hospital in Bend. Not sure what internet connection is available at this specific listing for your husband's job.

Other spots pop up pretty regularly in your price range.

And it is highly unlikely our "levee" will ever be breached (it is called the Cascade Mountain range).

[C10h12n2o5ht]

Thank you all for your thorough responses and your support! You guys gave us some great advice, and I think this really gives us some good information to keep in mind as we start our search. I think if we could even get something around or a little less than 0.4 acres we’d be able to work that too. Mostly just want the privacy and to have a couple of chickens without irritating neighbors etc.

Thank you all again! I’ll update yall once we have a better idea of what we’re going to do. Take care and have a great week!

[gray horse]

For the Portland area, look out towards Newberg, and Canby areas. Possibly Sherwood for smaller acreage. And PLEASE do verify you can build a house on raw land, I believe the minimum acreage bow for EFU land to build a new (not replacement) dwelling is 80 acres.

[leastprime]

Get a good RE agent with contacts. I cannot emphasize this enough because a good representative will find something, someone , somewhere even outside his/her zone of expertise.

20 months ago sold property 10+ acres and a home/property(14,000 ft2) in midValley Oregon. Both considerably less than $700,000. Demand is fierce.

Land without home may require take cash or private financing.

[Silverfall]

Originally Posted by leastprime

Get a good RE agent with contacts. I cannot emphasize this enough because a good representative will find something, someone , somewhere even outside his/her zone of expertise.

20 months ago sold property 10+ acres and a home/property(14,000 ft2) in midValley Oregon. Both considerably less than $700,000. Demand is fierce.

Land without home may require take cash or private financing.

You can buy acreage, no problem, for less than that if there is a home on it. Ready to build land with no home on it is a different beast. The OP would do a construction loan if they don't have the cash for the land and the build. Umpqua does them locally.

[texasdiver]

Originally Posted by C10h12n2o5ht

Thank you all for your thorough responses and your support! You guys gave us some great advice, and I think this really gives us some good information to keep in mind as we start our search. I think if we could even get something around or a little less than 0.4 acres we’d be able to work that too. Mostly just want the privacy and to have a couple of chickens without irritating neighbors etc.

Thank you all again! I’ll update yall once we have a better idea of what we’re going to do. Take care and have a great week!

You can keep up to 3 chickens in Portland without any sort of permits as long as they are not roosters. You can even do beehives. This sort of thing is getting more popular:

https://www.portlandoregon.gov/bps/article/362065
The City Chicken

Honestly my opinion is that you'd probably be happier in the long run to just take your budget and find a small house somewhere on the east side of Portland with a decent yard and do your own thing like everyone else. Lots of that sort of thing is happening all over Portland

https://www.oregonhomemagazine.com/g...-urban-farming

If what you want is land out in the country to build your own thing on then both Oregon and Washington are going to be somewhat more difficult. Much much easier to do that sort of thing in say Texas or even say Vermont where there are little acreage farms all over the place you can buy.