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Is there any way to tell from the listing if a rural house has normal utilities (like in suburbia), as opposed to something weird like having water delivered by a truck?
If not, is there a general rule of thumb of what to expect and when (depending on the town size or something) ?
Like some of the others posted, most houses in rural areas these days are going to have a well for water and septic for sewerage.
You might come upon that odd house time to time that is self-sufficient with its own power generator of some kind (ie solar, wind, gas generator), but something like that will be pretty obvious once you get a look around the property.
Some water well pumps are powered by a wind turbine (and you'll see a windmill on the property for that).
Another thing to look into is gas, if you use it. Most rural properties have no natural gas pipelines. They usually have a propane tank and have the propane delivered by a dealer.
Good to know if you have a gas range, gas water heater, or gas clothes dryer.
Many rural properties around here have cisterns to supply household water. Some have water delivered, and some have their own trailer or truck mounted tanks to get their water.
In our little housing development, everybody has a well and septic tank/drainfield.
While there are some windmills still around, I have never seen one that furnished water to a house. They are always used to keep a stock tank full.
Every real estate listing I have seen here specifies city utilities or well/septic or cistern, as applicable. ALL buyers want to KNOW!
There are several places in Arizona where water is delivered. We had a home in Arizona that was like that. It was no big deal. When the tank got low, we just called up the water delivery company and they would bring a truck out to fill it. It was super easy. They even got the water from the local town's water supply.
We were on acreage and were about 15 miles away from the town. We had normal electric, septic and propane as well. I really, really liked living there. No neighbors right on top of you....you can have all the chickens you want....I could go on and on.
Here is a listing from Arizona that says what kind of utilities that a place with water delivery has...
Is there any way to tell from the listing if a rural house has normal utilities (like in suburbia), as opposed to something weird like having water delivered by a truck?
If not, is there a general rule of thumb of what to expect and when (depending on the town size or something) ?
You could always list the town and someone here could probably check the area.
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