A Few Acres Near Savannah (real estate, rental, house)

[CoastalGAGuy]

I've toyed with the idea of moving beyond the city limits and combining my home and office into a single, large, rural location. But, not too rural. I'm not sure I need to stay in Chatham County, but if I don't, I'd need to be pretty close to the county line somewhere in Bryan or Effingham. I would need to be able to build a large-ish custom metal building (approx. 120 ft. square), preferably adjacent to a modest house that already exists on the property.

Having never looked for that kind of a property, I'm not sure where to begin. Any real estaters out there with some good basic info/advice? Really, this is just a concept at this point.

[pink caddy]

CG
Did you mean to write "1200 square feet"?

[pink caddy]

You might want to look at "Land Watch" a real estate site with a huge array of offerings for Savannah and surrounding area for some ideas.

[gentlearts]

Originally Posted by CoastalGAGuy

I've toyed with the idea of moving beyond the city limits and combining my home and office into a single, large, rural location. But, not too rural. I'm not sure I need to stay in Chatham County, but if I don't, I'd need to be pretty close to the county line somewhere in Bryan or Effingham. I would need to be able to build a large-ish custom metal building (approx. 120 ft. square), preferably adjacent to a modest house that already exists on the property.

Having never looked for that kind of a property, I'm not sure where to begin. Any real estaters out there with some good basic info/advice? Really, this is just a concept at this point.

Just a comment about what you want to do....we did this exact thing for my husbands business. He loved walking out the back door to go to work. However, when we went to sell, we severely limited our potential buyers, even though the business building looked like an attractive barn. Hindsight being 20/20, we would have had the business at a separate location.

[CoastalGAGuy]

Originally Posted by gentlearts

Just a comment about what you want to do....we did this exact thing for my husbands business. He loved walking out the back door to go to work. However, when we went to sell, we severely limited our potential buyers, even though the business building looked like an attractive barn. Hindsight being 20/20, we would have had the business at a separate location.

I definitely appreciate your take on this, GA. I've been running a separate location for the business for many years, and while it has worked out fine for us, it's also limiting. The location is actually in a slowly gentrifying part of town, and we would consider keeping it as a rental property. But it's pretty small - just 1,000 sq. ft., and I could really use some land where I could build a proper studio. The space required for such a facility is just too large to really consider the high costs of staying in the city limits, in all likelihood.

So, we are thinking about the options. Going to the country has its benefits, but also some important issues to consider - access to reliable very high speed internet is critical for the business, for instance. The other side of the equation - when it's time to sell way on down the road - wasn't something I had considered too much at this stage, but maybe it's something that would tip the scales in favor of not combining things into one giant homestead.

[CoastalGAGuy]

Originally Posted by pink caddy

You might want to look at "Land Watch" a real estate site with a huge array of offerings for Savannah and surrounding area for some ideas.

I'll check that out thanks, Pink. I also realized the filtering options on the MLS realtor.com site are pretty good. It seems just filtering by 1+ acres has really confined the results nicely.

[pink caddy]

The problem with filters is that they filter out the not investigated possibilities. I came across this quote this past year and I have put it on the cover of my daily note book:


"Without leaps of imagination we lose the excitement of the possibilities. Dreaming, after all, is a form of planning".

[CoastalGAGuy]

I hear that, too. All of this is very formative, of course. In the end, keeping home and business separate might be the best route to follow, with a cleaner exit strategy on the other end of things. Perhaps it means finding a better commercial property and making the move strictly business.