Looking for a small town to raise my kids.....

[jazzlover]

A friend of mine owns a ranch north of Green River. He turned his ranch over to his two kids and took a job elsewhere because the ranch would not support more than two families very well. He and his kids are good ranchers and good stewards of the land. They have owned the ranch for nearly 50 years, and own it outright. How many acres? About 4,000 deeded, plus about 4 times that muich on BLM and Forest Service grazing leases. That's pretty much what it takes to have a "going" ranch to support a couple of families these days. 200 acres isn't really a ranch in most of Wyoming (unless it's prime irrigated land, which commands a big premium price)--it's playtoy for people who want to pretend to be ranching. Which, of course, leads to the old joke: "How do you make a small fortune ranching in the Rocky Mountain West?" "Start with a big fortune."

[StealthRabbit]

Give a look to Powell / Lovell area and you will be close to MT and have availability of irrigated acreage and local feed sources. Both WY and MT have land prices that exceed true value. There is still non-farm real estate dollars fueling the prices and both states are preferable destinations to those with extra $$.

I wouldn't expect to depend on farm income for many yrs. (Thus try to find a place with good access to other jobs.) Night and evening shift jobs are the best match for getting a farm productive.

[sunsprit]

Originally Posted by MellowBamaGal

So many things to consider.

I would love to make a living from the ranch. The horses would be for our own pleasure, so we wouldn't have more than 10.

I don't HAVE to depend on the ranch being a source of income. It would be an added bonus, but I would live off of the income that I have coming in already. We invested wisely, and my husband works as a government contractor, so money isn't going to be a problem.

I don't have to raise sheep either. It could be any animals, I just want a farm. I want to be with nature, and I want my kids to have the experience of working hard and knowing what real family time is.

As it is now, they are in front of computers or texting their friends. We live in a subdivision community and with that comes problems.

I would like to be far enough out so that going to "town" is a chore. I want to raise a garden in the summer and put up vegetables and such.

Its always been a dream of mine to live in a small town. One where everyone knows everyone. Where neighbors can depend on each other in times of need or hardships. Sure I love technology and stuff like that, but I could do without all of the gadgets just to make a better life for my kids and myself.

From what I understand here, what you're really seeking in relocating is privacy, independence, a very limited access to town/city, and a home based hobby farm and ranch.

IMO, you can choose almost anywhere in the state to accomplish this if you have a truly adequate independent income to live on. It comes down to how much money you want to spend for a "place", and you can accomplish your goals with anything from 40 acres to hundreds of acres, or even more land if that's your pleasure.

However, in view of socializing your kids, access to schools and activities, I think you'd do better to consider a place not quite so remote and difficult to access. Plus, your family can participate in a lot of activities, such as 4-H, which gives the kids a good foundation in farming/ranching/personal responsibility and a sense of accomplishment with their peer group. This would be more easily done from a home ranch closer to a town, and a bigger town has a lot more opportunities than remote places. Just my 2cents observation from watching a lot of local Cheyenne area families activities with their children and growing up ... like watching a 14 year-old come to my place to buy livestock equipment and negotiating his own "best deal" for the purchase and then bringing out his own checkbook to pay for the purchase. My contact with 4-H'ers has been pretty positive through the years, and they have equestrian programs as well as the livestock programs.

As far as farming in Wyoming goes, unless you're into dryland production, you'd best be looking for a place with agricultural irrigation water. This is a big deal for much of the state and you may not take it for granted that you have any such water right or it's availability on your prospective "farm". Even if you see "surface water" on a property, make no assumptions that you have any right to use it for any purpose whatsoever except to watch it flow through the place. Otherwise, you'll be using your domestic permitted well to irrigate a maximum of 1 acre of landscaping and garden plot, which isn't very much area. Due diligence on your part is imperative for this, and don't take the word of any real estate agent about it. You must do your own research and check out the historic availability and delivery of irrigation water, and be sure that it's on a legal permit.

[WyoNewk]

Just for the fun of it, here's a 240 that looks nice in NE Wyoming, priced at $631,500. (I have no connection with this except that I know the realtor offering it.) Notice it's sold basically as a nice rural tract for a home or cabin, not as a producing ranch. It would certainly make a nice building lot!

[sunsprit]

Originally Posted by WyoNewk

Just for the fun of it, here's a 240 that looks nice in NE Wyoming, priced at $631,500. (I have no connection with this except that I know the realtor offering it.) Notice it's sold basically as a nice rural tract for a home or cabin, not as a producing ranch. It would certainly make a nice building lot!

That's a pretty nice lookin' chunk of ground, at over $2,600 per acre.

In the interest of guiding the OP as to typical concerns about buying land here, a few questions they might ask when considering such a property:

1) "developed spring and pond" for what water use? What water right and use, if any, is being sold with the 240 acre tract? Are there others with rights to the water that is stored or flowing from this spring and pond? Is there any "irrigation water right" being sold with this property?

2) is the tract fenced from the adjacent property?

3) what is the adjacent property used for? are there any current plans for subdividing that property? into what size parcels? Is this parcel used for farming or ranching now? in what way? Is there acreage and soil that would be tillable for farming?

4) are there any easements, such as access roads or utilities, in place on this tract? Who owns them, and do they have any plans to use them that might impact this tract's owner? Is this tract accessed by a public road or does it require going through somebody else's property? If through somebody else's property, is there a recorded easement to ensure that access? Who takes care of the road maintenance and plowing in inclement weather?

5) are there any tract covenants, or lack of them, which might adversely affect the owner of this tract? On this tract or adjacent lands?

6) what public services are available with this property? Power? Phone?
Emergency services, such as fire dept? School bus route? Mail delivery?

7) Has the tract been surveyed so that the fences or property lines as shown to the prospective owner are the true property lines? Or are they an approximation which may lead to fence line/property ownership issues later on?

8) Wow, I'm impressed. Just a few miles to Hulett. No offense to those folks living there, but outside of the golf course and a spectacular new airstrip runway and some new taxiways and new hangars, a few bars and a real estate office or two ... I don't recall seeing much there in Hulett. This looks like a property where you'd be heading over to SoDakota for shopping and the amenities of town .... So, if I was going to build a place on this tract to live on, how difficult is it to get a GC or sub-contractors to do the stuff I'd need, like backhoe work, well drilling, septic installation, concrete work, building erection, and all the building trades people on site?

These are but a few of the concerns one might have about buying property in Wyoming. They're not meant to be derrogatory in any way, but information you need to know about what you're really buying. After all, when the funds clear the closing table, the buyer is the one who gets all the benefits and also stuck with the drawbacks of the property purchase, not the folks who walk away with money. Asking the questions before spending any money may save you a lot of expensive surprises later on. Be sure to get answers from people who really know the answers, like the State Engineer's office, or the school transportation district, or the local fire department ... not from a real estate agent who is all too happy to give you an answer because you asked a question.

[eric#1]

It will most likely take thousands of acres to raise much at all in the parts of wyo. I am familiar with. Turning profit in the high plains will definitely require the hard work you speak of. Having ten horses alone could strip the grass off of a few hundred acres in fairly short order, especially in rockier and dryer areas. You mentioned wise investments in the past, ranching in Wyo. I am sure has been good to many, but for most that is due to the way of that life, not the $ made along the way. I am not speaking from my experience, but a # of my family members live the life you speak of - the romance of it in the tougher years can pushed aside by months of drought followed by months of snow. As others have said - not trying to scare you just adding what I have wittnessed my family struggle with.

[jody_wy]

Most Ag colleges econ departments figure 400 to 700 AU to support a family, A AU equaling a cow/calf, or 5 ewes plus lambs. In my area the ranches run 80 to 400 head most have a base property that they use in the spring and fall and the cows go onto a forest permit for most the summer(June thru early Oct). Most every place has an outside source of income except for a few off the 400 head outfits. Seem that people that buy smaller acreages the one that run a small flock of ewes make out better then cows. Once they get good fences up a good guard dog, and a small barn. Not needing chutes and corrals that cow take.
My area you can dry farm alfalfa (lucky two cuttings) barley and oats. But increased yield on irrigated. A lot of flood irrigated meadows and native grass hay. The irrigated alfalfa and grass is sprinkler a lot of gravity flow systems, but if you have to pump that can be big dollars just to turn the power on.

[rmmoore]

Growing up in 'Bama myself, I know, or at least have a pretty good idea, of what you're coming from. The posts here "warning" you of land, grazing, and ranching issues are spot-on accurate. Life here is an entire world apart from down South. In both good and not-so-good ways, depending on your perspective.

The Powell area, and the area between Green River and Evanston south of I-80, is about as good as you'll get compared to land usage for farming/ranching/grazing that you're accustomed to. And even that is NOT a like-for-like comparison. It's just the closest we've got. PM or Direct Message me if you want to chat more in-depth from a "former" Bama-boy. We had a dream too, and had to change it quite a bit, but are still happy about our decision. Wyoming is HOME, and we ain't leaving.

[sixofone]

There are several nice-looking small (200-500 acre) working farms available in the Goshen County/Torrington area that might interest you. You get no "mountain views" but the land here is lower in elevation, higher in rainfall and more fertile than some other parts of the state, plus we have an agriculturally-based economy and warmer weather. It still gets cold and windy, however.

Pay careful attention to the caveats from the other posters, especially in the area of water rights. Those folks know whereof they speak!!