my land base

[petefrom bearswamp]

Some of you may have noticed that my land base has shrunk considerably over the past couple of years.
My largest total ownership of forest property was 239 acres in three parcels.
At my age I started pulling in my horns as regards land ownership.
Sold a 53 acre parcel last spring, then was able to sell my 129 acre parcel to my son for  a very reasonable price while holding a substantial mortgage on it.
This gave me ready cash and steady income for us and for my wife after I head to the great sawmill in the sky.
I  bought the first parcel, the one I still have, in 1986, and when I bought the second one, 53 acres, my wife asked why I was buying "all this land", and I said just wait and see.
The third parcel is where we built our home 30 years ago
I think that after 7 timber sales and 2 land sales she knows why.
In addition to the intrinsic value the peripheral value of enjoying the parcels for hunting and just looking at "our trees" makes ownership doubly worth the investment.
AS someone said many years ago , buy land they aint making any more of it.
I  will have a timber sale on the remaining parcel in 2024, Lord willin, then sell the property.

[Hilltop366]

Smart man, usually the worst you can do is keep up with inflation, usually better than that. 

[Bruno of NH]

That one thing I regret 
Not buying more land when I was young 
Best thing young folks can do 

[JonathanPace]

Buying land or property of any kind now is an uphill climb. My grandparents took the opportunity to do so in their day, and it's still paying off. 

[moodnacreek]

I certainly respect a man who buys land for his own satisfaction and what it can produce and I would assume we went with out other things to do this. Also some credit must go to the other half for hanging around and supporting the man.

[SwampDonkey]

I never had to buy land here, my dad gave me a chunk off of his 850 acre farm. But it sure is nice to tromp on and get my firewood from. The firewood alone, over say 10 years, is $30,000 in my own pocket. Then there is the enjoyment of walking your woods and observing changes and seeing the wildlife.

[Ventryjr]

That one thing I regret
Not buying more land when I was young
Best thing young folks can do

I just turned 28 a few weeks ago. And that's one of the hardest things to do now adays.  It's hard to get a loan on raw land with out some kind of collateral, land around here starts at $2k/acre.  My wife has student loans till 2030 and we haven't even had kids yet.  Wish I could have met my wife before she went to college and talked her out of that piece of paper. Those payments would cover a mortgage on land.  

[petefrom bearswamp]

Hang in there ventryjr.
I was 49 before I bought any forested land.
bargains were hard to find then too, but I persevered
MY son is still looking for more in addition to what I sold him.
The 2K per acre is about right but consider that although hard to find some timber values per acre can double that figure

[Walnut Beast]

My new real estate agent is a younger go getter and he is just getting ready to close on 40 acres. At 5,500 bucks a acre for non tillable land it was a little to much. So his construction buddy is going in half with him. They both will be able to enjoy it with their kids and hunt there. How he actually got the client that was the owner of the full 160 acres of  property is the guy that owned it lives out of state and he had it advertised on Facebook for way less money and my friend called him and told him he is selling it way way to cheap. So the guy pulled his Information. Long story short my friend sold it for him and put a few more thousand a acre in the guys pocket. And on the 40 they got they paid the guy the full value also. The options they will have now is possibly buy a little more down the road from the guy that got the 120 or sell and keep working up the ladder for a little more land. 

[SawyerTed]

Fortunate to have inherited land and will inherit additional real estate in the not too distant future, sadly. 

When you are young and inherit land, you can be land poor.   We were and it took years to turn it around.  But our property is paid for.   It will eventually become our children's.  They will be the fourth generation here.  

Each generation has had their challenges in keeping the land.  Each solution was different.  Ours has been different than the previous one for sure.  

[SwampDonkey]

Any wild land around here ranges from $250 - 1500 an acre. Mill bought  a piece over the hill from here, maybe $650/acre, if I recall from the sale price. My cousin just bought a lot a year ago near his place with a 30 year old house and 80 acres, that has probably 60 acres cleared for $200,000. No big hills to climb. So that's maybe $1000 an acre, lock, stock and barrel, if you figure $120,000 for the house. That's in Canadian pesos. :D  It has water, pond and a creek. Plus he got the guy's John Deere tractor. ;D

[barbender]

 Ted, out in Buffalo, Wyoming, where a lot of my family lives, you can really find the definition of land poor. The ranches along the face of the Bighorn mountains bring millions, but families are living there on the third or fourth generation just raising cattle and/or sheep. They aren't rich and never will be unless they sell the property. 

 Tax laws are very different in Minnesota than in Wyoming. Here, you would never be able to hold onto a property with that much market value as a working person because of property taxes.

[barbender]

 Not to mention, you have to have a really good succession plan in place to be able to pass property with that value on to the next generation because of Federal Estate taxes. Otherwise the kids end up having to sell at least part of the ranch to cover the tax burden (theft imo). 

 The West is turning into an exclusive wealthy persons playground.

[SawyerTed]

Our solution is a revocable trust with the children as Trustees.  Every place is different but the trust is the way to avoid the estate taxes etc here.  

A trust is an involved process but worth the effort in the long run.  Much better than a Will alone. 

[SwampDonkey]

Property tax on undeveloped land is hardly anything here, but there is a tax if land is transferred based on fair market value, even if cash doesn't change hands. As I recall that wasn't all that much tax, because the owner has to pay the tax and I didn't here any whining. :D

[maple flats]

I own several parcels, but the one with my sugarhouse and sawmill on were bought in 1976 for $200 an acre, it's just 15 acres. I got a bargain on it, at the time my brother needed down payment cash on an estate of which my 15 acres were a part of. I gave him the $3000 cash and got the deed several weeks later. It was a real good buy for use, 1n 1979 I had it logged and got $3575 for it. However, I then vowed to never let a logger in my land. The logger I had drove over every tree he could, left ruts up to 3' deep and left good logs on the ground. In fact, in 2005 when I got my Peterson, the first 2 logs I sawed were cherries that had set on the ground since 1979. I don't recall the lengths, but both were mostly straight and something like 11' and 15' long. The longer one was also the largest diameter. They both had significant rot on the first 2-3" in, but there was some very fine cherry remaining in the rest of the logs. I mad a stickered stack 11' long x 42" wide and 50" high. Some was sawed into 1" boards, some 5/4 and some gun stock blanks something like 2.75x 2.5" cut sizes, I have a friend who likes to make black powder gun stocks using cherry.

[dogone]

    Buy and hold your land:forever. Find some way to pass it to family , either free or cheap. A family can not keep on repaying for the same land.You have an opportunity to create lasting wealth for your family. Be sure it doesn't get sold off and the cash frittered away. You probably only get one chance to do it right.

[Stephen1]

We are in the process of setting up a family trust for the property I'm living on right now. a hard process that takes money to put in place. 

[Walnut Beast]

Transfer on death deed keeps it out of probate and it keeps somebody else from putting a claim in

[thecfarm]

I have no idea what will happen to this place. Wife kids are not really interested in "owning" The Farm" Too far, is all they say. Meaning too far out.  :
A little more than an hour away from 2 good size cities and about 40 from another.
But they like to hunt here.
There is A LOT of work that goes into this place. I can't see her kids keeping up on it.

[petefrom bearswamp]

We went the trust route about 6 years ago.
Avoids probate etc.
We now have peace of mind in our declining years.
My one remaining parcel of forested land is 70 miles away and the ATV an side by side people treat it as a public trail system making some very deep ruts
To far to monitor as regards this problem.
Gonna sell  the timber next year and sale it for a bargain price.
 

[dougtrr2]

I heard that the best way to keep unwanted people off your land is to sell the hunting rights to a group.  Those hunters are very good about keeping people off "their" land.  ;D

Doug in SW IA

[WhitePineJunky]

We went the trust route about 6 years ago.
Avoids probate etc.
We now have peace of mind in our declining years.
My one remaining parcel of forested land is 70 miles away and the ATV an side by side people treat it as a public trail system making some very deep ruts
To far to monitor as regards this problem.
Gonna sell  the timber next year and sale it for a bargain price.

Everyone's land is communal to them until it's their own land, atv riders(most).