# Finding Land



## nwodestroyer (Jan 5, 2009)

My buddy and I foresee the hard times ahead and we both agree we need to find some secluded land to build a survival bunker/shelter and begin stocking it up. Our problem is, both of us live in the city (in nebraska) and so finding secluded land for sale where we live has become a HUGE challenge. Most acreages are sold in chunks of 10 or more which means you have to have $50,000 or more to spend. We do not have that kind of money. The most we could come up with would be around $20,000. Finding smaller chunks of land is near impossible, and when we do find it, it goes for way more than $20k. 

So far it's looking like the only alternative is bugging out on foot when TSHTF. Any suggestions on helping us find land cheap?????????

Thanks.


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## Denny (Oct 14, 2008)

Land isn't cheap in NEBRASKA?!?! I think we're all doomed. LOL

Seriously, though. The best thing to do in that situation is to go ahead and buy it IF there is a clause in the deed, stating that you can separate the land. Sell off the rest and maybe you'll make your money back. Kinda like the crack dealer who takes his "pinch" as the middle man


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## NaeKid (Oct 17, 2008)

I would jump on that kind of price ... 

For me to get 10 acre would cost me closer to $500,000 .. and I was thinking that was fairly reasonable. If I was to purchase a "small" piece of land (under 50 acre) with a mobile-home on it would be taking closer to a million-bux outta my pocket.

With the huge-drop in land / house prices in this area, I am trying to hold-out for buying something in the $200,000 price-range .. and, I am hoping for a quarter-section.


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## Canadian (Dec 14, 2008)

$50 grand for ten acres is dirt cheap compared to prices around where I live. However, I do get the fact that we're not all made of money.

Perhaps you can ask other people you know if they would like to chip in for part of the cost? Family members and friends might want some land out in the country. If everyone wanted to share the payments would be really cheap and getting credit approved would be no problem. If you could get ten people interested you'd only need 5 thousand each. That's pretty easy for most people to handle. 

If the area goes up in value you can sell it and use the money to buy another undervalued piece of land.


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## nwodestroyer (Jan 5, 2009)

Well, if there is anyone from eastern nebraska who wants to join my buddy and I in our survival group, please contact me. I'd love to have another person or two of like mind who could help break up the cost of buying a bugout location! [email protected]


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## StillStanding (Jan 24, 2009)

To get land for less than $50,000 you have to find land that either lacks road access, lacks access to an electrical utility, or is not buildable. There are some lots of swampland that require a 1 mile overland walk from the nearest dirt road in Northern MN which can be had quite reasonably. Moving up from there if you find someplace that isn't suitable for agriculture and that lacks electricity you may do OK.

You get what you pay for.


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## The_Blob (Dec 24, 2008)

In this "buyer's market" you can find a _*lot*_ of real estate bargains, especially if you make it clear to the seller that you do not have a problem with just walking away from the deal if you don't what they offer.

of course that's true in any transaction


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## dilligaf (Oct 17, 2008)

i just picked a random state,arkansas..

heres 18 pages of land under 20 grand. tracts of all sizes..

Arkansas Property Search Result: Real Estate Property For Sale in Arkansas Price From $10000 Price To $20000

you live in the "city" in nebraska,i assume its lincoln or omaha. i find it hard to believe that within a 4 hour drive there isnt cheap tracts of land,but if there indeed isnt the logical option would be to look elsewhere,(arkansas perhaps) and just adjust bug out plans accordingly..


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## Fn/Form (Nov 6, 2008)

nwodestroyer said:


> My buddy and I foresee the hard times ahead and we both agree we need to find some secluded land to build a survival bunker/shelter and begin stocking it up...


If you're a veteran... some states have a Veteran's Land Board. The land is for veteran purchase, and they help with financing in a big way. My uncle is a USMC vet, and he found 10ac on basically a part-time job budget.


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## endurance (Nov 26, 2008)

I have no problem finding 35 acres for $35k in Colorado. If you're looking for 5 acres, it starts at $5,600 and runs up to $15k depending on what you want. I'd recommend using Zillow or Colorado Horse Property and search away. Park County would be one place to look, but expect harsh winters (but good hunting). Otherwise, the plains of Colorado are amazingly cheap if you get 2-3 hours southeast of Denver. I've seen 1,600 sq. ft. homes on 20 acres going for $85k out there. Most of it is dryland farms, which means no water rights with it, but it's good productive land and wells are rarely deeper than 135'.


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## The_Blob (Dec 24, 2008)

you could try Foreclosure.com - Home Foreclosures, Pre-Foreclosures, Bank Foreclosures

No matter what you may have heard or read, there is no such thing as "free land from the government." There is no federal homesteading program and public land the government finally does sell is sold only at market value.

Under the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 (FLMPA), the federal government took over ownership of public lands and abolished all remaining traces of the often-amended Homestead Act of 1862. Specifically, the FLMPA declared that, "the public lands be retained in Federal ownership, unless as a result of the land use planning procedure provided in this Act, it is determined that disposal of a particular parcel will serve the national interest..." 

Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) oversees the use of some 264 million acres of public land, representing about one-eighth of all the land in the United States. In passing the FLMPA, Congress assigned the main duty of the BLM as "the management of the public lands and their various resource values so that they are utilized in the combination that will best meet the present and future needs of the American people." 

U.S. would seem to have enough land to accommodate that demand easily. America has about 7% of the world's land, but only about 5.6% of its population. Little of the nation's surface is inhabited; nearly three-quarters of the population lives on 1.5% of the land. If all Americans were to move into Texas, the resulting population density would be no greater than England's. If the country seems crowded, it is only because so many of its residents insist on clustering in cities and suburbs.

The U.S. is not running out of land, but the empty areas are not always available for development. Close to half of the country's 2.3 billion acre surface is still taken up by farm and pasture land. More than one-third of the land is owned by the biggest single holder: the Government. The bulk of this consists of timberlands, national parks, grazing land and military reserves in Alaska and the Far West. 

Even much of the vacant land is acreage that no one wants to live or build on. Large tracts of fairly cheap land -less, say, than $300 per acre - can still be found in such relatively unpopulated places as northeastern Vermont, Alabama, Oklahoma, Missouri and northern Michigan. There is even some good shorefront land available for less than $5,000 an acre in North Carolina and Washington - though along many other shorelines, houses are jammed wall-to-wall and prices are outrageous. Trouble is, people settle not just where land is cheapest but where there are jobs, schools, hospitals, roads and other amenities.

To spread those population attractors around, the Government is financing a modestly ambitious 'new-towns effort'. But little significant population redistribution is taking place, because developers like to site their new towns near existing metropolitan areas in order to increase their chances for success. I'm pretty skeptical of the chances for much reshuffling.


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## saintsfanbrian (Oct 30, 2008)

Hey, if the Government wants to pay me to go settle on a piece of land some where out in the middle of no where I am all for it.


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## Largecar (Jan 30, 2009)

I reckon we set on a gold mine. Our land was $1000 an acre, good well water, 
a mixed terrain and plenty of deer and wild pig to boot. Wish you good luck finding the land thats is right for you. Just a suggestion, try your county for tax sales or drive around looking for an abandon property. One other thing cash talks around here so you may want to keep that in mind.


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## youpock (Oct 20, 2009)

What is the land like that you can 10 acres for $20k? Is it hilly or forest? I remember driving thru Nebraska and saw lots of plots in/around hwy 80 that had what looked like small lakes or large ponds.

Once school is finished up my brother and I plan on buying land outside a city a few miles away from where I live now. Plots come up here and there in about the $200k range but you can between 150 - 250 acres. The problem is most the land lacks trees and running water. I found one plot about six months ago that would have been perfect, 147 acres with both flat and hills, with a small river/creek. For only $198k unfortunately timing was just bad : (


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## horology (Mar 23, 2010)

endurance said:


> I have no problem finding 35 acres for $35k in Colorado. If you're looking for 5 acres, it starts at $5,600 and runs up to $15k depending on what you want. I'd recommend using Zillow or Colorado Horse Property and search away. Park County would be one place to look, but expect harsh winters (but good hunting). Otherwise, the plains of Colorado are amazingly cheap if you get 2-3 hours southeast of Denver. I've seen 1,600 sq. ft. homes on 20 acres going for $85k out there. Most of it is dryland farms, which means no water rights with it, but it's good productive land and wells are rarely deeper than 135'.


Check us out, Place of Refuge 2012 - A Survival Community

Thanks
Dan


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## Frugal_Farmers (Dec 13, 2010)

Look for local bank auctions. Very little advetisements on these but you could find a steal. A 16 area plot near us just sold at auction for $21K. If I had the cash I would have jumped on it myself. Lot's of folks are losing their land that has been in the family for generations. Sad, but true--it's the sign of the times.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

Location is everything. Man, how true that is.

You will need about 20% down to buy raw land. Can you muster up that kind of collateral? 

See if you can get a "Co-Op" going. Buy 100 acres, then sell it off as 10 each 10 acre plots, keeping a couple for yourself. Gotta be a market for that! The surveyor will cost a couple thousand, usually do do that kind of job.


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## Clarice (Aug 19, 2010)

Most of the acreage here in SE Arkansas is $3500/acre. To me where we live is one of the safest places. We are miles from any large cities and mostly farmers. We only have about 2 acres and grow a nice garden, have lots of fruit trees, 75 chickens and 2 rabbits. The # of rabbits will increase June 8th if all goes well.


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## woodsman23 (Aug 6, 2009)

This is what 9,900 can get you in western ny, comes with a great spring fed pond and spring water to the house. No hopuse when i bought it i built my own..


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## goshengirl (Dec 18, 2010)

Holy cow, Woodsman - that's fantastic!!!


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## Clarice (Aug 19, 2010)

Beautiful place Woodsman.


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## StrayDog (May 2, 2011)

Well you must have a better gig than me... Taxes here are 3600 a year on $ 91,000 in assessment. Taxes are up 80% in ten years; highest in the 50 states. Sorry but I would never recommend a place where the monthly tax commitment is higher than the house payment on a 15 year mortgage. :nuts: Soon as we locate the new state we want to live in, NY can kiss my proverbial buttocks.


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## gypsysue (Mar 27, 2010)

That brings up a good point, straydog. Always check on the property tax before you buy a property. If the property is sitting empty, see how much it'll go up when you move onto it. 

Our property had sat empty for 7 years when we bought it. When we moved into the cabin it went up more than 4 times the amount it had been sitting empty. Montana has weird ways of doing their property taxes. We do benefit from one of their other quirks in tax code...our cabin isn't on a 'proper' foundation, and while we're not required to do anything about that, we're taxed at a lower rate because of it!

Do your homework. Ask questions of the assessor and/or tax office. Find out how much things like sheds will increase your taxes. We have a couple of those Costco "garage-carport tents", and they're not taxes as a building. We built a pole frame and put used metal roofing on it for our bicycles and motorcycles, and it gets taxed. 

Homes here are taxed by square footage of the ROOF! Doesn't matter how nice it is or if it's one floor or two. 

Boats are the same. We went to register a 12-ft rowboat (with a small gas motor) and it was outlandishly high. They told us the foot thing, they're taxed and registered by the foot (boat registration, however, is a one-time permanant license). So we paid the same as someone with a $50,000 12-ft racing boat or any boat that length regardless of value or motor size!


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## woodsman23 (Aug 6, 2009)

StrayDog said:


> Well you must have a better gig than me... Taxes here are 3600 a year on $ 91,000 in assessment. Taxes are up 80% in ten years; highest in the 50 states. Sorry but I would never recommend a place where the monthly tax commitment is higher than the house payment on a 15 year mortgage. :nuts: Soon as we locate the new state we want to live in, NY can kiss my proverbial buttocks.


I know NY taxes are the highest i agree with you i pay almost 2k a year in taxes and i am not happy one bit. But i built this home here with my own hands and made this place what it is today.. I am not moving.. When the SHTF who's gonna collect taxes anyways.... Also i have a home in fla and while taxes are cheap there insurance for the home far outweighs the tax rate here................. it's give and take insurance here in NY is maybe 300 a year fla minimum 2600 a year.:surrender:


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## StrayDog (May 2, 2011)

woodsman23 said:


> I know NY taxes are the highest i agree with you i pay almost 2k a year in taxes and i am not happy one bit. But i built this home here with my own hands and made this place what it is today.. I am not moving.. When the SHTF who's gonna collect taxes anyways.... Also i have a home in fla and while taxes are cheap there insurance for the home far outweighs the tax rate here................. it's give and take insurance here in NY is maybe 300 a year fla minimum 2600 a year.:surrender:


I understand your points. I have built and or rebuilt 5 houses over the years and don't get me wrong as I love the country up here. They may not collect tax in the future but for right now any extra money I dream of setting aside for anything goes to tax and we are falling short. 
As long as your in a position to keep up your ok but we are on the brink and are no way prepared for anything down the road. We are being taxed into extinction and I think our money could be used better getting us ready than providing for the government any their families. 
On a side note, I learned today that a trash man in NY City makes $75,000 to start with benefits and some veteran workers are making 6 figure incomes; for picking up trash? I care for people everyday and have their lives in my hands yet make less than a quarter of that... :dunno: 
Don't get me wrong but its just one of the reasons I can't stand this state. Meh, that could turn into a whole new rant but you do have a nice place there. Hopefully you can still prepare as well. :rantoff:


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## gypsysue (Mar 27, 2010)

Well, Montana may be a cold place and gardening takes a lot of work protecting the plants from the weather, but our property taxes seem to be cheaper than most places. We pay $380 a year for 20 acres of forested land in the mountains with a log home and outbuildings.

Of course, extra money tends to go on more shelter for garden food, such as small greenhouses, hoop-houses, wall-o-waters, row covers, etc!


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## BillM (Dec 29, 2010)

*Survive in place for a year*

WTSHTF, A large precent of people will not survive !
If you can survive in place for a year after LAWKI ends. The population will be greatly reduced and there will be a lot of cheap land and equipment.

:scratch


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## gypsysue (Mar 27, 2010)

BillM said:


> WTSHTF, A large precent of people will not survive !
> If you can survive in place for a year after LAWKI ends. The population will be greatly reduced and there will be a lot of cheap land and equipment.
> 
> :scratch


True. If only we had a time frame for that! It could be next week, next month, next year, next lifetime. Drat....if only I had a crystal ball! :scratch

Our own personal "SHTF" has been financial, and if we didn't have this place, AND have it paid off, we'd be homeless and starving (or at the mercy of endless government programs). :gaah:

But you make a good point. :ignore:


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## kejmack (May 17, 2011)

Yeah, but NY taxes will kill you. That is the reason that the under 30 crowd is fleeing NY in droves.


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## StrayDog (May 2, 2011)

kejmack said:


> Yeah, but NY taxes will kill you. That is the reason that the under 30 crowd is fleeing NY in droves.


We are well past 30 and if I could convince the wife to move out of NY I would do so in a heartbeat. 80% property tax increase in the last 10 years with no end in sight. House payment for 15 years: $155.00, Interest $344.00, Taxes $322.00.

Things are out of control here and getting worse daily. I could go into a big speal but its not worth getting worked up about; only getting out.


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## HELIXX (Jan 2, 2011)

Try Mo and a TN. Dirt cheap there in the Ozarks and Mark Train forest.


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