jdemaris
02-03-2004 10:00:29
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Re: Re: Re: Re: land prices in reply to Hermit, 02-03-2004 07:52:30
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"Character" in reference to land is, of course, is a relative term. I already live in a rural farming area with mountains, valleys and beautiful views. Deer, turkey, coyotes, bear, brook trout, lake trout, etc. Most on our own property except for the lake trout. I also have no neighbors, which I like, on our 50 acres. I make maple syrup and have a couple of nice stands of sugar maples. We've been considering moving closer to my wife's parents since my kids are grown and this area is losing it's rural and agricultural character. So . . . since my wife is from Michigan, and her parents still live there (they retired and moved from Dearborn to Alpena), we've been trying to find something comparible to this area in Michigan. Seems the state is mostly flat, so finding a piece with some hills or rolling terrain (one of the attributes that I consider as character), is difficult. Would also like some sugar maples. A few realtors that I spoke with in the U.P. describe such land as "Classic" and highly desireable and very expensive. Seems what goes for $400-$800 an acre here brings $4000-$7000 an acre there, if you can find it. Long story short, it's hard to move from a beautiful area to live somewhere flat with scrub trees. Don't get me wrong, I'm not sitting here with my nose in the air. Everyone likes something different. Most of my kids hate this place and live in cities. I have a friend who says his wife can't stand to live anywhere that she can't hear police sirens and firetrucks on a daily basis. So, who knows? We haven't seen all of the U.P. yet either. We saw some nice areas in the western U.P. around the Porcupine Mountains but we saw nothing reasonable for sale. We also found some beautiful areas around Grand Marais, and basically, that's where we've been trying to buy some land. We also looked at some old potato farms in Posen which were priced close to reasonable. There's an Otsego County in Michigan that was named after our Otsego County, in New York - where I live right now. Named by people leaving here, and going there for cheaper but similar land. Another apparent drawback to many parts of Michigan is the lack of junkyards. I know, sounds silly, but this is a tractor forum, right? My old and crappy 1973 motorhome broke down in Alpena, and I asked my father-in-law where the nearest auto/tractor junkyard was, and he informed me that there weren't any. I didn't research the matter to find out where the nearest one was - but panic set in. I've never lived anywhere before that didn't have junkyards. As far as what you mentioned about taxes, yeah, you're right. Big problem around is - city people have been coming here and paying inflated prices for land - which makes bargains hard to find. Then, whenever their assessments go up, instead of questioning the matter, or grieving at Tax Greivance Day, they take it as a compliment and assume it just means their property is worth more. That's just screws things up for the rest of us. We've got a couple of hundred acres of land scattered around here, and in the Adirondacks and on the Tug Hill Plateau in NY - but it's getting so the taxes are too much and we've been considering getting rid of it all and moving on. Problem is, move on to where?
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