Country Property Dirt Cheap: How I Found My Piece of Inexpensive Rural Land...Plus My Adventures with a $300 Junk Antique Tractor
The key word here ischeap, since if you have enough money, a broker can find you something nice even in Orange County. The trick is to avoid brokers and get out in the sticks. In southern Iowa, Turner studied plat books, looking for odd pieces of land; he drove miles of gravel roads; he ran ads in small-town papers; he went to farm auctions; and he learned the difference between quitclaim and warranty deeds, as well as how to deal with surveyors, at what point to contact a lawyer, and how to determine the right amount to offer. Finally, he found 15 acres of timber, with rural water and power already available, for $6,000. Next he bought a Farmall H tractor for $300, and a building for $100--the most delightful chapter explains how to jack up and move a building along back roads. A modest, quirky book, well written and entertaining, by an obsessive bachelor whose like can be found in any public library and whose method would seem to be applicable in any rural community.John Mort