In the meantime I would appreciate any advice you could give about questions we should be asking or resources available for us to research.

Many thanks!
Sharon

An elevated block is always preferable. Ask the locals what they recall about heavy rains in the area.

If fast internet access is an issue you may want to ask what the phone services are like. ADSL only goes to about 4 kms from the exchange.

And no offence to the honest real estate agents out there, but unless they are verifiable facts (ie is there town water) don't ask these questions of the real estate agent. They will either lie or glorify the answer.

If it's in a town you are not familiar with you might want to see what facilities are available. Can I assume you are going to live there? Do you have kids that will require schools?

If you wish to keep large animals you might want to see if there is a vet within reasonable distance or will visit. Farriers? if you're looking at keeping horses.

Perhaps I'm jumping to conclusions about your requirments, but just things I'd consider.

Check out the Farm Life Forum. There's lots you can pick up.

there is much to consider bedore purchasing acreage, water etc.,. are probably the least of those considerations. you cannot believe anything that real eastate people say they know nothing of telling bad land from good land all they know is flog it off and get the commission.

here in qld running power and phone to your block is probably going to cost around $10,000 dollars, there are a few variables which could make it cheaper or dearer, and up here the power companies want a 10 year guarantee so you pay a set price for power even if you use less than that amount.

whatever don't buy with the heart buying real estate is for using the head only. but like i say there is much to consider and lots of it start from your suburban home before you even begin to buy or look for property.

just remember there is good land and useless land you need to be able to tell the difference, because at the end of the day the "buyer beware" motto realy counts, you buy a lemon that you fell in love with and the chances are when you want out no one else will want it.

for the main properties of that size you need to provide your own water talking to locals may help a bit but usually that comes later when you need to use a local service so you use the best or most reliable.

best advice i can give you is your homework starts before you start looking.

len.

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We have since seen a few other blocks to investigate further. I have spent a bit of time talking to the council in the shire where the land is located about planning requirements, etc. and also to someone I know who built near the area (albeit a few years ago) about such things as using bottled gas/having power run onto the property, etc. More investigation to do of course, but hopefully it will all pay off and we will find a property we are happy with.

Regards, Sharon.

yes getting the average rain falls for the area are top of the list it's just you gotta watch what you read into them:

1.. get the average over the last 99 years

2.. get the average over the past 10 years

3.. get the medium average for that 10 years ie.,. they drop out the highest and lowest falls recorded this will give you a closer indicator of what may actually fall in that area.

4.. get a yearly average of how many rain days they had in those 10 years, just think if you get all your rain say in 100 days of the year there are a lot of days that you don't get any hey? like last month all the rain came in 4 days and a rain day is counted if .2mm of rain is recorded in the guage that equates to a good heavy dew.

now having said all that the actual rainfall on the propeerty you hope to buy may not be the same as the district average which is taken from a rain guage generally at the local post office ok!! like where i live we are app' 5k from where the rain is recorded and we get around 15 to 20% more rain than they do that is a lot of rain over a year. of course if we had bought further west we may get proportionaly less, something to keep in mind.

if you are going to talk to neighbours find ones who keep good rain fall records and work you own averages.

rainfall is only one aspect there are many more traps out there for the unwary and unwise.

but like i said in my previous post my advice don't buy anything that you fall in love with that means the heart rules and head must rule in this purchase.

let the buyer beware

len

consider age and general health this brings distance to hospitals time for emergency services to get to you and all of that. remember as i have just found out you can't factor in for the unknown health problems that could come along, so you need to buy land that has some speculation value or land that someone else other than you will want to buy. in times of drought farmers section off and sell their least productive land they give nothing away, they know what they are doing.

the crunch line is you need to develop a criteria of WHY? you want to move to rural and what you hope to achieve, you can't go on the hairy fairy stuff you know the head in the clouds of wanting to be a land baron, don't laugh! lots do and we see it all the time people sitting it our on a block of useless dirt waiting for the right time to sell, must be like hell on earth.

and first up you don't turn 20 acres into lawn it just doesn't work that way. the general rule is anything less than 10 acres is too small to do anything with and too much to keep as lawns and garden. and 20 acres to 120 acres takes the same amount to look after. so if there is a larger block that is better quality land put that on your list.

and when running power every power pole you need to put in can add thousands to job, and you have to pay for the trench for the phone from the front boundry to the home site. and the most ridiculous thing we see is people who buy acreage then live right at the road boundry and cop the traffic noise and in most cases the dust, might as well stay in the 'burbs.

we took 18 months of driving around south east qld looking and learning and asking questions of old timers and those who use the land for making money, just to learn what to look for in a good block of land and we duid pretty well, we had a pretty sound criteria that kept the heart out of the deal. abd on top of that we would visit a block up to 6 times just checjinmg and getting the feeling, we did that very many times many agents thought we where ready to sign but they where wrong.

len

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the web address will change soon but the e/mail address will remain current.

But some of the points mentioned, might not be problems.

If you have to use bottled gas, it is no problem. Unless you are really out in the Woop woops, you might have difficulties in delivery but in Victoria, I am sure you will be fine.

If you plan on growing stuff then check the soil. Good soil will mean you will not have to do all the hard work of bringing it up to standard. As Len said, check rainfall.

Check with anyone on the neighbouring properties before you buy. They will give you valuable information on all these considerations. I found that knocking on doors and asking what they knew about the property for sale was a great way to see if they might be a good neighbour. Nearly always, they were friendly and generous in their advice.

Cheap land is rarely as good as the more pricey land. You tend to get what you pay for.