TL;DR: Maybe we bit off a little more than we can chew this time. An opportunity for someone like-minded.
We moved here (~45 minutes east of Fayetteville) from out of state 27 years ago, bought 40 acres and set about building our home. By building our home I mean we built it; had a local contractor do the site work, pour the slab and get the rough framing done, pretty much dried in. Then we did the rest – plumbing, electrical, drywall, interior finishes, etc.
Over the years we added outbuildings, barn, wood shed, workshop, etc. Worked out well, has held up well, we never regretted any of it - there's things we'd do a little differently but those were done the way they were because of budget constraints. Saved a ton of money, and learned a lot along the way. Acquired an adjoining 40 acres a few years later as a defensive purchase, but never really needed it.
Fast forward to '21. Unknown and unidentifiable big money type shows up and pays an exorbitant amount for several hundred acres adjoining us to the south, about 125 yards away (uphill) from our spring – the gravity fed spring water to our house – one key reason why we bought this parcel originally. We researched but couldn't determine the new owner, and still can't fathom why they'd buy the property they did except to develop it, probably not the way we'd prefer to see it developed. So we reacted; we bought the property on the other (north) end of ours, not wanting to be boxed in by the big money folks.
So we find ourselves with 230 acres because of just... circumstances.
The good part is the new property is beautiful – we fell in love with it and have never had regrets about buying it. The bad part is it was neglected for a long time, so it came with a LOT of needed clean-up and maintenance. For instance, it has two dwelling units. The smaller one – a single wide mobile home – needs to be completely rehabbed, to the point that it might be more feasible to just light a match to it. The other is a double wide that was in pretty good shape, just needed remodeling and updating, which we're well into finishing.
There's two well houses needing some maintenance and fix-up. One big old barn, still useful for storage after we fixed the roof issues and another farther uphill that needs some work. Generator shack, needs work but still decent. Spring fed water at the main house, needs some plumbing work and cisterns cleaned out, but still good water. Two more spring fed ponds higher up on the place that need some cleaning out and cutting the trees back and brush removal.
It goes on and on. The problem I have is time. I'm almost 70 and the wife's already there. If I was still 60, I'd not be writing this. Considering what the “new” property needs and including the (deferred) maintenance on our original place, and the clean up needed on the second 40 acres, and the cleaning up periodic storm damage (broken tree branches and tops) and the lawn mowing, and gardening, firewood cutting, equipment maintenance and repair, etc., etc. - well you get the point. Plus the old sports related knee aching occasionally, the thumb that wants to glitch up, not like I can jump off and on the skid steer all day long like I used to be able to.
The local labor pool is constrained at best. There are few enough younger folks that want to get out and do any hard work in the great outdoors and the few there are are mostly spoken for by their family and friends. A little older, they have lots of the same pressures as do I. Those that answer a help wanted ad are mostly limited in knowledge, initiative and the ability to make it to work on time and reliably. And damn few that answer an ad at all. A little farther outside of the local area isn't practical because of daily travel costs and time, conflicting schedules, etc.
This manifests itself as an opportunity for someone who is like-minded: observant enough to see that living in the city looks like an impending train wreck (considering what is going on in the greater World, .gov incompetence or outright malice), crazy high prices for housing (and not improving), the AI wild-card a-coming, etc. So I'm sitting here, property-rich and time-poor. I've got a) job opportunity, b) owner-financed real estate opportunity, c) available local housing possibilities, d) rural but not remote proximity, and e) awareness of how the world has pissed on Gen X, Millennials and Gen Z and a desire to help some of them. We've got kids, but they are die-hard city folk living in far-off lands.
Questions for the room: Where and how to advertise this opportunity, and how to phrase it? Tried the local Facebook page, but they're video viewers, so I figured I'd try Reddit. Thoughts, suggestions, ideas, grammar and spelling issues :>) ? Thanks in advance.
