Rancho Subsim (for reals)

[Onkel Neal]

Well, I've been thinking about it for some time, now I'm actually looking: for land to build my retirement home. :woot:

I'm not retiring, yet, but I am ready to buy some land and start working on a small cottage. Here are my goals and requirements:

Land
Needs to be a least 3 acres, up to 20.
Must be out in the country, west of Eagle Lake, east of SA, north of Edna and south of Waco. My favorite areas are LaGrange, Lockhart, Gonzales, and Halletsville.

Cottage
Still in the design stage but it will be a small two-story, cement slab, dutch gambrel style roof.

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/picture.php?albumid=10&pictureid=7040


Like that, except with large garage doors on the bottom floor.

Bottom floor will be my garage and motorcycle workshop. Top floor will have my studio apartment, small kitchen, closets and bunk bed. It will be maximized for space conservation, like a yacht or a submarine.

Yesterday I scoped out some property near Sublime, Texas (https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4aV4JtIYQcdLTZodFhyYWxTV1k/edit?usp=sharing) that looked pretty good. I used my cell phone in my shirt pocket, it worked ok until the end, then it fell out :doh:

[GoldenRivet]

If you open up anything in Lagrange - let me know :03:

[Betonov]

Don't forget guest rooms for tired travelers form Europe :)

[Sailor Steve]

Wow, that's pretty cool, Neal. :sunny:

It's good to have a plan.

[AVGWarhawk]

Plan your work and work your plan. :up:

I will always be in the country. Somewhere in the Appalachian mountain area when I retire.

Good luck!

[Jimbuna]

Looks a bit like Amityville http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v499/c_jane24/Smileys/4_6_100.gif

try to ensure the hot tub has a drinking bar attached for when I next visit :)

[Wolferz]

I take it this nixes the plan to move to Austria or will you be building your summer home there?:03::D

[GoldenRivet]

Appalachian mountain area

Damn good people

spent many summers there as a kid putting pennies on train tracks, hiking through the mountains playin war, catchin "craw dads" out of the creeks... one of Earth's great places.

:up:

[TarJak]

Neal,

I suggest you also get some steps installed so you don't need a ladder to get to the front door.:D

[Stealhead]

Neal,

I suggest you also get some steps installed so you don't need a ladder to get to the front door.:D


:har: I thought that door was a bit funny as well.

[the_tyrant]

Great idea:yeah:

If I were you, I would plant a vineyard too! Nothing too major, just a small vineyard for a few cases of wine per year.

Mainly for your own consumption, and whenever your subsim buddies visit

[eddie]

Looks good Neal, wish you all the best with that project!:up:

[Oberon]

Neal,

I suggest you also get some steps installed so you don't need a ladder to get to the front door.:D

Steps?

Nonsense, this is how Neal will get in his front door:

http://johnwelbourn.powerathletehq.com/files/2013/02/Evel-knievel-1.jpg

[Onkel Neal]

So, I set up an appointment with my bank tomorrow. And I called the realestate company to ask a few questions about the land:

. The property that you called on is no longer on the market, the seller's sold another piece of land that they had and they no longer wish to sell their property.

:dead: Starting over....

[nikimcbee]

If you open up anything in Lagrange - let me know :03:

Subsim cult compound? Waco has been taken.

[mookiemookie]

Why build above ground? Get a bunker. :Kaleun_Periskop:

[Herr-Berbunch]

All sounds good, the garage obviously needs to fit a limo, and you need some doors that people can see. :yeah:

And you don't need a guest room, but some kind of dorm-block for the meet. :D

[Onkel Neal]

No, there won't be room in this abode for dorms, but I can provide camp ground :)

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

No, there won't be room in this abode for dorms, but I can provide camp ground :)C'on Neal! :D I'm confident there will be enough real estate for small scale (Marine) barracks for next SubSim meet. I'm sure you know who you should recruit to keep order... (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUr6kr6TagU) :D

[Buddahaid]

Alla en el rancho subsim....

[Platapus]

Neal,

I suggest you also get some steps installed so you don't need a ladder to get to the front door.:D

That would only encourage visitors.

but that's the way to do it, buy some dirt in a nice location and build. I should have done that back when I was single.

Every once in a while I drool over the Log Homes catalogs. That would be sweet.

Good luck with these plans. :up:

[Mr Quatro]

Don't forget to make sure you have the right to pass over other people's property to get to your own. I forget the legal term for it, but around here it has to be renewed every five years.

I bought a piece of property off the grid about 1 and 1/3 acre and lived on it for three or four months, but when winter came I decided to move into town.

While I was living in town someone came along and bought both pieces of property on either side of me and then tried to buy mine from me so he could have a super nice parcel of land to build his cabin on. When I would not sell he informed me that I could no longer use the two roads that travelled through his property to get to mine. I then asked if I could park at the bottom and walk up and he said, "No".

The walk up to mine was to steep to drive or walk so to make a long story short I sold him my parcel, it's now worth three times more than it was seven years ago.

Make sure you have the right of way and mineral rights too and don't think a survey is too expensive an item to include.

Hope I can save you some grief ... :yep:

[Oberon]

the garage obviously needs to fit a limo,

For when Jim comes over. :03:

[Onkel Neal]

A :subsim: cult? Near Waco-we'll all be Branch ONKELIANS:up: AS to the stairwell of the proposed 'land yacht'; look into a corner stairs with alternate uneven half steps to conserve space. Only 6' sg. My Bro-inlaw, a skilled carpenter, built one in his small custom house in Mass. and its REAL COOL ...just be sober coming down! What happen to Austria?:k_confused::Kaleun_Salute:

Austria was out when I was warned I could not strut about bragging about being a Texan. :sunny:

[Mr Quatro]

Hire an easement, eminent domain or 'right of way' Attourney. Generally it cannot be denied as it is grandfatherd in. No hearing officer will put up with it as it lowers the value of your property (access) and that pisses off the county assessor.


Thank you, but it was seven years ago and I was too poor to hire an attorney. I paid cash and he paid me cash and what the heck lesson learned the hard way. Now I like electric power and even though I was debt free gas is $3.85 a gal now and I needed two gallons a day for the generator plus water, plus fire wood plus trips to the store 20 miles away.

But thank you for your good advice ... I just got bullied is all.

Check out these cabins: http://www.pinterest.com/abinonsekiz/cabins/

[Catfish]

Hello Neal,
and i thought you had plans for the Netherlands err Austria ? :)

Nice house anyway, sad it was gone but there sure are lots of others! We have built a timber-frame (?) house in Germany, but very modern in a lot of ways. It is not ready yet after almost 6 years, but it is much fun working on it and seeing improvements and progress.

How warm is it in the area you want to settle ?

We first intended to install a 'Blockheizkraftwerk' (how do you translate that, a "block heating powerhouse" ? lol). It is generally an engine that produces electricity, and heats water as a by-product via exhaust-heat-exchanger. You can even earn money with it here if you direct electricity into the public grid with it. You can alternatively produce your own current as an 'island solution' , but then the engine would have to run as soon as you need current. Not necessary here, but nice to have in case of the inevitable Zombie apocalypse (ahem).
You can run it with fuel, propane or natural gas when you use a normal engine, or alternatively a Diesel that can also be run with castor or any plant oil. You just need other jet-nozzles, and a changed controlling device.

Unfortunately for such an engine you really need a block of several houses to heat, or at least a very big and/or badly insulated home for the engine in order to run long enough. In our case, we soon realized it did not make sense unless we had a heated driveway to melt snow, and an open swimming pool (the latter being heated to 20 degrees Celsius in winter).

So we installed a usual cheap combi gas heater, for water and heating. It is supported by some sun-collectors mounted on the southern part of the roof, and an iron-cast oven with water jacket, that can be fired with wood. The latter became much too complicated, as it heats too much and thus needs regulators, an overflow gully and valves to fill it up again.

A further problem is the heating pump is electric, so the central heating system would fail in case of a power-out, but i take it the temperature and water would be agreeable enough, with the oven.
The internet would also fail but we even saw to that, but this is another story (internal 2nd 12 V grid, engine and batteries).
I am sure we will never need that all though, but it is much fun :)

Thanks and greetings,
Catfish

P.S. and thanks for the mail :up:

[Onkel Neal]

Howdy Catfish, awesome that the mail has already made it there:o That was fast.

Well, it really does not get cold here, probably only gets to -2 once or twice a year, and only as low as 4~6 for a week or two. Mostly the winter here is 7+.

The land I was looking at did not have a house yet. I included that image as an example of what I want to build. I am now back to the stage of looking for land... it will probably take a while.

I agree, the building aspect is a lot of work but also fun and gratifying. I have done some of this before. I will have a contractor pour the foundation and build the frame and roof, then I will hang the windows, doors, add trim, walls, and sheetrock, etc. as I have time.

[Catfish]

Hello Neal,
the mail was indeed here the day before yesterday :)

It can get bitterly cold here in winter, but also very warm in summer.
Don't know what that is in Fahrenheit, but we have up to 35 degrees Celsius in (hot) summer, and down to -20 Celsius in (hard) winters.
Last winter and this summer matched those numbers .. so heating is a serious issue.

I like the style of the house you posted, very nice and roomy, but not too big to maintain. There would be a nice place for a veranda (?) in front of that door ..

Unfortunately the landscape here is quite flat, and even if there are some smaller lakes and tiny 'rivers' around, there is nothing to see from our house being withinthe woods.
The house is also grounded on a concrete foundation, but they 'forgot' some part, some timber sill frame already sitting partly on nosthing but air,
and we had to pour the rest of the concrete ourselves, later linking the new part to the old one via stainless steel anchors - threw us back 3 months in working time.
Anyway for us it is much fun, even we did not have much money when we began. Doing a lot yourself is not only financially rewarding, thinking of the 'quality' some hired workers do at times ..

Good luck, maybe we can have a housebuilding thread at some time, with lots of pictures :up:

Thanks and greetings,
Catfish