So I have 100 acres of fenced in property in the rural county. I am inheriting from my grandparents. it’s pretty hilly but lots of green grass. There is a spring house as well as a creek that runs through. What would be the best way to make a profit on this property. I currently work 40 hours a week at a real person job (it’s very sad) I’d love to figure a way out to eventually make enough profit to quit my job.
by Outspokenwomen
26 Comments
My guy! Congratulations! First things first – never get rid of an acre. You can never get it back.
Next, it sounds like you have great grazing land. You can board horses if there’s a market for it, raise cattle, or lease your land to a guy who wants to raise cattle. Probably more things but man what a great inheritance. Plants some trees in honor of the grandparents.
Best way would be strike oil or put up a cellphone tower. What you ought to do is grow barley to feed to chickens. Don’t quit your job
Rent out the land for camping, hunters, dog training or horse riders. Just upkeep the trails every so often and maintain cleanliness rules. Obviously not all at the same time rotate whats being offered seasonally.
Alpacas, their wool is a more expensive than sheep and you can make a type of petting zoo with them.
I would just supplement it, like grow your own food and just enjoy the property. While renting it out to people might make money, peace is truly priceless. Unless you have a really bad job; it’s a shit ton of work to make a homestead profitable, especially by yourself. It may even be impossible. (Unless you’re bad at accounting and trick yourself into thinking you’re profitable).
Homesteaders are also working real person jobs.
Awesome piece of property. I guess the best thing to decide is how much income you can survive on? Then deciding what you will and won’t need in order to leave your current job. Start small, plant a garden that can reduce your food bill, put the money you saved into savings towards the next project.
There will be no quick cash crop/livestock that’ll get you out of the rat race. However, working towards removing yourself from the rat race can be just as fun.
Probably easiest is to rent most of it out to farmers and in the meanwhile figure out what you’ll do with it.
If it’s all hilly land then you’d probably be looking at using it to rear animals for meat, since it’d be too difficult for tractors and machinery to drive around on.
Spend some time at local farmers markets, go to animal auctions, talk to people there, look up past sales numbers for example of calves and sales numbers when they’re finished or sold for slaughter. I’d try and get as much local information as you can because Google can only help so much.
Maybe try to get some part time work on a farm so you can see if it’s something you’d actually want to do, especially in the cold, wet and wind.
Pony rides 100%
Wasabi farming
Make sure the perimeter fence is stout. Cross fence it , (electric )with access isles to water. Do a rotational grazing of beef cattle. Buy hay, in season round bales, feed these during cold months.
Sell the meat as premium grass-fed on fb marketplace, halves and whole. Use a local processor. You’ll need a tractor or skid steer with forks and bucket, and a small cattle trailer and truck. Rent a bull in fall for breeding your cows.
You can start small with a couple cow/calf pairs, and winter feed small square bales.
Remember they need shelter from the wind.
Once you’re set up, it doesn’t take much input.
Are you anywhere near a population center? You have a lot more options with customers nearby.
Fence 2-3 acres off and register with Sniff Spot. Its an app that connects dog owners with private properties to run their dogs. Check the app – not sure of pricing and such.
Fence it. Clear some paths. Get insurance. Set up an LLC. Tent campsites. Until you can retire
Never sell the land
Look at leasing it to cattle folk until you think of something elae
fenced in? rent it out as pasture. Sheep, goats, cows or horses.
I have 30 acres and a neighbor is doing fairly well with goats and sheep. There’s a brisket market for goat meat and lambs. I’d venture tgat a combination of cattle, goatrs/ sheep, and chickens (you can alternate pastures with these three and reduce labor…let them naturally do the work…no scraping cow dung off the pasture along with with growing some soybeans and or alfalfa (both to regenerate the soil a bit and for the forage). You’ll still need periodic fertilizing with trace elements and P K. Congrats and condolences. I too got mine from my grandparents but in a way (life trust to my Aunt and her ignorant husband) that made it too late in my life to really use it well. So be wise. If you’ve got the energy to farm it then great. If not sell it now and invest. Sounds like a great set up with water already there. So much work on mine to water livestock. If the fence is good buying calves in the spring and grazing them until fall and then selling them as 100% grass fed beef might be worth it as it would be easier as the food and water are already there. The goats will eat what they won’t…and the chickens scratch through the rest.
Good luck and again both condolences and congratulations. I’d give the land back to have my grandparents back in a second.
You can lease the acreage to a farmer for what’s called “calf & cattle grazing”. You’re gonna want to talk to some knowledgeable people about how to protect yourself legally if something goes wrong (I don’t know what, like a calf gets out or a sow gets sick or something) but so long as you secure the property boundary, some local farmers might love to pay you a few bucks to give their herd some exercise.
look at joel salatin’s polyface farms! him and richard perkins do great stuff
I am quitting my job and coming to work this farm. 100 acre… Isn’t that a loot? I own like 1.300sqm of rural…but that wouldn’t ever make a life from it. I only think some day to convert it in my garden since I live 15 min walk.
It’s not going to be easy. Very few homestead full time and make any sort of living wage.
The more profitable ways I could see this going are.
– horse boarding, lessons, trail rides, camp
– high value nursery crops intensively managed
– farm experiences – pumpkin patch, pick your own apples, airbnb on the farm etc
What are the farm distillery laws in your state?
Deer stands. Fence inspection
It’s hard to give you good advice without knowing your location. Are you near a population center? Do you want to go the “wholesale” route or sell direct-to-consumer? Livestock or veggies?
You place a wife wanted add such as this classic:
“I am eighteen years old, have a good set of teeth, and believe in Andy Johnson, the star-spangled banner, and the 4th of July. I have taken up a State lot, cleared up eighteen acres last year, and seeded ten of it down. My buckwheat looks first-rate, and the oats and potatoes are bully. I have got nine sheep, a two-year-old bull, and two heifers, besides a house and barn. I want to get married. I want to buy bread-and-butter, hoop-skirts, and waterfalls for some person of the female persuasion during life. That’s what’s the matter with me. But I don’t know how to do it.”
Where are you located? I do farm consulting and help you get started. It’s not easy and there is an up hill battle but once you get established that’s when you can start making money. Depending where you are at there are grants that we could help you get as well.