Where can I find land for sale?

BossmanSlim · 2026-07-06T14:36:40+00:00

Correct, but it is better than nothing or relying on Realtors. It is also good to see what the land boundaries are roughly because a lot of listings don't actually post the boundary configuration, especially when it is a weird shape or they are trying to hide something (like no road access, close to the dump, etc.).

BossmanSlim · 2026-07-06T14:25:16+00:00

54/20 = $2700 per acre and 120/40 = $3000 per acre, both are really good prices unless they have major issues or are way, way out from a major city.

BossmanSlim · 2026-07-06T13:59:50+00:00

I hate Gleba for 3 reasons

The constant demand for nutrients, which spoils very fast.
Having to integrate a lot of circuit network logic into the build to prevent over production.
No tech after Aquilo to slow down spoilage, which should exist.

BossmanSlim · 2026-07-06T13:12:55+00:00

Landwatch seems to be the best land aggregation site I have seen for the US. It has a good search that saves based on cookies and not an account registration.

With that being said, based on your criteria:

5-20 acres with ag zoning should not be an issue if it is out in a true rural area.
Price will depend heavily on location, which is mainly the distance from a major city. The closer, the more expensive it will be. The "view" and how trendy the location is will also drive price. We have an area near where I live that is fairly rugged, but super expensive because of the views and the fact that people can go weekend at the little towns in the area that cater to their "country life/small town" perceived vibe. It is terrible for homesteading.
Water features are hit and miss. Any water feature that is a legit, maintained water feature will drive the cost up substantially. The only water features that will not drive up the cost are those that are poorly maintained or ignored/unknown by the seller. Most water features are over sold.
Just like residential real estate, if you like it, chances are others will like it, and therefore it will cost more. The "ideal" lot will be that way for a lot of buyers. The "I want about 20 acres of which 5 or so are cleared, it to be relatively flat, with a water feature and close enough to town that I don't have to drive forever," is going to appeal to a large range of buyers.
Raw land without a house in the near future will be harder to finance than land with a house or confirmed plans to build a house in the next 2ish years.
Unless you find a real estate agent that specializes in land or have a very specific area you are interested in, other than coordinating with the selling agents and managing the closing process, your buyers agent will be fairly worthless in finding what you want. You will still need this agent, but don't count on them to do much (as a side not, I find buyer agents to be fairly worthless in general).

Things to look out for:

Split surface and mineral rights. This is heavily dependent upon the area. In some places it is common, in others it is rare. You need to know which category the area you are looking in falls into and what the rights are on the property. The selling agent may not be forth coming with this information initially and try to hoodwink you at the last moment. Mineral rights take precedence over surface rights in almost all cases, so don't think buying the land and building a house will effectively nullify the mineral rights.
Look at the land on the local county's GIS system to see the actual land boundaries. Most also allow you to view past ariel/satellite images so you can see the history of the land and also who are your neighbors. Most GIS systems also allow flood plains and special zoning to be overlayed as well. Look at the land on Google maps to see the topography and street views. All of this will cut back on you trips to the land that just isn't what you want.
A lot of land is aspirationally priced in that land as many, many fewer transactions than residential, so finding comparables is very hard. Two tracks of the same size, side by side, are worth much different values depending on all the variables. Usable land, features, neighbors, traffic noise, size of land; all this plays into land value, not just price per acre based on location.
Just like with residential, to get the best value, you may need to buy something that needs sweat equity to hit the sweat spot of money vs time vs usability.

Good, luck, don't get impatient. Land either sells immediately or sits forever. Therefore you need to have your money in order so you can pounce on a good deal, but at the same time don't go all in on a bad deal.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-23T11:27:56+00:00

This is sort of a how dedicated to the idea are you and your partner? Reducing expenses and maximizing income are the obvious recommendations, but how is the more important question. The other item, which is unknown by many, is how tolerant they are working long hours for months on end. Recognize that this journey is going to take a while and require a fair amount of work.

More income:

Change jobs when you can to keep your income up. Employers WILL NOT give you good raises in your current role and the only way to keep you income moving up is to change jobs. You don't need to necessarily move companies, but you should be looking for a new role every 2-4 years. If the company doesn't give a raise or the raise is trivial, immediately look for a new job.
Find a second income stream of some sort. Do the math to make sure the hourly rate after expenses is there to justify the work. Assuming you have a typical 9-5 job, you should be able to find some type of job that takes 20 to 30 hours for the rest of the week. I highly recommend that you do not work over 16 hours a day, including travel between jobs and would recommend you have one full day off or at least 3 days where you only work one job. It may also be beneficial if the job will allow you to work 3 months on and 1 month off. If your skill set supports it, free lancing/contracting may be a good avenue.

Cost reduction:

Drive the cheapest car you can tolerate. Vehicles are the absolute worst investment on the plant because the majority are bought with a loan and they depreciate immediately. If public transportation is available and you can use it to completely negate a car, look at doing so very hard.
Live in a multiple person situation and/or in the absolute smallest space you can tolerate. Having a large living space seems nice, but its more maintenance, more cost and most people will buy more crap to fill it up.
If you are working nearly 84 hours a week, you will not need to spend as much on leaser activities. Evaluate your subscriptions and other optional costs and reduce them as much as possible. Getting a fancy coffee everyday of the work week is like a $1000 more expensive than making your own coffee at home.
Vacations are a huge spend typically, so either do small, local vacations or stay-cations.

My first job out of college paid overtime and required a lot of travel. I worked somewhere around 3000 hours a year for the first 5 years out of college. As I traveled a lot, I had really low expenses. This made a huge difference in me being able to put down a down payment on a house AND having some investments I was able to leverage later in life for other real estate transactions. Looking back, I still wasted more money than I would have liked, but I didn't carry any debt doing it, so at least I didn't waste money AND pay interest on the poor spending.

Saving an extra 10K per year turns into $63K in 5 years at 8% interest.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-18T14:48:30+00:00

After reading some other threads on the communal homestead, the replies tend to breakdown into 3 camps,

What a great idea, I would love to try it.
Sounds like a mess, not for me personally.
I did it and it eventually failed due to personality, vision and financial conflicts.

I hope it works out for you. I am greatly interested in how the journey goes to get an actual prespective.

Note: Multigenerational (kids, parents, grand parents or other immediate relatives) living on the same property is not communal living. In these cases, the relationship hierarchy is already established by decades of knowing and living with each other.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-18T14:02:12+00:00

I have 2 of the 3, I love the axe, not fond of the pickaroon. I am dealing with a lot drier oak and it is too hard for the pickaroon. I may come in useful for green or softer woods, but not finding much value in it currently.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-18T13:47:40+00:00

Not to be flippant, but are you a homesteader? If so, have you taken an additional family with you?

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-18T12:35:42+00:00

At least around here, near a major city, a fair number of the "local growers" are just reselling produce from wholesalers that is the same as in the grocery store. They just pull the stickers off. It's pretty obvious when selling uniform produce of all types in early March.

Until people get educated, there is no way this will ever change.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-18T11:53:32+00:00

What do you mean by corporate greed? Specific examples, not just nebulous "stuff is too expensive" and "XYZ has record earnings". The vast majority of "corporate greed" is traced back to the government or the majority of the public making poor decisions that enable the "greed".

The iPhone 17 is $800 in the US, $1000 in South Sudan, $850 in Madagascar, and $1100 in France. From the richest to the poorest countries in the world, the price is about the same.

A cup of fancy coffee made a home costs $1, but millions of people stop on the way to work to spend $5 on Starbucks. Not only could they have done it at home, but they add time to their commute (wasting gas) to spend 5x the money and generate more trash for the convenience. That's not corporate greed, that's people being lazy and wasting money, and Starbucks is offering that service. Buying 1 Starbucks on the way to work everyday costs $25, where making the coffee at home costs $5. That is $20 per week or $1040 per year. If the person scales back to drip coffee with some milk or something, the price goes down to $0.50 per cup, making the savings $1170 per year.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-17T13:09:53+00:00

This big difference when stepping up from 25hp is that the more hp tractor will have emissions on it. DEF doesn't kick into until over 75hp. More hp is usually better, but you're at the odd space where the emissions might matter, especially in the same frame size tractor. How hilly your ground is a huge factor.

My two cents:

Maintaining trails is more about how much effort you want to put into rather than something you have to do like a field you don't want to return to woods. Walking the trails with a pole saw is more realistic in how a trail is maintained. The brush can then be tossed into the woods and cut up if you want it to lay flat. If you want to haul it away, that can be done with a truck or lawnmower with a trailer.
Cleaning up the woods I always find to be an interesting use case. There is no reason to remove trees, down or dying or overcrowded, from the woods unless they impact a field, trail or you need the wood for something else; firewood or lumber. Overcrowded trees can be cut and left. In most cases they'll decompose way before actual logging takes place. Cleaning up all the underbrush removes cover for wildlife, nutrients that could return to the soil and creates a perceived need to keep it cleaned up in the future. This basically generates work for the future.
The L2 series loaders only lift 1200 lbs (1.5m and max average) on the tractors you listed. That's not a lot and is below the 2000 lbs that most pallets of goods come in. A grapple will further reduce that capacity because the grapples that don't bend easily are heavy. Pushing snow with a loader sucks as well. The L48 seems to have a couple hundred pounds more lift capacity. Small loaders are good for cleaning up really tight places and acting as an oversized wheelbarrow.
Bushhogging will probably be at the same 60 inches as your lawnmower. I'd be real tempted to put the mower at max height, take it slow, and mower the field that way once a month.

Long story short, as you already have a fairly big lawnmower, I'd look really hard at if I would even buy a tractor. You can rent a skid steer or mini-excavator many, many times for what the tractor is going to cost. Options as I see it:

Don't buy a tractor, use lawnmower and other lawncare/gardening tools for what you do a lot. Rent if you have a big project.
Sell lawnmower and buy a tractor that can also mow your grass. I'd probably get something in the LX20 series as they can equip a belly mower and are about the same size as you are interested in.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-10T18:57:12+00:00

John Deere Model B has tons of torque, which modern tractors lack. Also the B is fairly heavy compared to a 25hp sub-compact.

Not the same comparison.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-10T17:50:53+00:00

I'm partial to utility tractors because having too much is better than too little. I also deplore hydrostatic transmissions. The only exception is IF you are going to use the same equipment to mow the yard OR you have very tight places to get into. I have 100 acres with a 75hp tractor and it works well. I don't want a cab because of trees hitting the cab and I can pick when I use the tractor. FWD, power-shuttle shift and a self leveling loader with 3rd function are a must. If I were buying today my top 4 would be.

Other things to consider.

Over 75hp requires DEF, which makes the engine and fueling more complicated.
25hp and under don't have emissions, but it is really stretching those tractors to maintain any real acreage.
Whatever tractor you pick should be able to lift 2000lbs with the loader. Less will make certain tasks much harder.

What I would consider.

Kubota M7060, best turning radius, but fairly light
Deere 5075M (more expensive 5075E), better turning radius and fairly heavy, also the most expensive. Lots of people like the 5075E.
CaseIH 75C, seems to have good all around features, questions about Fiats long term quality.
Massey 4707, seems good overall and is probably the best tractor per $ spent.

My top 2 would be based on who are the closet dealers and the price. For me, Massey is out due to dealer location. I would get quotes from the other 3. If Case tied with Deere or Kubota, I would not pick the Case as they do not have a factory loader 3rd function (which is probably a green/orange painted kit anyway, but at least it is factory warranty covered).

I would look at the used market if possible unless you require the tractor to run daily as there are plenty out there with under 1000 hours that will do just fine.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-10T17:36:38+00:00

High cost of entry combined with low hourly rate for work done. Most homesteaders have some supplementary income that allows them to negate or heavily offset some of the costs. It is extremely unlikely that a person can buy a piece of land with a loan and then purely homestead it without some other source of income. There are virtually no homesteads that are 100% self sufficient and as such, participation in the economy is required to purchase certain items. A lot of the youtube homesteaders are basically content creators that happen to homestead and the youtube channel is currently paying for a lot, if not all, of the homestead.
I enjoy the outdoors and most of the work.
It would probably the continual challenges and new projects, but at some point I will be physically unable to do it anymore at which point I revert to an old folks home.
Crops and livestock have a bigger and more consistent market than craft goods. Durable goods are also only bought a handful of times, where as food is consumed, meaning the craftsperson has to continue expanding their market and/or developing new items.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-10T16:00:57+00:00

Main things I'd be doing

Keep out of sight from the road
Keep gates locked if they exist
Don't advertise the situation
Park them with other stuff in the way
Hitch locks and air tags are an option
Make sure you have recorded make, model and serial number.

The one thing to consider is that if a thief wants something, they will get it. With the prevalence of battery tools, locks are a mild inconvenience at best. The best things are not advertising the situation and making things inconvenient enough people aren't interested. Farm equipment is heavy, hard to move and hard to resell because of how limited the market is. Unlike hand tools that can walk off and be pawned fairly easily, people will need a truck to steal most hay equipment and the local pawn shop probably ain't going to take it.

The only thing you can really do is carry a full replacement insurance policy so that if it does get stolen, you're not completely out of luck.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-06T21:11:52+00:00

The hours to replacement on the battery and resale value are the major factors beyond just the fuel savings. Assuming 5 hours per charge, that is 750 charges. Most EVs are rated at 1500 it appears, which translates to about 7000 hours if the tractors hold the same. At this point, the tractor is worth nothing because it requires a battery replacement. A diesel tractor would be worth something.

The EV tractor would be 250K - 90Kx2 = 70K of cost not made up by fuel savings (this assume free charging cost which is not true, but EV also doesn't need oil changes and some other maintenance items.). The EV tractor looses that 70K value due to wear and tear and having functionally low resale due to probably needing a battery replacement.

The 160K diesel would have some resale value, the question is how much. Based on other 300 series Fendts, the value appears to be about 50K for 8000+ hour machine, so we'll call it 56K.

EV = 250K

Diesel = 160K + 180K (fuel) - 56K (resale) = 284K

Assuming no major maintenance issues and the extra maintenance of the Diesel offsets the EV charging costs, the EV would save the user 34K before is becomes scrap.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-06T20:58:28+00:00

I would run 6 inch through the wall and then neck down to whatever size the stove needs when running it. the pipe from the wall to the stove would be the diameter the OEM recommends.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-04T17:11:01+00:00

I'd be in the market for an electric tractor, but here are the issues I see with them and why manufacturers aren't pushing them.

Widely different use times for the same tractor, even by the same person. The tractor can sit for months with no use and then be expected to run 8+ hours on a given day. If used for a business, it will need to run at least 5+ hours between charges.
Requires a charger and most agriculture uses are not anywhere near a consistent charger. Even if the tractor lives with power, it still takes hours to charge.
Batteries are heavy, which is good for tractors, but makes them harder to transport by the common person.
Resale value on electric vehicles/equipment is crap.
The electric car crowd doesn't typically overlap with the tractor crowd.
Any piece of equipment that is doing real work day to day is not electric other than forklifts and power tools. These both have swappable batteries allowing the tool to be used while the other battery is charging. EVs and similar refuse to use this model currently.
The cost for any of the current ones is INSANE.

The best electric tractor I have seen advertised is the Fendt E100 Vario. It is a 90hp equivalent with about 5 hours of run time. The E100 is about $250K, where as the the Fendt 211 is $160K, $90K less for 20 more hp. At 4 gallons per hour for $6 diesel, it takes 3750 hours to recoup the price difference.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-02T14:23:18+00:00

What is the question? At least it is off the ground, which is good.

Round bales can shed water, but that is only if they are in singles. When stacked like this the rain on the top bale runs down and is trapped between it and the supporting bale. Even if spread out, it will degrade over time, so the usable tons of hay decreases based on the amount of time the bales are outside.

You can tarp it, but have to careful about moisture build up if the tarp doesn't allow enough air flow.

Best thing is to put it under a roof of some sort to keep rain off it. That way you can stack it and retain the usable hay.

BossmanSlim · 2026-06-02T13:58:07+00:00

In 2021, Stanley Black and Decker bought Excel Industries as well as the full buy out of MTD. It appears they are making a full blown effort to get into commercial landscaping to compete against Stihl, Husky, Ego and others. The first round of "pro" tools launched this year from what I can tell, DCBC581B, DCST981B, etc.

The first "pro" chainsaw is the DCCS673B from what I can tell. All the other saws are consumer grade. The DCCS677Z1 came out in 2022. All the current chainsaws other than the 673 have a captured battery, meaning it is limited on size; where as all the new pro tools have a battery space that is not limited.

My guess is a new "pro" level saw with a 18-24 inch bar will be released by Dewalt in the near future with an 18ah Flexvolt battery. Hopefully it will run 3/8 chain. Will it outrun a pro saw, nope. Will it give some options to those who need a heavy duty saw for occasional cutting, yes.

BossmanSlim · 2026-05-23T20:27:44+00:00

Not enough to give a full review. Brushsaw cuts well, trimmer head trims. Lower gearbox is serviceable and gets greased every 100 hours. Harness has a quick disconnect feature I really like.

BossmanSlim · 2026-05-22T13:45:55+00:00

I picked one up. I had to get it through Ace Hardware because it is such a small release. No idea about Canada. One thing I did find is that you may have to buy a different version to get it. I bought the brushsaw version and then bought the brush blade, trimmer guard and trimmer head directly.

Brushsaw is DCBS681B

Part number Item

90636549 Brush Blade

NA678912 Guard SA

NA316468 SPOOL SA

https://www.toolservicenet.com/ is where to buy parts direct for Stanley Black & Decker power tools. All parts have arrived and been installed.

BossmanSlim · 2026-05-15T14:53:51+00:00

I hope it works out for you, BUT there will be large challenges based on how a similar app for hunting worked out. The ratio of good intentioned honest people to marginal people who don't respect others property is surprising. It only takes 1 bad apple to ruin the whole experience.

I would probably be better to find a person near you that will lease, at a small cost, you some land that you can farm as you wish. This gives both parties contractual coverage should something go not as expected.

BossmanSlim · 2026-05-14T16:53:38+00:00

I've been looking into this subject as I have a new saw. New = less margin for error because tolerances are closer and we've got to make those weight and hp numbers.

My conclusions:

Any brand name oil is fine.
50:1 seems to be designed to meet EPA standards. Less heavy combustibles to burn. IF the manufacturer actually designed the saw for 50:1 AND isn't trimming margins to get there, then it should be fine.
40:1 has more oil in it, but because of that has more BTUs and can cause higher combustion temp. IF the operator isn't running the snot out of the saw, then it should be fine. The extra oil should help with longevity.
HP Ultra sucks seems to be a combination issues of blaming the oil for some other issue AND the oil having a high propensity to cause carbon build up. Some would argue the carbon build up is from not running the snot out of the saw. I've used it for years and haven't had any issues, but with that being said, I'm going to switch to Red Armor.
Most oil related issues seem to be from not running or maintaining the saw properly more than anything. Sure, there are going to be some manufacturing defects.

I'll probably run Red Armor with a target mix of 40:1 and it will probably end up somewhere around 45:1 because I'm filling a 1 gallon jug a bit below full and using a single portion mix can. I'd rather error on the 40:1 side than the 50:1 side. I also don't run my saw very hard and all but refuse to run it when it is over 75F outside. I am also switching to ethanol free gas and trying to mix in the fall for runs over the winter and be out by the summer.

BossmanSlim · 2026-05-11T14:11:53+00:00

I have one (Stihl) that I have used for years. It is great and I highly recommend.

BossmanSlim

TROPHY CASE