Civil Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
you know this is the place. If you don't, you probably
shouldn't even entertain the prospect of log building.
So the land doesn't have a spring. It could be full of
phosphate anyway. Maybe that wet-weather waterfall
runs only four months out of the year. Invite friends
only on wet weekends. But that white oak tree is 200
years old; Daniel Boone's contemporaries scouted
around it.
You can always drill a well, and maybe push in a
road without ruining the whole mountain. You can get
the local cooperative to extend the electric line, or use
kerosene lamps (avoid most schemes for generating
your own). And you've searched for a year, and argued
with your spouse, and you're tired.
So buy it. If you can live with it, whom do you have
to justify it to? Well, the banker, mother-in-law, the
guys at work . . . Nonsense. This place has the right
vibrations. It's your personal statement. Here is where
you build your log house.
Cautions
These are a couple of things to watch for. Whether or
not you buy through a real estate agent, insist on clear-
ing up anything questionable on the abstract. Title
insurance is often substituted for an abstract. Read all
fine print. That option to drill for oil, cut timber, or
other evidence of mineral rights forgone by previous
owners could still be active. If there's any doubt about
property lines, have the land surveyed by a licensed
surveyor. It costs, but your building site should not be
too close to the line. Who knows what may become of
the adjoining land? A hog farm? A chemical plant?
Watch for liens; make sure you have good, legal
access; don't take any rights for granted. The romance
of opening three pasture gates to get to your haven
pales in nocturnal sleet storms. And a new owner next
door may have other ideas about the route he will pro-
vide you access on. If you buy with others, get it all
down in writing. When George and Sally split up, she
may end up with it all and sell it to a paper mill. On
this note, it's better to own your part free and clear,
and keep a friendly relationship with the others. Ideals
wear thin when it's mortgage-payment time.
I might mention that my wife, Linda, and I found
200 acres bordering the National Forest, which we
decided we must find a way to own — that is, at least
part of it. After much balancing of eggs, cajolery,
drawing and redrawing of imaginary division lines, we
were able to get a brother and three close friends to
buy parts of it, leaving us with our choice of some 40
acres of clear creek, waterfalls, and bluffs. We go there
whenever we can and swim in the creek and listen to
the silence. Someday I'll build a log cabin there, very
near the site of a 100-plus-year-old settler's home.
That's one way the land purchase can be done in a
group, and there are certainly others.
Think Ahead
But don't create a place so weird or remote or with
such limited appeal that you're stuck with a turkey if
you do need to sell someday. This ended up happen-
ing to some friends of ours. They built a delightful
house up from a long, clear pool in the creek, down a
long, very difficult limestone ledge road. The house
Keep looking for the site that is so right you can grow to belong to it.
The right spot is worth a lot of inconveniences.
