Homestead Searching

In a small town, searching for a house is an interesting, frustrating venture. In a more urban area, if you don't like the choices you're coming up with, just wait 15 minutes, hit the refresh button and presto! There are 20 more to choose from.

In the city, your selection criteria could look something like this:
- good neighborhood
- 2,200 square feet
- 3 bedrooms
- new appliances
- 2 car garage

In the country, if there's one new listing every week, it's a miracle. So, you either take what's available, or you build something. Well, with the prices of building being quite a bit higher than buying right now, we decided to start by looking at what's already out there. Our selection criteria look something like this:
- not so far out of town that if we got home one day and discovered that we forgot to get canned peas at the grocery store, we could actually go back and get some without first having to get to a gas station or abandoning the peas altogether.
- far enough away from neighbors that we could garden naked if we wanted to, but close enough to neighbors that if we needed sunscreen, we could throw on some tennies and a robe and be back in a ... flash.
- must have access to high-speed internet. Believe it or not, some places are still so far out in East BoJangles that smoke signals and dial-up are the only options.
- do the neighbors have 4 rusty lawn mowers, 3 goats, 18 free-range chickens, a dog kennel, a couch, and 12 kids in the front lawn?
- was the home built in this century? Don't get me wrong, I've got nothing but love for the Century home, but if I'm going to buy something permanent, I would really like to be able to run a hair dryer and the refrigerator at the same time without blacking out the entire neighborhood.
- something that's on a well-maintained rock road. I would rather not need a 4x4 monster truck to get down the road to the house in the Spring. Of course, having a monster truck would be pretty sweet ...

Believe it or not, not many houses have met this criteria yet. Okay, no houses have met this criteria. But, we'll keep watching the obituaries ... er, the real estate listings, I mean. There's bound to be something. Like the Muppets said, 'I hope that something better comes along!' There are other alternatives in a pinch, though. I could just get my hands dirty and dig into a south-facing hill. It wouldn't be that bad, would it? I mean, look at the pride of ownership on this guy's face!