[Agape Oaks]

Hi Y'all
I've had my home for sale since April.....& the market is aweful! I have 3 acres in the middle of a very suburban area.A very yuppy area where people wnat the fancy new homes with manicured yards & I get feedback that I have too many animals. Tempting to put up a sign saying that animals don't stay with the house My plan was to move to a bigger piece of property & build a barn with a milking area. I currently have fiberglass shelters & milk in a garden shed. Property taxes have gone sky high & despite applying for ag exemption for the past 5 years, I get turned down every year- was told most recently that they have to be self sustaining & I have too many goats, so if I feed them it's not ag. Makes no sense to me at all- what I suspect is they'd rather have the high $$$$ so will continue denying me every year. I love my neighbors (even had next door neighbor offer to let me use their 6 acres for my goats to graze as they don't want us to move). I love my big oak trees.....just hate the traffic, the high taxes & need a barn . I was reluctant to spend the $$$ to build a barn as I wanted to move. With the market this bad though, I'm reconsidering....maybe I should take my neighbor up on using his property too, then maybe we could both get ag exmption? Maybe I should build a barn & plan on staying a few years until the market is better? Is there an inexpensive way to build a barn with a nice milking area? I'm not looking foreward to freshening does in Feb in the cold, hunched over in a short shelter! Any advice?

 

[Sondra]

You could do as LeeAnne did and build a nice hoop house put straw around it for added warmth

 

[Cotton Eyed Does]

I would make it a temporary shelter, like the hoop house or a portable metal building that you could move and take with you. Be sure it is a metal building because the goats will eat those paperboard (fake wood) type portable buildings.
Here is a small one that I have for my boer girls. This one is just 8 t-posts, 2 cattle panels that are connected with cable clamps, I wrapped the top of the t-posts with a heavy plastic and duct tape to keep from ripping the heavy duty tarp that is on top. I have had it there for almost 2 years and the tarp is starting to deteriorate from sun and wind/weather exposure. I'll probably get through winter with it and replace it in the spring.

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[Sheryl]

Wow Christine. For a temporary thing, that looks really good. I've tried to do that before, only with just one hoop. I think I spread the sides apart too much. But my girls and boys just tried to climb on top and tear them down. Ended up being a mess. How do you keep your goats from trying to climb on them?

Sheryl

 

[Cotton Eyed Does]

I guess it is too tall. They have never even tried to jump up on them.

 

[LynninTX]

My first the goats climbed... we had to make the sides straighter.... we do lots of hoop houses here..... I like 3 panel best.

I currently have

1 6 panel
2 4 panel
5 3 panel

 

[LMonty]

We (or I should say, the Financier!) did a 3 panel as a temporary pig shelter. I am really happy with it. I think we'll be building a longer one for hay storage next year. I wondered how long the silver tarp would hold up. I'd be really pleased to get 3 yrs out of it.

To answer the original question- I'd get out of Dodge.

As a matter of fact, thats just what we did this spring...moved from just NW of Milwaukee to the Ozarks. I am so happy to be here, and so greatful we moved. We dropped the price of our house almost 10 % to get a quick sale. It's been a bit crazy at times, and we got lucky that we sold just before the housing market tumbled. But the price of what youre looking to buy will be cheaper too, so it about evens out.

No matter where you live, you (well, most of us, I'd bet! LOL) still have to pay the mortgage at the end of the month. Might as well be happy when you write that check, compared to frustrated knowing youre not a good fit with the home youre paying for.

We pay 1/3 less each month for a home we really like, with land and no restrictions, and great neighbors, and almost no property taxes instead of 3k a year like we did before. If we hadnt taken the risk, and given this a shot- we'd probably still be there and still be unhappy.

Go for it! No guarantees in this life, but unless you take a chance, you wont gain.

 

[Katarina]

"was told most recently that they have to be self sustaining"

Thats nuts. After all a few years back Texas law was changed to say that the fact that an animal was purely for recreational purposes did NOT exclude it for ag exemption use. This was done to allow horses to qualify for ag exemption. If you havent already you might actually read the county policy/guidelines and poss appeal.

 

[Agape Oaks]

OK I made a hoop house....for the llama who never uses it . I have it in my front pasture & I have several does who climb it- my sides aren't as steep as your though. My shelters are fine....what I really want is a nice milk room, & a nice area for my does to freshen, with electricty & plumbing, which a hoop house wouldn't have .

The whole ag exempt thing......having 3 acres seems to be a problem as a friend has 6 acres & has 7 goats, who aren't milked or bred (lawn ornaments) & has ag exempt. Mine who are bred & are milked every day & I can't get it. Initially I was told I had to have them for 5 yrs, when I hit that I was told I had too many as they couldn't be self sustaining with that many goats. They said 1 -2 goats per acre & didn't care that mine are Nigerian Dwarf goats. My taxes were about $6000!

 

[Guest]

$6000......yea, I'd be moving, but it wouldn't be because of my goats.....it would be because the gov. is ripping me off. Your paying enough in taxes to pay a big portion of a mortgage in a year. ....I'll almost betcha that you don't get $6000 worth of representation.

 

[LMonty]

Move to AR. We went from spening 3k in taxes in WI for 1/2 acre and a 2/1 house, to 17 acres and a 4/1 house. Still waiting to hear what our taxes will be this year, but the prior owners taxes last year with our ag and homestead exemption- are you ready for this- 37.00. Thats for the YEAR.

The only public service we dont get here is garbage disposal. We paid about 2 k last year for heating oil- well, we have an outside wood boiler here- burn most of our garbage in that for heat. Even if we paid for wood, not cut our own- and theres plenty free around here- it would come to a couple of hundred a year heating costs instead of thousands.

The only thing that seems to cost us more here is insurance-between house and car its a few hundred more a year. Since our mortgage here is @ 300 less a month, 2 months mortgage savings makes up for it. We went very rural, so gas does add up, but less often trips to town then we used to do kinda makes up for that.

The downside is employment here can be hard to find- and good paying employment even harder. Depends on what you do. But I know that some folks who have enough equity in their homes elsewhere have been able to buy property here outright, even with land- so the income issue is a lot less of a problem then it seems if youre in that position.

 

[LynninTX]

And out here in East TX my bill this yr on 11 acres is 350... with homestead & timber exemptions...

 

[Katarina]

ah.

in our county you have to have 10 acres...and for ten acres that would require (so they said) 56 goats.

(or commensurate 'animal units' :lol)

 

[Katarina]

Oh, and teh taxes on our place is nearly 4K but after we get an ag exemption (cant til next yr) it SHOULD go down considerably.

 

[Guest]

:blush.....I'm almost ashamed now of what I said about these Alacrats here......I only have 1 acre with a small cottage type home. a wood working shop, a goat barn, a green house, and a garden/lawn mower shed......only claim that we make is homesteading. City water runs me about $30 a month....garbage pickup runs me about $6 a month. My property taxes this year was about $40. :duh.....maybe I should count my blessings a little more often.
IMO......You folks in TX. should have a Boston Tea Party. :goat

 

[Agape Oaks]

Move to AR. We went from spening 3k in taxes in WI for 1/2 acre and a 2/1 house, to 17 acres and a 4/1 house. Still waiting to hear what our taxes will be this year, but the prior owners taxes last year with our ag and homestead exemption- are you ready for this- 37.00. Thats for the YEAR.

I'd move to AR in a heartbeat if I could......I own my office so have to be able to drive to it to work . Maybe someday when I retire....if I can ever afford to after I pay my property taxes !

 

[Katarina]

Ah, but does AL have income tax? TX makes its $$ via property tax because it doesnt have income tax. AL may have low, low prop tax--but makes $$ from income tax. Pick your poison...

 

[Guest]

Yes, we do have an income tax, but I would have to be making a lot more than what I do now to get into that 4 to 6 k tax bracket.........We are a family of 3, making about 28k a year....my state income taxes last year was roughly $300. ...Sales tax here is about 10% here in almost any town that you shop in now.......And your right , pick your poison....I betcha both off us pay more than 50% of what we make back in some sort of a tax, and that's outrageous no matter where you live.

Sorry.....I wasn't meaning to sound like I was knocking TX. ....Ala. has it's share of faults too.

 

[NubianSoaps.com]

No state income tax, 13 acres and house and 2 buildings with heated space and we pay less than $1000 bucks a year in property taxes. Course the economy is in the toliet, diesel is over $3 a gallon, and our county is spending millions on the roads around here that go from a town of 7000 to 500 and a road that only intersects the two!!!! Super highways to nowhere! My kindergarden grandson has a book in his classroom that has my 28 year old daughters classmates name in it! We also have more women and children without insurance than any state in the union. And diesel is over $3 a gallon!!!! Gotta love those politicians!

Oh and have you seen the 'real' hoop houses in FarmTech.com catalog? Vicki

 

[Bella Star]

I am also ready to move and yes Taxs in Texas are horrible , the only problem is we cant find a place that has everything that we have now for what we will sell for.