So, it's official - We bought a farm!
Contracts are signed, money has been handed over and the deal is done.
What does this mean for us and the little old cottage?
It means we aim to have her done and on the market in about 4-5 weeks time, realistically priced. (there is a lot of work to do prior to then!)We have a real estate agent lined up who comes highly recommended by dear friends and he certainly feels like the right fit for us. We aim to move to the farm over the Christmas holidays, ready to start the boys in their new school at the beginning of the year.
The farm is truly beautiful and I'm excited to be able to begin to share our plans with you. It is 45 mins inland from Port Macquarie, NSW. The property is 265 acres and a combination open grazing land and hilly rain forest. It's climate is sub-tropical, so lots of warm weather and rain. Very different from what we are used to here. We are able to open it up to the last time it was logged in 1990, as per strict environmental guidelines. This will greatly improve the amount of sheltered grazing land. At the moment there is about 60 acres cleared. Currently there are cattle on the open land and the rain forest is mostly left to be wild. We will be clearing out a lot of the undergrowth and will push goats through the hilly parts with movable, electric fencing. There are a lot of weeds on the property and are a large part of the undergrowth which needs to be cleared. We aim to have a chicken tractor or two and breed a good heritage duel purpose chicken that's suitable for both egg and meat production. Something we hope will be good as a backyard pet and also for the small acreage farmer. Joel Salatin has some great techniques about running a bio-diverse property and the advantages it can bring. Grant will also have his wood roach farm which he has been busy growing and expanding in preparation for the move. He sells them in bulk primarily to lizard breeders and has a link in the sidebar, if your in need of some woodies. ;)
There is a HUGE amount of work to do. They entry road needs serious repair, there are sheds and infrastructure to build. The property is totally off grid so that will be a learning curve in itself. However technology has come a long way and we should be able to live a pretty comfortable modern life. We will have a generator for backup, LPG for hot water and cooking, a composting toilet, large galv rainwater tanks, and some kind of natural system for filtering grey water, maybe reed ponds? Council approval will dictate that. We have a lot to learn and we hope we will have a lot to share upon the way. (Whats life without an adventure or two right?)
You may be wondering about where we are going to be living? Well upon a lot of research, too-ing and fro-ing we have decided to built a 30ft yurt, from Pacific Yurts which will be custom made for us and and shipped in from USA. We will then build a second smaller yurt which we will kit out as bedrooms for the boys and second living space. We are buying in cash, so we are being very slow and mindful of budgets, choosing to act slowly and methodically rather then rushing to do it all at once. There are going to be a lot of unforeseen costs in this venture and we need to leave room for that. I'm not going to lie, its already proving to be challenging to force ourselves to act slowly. My desire for the boys to find this transition simple, comfortable and for life to be as "normal" as possible throughout this period is at direct odds with going through the process slowly and doing things only as we can afford them.
The reality is, we don't want to rent. We want to live on our farm together from day one, with all our pets. To line out part of a shed takes time and money, at the end we would be stuck with a lined out shed and little chance we could get any return on it in the future. I mean a farmstay/B&B is not an appealing retreat if it is situated next to a workshop/machinery shed. Shipping containers are not actually that cheap by the time you kit them out, whilst also being very time consuming. Access to actually deliver such huge items is also problematic on the farm tracks. So, after much consideration we have settled on yurts. One big one and one little one, linked by a corridor which will double as the laundry. This will give us the space and privacy we need as a family. They go up in a matter of days and once up the entire outside and inside of the yurt is instantly finished. Which is a huge plus for this for this Mama who is tired of the dust and the dirt of renovating. They come with NASA designed insulation, and have three layers to them. From there popping up a few stud walls to create a couple of rooms and lining them with timber match lining is relatively simple in comparison to a more traditional build. We will then build a simple, modern and functional kit kitchen.
Yurts are such a beautiful space, with their round walls, exposed woodwork and lovely high ceilings. We plan to call the yurts home for a number of years until we have managed to save, buy and self build a kit home. At that point we will disassemble the smaller yurt, move it to a private location on the farm, freshen them both up and make them into two beautiful nature/farm stay B&B's and open them up to the public. The big one will be suitable for a family and the smaller one will be more suited to a couples retreat. So whilst we sound crazy, we have an extensive long term plan that is bound to keep us busy for the next few years and beyond! (What could go wrong?!)
You may be asking what that means for this little blog? Well in our researching we have found a lot of American and overseas people talking about how they set up their off-grid properties, but far fewer Aussies. As a result we have been thinking we may record our journey via a YouTube channel. With the perspective of things we have learnt which are relevant to an Australian audience. As we slowly develop income streams from the farm, links will be added to access those on banner or sidebar of the blog. I'm contemplating a Facebook page to increase the blogs reach, though I'm somewhat hesitant to add another social media platform. Is it really a worthwhile extension or simply another thing to add to my "to do"list? I love Instagram and blogging, I'm not sure I feel the same about Facebook. What are others thoughts? The blogging side of it will remain much the same. I'll still share as I do now, with the aim of keeping it real, being imperfect, writing about family, simple living, creativity, and various ramblings as they come to me.
Anyway, what an epic post hey? When I started this blog I didn't think it would take us quite so long to get to this point, but persistence and patience always pays off. On that note I had best tackle the washing before the kids run out of socks!
Much love,
Emma
xx
Contracts are signed, money has been handed over and the deal is done.
What does this mean for us and the little old cottage?
It means we aim to have her done and on the market in about 4-5 weeks time, realistically priced. (there is a lot of work to do prior to then!)We have a real estate agent lined up who comes highly recommended by dear friends and he certainly feels like the right fit for us. We aim to move to the farm over the Christmas holidays, ready to start the boys in their new school at the beginning of the year.
The farm is truly beautiful and I'm excited to be able to begin to share our plans with you. It is 45 mins inland from Port Macquarie, NSW. The property is 265 acres and a combination open grazing land and hilly rain forest. It's climate is sub-tropical, so lots of warm weather and rain. Very different from what we are used to here. We are able to open it up to the last time it was logged in 1990, as per strict environmental guidelines. This will greatly improve the amount of sheltered grazing land. At the moment there is about 60 acres cleared. Currently there are cattle on the open land and the rain forest is mostly left to be wild. We will be clearing out a lot of the undergrowth and will push goats through the hilly parts with movable, electric fencing. There are a lot of weeds on the property and are a large part of the undergrowth which needs to be cleared. We aim to have a chicken tractor or two and breed a good heritage duel purpose chicken that's suitable for both egg and meat production. Something we hope will be good as a backyard pet and also for the small acreage farmer. Joel Salatin has some great techniques about running a bio-diverse property and the advantages it can bring. Grant will also have his wood roach farm which he has been busy growing and expanding in preparation for the move. He sells them in bulk primarily to lizard breeders and has a link in the sidebar, if your in need of some woodies. ;)
Port Macquarie, which will be our large center, though there are smaller towns closer. Looking out to the ocean.
There is a HUGE amount of work to do. They entry road needs serious repair, there are sheds and infrastructure to build. The property is totally off grid so that will be a learning curve in itself. However technology has come a long way and we should be able to live a pretty comfortable modern life. We will have a generator for backup, LPG for hot water and cooking, a composting toilet, large galv rainwater tanks, and some kind of natural system for filtering grey water, maybe reed ponds? Council approval will dictate that. We have a lot to learn and we hope we will have a lot to share upon the way. (Whats life without an adventure or two right?)
A little peak at the property.
You may be wondering about where we are going to be living? Well upon a lot of research, too-ing and fro-ing we have decided to built a 30ft yurt, from Pacific Yurts which will be custom made for us and and shipped in from USA. We will then build a second smaller yurt which we will kit out as bedrooms for the boys and second living space. We are buying in cash, so we are being very slow and mindful of budgets, choosing to act slowly and methodically rather then rushing to do it all at once. There are going to be a lot of unforeseen costs in this venture and we need to leave room for that. I'm not going to lie, its already proving to be challenging to force ourselves to act slowly. My desire for the boys to find this transition simple, comfortable and for life to be as "normal" as possible throughout this period is at direct odds with going through the process slowly and doing things only as we can afford them.
A rough to-scale sketch of the yurt floor plan. Above the master bedroom in the big yurt there will be a mezzanine which will act as a study/sewing space.
The reality is, we don't want to rent. We want to live on our farm together from day one, with all our pets. To line out part of a shed takes time and money, at the end we would be stuck with a lined out shed and little chance we could get any return on it in the future. I mean a farmstay/B&B is not an appealing retreat if it is situated next to a workshop/machinery shed. Shipping containers are not actually that cheap by the time you kit them out, whilst also being very time consuming. Access to actually deliver such huge items is also problematic on the farm tracks. So, after much consideration we have settled on yurts. One big one and one little one, linked by a corridor which will double as the laundry. This will give us the space and privacy we need as a family. They go up in a matter of days and once up the entire outside and inside of the yurt is instantly finished. Which is a huge plus for this for this Mama who is tired of the dust and the dirt of renovating. They come with NASA designed insulation, and have three layers to them. From there popping up a few stud walls to create a couple of rooms and lining them with timber match lining is relatively simple in comparison to a more traditional build. We will then build a simple, modern and functional kit kitchen.
Yurts are such a beautiful space, with their round walls, exposed woodwork and lovely high ceilings. We plan to call the yurts home for a number of years until we have managed to save, buy and self build a kit home. At that point we will disassemble the smaller yurt, move it to a private location on the farm, freshen them both up and make them into two beautiful nature/farm stay B&B's and open them up to the public. The big one will be suitable for a family and the smaller one will be more suited to a couples retreat. So whilst we sound crazy, we have an extensive long term plan that is bound to keep us busy for the next few years and beyond! (What could go wrong?!)
You may be asking what that means for this little blog? Well in our researching we have found a lot of American and overseas people talking about how they set up their off-grid properties, but far fewer Aussies. As a result we have been thinking we may record our journey via a YouTube channel. With the perspective of things we have learnt which are relevant to an Australian audience. As we slowly develop income streams from the farm, links will be added to access those on banner or sidebar of the blog. I'm contemplating a Facebook page to increase the blogs reach, though I'm somewhat hesitant to add another social media platform. Is it really a worthwhile extension or simply another thing to add to my "to do"list? I love Instagram and blogging, I'm not sure I feel the same about Facebook. What are others thoughts? The blogging side of it will remain much the same. I'll still share as I do now, with the aim of keeping it real, being imperfect, writing about family, simple living, creativity, and various ramblings as they come to me.
Anyway, what an epic post hey? When I started this blog I didn't think it would take us quite so long to get to this point, but persistence and patience always pays off. On that note I had best tackle the washing before the kids run out of socks!
Much love,
Emma
xx
