Looking for Land

Once we knew we'd be moving to Silver City, NM, we started perusing the internet looking at houses and land for sale.  We wanted to get a feel for prices and what kind of things were available.  We had this sort of dichotomy of interests.  On the one hand, we like old historic houses with character and a walkable location.  (The ultimate in sustainability would be living in a pre-existing home in a walkable location.)  On the other hand, we really enjoyed our off grid, rural acreage where we were living in Maine.  So, we kept our eyes open for both options, just seeing what the winds might blow our way.

We had settled on Silver City in part due to its location in the foothills of the Pinos Altos range. Silver City has fantastic mountain and road biking, hiking and backpacking all available right around town and/or within fairly short drives.  There are two wilderness areas close by.  The community is diverse and eclectic - totally our style.  There's a local food movement, a food co-op and two farmer's markets.

We knew we wanted to be close enough to town to easily join in on group bike rides and in-town festivals, etc.

One parcel of land began grabbing our eyes back in March 2018.  Our house in Maine went under contract.  The parcel was still available.  Nothing else had shown up that grabbed our attention yet.  By the time we were packed up, closed on the house and heading west in June, the parcel had dropped in price by $10,000.  Oh yeah, our attention was grabbed hard!

Once we arrived in Silver City, got moved into a rental and started driving around, we made sure to visit that parcel.  It was beautiful.  We met with a realtor.  We looked around, we drove around, we explored.  We were trying to think things through and not jump on it.  We're both pretty cautious people and we didn't want buyers' remorse.  The realtor knew we were super interested and he informed us when another party inquired about the parcel.  Uh oh.  We got a bit nervous.  Two days later he informed us the price had dropped another $10,000!!  The reason is that to get power to the property would require an easement through a neighboring property.  The other party who inquired didn't want it after they found out.

We were intending to be off grid, so this didn't matter to us.  The price drop, however, was fantastic news as we had been interviewing contractors and learned that the cost/sf for building a home was a bit higher than we were expecting.  This meant, we really needed to find cheap land in order to build and not end up with a huge mortgage.  And, it seems, it was delivered right to us. 

Other parcels were too far from town, too expensive for us, too deserty, water waaayyy too deep, or land waaayyy too steep, etc.  This parcel was absolutely perfect and affordable.  We made our offer, it was accepted and we close next week.