We are legal residents of Washington, having lived on the western side for 20 years. We sold our house last year but since no other state can claim us, we are still registered and domiciled here.
We want to continue traveling and boondocking but we need a place to occasionally spread out for several months and the RV parks are just not doing it for us. Even the spread out ones are way too close for my enjoyment. I want to drop the pods off of the truck, do some metal working, and not really worry about having to move until I feel like moving. We also want to do some winter camping since we designed our camper for that but the truck is not really winter snow capable with the pods on it (just a bit too heavy for my comfort). If I drop the pods under a simple pole barn we could haul snow mobiles on the truck flatbed. The insulated living pod would likely be quite comfortable with its propane furnace and I could get a 100 gallon tank. I figure the pole barn would keep the snow off the pod and be under the 200 or 400 sq ft that does not require any permit in eastern Washington counties.
So I am looking for road accessible cheap raw land and it seems to be available for $1000 an acre or so in 20 acre parcels. Probably can offer even less since some have been on the market for 2+ years. Likely cheap because it is very hard to get utilities in but we don't need to build a house. We travel in our house. We boondock with about 40 gallons of water use a week, so if I bring in a 250 gallon tank on the flatbed, it is good for a month at least. This is if I don't manage a catchment. I would haul out waste.
It would not be long term except the one winter we do as an experiment. Most times we would come back once or twice a year and spend a month or so. Very unlikely to get in trouble with the counties as they seem to be unable to deal with a local person who has nine RVs on their property and illegally rents them out. They have sent them a notice every other year but claim that is about all they can do. Unlikely that such lax policies would ever flag a single RV on 20 remote acres who is not permanently staying there.
The money seems to work out. $20k 20 acre parcels have about $130 a year in property tax. The opportunity cost of $20k invested in a 2% CD is $400. So essentially the land would cost us $530 a year for a 20 acre private RV site with no hookups. Yes we might be able to illegally stay on BLM land in Washington longer than 14 days but I don't think we would be allowed to build a pole barn to shelter the pods.
Opinions?
We want to continue traveling and boondocking but we need a place to occasionally spread out for several months and the RV parks are just not doing it for us. Even the spread out ones are way too close for my enjoyment. I want to drop the pods off of the truck, do some metal working, and not really worry about having to move until I feel like moving. We also want to do some winter camping since we designed our camper for that but the truck is not really winter snow capable with the pods on it (just a bit too heavy for my comfort). If I drop the pods under a simple pole barn we could haul snow mobiles on the truck flatbed. The insulated living pod would likely be quite comfortable with its propane furnace and I could get a 100 gallon tank. I figure the pole barn would keep the snow off the pod and be under the 200 or 400 sq ft that does not require any permit in eastern Washington counties.
So I am looking for road accessible cheap raw land and it seems to be available for $1000 an acre or so in 20 acre parcels. Probably can offer even less since some have been on the market for 2+ years. Likely cheap because it is very hard to get utilities in but we don't need to build a house. We travel in our house. We boondock with about 40 gallons of water use a week, so if I bring in a 250 gallon tank on the flatbed, it is good for a month at least. This is if I don't manage a catchment. I would haul out waste.
It would not be long term except the one winter we do as an experiment. Most times we would come back once or twice a year and spend a month or so. Very unlikely to get in trouble with the counties as they seem to be unable to deal with a local person who has nine RVs on their property and illegally rents them out. They have sent them a notice every other year but claim that is about all they can do. Unlikely that such lax policies would ever flag a single RV on 20 remote acres who is not permanently staying there.
The money seems to work out. $20k 20 acre parcels have about $130 a year in property tax. The opportunity cost of $20k invested in a 2% CD is $400. So essentially the land would cost us $530 a year for a 20 acre private RV site with no hookups. Yes we might be able to illegally stay on BLM land in Washington longer than 14 days but I don't think we would be allowed to build a pole barn to shelter the pods.
Opinions?
