Unique rural retreat in Oklahoma for sale by Auction

Auctioneer Agent- https://www.wigginsauctioneers.com/auctions/m.auctions/40/view/854
real estate video-  
forest garden video- https://share.icloud.com/photos/0GOETR0cmFiPJVwQGiMwr0FIQ

Starting bid is $50,000

Charming 5.29 acre country retreat in the Oklahoma City limits. Private, tucked away and secluded. 3 bedroom, 2 bath old farmhouse with an attractive park designed to be a food forest and wildlife sanctuary.

Abundant mature trees including pines, wild pecans, hickory, oaks, fruit trees, berries, flowers, etc. Land cultivated since the 1920’s makes excellent soil for gardening. Also ideal for morning exercise, picnics, camping, food foraging, etc.

If a property with privacy is what you're after, look no further than this rural retreat with no nearby neighbors for sale by auction, May 29th at 10am.

Conveniently located between 4 public lakes/reservoirs (Thunderbird, Draper, Twin Lakes, and Wes Watkins) for recreation, camping, and fishing. Only 20-30 minute drive to/from Shawnee, Norman, and OKC. Five different grocery stores/gas stations are only 5-10 minutes away.

Utilities are OEC electricity (with fiber optic internet availability), great tasting well water with a working pump, propane gas (2 x 300-gallon tanks), and OKC garbage collection service.

Includes 2-car garage, storm cellar/root cellar, storage shed, secure gated property with perimeter fence, metal storage shed/loafing shed, chicken coop and well house. Fence protects against stray dogs, coyotes, and wolves. Due to fence protection, this property has a perfect natural habitat for small game, and already has an abundance of rabbits and squirrels.

Perfect property for gardeners, preppers, survivalists, permaculture enthusiasts, or just anyone who likes to spend time out in nature.

Contact Auctioneer Agent for details.

I watched the YouTube video. The drone flyover really shows the amount of work that has gone into this property. It appears to be an exceptional value if it goes for anywhere near the starting bid. I would guess that it is far below replacement value for just the buildings and then there's a good quantity of land that has had a lot of work done to it. Miles ahead of starting with bare ground. Around here properties like that start at about 1 million.

It's a pretty property but it's not all that far from me and there are some real howlers in that listing:

Fence protects against stray dogs, coyotes, and wolves. Due to fence protection, this property has a perfect natural habitat for small game, and already has an abundance of rabbits and squirrels.

There aren't any wolves closer than New Mexico.  Coyotes and many feral dogs climb wire fences.  Solid metal or wooden fencing is not visible in the drone shots -- almost certainly, the fencing is the normal three-to-five strand barbed wire that's typical in these parts.  Canine species don't even slow down, they flow through fencing like that at a dead run.  If the property has been used to grow small livestock, it might have square/hogwire type fencing (although it's not visible in the video) but coyotes climb that stuff easily also.  

...old farmhouse...

 How old we talking, exactly?  Is it even habitable?  This might just be the brevity of the listing, but that large field-stone cladding visible in the photos is a very old style and every house I've looked at in Oklahoma that had it was 100 years old and in a terrible shambles.  (One I looked at sat unsold at a $5,000 price point on a town lot for two years.)  They mention the property was in cultivation since the 1920s, so...


They also keep swapping between "country" and "rural" which is odd for a property inside the city limits of Oklahoma City, which is a metropolis of 650k people and the state capital, county seat, and heart of a metro area with 1.4 million people in it.  It does cover 620 square miles, but even so.  By local standards, the place might be "in the country" but it's rural only by courtesy.  It's the sort of place (if it actually has a nice house on it) where city folk would commute from so they could keep animals and play farmer on the weekends.  

On the price upside, they mention mature pecan trees. I am aware of oilfield operators having to compensate land owners in my area for mature (old growth, pre white settlement) pecan trees destroyed by oilfield operations, sometimes at rates of two or three thousand dollars per tree.    There can't be many such trees present (mature pecans are HUGE) but even a few would be a major attraction for any buyer, and more so for any permaculturalist.  

Just some things that went through my head when I saw the listing.  There might indeed be a bargain there for the right person!

If those city folks raise those animals and a bunch of other food, at what point are they no longer playing farmer? Many people need to keep their day job. To me, having a piece of rural land that is close to the city, is a huge bonus, because it means you're likely to be able to sell things if you produce more than you need. And if there are city folks who want to maintain their current job, this seems like a better bet than having a long commute. Commuting is probably the most wasteful thing that Americans do, and this is particularly true for those who are trying to establish themselves in the countryside. A distant piece of land is purchased, and often they commute to it on a part-time basis for many years.

As to the condition of the house or local market conditions, I have no idea.

Dale Hodgins wrote:If those city folks raise those animals and a bunch of other food, at what point are they no longer playing farmer?

"Play farmer" to me means the kind of people who keep two decorative horses they never so much as speak to, for the sole purpose of having them be seen from the road out front.  That sort of thing is very common in these parts.

Anyway, I wasn't expecting you to answer any of the questions I had, I was just sharing some issues that popped into my head for the benefit of people who might be interested in the auction.  I'm one of these people who evaluates a text by looking for flaws.  If I see one or two obvious wrong things or statements that don't match the version of reality I'm familiar with, I assume that other things I'm not in position to evaluate may also be amiss.  Trumpeting fencing that protects from wolves that don't exist in the state caught my eye in that context, as did the "rural" descriptor for a property located inside the largest conurbation in the state.  Maybe this sort of critical reading has value, maybe it doesn't, take it for what it costs...