Homestead on different land?

Is it possible or completely unfeasible to buy a piece of land away from your home and have a homestead there? Would it just be to hard with how often you would have to go out there? We live in Wyoming but the town we live in you can only have chickens and nothing else, I really want to raise a pig, possibly sheep, and someday I dream to have a milk cow, land just outside of the town is cheap but have no houses, and my husband really doesn't want to sell our house we have only been in it a year and love it, but it limits what we can do, we love our chickens and ducks, and having a garden but part of me wants more

I suppose it depends in part on how far away the land would have to be - 1/2 mile, or 5 miles... You would need to visit animals at least once, probably twice or more a day, every single day, no matter the weather. Would you be able to get through a blizzard to tend them?

If you can arrange a workable farming setup, I would consider setting aside a good house site on the land so you would be able to build in the future if you really decide the life and the land suits you. If nothing else, it would be good for resale value.

Crystal,

On the one hand, cattle producers do it all the time. On the other hand, having raised sheep and goats both ways, I wouldn't want to go back to not having the livestock right out the back door. We have much better outcomes (less illness, fewer kidding problems/losses and fewer predator losses) from being able to interact with the animals several times daily. I believe there's quite a bit more interaction even on a subconscious level. That's not to say you couldn't do it. The only way to know for sure (as is the case with most homesteading ideas) if it would work for you is to give it a try. Maybe with a minimum number of one species to start?

Don't ever let anyone tell you that something can't be done or that what's working for you is wrong. 😉

Thanks, I would love to just live on it, I am thinking maybe if we spend a couple years saving so we can buy the land with cash then stay in our home until we can afford to build a modest house. I am hoping my husband will change his mind, he is a self proclaimed preper and doesn't see the point in getting land and building for a future he doesn't think will be there but I feel like building towards our future is more important then loading up with stuff we may never use we will see thanks for the input!

Meet him where he is at. Tell him that you both of you to know how to identify wild edible when you go 'hunting/foraging when civilization ends'.
Tell him that you rather live in the boonies where your bullets will last longer.
Build you own rocket mass heater for when the year ends and you can't order another tank gas for heat and cooking
Practice weekly how to properly dress a animal after you kill it.
Practice how to stealthy kill rabbits/voles/mole with you silent but deadly crossbow.
Practice weekly how to get drinking water when the grid goes down and you can't buy gas for your generator after year 2.
Practice how to have a fit and 'stamina' filled body, to deal with the hard times ahead vs being 250lbs and overweight.
Practice herbal medicine. We are social creature and at some point we are going to form 'gang' and the healer always has free food.
Practice how to hide caches of living food in plain sight.
Practice which plants to eat for a source of safe purified water.

That is exactly what I want to do but he is more buy everything and anything you can even if you wouldn't use it in an emergency and then sit around and wait, this developed a couple years ago and its driving me nuts because I am more of a do something if you are worried about something, learn a skill provide for your self, things you buy only last so long....hopefully he will change his mindset eventually...

What exactly does he buy/want to buy?
I am somewhat sexist and totally support you following what he says as the CEO of the house, but it sounds like he is okay with you following your 'crazy permie idea'.
So run with it and plant you fruit and nut tree, plant in the fall for better survival rates. Expect 50% losses, but it is still worth it.
Banish the idea of having animals while you live offsite, except maybe bees but still expect 70% the 1st year and 50% thereafter
aka get 3 starter hive, expect only 1 to survive and then split the surviving hive, every year thereafter.
Get some short term woofers so that if you do take a 1week vacation all of you folks can do 2 months work in that time period.
Rent machinery and get stuff done quickly.
Once the system is up go weekly to do grocery shopping.
Be realistic, don't expect even a morsel of food for the 1st 3 years.

The list never ends lol we have tons of stuff and food, I have been very supportive but after 3 years where 1/3 of our income goes to this stuff where I scrimp and save every penny and he spends it, I took two extra jobs this year along with my already busy life of home school, raising kids, animals, gardening, normal house stuff, and now he wants 1/3 of the new income I make for preps, he just got a $3,000 tent we saved for and I asked if we could take a break and work on saving for bigger land or animals or expanding that garden and he was shocked and told me he has a new list of stuff already, I try to be as supportive as I can about it but I hope it calms down some day, I would love to save, pay off the little debt we have, plan for a future but that gets all held up, he doesn't want to plan for gardens and stuff more then a year out, I did get some fruits trees from my parents for my birthday but he felt it was a waste but oh well I got them

At $25 per, you can plant 200 fruit and nut tree for $5,000. Very doable over a 2yr period. All kids gift should be fruit trees, lol. You can do it alot cheaper if you visit somewhat local arboretum/food forest/nurseries.

Now as for how family budgets is done. He probably thinks that he is doing 4x better than what his parents taught him and that he is doing pretty good. Maybe work on a budget with him. We all have our addictions for some it is boats, others drugs/alcohol/gambling, still for others it is being workaholics. When it comes to addictions....from the outside it seems like his is pretty mild.

How does sending the kids to public school for a few years while you both work full time. He pays 2/3 of his income to the household bills, you pay 2/3 of yours to household bills and then he takes his 1/3 to prep and you take your 1/3 to 'PERMIE'. Everyone will be happy. Maybe some of that household bill is getting a au pair to homeschool for you two or something.

Wow! What kind of tent costs $3000, and where does he expect he might use it?

Some people might be comfortable with one person controlling a whole family's discretionary income, but I'm not. Some of the ideas above sound like they might work to set things on a more even footing. You won't get your husband to stop believing that society is going to collapse; all societies do at some point, and there is ample evidence that ours is in the beginning stages of collapse. (This has nothing to do with politics, it is simply a feature of comparative historical study.) The important thing is that the process almost always takes from one to three centuries to complete, and does not happen suddenly.
The Onset of Catabolic Collapse from J. M. Greer's Archdruid Report.

Maybe you can use some of these arguments and examples to help him see that prepping is most likely to be useful if it involves stabilizing your current location and resources to last. I don't know if it would be productive to ask what he thinks he will do when his stockpiles run out...

Hi Crystal,
There is a saying in permaculture circles "the problem is the solution". Personally I don't even LIKE this phrase, but I might represent a minority of one.

What the phrase suggests to me as helpful is to examine and re-examine the so called "problem". A redefinition of a problem as a situation or a puzzle might suggest possible pathways.

Speaking only for my self and the choices I have made: when the imbalance of power in my marriage became obvious, I no longer accepted it. When maintaining the imbalance of power became a motivation for increased manipulation and self gratification on his part, I was no longer willing to participate. I found it demeaning to take a role other than equal. I found it a waste of everyone's time for me not to have autonomy with an equal portion of the family's resources to manage, and pointless to have my privileges and responsibilities limited to what he meted out to me. It obstructed my learning and development to be so restricted and not to - with in reason, and within our resources-be "allowed" to pursue what I thought would be positive and constructive options for our whole family, to make decisions and find out where they took me. His role of complete responsibility was holding me in an phase of arrested development. I did not want to be protected from life, for the sake of his comfort and convenience.

You've asked the forum questions about how to proceed toward homesteading. I am commenting about your statements that put the responsibility on your husband as the impediment. You've stated he is not neutral, he is opposed. He is able to veto your desired pathway ONLY because you allow him to. Nothing wrong with that. It is your perfect right. But it does shift the focus AWAY from homesteading, and on to his opposition.

There may be pathways open to you you have not noticed. There may be impediments other than his opposition.

There have been some practical suggestions, and I especially like the one that starts by planting fruit and nut trees, leaving a house site for later. It might be a couple of years before you could make the transition even WITH his enthusiastic and full participation. It is a complicated process, but not without affording much satisfaction, and countless opportunities to identify your priorities and how to best meet them. If it's not what he wants to do, not how HE wants to spend the next 10 years, it is unlikely to be satisfying to anyone involved.

We all have to decide for ourselves what is right for us. That starts with a thorough assessment of all the variables and conditions, with no identified problems, only possibilities we examine for their possible benefits and drawbacks.

Have you taken a PDC? There is a step by step process of analysis that takes one through the planning of the homestead, an analytic process that is useful in assessing life situations such as we all find ourselves in. If you haven't taken a PDC, it might be a good first step towards your homestead dreams. Personally I would recommend an on site course that puts you camping out, building, sharing responsibility for livestock, etc. the hands on physical course rather than the online course.

Blessings, and good luck. Anything is possible when you are clear on your priorities and are willing to accept novel solutions to what used to be problems.

Crystal Walker wrote: I am hoping my husband will change his mind, he is a self proclaimed preper and doesn't see the point in getting land and building for a future he doesn't think will be there ...

Wow Crystal! I think you have a problem bigger than just wanting to homestead and needing money and a change of your husband's mindset to do it. Sounds like this is a more of a marriage breaker in the long run if you two can't come to terms. When I first read this, I admit I wanted to fire off something to you along the lines of "Dump that lazy SOB and use your money to build your dream without him." but, of course that is not only minding your personal business without knowing the first thing about either of you, but not very productive either. So ... after sleeping on it, here is my two cents -- for what it is worth.

First, it might be helpful for the two of you to find an impartial mediator -- a family counselor or professional arbitrator of some sort (not family member or friend -- they would NOT be impartial) to discuss your differing viewpoints with an idea of reaching some sort of compromise. This is too deep and too full of disaster potential to sweep under the rug or ignore. Your resentments are already very obvious and the more years you have to build on those and get angrier, the more disastrous the ultimate consequences will be.

Second, you might try sitting down with your husband and having a frank discussion concerning your different approaches to preparedness. Get a pen and paper to list all of the pros and cons of each scenario. List potential problems and then find practical solutions for them -- one at a time. I'm thinking that your husband is extremely short-sighted in his approach and the best way to get him to see that is if he develops his own list of the pros and cons of it. If he truly thinks there is no future (as you mentioned in the above quote) then have him explain to you who and what the $3000 tent and boxes full of preserved food, survival gear & gadgets, etc. are for? His consumer activity and his vision of the future are contradictory. Maybe when he gets down to actually trying to explain how endless shopping can save his world, he will realize what a silly (not to mention expensive) waste of time that is. For several arguments (to throw out there and hope he can catch them)...

1- There is no magic food pot that fills up with food each time it is emptied. No matter how much freeze-dried food he buys, it will eventually run out. Same with water. Ask him what he will do IF civilization as we know it dries up and everybody is scrambling to find food and water in a world without internet stores or even bricks and mortar shops to buy more from. Point out that with a garden (especially a food forest) and proper collection and storage of seeds, you have the closet thing to a kind of magic food pot to dip into, but with stored food, you only have it as long as it lasts.

2- Water will become more and more precious in the future. A well may not last forever, rivers may go dry, and there is a limit (rain) to the amount of water you can collect and store in cisterns and ponds, but I can pretty much guarantee those will outlast an expensive hoard of bottled water. What will he do when he empties the last container? Will the public infrastructure of water pipes and sewers even be working if the world goes to hell in a hand-basket?

3- For what purpose is the tent intended if not camping out somewhere wild in the hopes of foraging? I mean, surely he doesn't intend to set it up in the backyard and abandon the house when everything goes to pot -- that would be kind of pointless. So ... why not put it up on a piece of land you OWN to serve as temporary shelter until you can carve out a homestead? Seems like this is a classic case of putting the cart before the horse. $3000 would buy an acre of land almost anywhere (California and Hawaii excepted) and would make a substantial down payment on a modest-sized vacant parcel of 3 to 10 acres. (Can you return the tent for a refund and use that for land?)

4- If he prefers not to leave the house for awhile, why not buy a parcel of land within an hours drive and spend weekends planting trees and shrubs; clearing a place for a small house and assembling building materials like stones, logs and so forth; getting outbuildings (like chicken coops, tool sheds, etc.) up and ready; putting in fencing as needed; digging a well, ponds, etc. and establishing perennial food plants and herbs. Then go out there and do some work a couple weekends each month until everything is ready. At that point, moving in will not be such a scary ordeal because most of the important stuff will be done beforehand. Save getting livestock until you are actually on the land to care for them properly.

5- Since your husband appears to be a shop-aholic, satisfy his need to buy by getting him to invest in good, solid tools you'll always need around the homestead instead of frivolous purchases and suplies of dubious or short-term value. Accumulate things like shovels, hoes, rakes, picks, axes, saws, hammers, a generator or solar panels and batteries, maybe a small tractor and/or supplies of storable building materials like nails and screws and other hardware, ropes, chains, windows, doors, sheet metal roofing, fencing, etc. All these things find continual use on a homestead. And of course, do continue to buy or barter (or grow from saved seeds) lots of fruit and nut trees, shrubs, etc. You will also want to buy loads of useful books on homesteading, DIY building, gardening, food forests, permaculture, and even things like blacksmithing, weaving, herbal medicines, food preserving and anything else that may be useful in a world where you have to do things for yourself.

Well, I could go on forever, but that seems like enough to start with (probably more than you wanted to hear, really). Hope it helps! Good luck.

One thing that struck me first was that he has been prepping for three years, but refuses to plan more than one year out. I would ask him how many years he is going to continue prepping for immediate disaster.
It may not be productive in terms of immediate tranquility to ask where he plans to replenish his supplies after civilization falls, but it may either force him to think, or cause him to react so negatively that your course will become apparent. Counseling (or more diplomatically, arbitration/mediation) might help. I hope it does, as a good person ought not to be discarded without significant effort.

Traditionally it was very common for folks to live in the city/village and have a farm on the outskirts/sheep in the hills.
Alot of cities will unofficially allow you to have honey/bees, chickens/eggs (no roosters), dwarf goats (milk/meat), pools converted to fish farming aquaponics, as long as you are friendly with the neighbors and they don't complain to the city. I HAVE started the process of getting friendly with my neighbors.

It seems like he just bought the house you are living in 12 month ago. I CAN totally understand why he is reluctant to start moving already. Most renters don't want to move that often even more so if they have kids and extended family members for support. Permaculture is all about observing, and taking small steps. I DON'T know if buying new property and moving every 3 years is enough time to observe and adjust, esp if I HAD to include other ppl.

It is quite possible that hubby reduced his 'prepper hobby' to save up and buy the house that he moved into 12 months ago. And now he feels like after all that 'suffering' he can finally treat himself after 'treating his family'.

If I WAS considering how can I can fund MY future permie homestead, without any financial support from my partner:
1) I WOULD hire someone to take care of the kids and work more money than I AM paying out. FYI:the gov has free school/babysitters
2) I WOULD work more hours/freelancer jobs
3) I WOULD start my own company and if possible hire other people to do all the work.
Alot of us on this site is still struggling to start/fund our homestead.

I SEEM to get the idea that the partner wants you to pay for your share of the household bill so that he can have more money so that he can enjoy his hobbies.
I WOULD take him up on that offer and work 40hrs per week making money, and pay my 1/2 of the bill and have my own 'permie hobby' money.

Modern-day Women work full time and spend their own money on their own permie hobby and their hubby spend their own money on their own prepper hobby.
Old time Women stayed at home with the kids while the man worked for money and she didn't worry her head about all the family money he spend drinking as long as food was on the table and a shelter over the head.

Personally I would work my own money and pay my 1/2 of the bill and do my own hobby.

Crystal,
I commend your initiative, you are a prize of a partner.
Lots of advice above, Thekla raises a good argument on/for equal rights in your marriage. I don't know what your situation calls for. With kids it is a tough call.
My two cents go in a slightly different direction.
Every community has a population of older residents that may already have what you are after. Events happen that change how they are able to care for their land. Maybe a spouse dies or becomes disabled, without intervention from a caring third party, (son, daughter, neighbor, etc
) they are forced to sellout or go bellyup.
Is there a possibility that you have people like this in your community? Maybe a great alternative would be a partner, probably a woman, don't want your husband to accuse you of cheating. They have a place already, but it's too much for one person. Enter Crystal and her kids, I commend you on homeschooling your babies.
Lots of older people have kids that graduated and made a beeline to the big city, as soon as the parents die they give the property that their parents sweated over away for nothing.
Maybe a road trip around your area is in order? Maybe figure out when the mail runs and talk to a rural mailman. Maybe a small ad in your local paper. "Looking to trade sweat equity and some canned fruits and vegetables for a couple acres near town. I want to raise some animals."
Best of luck, plus some prayers for you and your family.