Buying the Farm

I think we've found our property. By my standards, it's been a long search - we've been working with our agent for almost 6 months. In the past, my realtor relationships have never lasted more than a few weeks - including a couple of one night stands - I bought my first cottage without looking at any other properties and I submitted the offer on my current house within hours of seeing it for the first time.

I enjoy telling people that my real estate transactions average 48 hours. I imagine they are impressed by the hidden depths of my personality. I am not the mild mannered accountant I appear - I am a bold entrepreneur, a free spirit, Donald Trump meets Stevie Nicks. In fact, my friends are amused because they know it takes me two seasons to decide to buy new winter boots by which time the styles have changed and I need to start the whole process over.

The truth is that I am a number cruncher - born and bred. Before I contact a realtor, I've spent months and usually years deciding on the right location, the optimal square footage and the price I'm prepared to pay. I've known since I was in college that I wanted a house in North Toronto and a cottage within a 2 hour drive of that house. Having done all of my homework in advance, the decisions were simple. The realtor who sold me my current house said I was the easiest client he'd ever worked with - I believe that was a compliment.

Living on a farm has always been more of a fantasy than a fixed component of the 30 year plan I devised in college (I really was destined to become an accountant). It was up there with buying an RV and spending a year driving around North America or packing 2 bathing suits and my toothbrush in a carryon and buying a one way ticket to Fiji - a pleasant distraction on a Saturday afternoon in April as I sat at my desk surrounded by unfinished tax returns.

It's only been recently that I realized the farm fantasy could become a reality. My youngest child is headed to college this fall; I have a partner who shares my fascination with alpacas. It's not easy to research rural properties without an agent. Unlike urban neighborhoods, farmers don't usually run open houses. I don't have any friends who live on farms so I couldn't invite myself up for a weekend and try out the location as a visitor. So I contacted an agent with little more than a price range and a general location - something within 30 kilometres of north Oshawa - and said, in effect "show us what you've got".

Our realtor was game but I could sense her growing discouraged as our first several outings served only to tell her what we didn't want - a log home, a bungalow, a new build, a "handyman special" (we're willing to tackle some renovations but we know our limitations), anything recently and expensively renovated (I'm not prepared to pay for someone else's redecorating - unless that someone is Sarah Richardson in which case it's probably out of my price range). Buying a rural property is nothing like buying a builder's home in a subdivision - there is an endless combination of lot size and location to say nothing of building styles, road access and zoning regulations. Our approach has been to look at everything and trust we'll recognize the right place when we see it.

The good news is I think we've found it - a well maintained century home on a 30 acre lot within our geographic parameters. We're going up this afternoon for one more look around before putting in an offer.

It's far from a done deal. Determining the true market value of a rural property is as complicated as determining the right property and for the same reasons - there's so much variation in location and style that's it's almost impossible to find comparables. And who knows what a building inspector may discover in a 112 year old home.

But I think I can say that I've completed step one of my next 30 year plan.