Not For Sale

[mjarrels]

Someone did their home work last week. Got a letter in the mail from some one who wanted to buy my old house (probably 140 years old). They got all the address right... but its not for sale. House means nothing to me... but the Bank barn and machine shed are priceless. Yes, the property is in location, location. location. Letter went thru the burn barrel. I Don't need the money.

mark

 

[Bird]

I would have read it, and replied that it wasn't for sale. Who knows . . . you might have made a new friend. In the early '60s, my dad bought 2 lots on Lake Texoma thinking he and mother might want to retire there someday. But in 1965 they moved to Alaska. I think it was 1968 or 1969 when someone wrote him a letter wanting to buy those 2 lots. Dad wrote and asked me what I thought about it, or if I wanted to buy them. I couldn't afford to buy them at the time, but thought they were a good investment for dad and told him so, so he wrote the guy and told him the lots weren't for sale. Then in 1973 my folks came back south and dad went to Lake Texoma to see how much things had change and found the guy who had written him owned the lots behind dad's 2 and on either side of dad's 2, had built a house on the lots behind dad's and was living there. So he had not only kept dad's lots mowed, but had planted fruit trees on those lots, which of course increased their value. In visiting with the guy, dad took a liking to him and sold those 2 lots way too cheap just because it was a nice guy.:laughing:

 

[jpm]

it was a real estate guy fishing for a deal :licking: of course way in his favor.

 

[mostly_gas]

I get 3 a year for the last several years.

 

[Thomas]

Also some what of the same thing.."We may have buyer interested in your home..call us etc.etc.".."Did you know that your neighbor wants to sell"

Confronted neighbor he wasn't all happy with R/Max.

 

[MossRoad]

I get letters like that... I think people just want me out of the neighborhood! :laughing:

But seriously, look at it from the other side. You are looking for a place to live or you are looking for an investment, business opportunity, etc... You see some property that is interesting. You go to the courthouse (or internet theses days) and find out who owns it. Then you contact them and see if they are interested in selling. How's that old saying go?

Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
No harm, no foul.
or
Get off my land!!!
:laughing:

 

[mantis]

I'm on the flip side... I have 3.5 acres, there is one plot between me and the end of the street that is 5.5 acres. The lot has been sitting vacant for years, and hasn't been mowed in 2+ years. I would LOVE to have that land, but have been told it's not for sale. I guess it is owned by some guy out of state that is hoping to eventually build a house, and retire down here.

 

[dmccarty]

I get letters like that... I think people just want me out of the neighborhood! :laughing:

Dang, you figured out what the neighbor's have been up too! They have been trying for years to get you out.

But seriously, look at it from the other side. You are looking for a place to live or you are looking for an investment, business opportunity, etc... You see some property that is interesting. You go to the courthouse (or internet theses days) and find out who owns it. Then you contact them and see if they are interested in selling.

I was visiting the GIS and Deeds office at the court house when we found the land we bought. I was about to start sending out letters. I was looking for land 20-60 acres, in a certain area, owned by people who did not live in the county. Hopefully people who lived out of state. :laughing: Figured they would be more likely to sell.

But we found our place first so I did not send the letters. I have a handful of properties that looked interesting.

Now of course I could do the research from home. BUT going to the courthouse was interesting. Reading the old Deeds was an education. And the county workers were very helpful. The lady in the GIS office, who still works there when I visited this year but the grayer hair , lived near some land we were bidding on. She had some real interesting information about the property we bid on as well as the owner and neighbors.

Later,
Dan

 

[Ridgewalker]

I got the 7 acres next to my original 43 by writing a letter to the guy I thought was the owner. Turned out he had traded the land to his boss for a different place.

His boss called me up and we made a deal. I stressed over that property for years, writing that letter was the best thing I could have done in my situation.

 

[Bird]

I'm on the flip side... I have 3.5 acres, there is one plot between me and the end of the street that is 5.5 acres. The lot has been sitting vacant for years, and hasn't been mowed in 2+ years. I would LOVE to have that land, but have been told it's not for sale. I guess it is owned by some guy out of state that is hoping to eventually build a house, and retire down here.

There can be many reasons property is not for sale. My brother bought 10 acres close to my place in Navarro County in 1995; two 5 acre lots together, so heavily wooded and grown up in briars and such that he didn't even know there was a little pond on the place until after he bought it. And we had a time cutting a trail around the perimeter, finding survey stakes, etc. And the reason it hadn't been touched in 50 years . . . In the very early '40s, a fellow bought 40 acres as a gift to give to his son when the boy got out of the Army. But the boy was killed in WWII, and the old man would not sell, nor allow anyone to do anything to that land as long as he lived. After his death, the heirs sold the place to a company that actually only wanted the mineral rights, so they divided it into 5 acre lots and sold the land that way.