Cost of deep wells ???

[check]

Back in 2003 we drilled a well, and the well driller gave us a choice. Either $4500 flat fee or $20 per foot. We knew some people around who only went 100 feet or so, so we went for $20 a foot. Wrong guess! He went down 400 feet, and it cost us $8000.

We have another property that we need to do well for so being gun shy I went for the fixed $4500. He found enough water at 120 feet. Wrong Guess again!

This is why I don’t gamble.

So 10 years later we bought another property, and all of these were right on Lakefront. but that same well driller told me he could not in good conscience recommend a flat fee. He knew that the soil was Rocky/Sandy, and that he would find water pretty much right away. Sure enough, at 45 feet he found 15 gallons per minute. It was only going to be $20 x 45 = $900, but his minimum was $2500, so that is what we paid. At least I didn’t guess wrong this time!

I have no idea what it would cost now. Fortunately, we have no more wells to drill!

 

[Rockbadchild]

70 to 100k seem crazy to me...

My dad got one done 6 years ago now and it's not very deep, but not sure the depth, but it cost him 12k with the water softener. They didn't reach the bed rock we have a thick over burden, it is true that if they drill a long way and have to ''frack'' to get water it can get expensive pretty quickly.

 

[Rockbadchild]

I would also water witching the location before drilling so you know where to drill to hit water. Not everyone has the capability of doing it and lots of people think it's a myth but there is such thing.

 

[JethroB]

I had a 4 inch 450’ turnkey residential well with 1.5hp pump & 120 gallon pressure tank put in 4 years ago with guaranteed minimum 10 gpm flow. $11,500. A neighbor was recently quoted $25,000. Same company (and pretty much the only one within 50 miles) and the hydrology here is pretty much the same and sand & soft clay.

Also had a 6 inch x 500 ft irrigation well drilled recently to supply the pivots. $46,000 for the hole and casing then $20k for pump and electrics. I learned something there, no lender will finance a well without a property lien or other pledged assets. I suppose it’s hard to repossess a hole.

 

[civilian]

Plus in Colorado even if there is a stream, creek, river crossing the property, you may not be able to use it because someone may have water rights to it. We were looking for property to build on in CO years ago, and heard of people that had to truck water in because they couldn't find water under them for a well. So we built in MI. Jon

 

[westcliffe01]

Unfortunately the well driller with whom I had an interview back in 2012 has not answered his phone nor returned calls for a few days and I think I might get a more honest opinion from him. I did discover the Colorado GIS mapping system for wells Geocortex Viewer for HTML5

With it you can view data for every known well in a map view for the state. Very interesting. In some areas like at the airport in Custer county the wells are 100ft deep or less, the same with wells near the state highway 69 which runs at just about the lowest point of the valley following the contour lines. At that point in the valley one probably has a layer of glacial till very similar to Michigan with bedrock underneath. So drilling a well probably faster and less expensive than drilling solid rock in the higher elevations.

I just have to try to get some more offers on the $/foot number, the $80/foot seems the highest number mentioned so far in this post.

 

[stumblinhorse]

Wondered if you were looking in west cliff area with your name…. I have lived all over the state. Where do you go to buy food if you live in west cliff? I did my weekly trip of 88 miles round trip to the grocery store in -22*F today. There are some 40 acre lots down the road from me for sale starting at 10k an acre... Welcome to Colorado!

 

[westcliffe01]

I had been interested in an old subdivision in Custer County, Centennial Ranch. But it appears that a recent influx of folks from California and NY state resulted in pretty much any available land parcels being bought up now being "flipped" at $150K+ for a 35 acre parcel. These were selling for $23k/parcel back in 2012 while I was getting divorced. It has taken me some time to get back on my feet after paying off the divorce settlement I was handed after the trial... I have to seriously wonder who is going to buy high altitude barren rocky land with no available utilities, no snow clearing, snowed in for 2 months at a time, well costing $70-$100k for 500+ ft through solid rock for $150k a 35 acre parcel ? It had originally not been selling for decades at the $23k per parcel prices but I guess if you sell your house in CA for $3 Million, then it looks cheap and one can afford to own hundreds of acres...

When one reads the covenants of the newer subdivisions, the terms of the agreement are so severe (newer subdivisions usually the developer sold off the water rights to make some cash as one of the first steps in the development process). The contract that was the basis of the sale of the water rights from the original several thousand acre ranch, is now part of the covenants of the new subdivision. So despite the $70k or whatever it is that your new well costs, it has to get a meter and one is only allowed to draw from the aquifer an amount proportional to the rainfall within the catchment area. Which in a dry year may be zero... Furthermore, if a local "water board" were to be established and began distributing water by pipeline from a central location (would be expensive because of the cost of burying pipeline in solid rock) you would be forced to abandon your well that you just recently paid so much money for and would then be obliged to buy water from the water board at whatever charge they decided it was worth... A truly horrific scenario. I would drop dead before I abandoned a $70k well that I had just paid for, just to be replaced by expensive, unreliable and potentially impure city water. Thus obviously I have to reject buying land in any such subdivision, which account for at least 80% of available land in Custer county.

Here is an example of the sort of covenants that I am referring to https://cuernoverde.org/files/CVOA-Covenants-As-Recorded.pdf

 

[stumblinhorse]

I had been interested in an old subdivision in Custer County, Centennial Ranch. But it appears that a recent influx of folks from California and NY state resulted in pretty much any available land parcels being bought up now being "flipped" at $150K+ for a 35 acre parcel. These were selling for $23k/parcel back in 2012 while I was getting divorced. It has taken me some time to get back on my feet after paying off the divorce settlement I was handed after the trial... I have to seriously wonder who is going to buy high altitude barren rocky land with no available utilities, no snow clearing, snowed in for 2 months at a time, well costing $70-$100k for 500+ ft through solid rock for $150k a 35 acre parcel ? It had originally not been selling for decades at the $23k per parcel prices but I guess if you sell your house in CA for $3 Million, then it looks cheap and one can afford to own hundreds of acres...

When one reads the covenants of the newer subdivisions, the terms of the agreement are so severe (newer subdivisions usually the developer sold off the water rights to make some cash as one of the first steps in the development process). The contract that was the basis of the sale of the water rights from the original several thousand acre ranch, is now part of the covenants of the new subdivision. So despite the $70k or whatever it is that your new well costs, it has to get a meter and one is only allowed to draw from the aquifer an amount proportional to the rainfall within the catchment area. Which in a dry year may be zero... Furthermore, if a local "water board" were to be established and began distributing water by pipeline from a central location (would be expensive because of the cost of burying pipeline in solid rock) you would be forced to abandon your well that you just recently paid so much money for and would then be obliged to buy water from the water board at whatever charge they decided it was worth... A truly horrific scenario. I would drop dead before I abandoned a $70k well that I had just paid for, just to be replaced by expensive, unreliable and potentially impure city water. Thus obviously I have to reject buying land in any such subdivision, which account for at least 80% of available land in Custer county.

On top of all that, building a house is both costly and slow in remote areas. I have done it once and got my fill. Building in my county starts at about $500/sqft. That doesn’t include the well or septic or any excavation. And will take multiple years. With the fire we had a 2 1/2 years ago, 300 homes burned and less than 50 are built back. My advice is to buy an existing house…

Those covenants are not common across the state. I live rural so nothing here. The 40s down the road from me are a subdivision. But many places are not subs.

 

[Boss 302]

Glad I don't live out west, that's alot of scratch for drilling a well.