Hello,

I wanted to get your opinion on what I am thinking about doing.

I currently own a beach house which is my primary resident and I cannot shoot at that house. I love the house and the beach but I also love shooting.

I want to purchase 5+ acres within a 30min drive of my house just to use for shooting. I would love to purchase 10-50 acres but 5 would be sufficent for what I am trying to do.

what I want is a peice of land that I can build a nice little 50 and 100 yard personal range on. I currently go to this nice 50 yard indoor range but I want some place I can call my own and go there on the weekends and shoot, build a bon fire and drink some good ole american beer.

Let me know what you all think. I have about 50K cash to buy some land and just want to know if it would be worth it long run. Short term it would be great for me since I dont have any real land to do anything on.

Without knowing your market it is impossible for us to guess if the land would be a good investment.

Thats all it would be. A guess.

As a vague generalization, land will barely appreciate enough to cover the taxes if it even does that.

Personally i would not look at this as an investment. It is more of a hobby expense. For what its worth i have a 95 acre shooting range. I flash graze it once a year with my cattle and i still dont consider it an investment.

I would look real hard at what percentage of your net worth this is. Unless you are a millionaire I wouldn't do it.  It is expensive for the use you will get out of it.

Lets say you go there and shoot every single weekend. You might go this often at first but probably not over the long haul but lets assume you do. to make the math easy that is 50 visits a year.

If you went there every single weekend for the next ten years and paid 50k for the land that is a cost of $100 per visit and that is not including things like fuel to get there, property taxes, etc. More than likely you will only go there a couple times a month on average.

A place where you can shoot is likely remote and not in an area where land values are booming so the value of the land is not likely to go up much.

If you have money running out your ears go for it but I would probably look into something else. You could probably get a damn nice exclusive  hunting lease for $5000 a year with hundreds of acres to not only shoot but hunt, maybe fish, ride atvs, on etc. If you did that for a year and didn't like it you  are not out a huge sum of money. You may really like it and decide you want to buy more than 5 acres.

My house sits on about 25 acres. I find it adequate to shoot on, but it is small. I wouldn't  consider 5 acres a recreational place.  

I am in this same exact position.  

I have been looking for a farm for several months.  

I am looking in the Suffolk Va. area.

You need to be sure the county allows shooting on private land.  

Also need to be aware of what is behind your land and back stops.

Looks like you are in Maryland??  maybe check out the eastern shore of Virginia for land.

If it's farmland with water rights, buy it!

Wrong side of the country.  Water is not a big issue on the east coast.

Kind of amazing how that changes by area. Where i live in southwest ks water rights are worth more than the land. My dryland farmground has averaged 11 bushel wheat the last 3 years. Cant grow shit without water here.

Find out about your neighbors.  5 Acres may not be enough if someone complains to local LEO every time you shoot.

could always find a small hunting lease?

just ask around when at the range, I was considering the same and as soon as I mentioned several people offered to let me shoot on their land so no need, bought a couple new rifles instead to take shooting.

I had the same idea but mine was more along the lines of build it up and charge memberships as a private range to cover the cost.


IE buy piece of rural land for a good price. Dig pond/build burms/ get a decent outdoor range set up and fence it in. Then get like 20-30 guys or who are willing to pay a monthly or yearly membership to have a key to the gate/be able to go shoot.


Even if it doesn't cover 100% of the cost it would be a way to have your own private range + have a decent long term investment. (Worse case scenario you break even... Unlikely the price of land will reduce over 30-50 years)

Keep in mind that a shooting range is an expense on land value because you are filling it with epa regulated lead and generally a shooting ranges noise  could prevent high-end neighbors. All this will pressure prices lower if you don't buy the right spot. The lead thing is probably only a concern if you open it to 30 people though.

A lot of hunting leases have a shooting range the members have built.  So I think this idea would be the overall best, and if you aren't really that interested in hunting it might be a plus to the other members.  On top of spending less money per year than a loan payment, you will likely have access to a lot more land.

Take this man's advice. Land is not an investment unless it is working.  Farm it, lease it out, live on it.  But don't buy it for growth in value.

Ive been looking and found 50 plus acres for under 50k. Its all woodland area off the man road. Its about a 30min drive from my main house so Im still trying to decide what to do.

Would you ever plan to build on it to live there as your primary residence?

 

Never.

If you turn it into a camp and lease it out for hunters you may do ok depending on how muchwild game you have.

My last lease had 1500 Acres and a place to park a camper for 1300 a year, Hot water bath house, with nice cook shed too. My family and I would go and camp for a week and never see anyone. The most people ever we saw at the camp at once was12 people and that was when the rut was full on. Membership held 20 members.

1500 acres off a river= lots of places to camp, ride 4 wheelers, 4wheel drive, fish,  make bonfires, shoot guns nekid if you want.

100 yard target was 5 minute walk from camper. One could set-up 600-800 yard targets if you wanted in the clear-cut easy.

I bought 26 acres about 12 years ago for that very purpose.  It has a small cabin type home on it, and i rent it out to a great renter (I got lucky on that one).  Put in a main shooting range that has 35 yards to the targets.  Ended up building a large pole barn type covered area for benches.  Then put a 200 yard rifle range on the adjacent side of the main range for longer shooting.  Its been a good investment I guess, because i get monthly income from it, plus i can shoot anytime i want to.

OK then, does the land have development potential or can it be farmed (income producing).  If so, purchasing it is feasible.

Does it cover your taxes, gas to and from the range, and insurance?  Plus any upkeep?

 

I basically looked at it that way and decided not to. I have family In PA and did the math. It would make more sense to just go back to PA a few times a year to shoot outdoors/metal targets and stuff.  The money saved on buying the land and all that would pay for ammo,trips to and from PA and indoor gun range cost over the next 40 years

I'm living in similar circumstances. Also live at the beach and have been pondering a 5 acre piece of property for shooting.  I would be looking at the property in same fashion....shoot for a while and eventually sell it to re-coup the purcahse price and any equity. Put up a small weekend range cabin and target barn.   Makes sense to me with one exception...EPA

I'm concerned that the lead in the berms would be assessed as an EPA hazard and make to land essentially worthless unless cleaned to EPA standards which is prohibitively expensive.

I found 13 acres with a cabin to hunt, shoot, ride 4 wheelers and relax.  They wanted 24K and I struggled with the decision, ultimately I figured most people pay that for a car which drops in value quickly.  I went ahead and purchased it, then a neighbor with an adjacent property contacted me to see if I wanted to purchase his 26 acres.

Its been great having 39 acres to play on, taxes are about 600 a year, and I guess for an investment its not great, but in the long run Ill have a piece of property worth a 115K+ that I could liquidate if needed.  There is also a view on the property that I have been wondering if I should put a nice cabin or home to really increase the value.