Hello everyone!

I was hoping to gain other's input that have way more experience than myself. It is now time for the hubby and I to start looking for our own property. We live in Florida, and absolutely love it here. However, as I am sure everyone knows, Florida is EXPENSIVE compared to the midwest where we are both from originally. 

In your experience, is it better to buy a nice house with land and build a nice barn and other structures if you could find 10+ cleared grass acres for around 300k, OR try to save up for something that is exactly what you want for around the 500-600k mark? (That just blows my mind how expensive it is for a decent house, barn, arena, and land here in Florida!)

We are afraid that if we wait to try and find something already exisiting, we may not be able to afford to have nice horses and get into breeding like we had hoped. However, we are also afraid if we jump on the land deal, we might be getting into an even bigger headache trying to build and getting caught up with construction time of our own barn. 

- Plus side on the property we have found is it is move in ready and crossed fenced, so we would be able to move in the current horses we have with a small lean-too. It also has a nicely sized arena, just needs new footing / lights re-done. 

Input??? This will be our first home, so we are seeing both the upside and downside to both options. I don't have any horse friends that live in Florida yet, so gaining input of residents who know the state better than I do would be great. 

Thank you!!

I am in Oklahoma  and what we looked at was way more expensive than to build. so we bought raw land.  Be sure to check with DEQ or ask bout sewer and how hard it would be to get  So much has changed! and how hard it is to get utilities unless it already has than you are way ahead of the game there!  Consider your time and how long it would take to build and what it would cost for what you want and then you would know which way to go.  For those price ranges I would be moving to texas or oklahoma!  Course Im from Oklahoma lol

This land already has a really nice house that was built in 2013, so thankfully the property has a nice well, septic, and all utilities out there! Plus we get really nice cell service which is nice, haha!

Put yeah, prices are crazy here. We just love the area so much. Hubby is stationed in the Navy, so moving to TX or OK isn't fesabile for us for a few years, and I just want my horses on my property with me! I sure wish prices were different!

From one Navy wife to another, don't worry about your dream home and barn until you're done being restationed around the world. We have a small piece of land and have had to clear it, grade it, and are in the middle of planting and fencing JUST to get horses there for however long we're at his current duty station. The only reason we even went to all that trouble is because the resale value on this home will be enough to pocket a nice savings when we do sell it (which we know will happen eventually).

It's better to board your horses now and have an affordable home OR to buy something less than your dream home that has a GOOD resell value. When you have to PCS your dream home will be hard to leave and you'll wish you hadn't invested all that money. Just my opinion. 

Thank you! If we were at risk for PCS I would be boarding, however my husband is in his last contract and scheduled to get out after this duty station. That is the only reason we have decided that we want to stay in this area as we love it so much. I am about to be in the job market from graduting college in August, so I really hope this to be our forever location. 

Thank you for you & your husbands service and thank you for your opinion! We've gone back and forth but don't want to miss out on a opportunity that might be really good for us to hop on. 

In that case.... BUILD!!! Make it exactly what you want!

Congrats to y'all, and thank your husband for his service too. Good luck, and let us know what you decide!

there are some really nice places in fl  and soth ga. i built my dream  and wish i hadn/t 

but thats a different story.  if not in a big hurry look for a while south ga is pretty cheap and has really nice places. i am selling mine 

but its already spoken for

I'm a realtor in OR so I'm not very familiar with Florida, but my two cents would be to find a horse savvy realtor to help educate you on the market and value trends. A good realtor should be able to give you an idea of building costs per sq ft, well/septic cost,  the cost of constructing a new barn, etc.

Where I live it is more expensive to buy land and build than it is to find an existing home. That being said, nice horse properties with 5-10 acres are in the 600k-800k range here. Land prices are outrageously high due to our land being bought up for hemp and marijuana. It's pretty sad. Majority of the existing horse boarding facilities and arenas have been turned into hemp drying facilities. We only have a few places left that allow you to haul in to ride at.

Always consider the resale value even if it is your forever home. You never know what will come your way in life and prompt the need to sell. A large majority about a home itself can be changed, but you can’t change location or how many acres you have.

Hope you guys find the perfect place and congrats with almost being finished with school!