Originally published at: For sale: Little town along creek (albeit not Schitt's Creek) | Boing Boing
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If it is pronounced “lepers”, than Leiper’s Creek doesn’t sound better than Schitt’s Creek
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You first…
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Sounds safe!
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You know the real estate agent in the second video mentioned historic preservation of the site… there is a way to ensure that happens… getting the county or state to declare it a historic site. 
But apparently, preserving history is a bridge too far?
It does look lovely.
[ETA] It’s an hour from Nashville and it looks like it’s near hiking off the Natchez Trace Parkway…
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You should have mentioned how much it cost.
They dug a new hole for the outhouse and replaced the candles.
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Do I get to declare myself the mayor and set the property tax rates?
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Tennessee wouldn’t be my first choice of location, but who wants to start an queer anarchist commune?
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Thank you kindly, Real Estate Agent, but most certainly do not want cows wandering in my roadways.
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You get used to that a lot quicker than you’d think. There are cows everywhere in the backcountry out here. The first few times I encountered them I was confused as hell (being from an area where this wasn’t normal). Now it’s just another day in the bush.
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Growing up in Kansas, it’s not a good scenario, as most rural roads have a speed limit of 55 mph. You have to look out for both deer and cows.
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If you own the town I’m guessing you will be responsible for maintaining the roads and bridges.
Ah. Yeah. Hadn’t thought of that. Most of the roads I see them on are too rough to go anywhere near that fast. We also have deer (and moose), but I see more cows than anything out there.
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It does look lovely and even with the exchange rate is way cheap relative to Australian prices. Get a bit out of town here and all you have to dodge is goats, emus, wild boar, kangaroos and roadkill with the odd occasional exotic like egrets. Pays to keep a sharp eye.
Always true in this world. 
It may have something to do with getting an ag(ricultural) exemption. Depending on which state and which county, this can mean not having to pay property tax, for example, if one successfully maintains one’s ag exemption with at the minimum number of cattle, beehives, acreage under cultivation, etc. (there’s an audit process and on-site inspections).
I wonder how that would tie the hands of any person seeking to make change/improvements/additions. Usually, once a place is deemed historic officially, you don’t get to change building colors, or change the roofing materials, etc. Then any rehab turns into a massive money pit because all construction must pass the muster of the historical preservation society or board.
Also: historically “old” white paint invariably has lead in it. So: lead abatement issues may well be involved, were one to try to make the place usable, or habitable. More costs, and it has to be done correctly to be safe for land, water, people, animals, etc.
Depends if the town is incorporated, and if it is, what’s written in the charter.
I realize you were likely asking in jest.
I’ve had several go-rounds on the process of how to make a town out of an unincorporated inhabited land area in Texas. It ain’t easy.
Would be fruitful to ask “what’s the water quality and has a NEPA lab run a decently rigorous water sampling set of tests on it” and also “where’s the electric power coming from, who owns it, and how reliable is the service?”
Anyone looking to set up an intentional community (I live in one, and have friends in others in the U.S.) will tell you that the basic friction points are:
- pets;
- children;
- garbage; and
- the decision-making process for town business (where “business” means everything from problematic neighbors, wildfire protection, corporations polluting something that causes suffering for town residents, lost pets/children/possessions, crashed power grid, fixing roads, mending water pipes, dealing with faulty septic systems, and oh so much more).
Been there.
Am there.
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Added to the long list of stuff I’d buy if I was insanely rich. (I’d try to turn it into some type of rural arts community.)
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Depending on the way the law is written, it usually means that they need to have it in line with the time period… I think many laws make some allowances for things that are dangerous (like lead paint)… I think the point is to preserve the look and feel as closely as possible to the original.
But since property owners are the only Americans who have rights, it means we don’t get to have nice things like historically preserved buildings… instead we have real estate agents making weak pleas that will promptly be ignored.
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Yeah, the rehabbing that I was thinking of for old buildings has to do with cost-benefit choices about rip-out-and-replace vs making every effort (expensive) to preserve existing materials for perfectly good reasons, if sometimes impractical from a time-and-money standpoint.
I get it about lead [paint] abatement allowances. I have worked on historical buildings in the U.S. midwest. Each municipality or commission etc. that has a stake in a building’s historical designation gets some amount of say-so in how the building can not only look, but what it can be made out of, and how the footprint/ foundation can be altered in size or shape.
Yes, they don’t ask you to repaint with lead paint even it is historical. Same goes for lead pipes and plumbing.
No, they are not thrilled with inclusion of high-performance insulated windows that don’t closely match original windows. Yes, adding air-conditioning is fine. No, all the historical wiring can’t stay, it must be entirely removed for obvious reasons, even if it is all still working ok.
Sometimes buildings look decent enough on the outside, like the siding or cladding just needs a good cleaning off and repaint, and then you get inside that building and you see that the dry-rot is so extensive, you’d have to pull each board off, carefully (because historic, maybe saving the nails even), reframe with good solid new materials, then reuse the cladding, or redo the exterior to emulate its original historic appearance.
I was just in an old but (I thought) passably functional barn last month, looked fine. The interior was a done-deal though, from the dry wood termites. It’s a shame but the whole thing (which is rather large and housed a bunch of farm equipment), is going to have to come down. It’s not safe to be in, especially on a windy day. One day a norther is going to blow it down. I think the owner got most of what he needed out of there, but for a brushhog, a custom-built hay baler, and a boxblade grader.
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