looking at a property in unincorporated Dyer County, with a Friendship postal address. Built mid-70s, well and septic, propane and electric. Heat and water heat is electric, I thought that was strange. One fireplace and the stove seem to be the only propane use. Fireplace with chimney for wood stove. What are the things I don't know to ask about?
Well testing, know the depth of the pump and water surface. Recharge rate is critical. Septic tank pumped last? In a flood plain or subject to any kind of high water? Make certain that the inspector you hire is NOT affiliated, even at arm's length, with the RE agent or the code enforcement officer. How far to EMS and fire services? And the list goes on ---
what @ghrit said ya can find some info @ Dyer County, Tennessee - Wikipedia this is potentially tornado country plus the river is nearby so floodin is going to be a concern what is the 1,000 year flood level in the area? elevation? are mud n rock slides common in the area? EMS n fire might be too far away yall are gonna have to be yer own EMS n fire dept. update tornadoes, floods plus earthquakes would be at the top of the list in that area, it is a high risk/really high risk quake zone ..
Tina Turner was from Nutbush. I used to play at Tom Cat's 21 club there when I was in a bar band. Worked there on the rail road a good bit in the 70s. Mostly river bottom land, swamps, big old cotton-mouths, lots of deer and raccoons. People are agri-oriented for the most part, and a little clannish until they get to know you. The Hatchie Bottom is some of the best hog, squirrel, deer, and varmint hunting you'll want to find and the earth grows things so fast that you have to pick them on the run. Dyersburg has most of the modern amenities and it's a good place to raise children.
Spiders. Do they have a lot of spiders? It's a little thing, but I camped in that area once and never saw so many spiders. You couldn't sit down without squashing a spider. They were everywhere! When the wind blew the spiders would fall on the tent like rain. Weirdest night I ever spent in a tent. If you have any fear of spiders this is an important question.
But if you don't mind the bowels of the earth opening up and rivers reversing their flow you might wake up to find you now own water front property. Here's a really good account of the formation of Reelfoot lake, which is North of Dyer county.
Watched the movie and know that all that happened and more. It's an awesome place and I get to go there a couple of times a year but I always get nervous when I get close to that side of Missouri. That Fault is still active and shakes things up every once n a while.
yeah we're in a suburb of Memphis now (Bartlett) so not really much of a change for weather and earthquake. The property under consideration is a little under 2 acres on a paved road. Not a flood zone at all. No 'mountains' but hills, and we're very near the top of one. Only one house higher up. It would be simpler to just show you the site on a map program but I'm sure that's a bad idea. It's about 10 miles southeast of Dyersburg. There's a volunteer FD for the area. Farm fields in every direction. I guess some of the things i was hoping to get pointed in the right direction about, are things like 'do the wells and septic really need re-done around here' and 'does the water taste ok' etc. It's not truly off-grid or survivable as some of you would mean it, but it's a heck of an improvement over the current situation, PROVIDED it doesn't come with it's own trouble we haven't thought of. I thought maybe some of you had insight into why you'd use electric heat over propane, for example. Maybe even have a suggestion on finding an inspector for well and septic. The agent doesn't seem to have any of this info, and is flatly discouraging trying to get any of it without making an offer, which I am willing to do if we can convince ourselves that this is a good thing to do... which kinda needs some of these questions answered... catch-22. Another thing - property values in the area just don't seem to have any rhyme or reason. Tough to know what something is worth as far as I've been able to tell. It's got only one sale in the tax assessor's history and that price was pretty close to what they're asking now, which is a lot higher than others not too far away, but a lot nicer than those too. I get a good feel for the area of this lot, others seem places I'd be happy to leave. I guess really just talking myself into it, or out of it, not sure which is wiser.
Run, don't walk, away from that agent. If he/she/it really wants to sell that house, no efforts will be spared to hook you by providing the info you need to make an informed decision. You indicate a reluctance to get you that info tells me there is one or more MAJOR difficulties with the house or property. I don't care for electric heat from a comfort and cost standpoint, had it in past houses. There's a good case to be made for a heat pump (which is, of course, electric powered) but window units aren't all that satisfactory. At this point, if baseboard is what's there, retrofitting for propane will be at the very best a PIA if not out and out expensive. In TN, it's an odds on bet that the supplier for juice is TVA, which MAY be interesting from the standpoint of cost, I don't know. Other power authorities (think Bonneville Power) typically used to have a real cost advantage.
@Idahoser You can hire your own real estate agent to do a lot of ground work for you. Your agent will be paid by the selling agent, usually. That's how I got this place, I had no more idea than the man in the moon what this area had hiding under the pseudo grass and the selling agent was clearly a dipshit.
we went for another look yesterday (without the agent) and a neighbor came over to talk. Very nice guy, very helpful info. He said he was hoping to get some older folks in there rather than kids. He had some history for this place, new septic and new pump in the well in the last few years. His systems are similar and he likes it, no trouble beyond normal. This house was built in '74 to replace one that burned down. Very encouraging. I do dislike the agent's attitude, but this is the selling agent, simply because it was simpler to contact her than getting our own to look into a property we'd already located. I can find one to represent me but at this point I'm not terribly concerned, I believe I can make an offer "contingent upon acceptable results" of the home, septic and well inspections, no? Not trying to discount your advice, just don't want to throw away a property that may not be as bad as that without being more thorough. It doesn't seem there's any competition, so we can afford to wait. Plus they've dropped the price twice already.
You sure can make an offer contingent on anything you want, of course with inspections, well and septic testing and title search just for starters. Whether you get your own agent or not, you should also use a lawyer to draft your offer that YOU pick out, especially knowing that the selling agent is, uh, held in low esteem. You are paying for the service so you want the lawyer's loyalty to you, not in any way beholden to someone bringing him business. (BYKT)
It's a heat pump. American Products, I think. There is also a motel style thru-wall unit in the 'smoking room' (what we'll use it for) but I may have to replace that one. Just surprised me, I would have thought propane would be the way to go for heat, but the neighbor also has electric.
Heat pumps, good, but can be noisy. I put one in when we upgraded the house in Richland, replaced a forced air furnace. (Picked a variable speed QUIET replacemet fan, the kids were nappers.) Baseboard, bad. I cannot imagine ever installing them deliberately. We had baseboard elements in a place in Longview, nearly had a fire. My ex was changing the beds and tossed a pillow on one of the baseboard covers, discovered it when it started smoking. Again, there's a trade off between electric and propane, and most of that question is answered with price comparos. TVA used to be low cost electricity, dunno about now. I have some doubts about the availability of propane fired heat pumps, but would not be too surprised to find they exist. If they do exist, it might be an interesting swap.
maybe a Ground Sourced Heat Pump would fit the Bill.... Especially, if the place has a well, and you have a winter garden... or a Catfish pond of reasonable size
I was imagining that a propane FURNACE would be more common than an electric heat pump. We have natural gas in our current home and that's what we have there. There is a fireplace and a place to hook up a wood stove which we'll probably do. I'm told this can keep the whole house warm. The smoking room add-on has a propane fireplace along with the motel A/C. Next time I make that trip I need to see what 2m repeaters I can reach. Our T-Mobile doesn't have very good coverage up there.
No need to go there and spin the dial looking, find some candidates here first. RepeaterBook.com: Quick Search for Amateur Radio Repeaters Amateur Radio Repeater database - Updated daily
