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1. Thanks for sharing that. I bought my ranch 20 years ago, when things seemed a lot less volatile. On a 2.5 mile stretch of low traffic travel and only 5 houses in the area, has changed. Lots of traffic, including logging trucks. It had 5 houses, now there’s about 50-60. I came home from work (airline pilot) and 300 acres joining my property line had survey stakes and orange tape every where. The county reduced it’s 5 acre minimum to 2 acres, and their “2 year for solid home to replace mobile home” has been waived. I see trailer homes all the way down the valley. I also see some nice and very nice homes being built. Some are 10,000+ sq feet with in ground pools. My property value has gone from $1200 acre to $48,000 acre. I was forced into retirement (Age 65 for airline pilots is so discriminating, I’m healthy, my 29 yr old wife and our 2 kids are all happy). About 10 years ago I saw the downfall crap of society during my South America, Central America, and European trips. I started prepping. Everyone knows it too. Last year I moved all my guns, ammo, and emergency supplies from a $500/month storage to 10 homes of trusted church members and pastors in TN and KY. I give them each $50/month for the room tax free. I have moved large gun safes, shelves, etc into the rooms. I train these church members about survival, setting up base camps, land navigation, firearms basic, advanced, and tactical, and more. I’m former Army Special Forces and Law Enforcement SWAT. I like your ideas, and we think a lot alike. One of the first thing I did 20 years ago was to fly overhead and get my aerial photos, and maps from the county. I’ve made a lot of improvements in security and comfort items. We are prepared to stay put or bug out. Thanks for posting .. sorry I rambled a little bit. Hello from the foothills of Tennessee.

   1. Did I read that correctly? You’re 65+, and your wife is 29? Or is she your wife of 29 years in matrimony, lol?

      I’m also currently in the midst of planning security, not only for my home, but also for my church and place of employment (I’m on the leadership panels). In fact, just had another consultation earlier today to iron out some questions. Funny how the LEOs all have the SWAT mindset and think only of active shooter events, the EMTs think only of medical events, and the lawyers think only of the possible lawsuits. It’s my job to act as overview to bring them all together as a cohesive unit. Sometimes like herding cats…

2. It is a good thing to not put actual dates on your plan, at least for now. Quarterly and semi-annually are good ranges. Mother Nature and weather are key in getting anything done on a farm. If you have 4 or 5 days of rain, it takes another week of dry weather before you can plow, plant, or harvest. If you are going to harvest your own animals that needs specific weather to work it. Put a standby generator for your house and a portable one for the barn, high up on your list. It took us 5 years to complete our initial goal list and we learned a lot in those years.

   Lowe’s has T-posts on sale in the spring and if you order a contractor quantity you get an additional discount. Tractor Supply also has pretty good fencing and farm gate sales in the spring. Local auctions can offer good bargains, but a lot of items are not in working order so you need to be able to repair whatever you purchase.

   Good luck and have fun!

3. I’m watching the highway being widened, “old growth” businesses being sold, storage facilities growing like mushrooms, traffic and parking patterns being changed, smelters, asphalt plants…all very disturbing when I think of what it means to the lifestyle and character of our little panhandle. I personally saw what unrestricted growth by outsiders did to Southern California from the 50s to the mid-80s. I’m seeing the pattern being played out again up here.

   1. We have lots of new storage facilities going up in the valley, too. What is up with that? People need to downsize. You can’t take it with you.

4. Great article! I currently stock up on gold but am looking to buy land in the near future.

5. We purchased a laminated satellite picture 25 miles x 25 miles with our BOL in the center. Then we tested the range of our FRS, GMRS, CB SSB and two-meter (non-repeated) radios from the BOL. We drew circles on the laminated picture indicating the range of each type of radio. SHTF we know when a BOL patrol will leave or enter radio contact on each type of communication. It also tells us how close someone would have to be to monitor each of our transmissions.

   We choose 25 x 25 with the theory that is how far a patrol could realistically walk from the BOL and return in one long day

   1. With 2 Meter radios, as well as others, a good quality antenna makes a very significant improvement in coverage area.

      1. I agree. It’s a huge difference between the supplied rubber ducky antennas supplied and a 16″ wire whip antenna. A little money well spent.

6. Matthew,

   I like the idea of determining the propagation of the various types of communications. A friend of mine showed me what he was planning on doing post SHTF with a GMRS radio. He had a simplex repeater that he picked up from Radio Shack (this was several years ago) and he was going to plug that into a GMRS radio. Then he had a platform set up on a pulley system that he was going to use to get the radio and repeater up into the air.

   Thanks for the Communications tip!

7. We bought our place back in 78 . After all these years of building , sweating , and sacrifice we find the urban sprawl has overtaken our little farm and we are in the minority as the urban elitists moved in and bought every election and spare acre around us .

8. I have a few new “neighbors” (like within a couple miles) that have expressed frustration on not being able to do everything the first year of arrival. My mantra has always been “you can’t do it all in the first year” and now it’s become theirs, too. It’s actually a running joke now.

9. Fast paced or slowed paced, one thing we can’t out pace is Urban crawl. I bought 25 years ago. Right up against 1,508,976 acres of a National Park. Back then it was a 20 minutes drive to the closest anything. Only 6 houses for miles. But now that country road is 5 lanes and the only buffer I have is that national park. Like the 29 y/o’s husband above the property value went from reasonable to insane. However, during these 25 yrs I built a fort(home), stocked a pond, grow crops, grove and husbandry. The perfect bug-in with security aspect everywhere. The downsides are the taxes and the Golden Horde now lives across the street. I stay because I own the water rights and IMHO water will be everything sooner than we want it to be.

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