Florida: Great Spots To Homestead (And Avoid)
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I retired in Lake County, FL (west of Orlando) 18 years ago from California, and the TRAFFIC IS TERRIBLE – WORSE THAN CALIFORNIA WHERE I CAME FROM. The cities keep annexing land for high density developments but can’t expand the roads due to all the lakes and cost of buying right of way. So it is GRIDLOCK everywhere. Don’t move here. Commuting is terrible. And the greedy city councils keep allowing high valuations to increase property taxes, and then the house insurance is terrible and is pricing people out of homes. Not financially feasible for retirees like me.
@@FiscalRangersFlorida I grew up in Volusia and moved to NE Ohio and have no regrets and would never go back. Everything you say is right.
The “Heartland” inland and between Okeechobee (S) and Bartow/Lake Wales(N) is actually very rural. Primarily Cattle/Citrus and the biggest cities are 25k of retirees.
The problem with N FL is that you get all the negatives of FL – shitty soil, horrible bug/disease pressure, summers too hot to grow much – but you also get guaranteed freezes that can happen as late as early March so you can’t even grow everything throughout the winter.
I can grow tomatoes year round, Mangos, Bananas, everything. I’m 70 Miles from Orlando and 60 from Tampa. Closest “big” city is Lakeland at around 100k people 35 miles from me.
Mostly cattle/citrus in my area.
Summers you can grow a large amount of food. But you have to be growing things that do well in the tropics/Carribbean. Cassava, moringa, chaya, sweet potatoes, pigeon peas and all kinds of fruit trees are almost zero maintenance once established. Traditional crops won’t work. And you can feed poultry, rabbits, etc. year round with bugs and with the seasonal weeds and permaculture crops. There are a lot of advantages. The summer weather is hard for people to deal with though. You just have to get out there and learn to accept it. Having a pool helps too.
@@TheFloridaprepper Oh yeah, I grow all those, especially sweet potatoes, okra, and cowpeas. Just talking about the “classic” crops everyone loves.
Lots of rural area in Florida. Get off the interstates and drive the back roads. If someone is looking to homestead in Florida talk to someone who actually lives in Florida. This video has a few valid points but not many.
Ya, I’ve unfortunately found that a lot in this series. It’s a lot of talking about stereotypes and generalities, and I don’t feel like any significant research has been done into the actual reality of each state.
I mean it’s good to unsuspend the generalities, and stereotypes are there for a reason, but there’s no reason to do this state by state thing if you aren’t going to be looking at details and nuances.
I lived in FL 15 years, and I enjoy road trips. Even in the “crap hits the fan” scenarios, being in the country an hour outside the se coastal metropolitan area is hardly the same as being even 20-30 minutes outside Gainesville or Jacksonville.
Agreed. Lived here my whole life and the most populated areas mentioned are of course filled with lots of people because those are our major cities.
TONS of rural, cheap land. Just an hour from Orlando you can find 1acre lots for ~$5k (of course it’s completely off-grid) that are in the “no go” zone.
I’m in a very rural part of FL. Many miles from a large city, lots of cows, chickens, goats, row crops, etc. Forests and bears and rivers. Not very population-dense. The only real problem I have with homesteading in FL is the soil, but if you choose local-hardy plants it’s doable. Sweet potatoes, mulberries, Seminole pumpkins, and cassava all go bonkers. Survival Gardener David the Good established himself in this region, and has written many books about growing here. Ignore concerns about hurricanes, they’re the easiest natural disaster to prepare for. You can see them coming a week away! Two weeks of food and water, generator with gas, you’re golden.
Very few people look at the best Florida area.
I moved to the rural area that only has a 12.5% millage rate.
I got 5 acres, 200-250ft above sea level, and my tax bill is $260/year.
My car insurance is cheap.
It is the most safe area from Hurricanes, from Miami to Houston.
What county?!? I live near Gainesville, my property is about 65 ft above sea level. That’s insanely low for taxes, how big is your house?
@@buckaroobonsaitree7488 Walton,not far from the Alabama border.
My home is a small double wide from 1985.
My FULL coverage car insurance on my Beautiful Silverado is $110 per month.
I can sit outside at nite and not see any mosquitoes.
There are too many wasps, bees and ants.
I got stuff for them.
No CHEMTRAILS here.
I was just looking at property in Putnam County, Interlachen FL near Gainsville. But found out it had a gas line running through it. Lol
Thanks for the insight, Curtis.
The hurricanes hammer the panhandle more than the entire state and you chose there? Try inland levy county.
Levy county has a lot of flood plain, even inland and the taxes are high. The properties with decent soil rarely go on the market and when they do they are very expensive.
@@mrpete9958 People always mention flood plain as a bad thing. I know of many farms on floodplains and I never hear complaints about them. Most people have done things to control the flow of the water on the land and it works great. I have flood plain land and it is fantastic. I can grow most things besides avocados because the saturation kills them. I grow citrus, bananas, bamboo shoots, and winter crops. I love it and it was super cheap because it is flood plain.
i live i FL and agree 100%. even if you live in a more rural part of florida,, a big city is relatively close (accept the panhandle). Just look back when the last few major hurricanes came through, people fled and packed all the major highways that leave florida clogging the highways
I generally like Curtis’s content but this video really just seemed rushed and lacking in attention to detail. East of Tampa Hillsborough, Polk and Okeechobee Counties have a large amount of rural property as do counties south of there. They are rural to the point where they did not have [non satellite / dial up] Internet Service available until recently and some that may still not have high speed internet. That said, the population has been increasing but the places that are more rural are not the places people go to visit. The rural areas are in between of the places Curtis points out as examples of high population (which are the tourist areas). Also, the fact that the properties he did show were not locations that that he felt were suitable and blamed his team for not picking suitable properties was not only disconcerting but also came off as a product of his disdain for the potential of homesteading in Flordia rather than a conscientious and professional assessment.
Being in SW Florida I can tell you that the advantage of being able to produce a lot of food all year long on small parcels of land (if you choose the right things) does outweigh partially the disadvantages you accurately address. The problem with north and even central Florida is you get severe frosts that limit what you can do with certain extremely productive permaculture crops.
Can confirm. We’re full. Prices are insane.
Gainesville is developing like crazy. I was up there a year or so ago and didn’t recognize the place.
Panhandle has been getting more of the hurricanes for a while though.
I live in north Florida near Gainesville. Our county has 1 traffic light. Yes, it is warm in the summer. But so is most of the nation. We are just warmer for a longer duration.
my 1 acre homestead is going up for sale in Naples next week. keep an eye out on zillow. 150+ tropical fruit trees, agricultural zoning, private well. lots of mangoes, figs and soon lots of very highly valued red custard apples. 600k.
You’re wrong about the weather. I was born in SW Florida and living for 20 years, moved to Orlando and lived there for the last 25 years, and have owned a homestead in the panhandle (Jackson County) for the last 5 years. It is hotter and colder in the panhandle because it is less tempered due to a lack of surrounding water like you have around the peninsula. There is also a significant hurricane risk in the panhandle (Hurricane Michael, Opal and others). But I chose up there because of less population density and people are generally nicer. I rather be surrounded by a handful of country fold than hordes of New York transplants….just sayin.
Hurricane Michael destroyed the Panhandle, the part of Florida this non-Floridian said is the best place to move because of less hurricanes. There are plenty rural areas here. Don’t listen to anyone about a state that doesn’t live there.
Florida is impossible to live in without being housepoor. Homeowners+Flood Insurance is outrageous and squeezing out long term homeowners. You can’t hold a mortgage without them by law. Auto insurance and everything else is really, really expensive. Everywhere in Florida that isn’t already populated is either a total shithole or in a flood zone and you’ll be dealing with LARGE amounts of standing water at almost every rainfall, not just hurricanes, though hurricanes are usually devastating. Newly developed areas in areas that were already populated are usually old trailer parks that used to be radioactive waste dumping sites for the military. The biggest problem with rural florida is that a large portion of it is sugarcane territory. If you live out in the sticks, the air quality is horrible. Cane fields are burned to the ground for harvesting, so you will have massive plumes of smoke to deal with regularly, and the nasty smell of sugar refineries isn’t pleasant either.
As a native Floridian don’t move to Florida we’re full. The mosquitoes are as big as birds the alligators will eat grandma’s Yorkie for a snack and the hurricanes will either blow your house down or flood it because it was previously swampland. I could go on but the list would be 67 pages long of reasons not to move here.
Fact, all the new homes are in flood zones. I laugh because these houses are being built where there used to be a swamp.
I used to work for my county mosquito control in the vegetation division spraying weeds in ditches and county owned retention ponds. The gators are everywhere! They are definitely not endangered!
The biggest problem is actually insurance and low wages.
@@livefreedom1776 Converting flood plain, swamp land and marshland here has been going on for over 100 years. People move in without doing research and then complain when it floods.
yep lol
Joel Skousen ranked Florida dead last with California. One of the worst places to be in a crisis. I’d put from I-4 south down there with Las Vegas and Phoenix. There’s so many reasons almost no one lived there before WWII. Hurricanes, mosquitoes and the diseases they spread, impossible to live without a/c, flooding exacerbated by overdevelopment, hard to grow nutrient dense foods.
And that’s beside the more commonly known reasons to avoid, like how it’s outrageously expensive, homeowners insurance market is collapsing, and there’s way too many people clogging the roadways which are the most dangerous in the country. Big crime and homeless problems when not compared to a failed state like CA. I would also expect FL to have problems with the water supply in coming years, with more saltwater intrusion in the aquifers which are being depleted at vastly unsustainable levels.
I just moved out this year and have no regrets. I wish everyone there the best, but the herd is wrong on this one. Any state in the South or Midwest is better in my humble opinion on most metrics related to survival or preparedness.
Native Floridian here. Auto insurance is outrageous here. Most areas are not homesteading friendly because of county ordinances. Rooster bans, limits on numbers of hens, and a ban on selling eggs are some things that people need to realize here. Gainesville/Alachua county and surrounding areas : pretty area, but urban sprawl and high property taxes are a problem. You need to own more than 5 acres to avoid chicken restrictions. Panhandle: lots of military activities are a negative. It looks like there is a lot of untouched land there because of military bases and state parks. There are a few nice areas with good soil, but most areas have poor soil and prone to flooding. Peninsula: ability to grow tropical fruit trees and an extended growing season are the only advantages. The poor soil quality makes it difficult to grow a garden without more money for soil amendments and a lot more physical labor dealing with the weeds, insects and plant diseases. Many areas have bans or restrictions on chickens, gardens, etc.
Curtis, you need to understand that doing research into areas is vital to avoiding a future disaster. FDOT is talking about putting an expressway in Bay and Jackson counties (your ok area in the panhandle). Many properties on the market in those counties are in the proposed path of the expressway.
One important aspect that is not addressed in this video is that the property taxes in FL are INSANE!!!