I think your landowner has overvalued his property by at least double. I'm guessing he paid about $350,000 for it about ten years ago.
Even a generous appreciation puts its current value at $800,000. It may even be worth it.
But that would put a 30-year mortgage payment at five thousand a month. You need a good plan for how to make the property generate income to support that level of financing, or you need to have enough interested parties, (i.e. your grown children), who will support its purchase.
Is there a way to set up a combination business plan that could make it an income-producing property? Perhaps a bed-and-breakfast/conference center/retreat or a commercial winery or such?
It would be nice to salvage the intact property, but it looks hopeless without a grand vision.
So I’m supposed to tell you about the drag races, according to my mom.
The ‘ZMax’ track (I’m not sure why it’s called that) is apparently brand new in Charlotte. It’s a nice track..clean, mostly orderly. The parking lot is confusing. Once you get in you’re allowed to walk around. The people will let you go anywhere except onto the track in front of a dragster..although if you tried to go there, they might just let you get run over by a smoke-belching ‘vette.
I went on Friday. It was the very first qualifying event, so there were seventy or so cars in line to race and a bunch more in the pits. I don’t know much about the pits themselves, because it was too crowded to walk around without getting in someone’s way. Also, I was only there for about an hour and didn’t have time to chat with everyone.
There were new cars ready to go as soon as the others had finished their twelve-second runs to the finish. It looked like most of the Queen City Corvette club was at the race. There were some Mustangs, a couple of Vipers, and one or two more expensive cars. And, of course, some stupid vehicles that nobody in their right mind would want to race...there was a heavily modified PT Cruiser on the track. It looked like every kid with a souped-up Plymouth from had shown up to race...there were plenty of bad cars. One of the Mustangs started blowing black smoke from under the hood before its race started and wouldn’t run.
Anyway, it was pretty fun to watch, and not too crowded on a Friday morning. I might have gone again in the afternoon since I had a free ticket, but there were other things going on.
Unfortunately, at our ages and with our health issues it wouldn't work.