Pro vs Con on Country Living

[Holladay]

Or "Why I should Live in the Big City"

Reading about the murder in St. Louis thread got me thinking. Why is good and bad to living out in the country.

Definition of "Out in the Country" is distance to buying stuff. I would say 45 miles. The ideal spot would be on 10-20 acres just outside of town. Those are cool CHEATERS. I am talking about out in the boonies.

Sorry about the format. I couldn't think of a better way

Pros:

Privacy is the biggest one.
I can go get the mail in my scuvvies.
Boff the wife on the trampoline.
No noisey neighbors including lawnmowers.
The closest neighbor in 1/2 mile away.
You know everybody.
Have a clay pigeon thrower in the back yard.
Can have multiple BIG dogs.
Dogs don't have to have fences. It's dog heaven. (when I whistle, it might take them 10 min to come because they were a mile away.
Get to have a big toys: big lawn mower, small tractor with all the implements.
Can have a big garden.
Can have a nice big green lawn to play football with the kids.
No neighborhood restrictions and guidelines.
Can play my guitar REALLY loud (if I had a guitar).
Get to sit in the back yard watching the sun go down over the valley with no noise at all except for those darn birds.
Can see vividly the Milky Way.
Can pee anywhere I want (fertilization).
Can plant a tree anywhere.
Get to have a 4 wheel drive vehicle for the snow.
Have a lot of space to do anything, like storing multiple vehicles.
Barns are cool.
Kids can play AirSoft gun fighting in the hay loft (except at night when they come in and ask where are the candles?)
No traffic, I live 15 miles from work and have only one stop sign and see 10 cars.
Property taxes are relatively cheap.
Have well water, thus no crap in the water to filter for my fish tanks...and don't have to pay a water bill.
I water my lawn for free!
Family and friends don't just stop by, they arrange a good time.
No City tax.
I don't have to lock my door (I don't know where the key is)
The BIG dogs keep the burglars away (Beware of Dog sign helps too. I added an "S")
Can own a bunch of guns and use them all.

Cons:

Isolation is the biggest one.
If I need a wiget to work on the house, it takes 2 hrs round trip to Home Depot.
When you DO go to town it takes all day, not only the drive, but you have to load up on everything because you don't want to go back soon.
Everybody knows you.
Big toys are expensive.
Mowing 2 acres sucks, weedeating is a real pain.
Kids can't hop on their bikes to visit a friend, you have to taxi them everywhere.
Gas is expensive.
Vehicles are expensive including the insurance for multiple vehicles (which you have because you have the space to store them)
If you have had a few, it is a loonnnggg way to walk since there is no corner bar.
I can't water my lawn because the well gives out.
Friends just don't swing by.
Finding a decent job can be hard.
Big gardens suck, weeding them and watering them all the time.
Big yards suck, if you fertilize well, your second home is the lawnmower seat and it better be a big expensive one.
Grass seed is expensive, I have to keep over seeding because my grass dies due to no water.
Up keep and maintenance is a lot of work (something always breaks) and expensive.
Guns suck. If you have a big place, people what to come over and shoot pigeons. They use all your guns and you have to clean them and pay for the shells.
Internet sucks...I have 3 different providers and none work at the same time.

That is about all off the top of my head. Please add more.

[CrazyPhuD]

Pro: Sheep never get headaches

[Iowanian]

There are no cons to living in the country.

[DaneMcCloud]

Originally Posted by JASONSAUTO

No you don't.


I've BEEN there and it ISN'T country.


I told you about the hills and pool ordeal...

It's the country where I live.

Your family is too uppity for dollar.

[Buehler445]

Originally Posted by Baconeater

Yeah, he went from bad (Sydney, NE) to even worse (where ever the hell he is now, KS)

LOL. And yet I live in town.

Scott has 4 stop lights ( 2 of them are pedestrian).

I don't think there are any where notorious is at.

[listopencil]

Originally Posted by srvy

Say you forgot you had 2 beers left in the fridge and your very thirsty. The nearest town is 12 miles away that has a grocery and liquor store but it's closed at 5 and it's already 6. The wally world is in a town 50 miles away and is open till 11 pm. But there is a filling station out on the highway 3 miles away but he gouges you at 7.50 a six pack for shifty nat light what to do what to do. Drive the fifty get your 30 pack and an ice cold 40 traveler with a sack for the journey home or get butt reamed and settle for a 6 pack of of shit ty beer or drink your only 2 beers and chase with ice water rest the night. That's country living your choice.

Sent from my SM-G928V using Tapatalk

Make your own.

[kccrow]

Originally Posted by Frosty

I'm an electrical engineer and live in the county. My commute is 13 miles one way on 55 mph highway. In the little burg near me there is an aluminum boat factory, a wood and gas stove factory, a refrigeration coil factory and two saw mills. There are also several small software/engineering companies. There is a surprising amount of industry hiding in some of these small towns.

I do have to go into Spokane about once a month or so to go to Costco and a couple of other places. However, there is a Walmart, three grocery stores and several hardware stores nearby so I don't have to go to Spokane if I don't want to.

By the way, OP missed one of the biggest cons - slow, expensive internet.

Come live in the UP of michigan where the biggest towns have 35,000 people and a wal-mart and none are closer than an hour from the other. most of the other towns in between have 2-3000 people at most. My only saving grace is I'm 2 hour drive from Green Bay

[BucEyedPea]

Originally Posted by Rain Man

If I was retired, I probably wouldn't mind living "out in the country", so I can certainly appreciate that lifestyle and suspect I would enjoy it. That said, I'm a city mouse and here are my pros and cons to living in the center of a big city.

Pros:

Access. I walk to work, the grocery store, the dentist, the mall, the doctor, restaurants, movie theaters, and everything else I need.

Car Savings. Because of the first advantage, my household has only one car, which saves a lot of money. Also, we drive very little even with the one car.

Choices. I have a lot of choices on everything. If I don't like my massage person or dentist or whatever, there's another one within walking distance. Within 10 minutes I can walk to four different grocery store chains (King Soopers, Safeway, Whole Foods, and Trader Joes). I have tons of restaurant choices. This is huge.

Home appreciation. As the metro area grows, central city housing gets more expensive. My home may be valuable enough when I retire to fund my retirement because it's a pretty high-value asset that's appreciating.

Labor pool. As an employer, there's a big labor pool available when I'm hiring.

Client pool. As a business owner, there's a big client pool that I can easily meet with.

Amenities. I have two enormous parks within walking distance, and a trail system five blocks from my house that extends probably a hundred miles (no joke).

Priority treatment. My street is on a snow route, so it gets plowed in real time with snow. Power outages and stuff like that get repaired in my area first because of the volume of people.

Anonymity. Some people might not see this as an advantage, but I really like being anonymous. I don't necessarily want to run into people I know all the time. Is that bad?

Peoplewatching. People walk by my house all the time, and I actually kind of like that. It makes the view more dynamic.

Cons:

Noise. I live in a very dense area, so I hear constant car noise in my backyard and an occasional semi or bus can be heard in my house.

Pollution. While I can't see it, I'm sure my air quality isn't as high.

Ne'er do wells. When I walk to work, I inevitably pass a fair number of people who look like the drug dealers on the "Just say no" ads. I get asked for money pretty much every day.

Small outdoor space and close neighbors. I don't really see this as a con, but others might. I live in an old neighborhood where the yards are small because everything was built in the horse and buggy days. I have good neighbors, but live in fear that someday they'll leave and a nasty person will move in. My house is probably only 10 feet from one of my neighbor's houses.

Ah, I miss city living. It's so much more fun...and things are close. Even the burbs are too quiet. But I'll take country every so often, and every weekend in summers. It's a nice mix to have. Had that in Boston.

[TLO]

Pros: farmersonly.com
Cons: farmersonly.com

[Over Yonder]

Originally Posted by Iowanian

There are no cons to living in the country.

Very damn few thats for sure! But, where I live one comes to mind. Rural utilities are alot higher than they are in the little town just 7 miles away. Well, now that I think about it, our property taxes are higher than town too. Like has been mentioned, if you need something and dont want to drive many miles, you will pay through the nose in small towns.

Really, for me the only disadvantages I come up with are about money. And I will trade a few extra bucks for solitude. But that differs with each person. The wife has hinted a few times about moving to St. Joe to be closer to her sister. And I have hinted that she should keep in touch

[LoneWolf]

I'm a cheater. We built a house on 20 acres three miles outside the city. No neighbors right next door, but I'm not really in the country.

[notorious]

Originally Posted by Buehler445

LOL. And yet I live in town.

Scott has 4 stop lights ( 2 of them are pedestrian).

I don't think there are any where notorious is at.

We get to see stop lights when I load the kids in the wagon for a trip to the big city.

[KCUnited]

Having lived in both, at this stage in my life, I'll take the city 100x over.

Cons of the city:

Goons trying to fight you for shoulder checking their slow walking asses while racing to the train.
Creepers on the train constantly leaning into my wife.
The 1k in parking tickets I racked up last year.
Traffic.
Waking up to all the city trashcans overturned during the night by lazy homeless.
Watching people blatantly litter.
No personal space when out, there's people everywhere at all hours.
Parking, I miss a mother****ing HyVee with their giant parking lots.
Having to get everything you buy up multiple floors to the condo (no elevator here).
Always having your head on a swivel can get tiresome.
Noise - the blue line train that services O'hare to downtown runs past my building every 7 minutes or so. I'm pretty used to it, but it does change the way you watch tv and even have conversations.

Pros of the city:

Having the entire world at my doorstep. Want a Costa Rican burrito? Down the street. Want a shawarma carved right off the spit? Down the street.
Our car has been in the garage with a dead battery since October because we never have to drive anywhere.
Much like the country, nobody here gives a **** about me and what I'm doing. Just another face in a crowd.
Better fit for my hobbies - multiple live music options within walking distance every night of the week. 3 small batch breweries within walking distance. 100's of entertainment spots within walking distance.
One of the largest beer distribution footprints in the United States.
I live on "Yoga Row", there's 5 yoga/pilates studios on a 2 block stretch, so the talent walking around here is amazing.
Property opportunities. Our property value has exploded in just one year due to neighborhood development.
There are multiple festivals taking place every weekend during the summer.
I could try to hit every bar/restaurant/festival in just my neighborhood for the next 5 years and never get to them all. There's 70+ other neighborhoods a short Uber ride away all doing something similar.
Major travel hub, direct flights are numerous and fairly cheap.

I'm on a 5 year plan in Chicago while we turn this condo and head some place warmer to live out our days. There's a bunch of things I don't like about living in the city, it can be a true grind at times, but the pros far outweigh the cons for where I'm at in my life. I could likely do a suburb down the road, but not sure I could ever go country.

[ThaVirus]

Originally Posted by LoneWolf

I'm a cheater. We built a house on 20 acres three miles outside the city. No neighbors right next door, but I'm not really in the country.

Make that 3 miles outside a major metro area and I'd call that ideal.

[HonestChieffan]

Pro's for rural living:

Neighbors...a lack of them or at a distance where they don't bother you

Have essentially all the services of city folk. We have rural water, same power as city living folk, sheriff does a good job.



Taxes. Less.

Critter control is easy. Coons, possums, 'dillos, squirrels...all a easy shot to eliminate.

AssTard beggars on corner going to town...none.

Traffic. Its unbearable when the two lights get out of synch but they just go flashing red and we 4 way it like the good old days.

Garden space. 50 by 100 is a non issue.

Convert "lawn" into Native grass and forb wildlife habitat for deer, turkey and quail. Neighbor think its great. In city some loafer wearing bedwetter would bitch to the HOA. I am the HOA.

I can park the gooseneck and the tilt trailer next to the shop building and leave the front end loader where I can hook on and not have some whiner piss and moan about not putting it in garage.

We can be in OP in 35 min. LS in 30, Independence about 50 min, and Plaza in 40 if we go after the morning rush. Everything city folk have we can have with no issues.

[Lzen]

My wife and I have a plan to be in the country within 5 years. We're so tired of living in the city. Too much crime, neighbors too close and/or annoying. We're just ready to get out and have some space. We both love the outdoors and are always jealous of our friends who live in the country. That being said, I don't want to be 50 miles away from the city. I think around 5-15 miles away would be ideal.