Start farming or see 1000% increase in property tax!

[hosspuller]

Just because the "county guy" couldn't give a definition of ag land doesn't mean there isn't a legal definition. Follow up on this. Each state/local has a defined ag use exemption. I suggest calling the tax dep't. They are the ones you have to convince your land qualify's.

 

[smstonypoint]

You say that most of the acreage in question is hilly and not tillable.

The fine folks in the Ag. Economics Department at Purdue have a publication that describes ag. use assessment in Indiana: Indiana Local Government Information Website: Farm Land Assessment. That publication says: "Special programs exist for other lands. Classified forest land, wildlife habitats and windbreaks may be assessed at one dollar per acre." The acreage in prairie grass may be a start in qualifying for a wildlife habitat assessment.

Steve

 

[hawkeye08]

To get ag status here, it has to be farmed commercially and show income of more than $100 per acre 3 out of 5 years... they are cracking down on it since the city folks are moving out to the country, buying 10 acres, putting a big house on and then letting the rest go to weeds. Sometimes they mow it once or twice a year, but nothing that could be considering farming. If it comes out of ag status, then 7 years back taxes are owed.

We tried to buy a farm that had been in my wife's family and the county planner told us that we would not qualify and it would cost us 7 years back taxes on 192 acres... we could afford the farm at the asking price but could not afford to take on the county on the farming (it would have been farmed by local farmer that leased many other farms).. it turned out to be a scam by a friend that was trying to buy it out from under us, they had talked to the county planner and said we were going to develop it, not farm it. We had no idea that our former friend knew the county planner or had tried to buy it out from under us until years later.

Don't get on the bad side of the county folks that determine the land use... you will go broke before you win that one. Also, we have farm service agency here that can help with that stuff.

 

[murphy1244]

Some friend?

 

[Baby Grand]

You may want to Google "ginseng" May have great potential in your part of the world. If it grew in Texas, I'd have it every where.

Woods are the perfect place for it, so you wouldn't have to disturb your place too much.

I had the same thought.
Great $/effort.
7 - 10 years before harvest might be a deal breaker for your situation, though.
The Plant Manager wants to plant some on our North facing wooded slopes.

http://www.wikihow.com/Grow-Ginseng

 

[lhfarm]

Thanks for the replies. I'm going to contact the Purdue Ag Extension for some advice and definitions. Also taking stock of what is already here (the fruit orchard idea). Probably have 30 black walnut trees. I've posted here about taking care of that "crop" every year. The "farm" has been in my wife's family since 1912. There are still porcelain insulators from when crazy Uncle Ben tried to raise pigs on acorns in the woods, containing them with "new" electric fencing. There were several farms up on the top of the hills, because they feared disease along the "bottom lands" near the rivers that run through Columbus.

During the dust bowl, my wife's grandfather "housed" starving cattle from out west that were shipped to Indiana. But the family also lost part of the farm during the Depression. My late FIL said they were lucky some years if they got their seed corn back. The land (down to 54 acres now) is crossed with old wagon roads that were the only way to town in the early 1920's. It is heavy clay and brown sandstone, known locally as "Brown County stone."

We have no plans to sell it and will pass it on to our son. But don't want to burden him or our grandchildren. The land is bordered on two sides by a forest preserve that surrounds a 400 acre private residential lake. The land owners association purchased 600 acres of "green space" around the lake. The land to our north is owned by a famous NASCAR driver. Neither of these neighbors will be doing any farming.

I'm not against paying our fair share. But a 1000% increase is just crazy. Not going to try to fight city (or county) hall, but I'd rather become a dirt farm than let this land become something it has never been nor should be - residential.

 

[Larro Darro]

I would call your Congressman. His staff is there to help you, and they will know, or find out, what would work as ag land. Our last Congressman helped my dad get classified as 100% disabled with the VA. They worked at it for months.

Here in Florida, ten acres or more of woods are able to get what they call a Green Belt Exemption. We have a ten acre piece of land on the Chipola River that is old growth woods that we pay a couple of hundred dollars taxes a year. Without the exemption it would have to be sold.

 

[cqaigy2]

Get a couple bee hives?

 

[newbury]

See your local forester and come up with a "Timber Management Plan"
DNR: Indiana Classified Forest and Wildlands program

You can manage it many ways, and should be "managing" it. It's just a case of proving to the government that you have enough paperwork to keep some "clerk" busy for a few days.

For instance:

IC 6-1.1-6-1
Classification
Sec. 1. For the purpose of property taxation, forest land and other land may be classified and assessed under this chapter if the land satisfies the conditions prescribed in this chapter for classification as native forest land, a forest plantation, or wildlands.

IC 6-1.1-6-3
Native forest land
Sec. 3. Land may be classified as native forest land if it contains at least forty (40) square feet of basal area per acre or at least one thousand (1,000) timber producing trees, of any size, per acre.
(Formerly: Acts 1975, P.L.47, SEC.1.) As amended by P.L.186-2003, SEC.2; P.L.66-2006, SEC.4.

Indiana Code 6-1.1-6

 

[Biggreenavalanche]

U pick blue berry farm !