A little over 100 years ago Oklahoma had a famous Land Run in which they gave away millions of acres to homesteaders who were looking for some free land. I had assumed that the days of free land were long gone, but apparently this is not necessarily the case.
Thanks to this article from Happy Rock, I found out that Kansas has several communities that are giving away land for free – with a few restrictions. All the communities require that an application be completed and approved before any land is doled out.
Requirements
Each county has different requirements of it’s homesteaders, but typically they require…
- That a family move in and build a new home within 24 months
- That the house not be a mobile home, but a house with a foundation.
- That the house is a minimum of 1000 square feet.
Of the few applications I looked at, it seems that these counties are trying to grow and build their communities with families. This makes perfect sense, a lot more tax revenue and local business growth would occur when a new family moves to town rather than someone just taking the land as vacation property.
Would you ever consider taking that offer?
At this point in my life, packing everything and moving to small-town Kansas is not what I have in mind, but I am sure there are some people out there that this would be a dream-come-true. I don’t know what the cost of living is in the middle of Kansas, but you can bet it is a whole lot less than most larger cities.
If you are interested, check out KansasFreeLand.com.
{ 1 trackback }
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Bob–It isn’t something my wife and I would ever consider doing, but it’s a nice option to have and for some people it would make abundant sense.
Are the counties in question located near employment centers, or is income mostly something you’ll have to develop once you get there?
My husband would so do this……thankfully, I don’t think he could find a job in Kansas right now. lol
I don’t know if I could handle being that “rural”. It is a neat opportunity though!
I would think there would be a very finite number of people willing or able to take advantage of this deal. A prerequisite would be in the area of employment/income. Are there jobs in these particular locations? If not, is it attractive to retirees or those self employed?
Too little information for anyone to make a move on.
I would pass at this time.