My fiancee and I purchased Dave's Field to Farm in May of 2009, and after reading it we were bitten. Both of us having been bought up on farms and being involved in farming for many years we saw this as an opportunity of returning to our roots.
The first thing we had to do was to look at the capital we had available to invest in this project how much we could raise either by sale of assets or shares for we had decided at the outset that we did not want to burden ourselves with a large mortgage or loan. This done we set about in earnest to find property.
One of the first properties we found was on the small side but was in an ideal position main road leading to a busy market town here in Devon. The property had mains water, low voltage power cables crossing the land and an easy access point. The draw back was the clawback clause in the proposed contract. This made the property unworkable, to me personally these type of clauses smacks of laziness by the owner, wanting to get rich from other people's hard work and believe me it was going to be hard work.
We then found another parcel of land 22 acres with stream, copse, two flat fields, a third field which was flat leading down a steep drop to the stream, all the fields were southfacing ideal. Price was within budget so we set about building a costing.
We collected quotes for the barn for the polytunnels, arks field shelters and alike. We then looked at services telephone would be no problem as the poles ran along the boundry with a distribution point outside one of the two gates. Mains water would be a little more of a problem with the main the otherside of the road this would mean the water board digging the road and bringing over a pipe for us costly but acceptable. Power electricity this was the problem.
The electricty companies we as householders deal with ie British Gas, SWEB, etc have nothing to do with supplying the mains to you ie the actual wire etc this is done by a Utilities company in our case Western. The nearest power cable was only 350 meters away running through a neighbouring field. We had to have it surveyed to obtain a quote and this was the sting in the tail. To have the new supply to our field boundary if run overhead would cost �12,000 if run underground the cost was �8,000 however we could save �3,000 if we did the ground work ourselves ie dig the trench, lay the pea gravel and reinstate. We would then have to pay our neighbour an annual rental for this trench.
All this and at least a 12 mth wait for the new power supply.
You may have guessed we decided that this was too too much, we want to get on not wait around. So friends the land is not the only initial problem the services that you may require could also be.
Hi.
I have a site in lincolnshire and as such the electricity supply had to be installed by 'central networks' the inital quote was £13k plus for a 340 metre underground supply (only option offered) eventially after much haggleing, we agree on £4k they supplied the dusting and cabling, I installed the ducts, pulled the cables and they connectted, After standing my ground and 'asking' for a solution and help, they became very helpful.
John