well, i live on 10 acres and i love it. but i do essentialy have 'waterfront property' since i have a huge pond that consumes a large portion of my 'back yard'. i love being able to look out on water and enjoy all the wildlife it attracts-i don't know that i would however enjoy living on a lake-if it was popular with sportsman or fishermen and the kind of 'wildlife' that might attract
i enjoy my peace and quiet and my property affords me that-if i had to contend with noise (and esp. drunken noise which was the norm at the popular lakes where we used to live) and littering (again a problem with those lakes-beer cans and the like) i don't think i would find it as enjoyable.
one thing that i would explore re. lakefront property is weather the home is part of a home owners association and what impact that has on ownership. we are in an hoa because of some special wrangling when this area was sold off and for the most part it's good but it can be a p.i.t.a.-and the potential for p.i.t.a homeowner's boards to get away with heck can be much greater if you live in an area where there are many absent homeowners who blindly give proxy's to people (we have as i imagine many lakefront areas have-people who only live here limited times during the year-so their views on a proposed decsion can be vastly different than people who live here year round and have to deal with very restricting rules on a daily basis-they think lowering the speed limit to a crawl of 15 mph is 'quaint'-it's not when you live with it 24/7
).
explore the local newspapers to see if there are any contentious issues or strong restrictions/ordinances with the government or eco groups re a body of water. i know of water areas that were incredible recreation areas until some enviornmental group got heated up about the impact boating had on the indiginous species-not much enjoyment to a dock and a boat if a ban or highly restrictive laws are put into place regulating when/how it can be used. there are some lakefront communities that also have realy tight laws on construction-so if a person wants or needs to building or reconstruction it can be a bear to get permits-and then very restrictive on when the construction can take place (i recall watching one tv show where there was no construction permitted after like 4 in the afternoon nor on weekends or legal holidays-it put a major crimp in renos and drove the price up for contractors). there's some waterfront property in california that's sure changed from the beautiful place it was-largly because while it had no flooding issues, surrounding towns did-they won the right to re-route waterways that impacted the lake-it's now more of a mosquito sanctuary than a desirable locale
if the lake is popular with non owners look to the placement of the property vs. the public access areas. being too close can result in having people troop through your yard, block your driveway and cause you to have to constantly monitor your property/call the police or tow trucks. popular areas with the public also contribute to marked conjestion of surface roads around an area-so if you do your errands and shopping on the weekends it can mean dealing with all the traffic of the 'tourists' (i grew up in a touristy area-the roads were a mess on weekends).
evaluate the cost of homeowner's insurance, but also look at other expenses. having a dock means upkeep and maintainance (i have a friend whose dad retired quite well off doing dock maintainance for private home owners), does that body of water attract 'gods little creatures' that may necessitate more upkeep on the home and perhaps pest services.
like i said-i love my waterfront property-but it's MY water, i control who can and can't go into it (though an occasional neighbor's dog may not agree with that
).
check also to see how property taxes are done in the state. if you buy a place where people are doing major custom homes as the existing homeowners sell off and the value of those homes drive your tax basis it can become ungodly expensive. when we lived in california we were protected by a tax initiative that passed in the late 70's that kept our property taxes based on the price we paid when we originaly purchased our home-so even though the homes in our neighborhood jumped from $180,000 when they were built to $650,000 in 6 years-we retained reasonable taxes. before that passed-and in states that don't do that-if you own a 'normal' home but your neighbors sell off and custom 'mcmansions' start building up, your taxes get based on THEIR values (i know people in napa that before the initiative passed saw rural land skyrocket in value-their taxes quadrupled and they could'nt afford to keep their long term existing homes). it's great to have an increased value if you plan on selling, but if you plan on staying long term it eat up that potential profit quite a bit.
good luck in making your decision.
Maybe cause seeing and going to the beach when I was younger so much justed burned me out.
Like I said, this has been a dream of mine since I was a little girl.
). so our upkeep is/will be the formal landscaping around the home with just general brush abatement on the rest of the property.
, and we awoke one morning to find several neighbors out with snow moving equipment clearing everyones entrances to their driveways
).
