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Newsletter from Montana - Minnesota
March 2007
We have a new agent:
Tim Hilbrand.
Tim is originally from the Western part of Minnesota, running a farm there for most of his life, and most recently headed a successful businesses installing school bleachers all over the Northwest. Now, his son runs the business while he sells real estate here in Montana.
His first listing is a
Motel with bar and restaurant in Park City, which is a small town just a few miles west of Laurel. Four units of the motel have kitchens and five units have a small refrigerator and a microwave. The two motel buildings were built in 1976 and some rooms still reflect the era with the original wall paneling in place. However, the buildings have been updated significantly: new appliances, all remodeled bathrooms, new carpets in several units, new roofs in 2003 and a coat of fresh paint all make it ready for business. Living quarters are included in one of the motel buildings - one bedroom, an office and laundry room. The bar and restaurant, in a third building, were built in 2003.
Laurel's refinery is expanding at a rapid rate, and next month 100 electricians are expected to arrive for a few months' stay - sounds like a good opportunity to turn this motel into a goldmine! It's a bargain at $ 199,900 for the motel
The
bar and restaurant are available for $ 299,900 and come with gambling (including poker) and hard liquor licenses, which together are worth $ 150,000. (These are floating licenses, so you could actually use them anywhere in Stillwater County.) Patrons can enjoy a pool table, gambling machines and a full bar. The kitchen is fully equipped with coolers, freezers, ovens, deep fryer and much more.
Here it is: the perfect business in a small town with the convenience of Montana's largest city half an hour away:
If that's not enough gold for you, the
Placer Mine
is back on the market.
This retired mine comes with a nice log cabin, four miles of fishing stream and eight miles of trails right on the property, which is surrounded by the Lolo National Forest. The trees are amazing - in addition to pine and spruce you can enjoy those spectacular Tamaracks, which turn a beautiful bright gold in fall. There is lots of wildlife, but you need to be a skilled hunter to hunt in the forest. The property is well taken care of, with selective logging to keep all healthy trees well spaced. You need to use your snowmobile in winter or know how to run a cat to keep the entrance to the property plowed. It is peaceful out there and you can live independently, removed from the rest of the world.
The
153 acres in Belfry
- the one with a mile of riverfront fifteen minutes from Red Lodge - can now be bought in smaller chunks. Eighty acres for $ 800,000 and 73 acres for $ 475,000. The 80 acre lot consists of four 20-acre parcels, so you could buy it together with another family and instantly have it neatly divided, or sell three parcels for $ 300,000 each and own the fourth for free with money to build a cabin! The 80 acres have two-thirds of the riverfront and the 73 acres have the other third with the island to the north.
If you would like to check the water depth for the Clark's Fork in Belfry or you enjoy kayaking, canoeing and the like, I just added a
new link to my website
which gives all the rivers and creeks in Montana and their water flow; it is updated daily.
The site gives the long-term median flow, 3/10 stream-flow (ft³/s), gauge height, and the temperature date/time.
The price for the
320 acres two miles south of Rockvale
just got reduced to $ 1,200,000 (from $ 1,850,000!) with irrigation rights for 120 acres, and a quarter mile of Highway 212 frontage. Ideal for a subdivision or ranchette, with two ponds, hills and irrigation stream. The 200 acres of dryland can now be bought separately for $ 450,000, the 20 acres irrigated land with direct access from the Highway are still priced at $ 210,000. All of the 120 acres have mountain views and about 1/3 of the dry land. The dryland forms a horseshoe around a private valley and in wet years it features a small reservoir.
If you need help around the house, Melanie Sherry and Carrion Parrish will help you out around Carbon/Stillwater/Park and Yellowstone County. Their website is
http://www.errandsmontana.com/
phone: 406/425 0962 email girls@errandsmontana.com
Their services include shopping (in Billings or around town) and delivery, homework help, care for the elderly, childcare, pet sitting and even house cleaning. If you think a shuttle from the airport in Billings would be good idea, ask them about it. They will need to show that there is public interest, before they can get a transportation permit. I filled out their affidavit and if there is a hearing I will show up and cheer! :-)
Christine Karpinski just published the second edition of her book "How to Rent by Owner." If you order the book directly
from her website, she will throw in free Priority Mail shipping until April 30th if you put "Montana" in for a coupon code. For the second edition of this book, she updated over half of it, devoting a whole new chapter to finding insurance. Other topics include how to buy a vacation rental with family, friends or strangers (co-op buying), how to create virtual tours for your home, circumventing bans on vacation rentals and avoiding scams. This book would be worth your while if you are planning to buy a vacation rental. You can also send her an email at christine@howtorentbyowner.com
I do have a
vacation rental for sale, which can bring in $ 100,000+/year if you do it right:
In case you have not heard, the world's most expensive residence is being built in Montana. It will be for sale for $ 155 Million - and you thought my listings have outrageous prices... But, if you would like to make an offer on it, let me know, I'll be happy to be your buyer's agent! It is located in the
Yellowstone Club.
There is an
artist's rendering of the home.
The owner is the developer Timothy Blixeth and he told Forbes Magazine that this deluxe wood and stone domicile will be 53,000 square feet, will sit on 160 acres, boast 10 bedrooms, and will allow those living inside it to have their own private chairlift to Yellowstone's exclusive ski slopes. It will also have its own built-in movie theatre and a swimming pool that starts indoors and winds up outdoors, when a glass panel slides away to separate nature from the closed off interior.
The fully furnished villa will also come with a completely stocked wine cellar and a driveway over a mile long. The house will be finished sometime next year and there is already much interest in it!
By the way, the Yellowstone Club does not allow people in only because they have money. They have been known to turn people away, because they were too snooty!
The previous most expensive house on the market was
Updown Court in Windelsham, England for $139 million.
An interesting sidenote: when I put my listings into European websites in England and Germany, the drop-down menu where I select the type of property I want to enter, always gives me these choices: condo, townhouse, home and.... castle! I suppose I would use castle for that listing in the Yellowstone Club :-)
The Europeans also still make good use of cobblestones and brick instead of pavement, which let rainwater drain into the earth like it's supposed to, instead of running off to storm sewers (picking up pollutants and causing erosion along the way). Runoff water flowing to waterways picks up junk like motor oil as it goes (part of why about 40% of US lakes and rivers aren't safe for fishing or swimming). Every parking lot, driveway, sidewalk and road is an impervious surface, acting as an unbroken barrier between the wet rain falling from the sky and the dry earth below. Water draining from these surfaces gains speed and quickly rolls off all exposed ground. Even minor rains become small-scale floods, eroding what little soil is exposed and quickly filling municipal storm systems.
For these reasons, it might be a good idea to consider alternatives to concrete (also known as pavers) when building or landscaping your home.
There are many types of pavers available, with designs and features for any type of landscape scheme you can dream up. Pavers also increase your home's value and help to increase your home's green
LEED
(Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) credits.
Locally sourced stone/reclaimed concrete pavers are best for the planet, requiring less transport energy to get to your yard. Prices on pavers depend on the amount you buy and where you live:
Gavin Historical Bricks
offers salvaged antique cobblestones and pavers - place them without concrete for best flow-through.
Biopaver
- great concrete alternative: interlocking pavers with room for plants to grow.
NaturalPAVE XL
- great-looking resin-based pavement.
TerraPave
- resin-based asphalt alternative, with a binder made from trees from sustainable forests.
Earth911 - enter your zip to see where to recycle the concrete removed to put in new pavers (which helps decrease the need for gravel mining).
Habitat organization in Billings accepts used building materials.
Well, its spring! Time for new things - that's what the eggs and bunnies stand for at Easter - symbols of renewal and fertility.
:-)
Best Regards,
Dorothea Lowe, Broker
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