Mountains - Ellijay Ga. Buy Raw Land Or Cabin?

It was back in 2005 when my mother began talking about Blairsville, Ga. A neighbor had just bought property in the area. 2006 rolled around and I began looking into real estate. Oh great timing eh? Everybody and their brother was into RE at the time. Even my nephew was thinking about flipping houses. When you see someone that has no business doing such you should know to avoid it. But these Ga prices were too hard to resist.

I was astounded with local Florida prices. The 700 square foot apartment I was living in had decided to go condo. $225K for a little box surrounded by block walls and no view. What a joke. So I thought of Blairsville and began checking out real estate sites. Homes in Kennesaw and Marietta were going for similar prices on four bedroom and 2 1/2 baths. Wow, what a deal I thought, but being single what did I need all that for? More research after getting a feel of Georgia pricing I gandered into mountain property listings.

Originally I wanted to buy 10-20 acres and the listings looked attractive. I cannot remember why I chose Ellijay. Oh... it was the pretty rental cabin pictures I saw. In any event 20 acres for $ 225K looked attractive. Compare that to the small Bonita Springs apartment or one half acre of sand for the same price, it was a no-brainer. Besides living in Florida since 1980 I had had enough.

Considering I grew up in rural Bucks County Pennsylvania, a change to some country living sounded like a good idea. As this blog progresses you'll notice this was more of a quest to buy mountain property and eventually build on. The eventual selection was an idea from a local real estate agent in Jim Stover, whom I spent three days with searching for a piece of wooded property with a creek/stream. Looking back I can't say enough about Jim. After all if it wasn't for him I would probably still be in Florida wondering why I bought property without a cabin.

It seems all the pictures I have of Jim show him from the back. I'll find a better one later but here's something that is now a part of the past. The Gilmer County courthouse (county seat Ellijay) was torn down and replaced by a new one still under construction.


Jim Stover's Georgia Mountain Real Estate Site