I am currently building a new farm on a small parcel of undeveloped land and I noticed that the problems are closely related to building a remote survival retreat. You need to build some shelter from the weather to live in and a dry place to store tools and work before working on the garden, planting fruit and nut trees, raising livestock, and adding the water, power, and septic systems. Since I grew up on a Midwestern farm 40 years ago my natural inclination is to start by building a pole barn.
For folks who might not know what I am talking about, a pole barn is simply a metal covered truss roof supported by two parallel rows of poles. The span between the rows of poles can range between 24 to 40 feet and the walls can be 8, 10, or 12 ft high. The walls are typically covered with metal roofing and insulation can be added to the walls and roof depending on the final use. The big advantage of pole barn construction is the speed of construction and the relatively low cost per square foot for wider spans. The cost is almost completely driven by the cost of labor and the skyrocketing cost of metal roofing panels, but it is still a cheap way to build.
In most rural areas you can either contract your barn and let the crew build it, or build it your self. If you make the support walls tall enough you can park a 5th wheel into your new barn, hook up water, power, and a septic system and have a very comfortable low cost shelter. The biggest advantage over just parking the trailer under a tree is the added storage. For example, you can build a 32 ft by 40 ft pole barn for about $6K of materials, park a 32 ft 5th wheel on one side and still have 900 sq ft of storage area remaining.
The other second big advantage is OPSEC. Once you build the building every sneaky little kid in the neighborhood will check it out with in a few months. An empty pole barn with some cheap rusting farm equipment is simply not interesting enough to bother with and will be soon forgotten. No one is likely to notice that your pole barn is wired for solar panels, plumbed for water, and has a septic tank buried out side. latter when you need to move in the barn will be old news and your trailer will not be easily noticed. If you want to preposition guns, ammo, or food storage in it as a remote retreat locations I suggest that you burry the stuff inside the dirt floor of the barn rather than trying to lock the doors against intrusion. Keep in mind that those sneaky little neighbor kids grew up on a farm and are probably handier with construction tools than most adults.
At one time I would have been concerned that a completed pole barn built on a remote site would be turned into a meth lab, and perhaps in the future might be taken over by squatters. My answer is the same, don’t finish the walls or install the doors. Crack heads and squatters don’t normally have the resources or skills to complete the building. While they may check it out, there is little for them to steal or break, and you can easily finish it your self in a few days.
To those newly awakened survivalist who are now interested in purchasing some rural land and building up a viable small farm against the possibility of a full scale economic melt down, I would caution that the process will take a lot longer than you might think. Depending upon your skills and the condition that you start with, you can expect to take 6 – 8 years of working your vacations at a remote site, or 3 years living and working on it full time. You are likely to have to live off your food storage for years while you hastily complete the remaining preparations for producing your own garden, cereal crops, fruits and nuts, livestock, firewood, water, and electrical power.
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