Category: Maine Homes

Fixing Up Old Maine Farmhouses | Country Living Stepping Back In Time

Fixing up old ME farmhouses and all the buildings around the homestead.

Country living housing projects require plenty of skill, lots of home work study and boat loads of patience. Building construction on older agricultural properties are definitely labors of love. It is best if you the home owner can tackle as much of the rehab work yourself to save money and for the joy of a real estate fixer upper restoration project.

Fresh Hot Coffee, Whatever Meal Tastes Improve After Maine Farm Chores Are Done.

The older homes that were once the cornerstone of vibrant small Maine farm families present a challenge though from the two extremes.

The never had any repair places are original. But the damage caused from lack of maintenance means the repairs are more than just addressing the surface of what you can see on the inside. Deep down inside the bones of a Maine farmhouse you will can be forced to replace or repair the sills, the floor stringers, any dry rot that is hidden until you start swinging a crowbar.

The replacement materials in your re-construction of the country home that has fallen from grace sometimes means making the woodwork or hardware supporting it by hand. Because you can not just trot into a big box building supply outlet to move it from a shelf aisle into your shopping cart. Often finding another farmstead that is being torn down is a source for what you need on the construction project. Re-purposing from a salvage pile of another deceased farm home dwelling with the property owner’s permission to pick through the rubble. Or locating someone that did save the yesteryear materials that were once part of an older farmhouse that is no longer standing straight and sound. Who piled them up to store under cover for their own re-building project that lost steam or they simply had more than their needed and now want to gladly free up the storage space for other trinkets.

Referring to the historical building notes on the New England, whatever style homestead is part of learning curve in the housing restoration maneuver.

To determine what exactly is needed once the reconstruction project gets underway in good shape. Study of floor-plans, the cut away more detailed diagrams, watching videos on the repair of vintage older housing. Talking to the old time now retired tradesman that all add up to combine and help guide the rehabilitation efforts. All are essential in combination for the know how needed to tackle the many loose ends the old farmhouse can present. It is delicate finish work in the hammer and nail but also to bring the major operating systems of the country home into present day.

Coffee Early In The Morning The Old Fashion Way! Get To Maine, Relax, Breathe.

The home in rural Maine that has gone through many owners adding their own creative talents to the Walton’s type housing is in some ways even harder to bring back into line. The past owners did not work together toward the same goal. Instead of just a few areas needing immediate attention and small ongoing detailing to make it like the original structure, there can be too much lost that resembles what the place looked like back in the year it was built. The attention to detail can make the re-construction scope pretty much every single room no longer mirrors what the original builder put together from the ground up.

The fixing up old historic farmhouses in Maine is slow tedious work and often too extensive to hire out because of the hundreds of hours, thousands of dollars to fix or repair or replace what ails the homestead.

But as long as a bank mortgage underwriter is not pushing for the place to be complete before closing. And you have a partner that is equally patient in the undo, redo, make do as the house with all the land around it returns to what it originally looked like. The this old house story can have very few scary chapters and a happy ending at the end. Making it better than it was when you first started many moons ago.

The what to do first is usually like any house project triage. Selecting the repair or replace the roof or heating system ahead of the installation of a new to you old Monson and Maine slate farmhouse long sink. Or removing to replace the kitchen cabinet hardware, electrical light fixtures and switches to match the period of this particular home era it really belongs. To get it back like the Beatles sang about being where you once belonged. Buy a farm house, whatever type of property where the renovation can be done in stages.

If you are buying to hang onto the place and are invested, the repair this old home movie is a long one with sequels.

You can buy a home you can not afford if it needs work, you are your own general contractor and you go slow. And hire out when you absolutely have to and recognize you are over your head. But stay on budget and pull back, extend the time to completion when something pops up you did not anticipate but that needs immediate attention and some funding to correct.

The saw horses in one room where the lath and plaster is being removed to hang new sheet rock after insulation, electrical and plumbing lines are put into the wall cavities. The peeling back multiple floor layers of old linoleum to get back down to hopefully a solid sub-floor or hardwood/softwood finish level. You don’t know what you are going to find the deeper you go into the many projects that spring up in the fix and repair of the old farmhouse you signed on for when the deed to the land under it was recorded in local registry of deeds.

Houlton Maine, Shiretown of Aroostook County. The Early Years. More Farmers Growing Potato Spuds, More Lumberman Sawing The Timber Logs!

Study of online imagery from others who embarked on the same repair your farm residence journey just prior to you can be encouraging.

The before and after images on any housing rehab can scare even the homeowner holding the camera to snap the shots and reviewing them in the progress album. Once you get started, there is no turning back. And when you run out of money or the projects to repair are large ones, the timetable to completion can be pushed ahead many months or even years on the calendar hanging in the old farm style renovated home kitchen.

The original acreage can be part of the missing puzzle piece when you decide to pick a farmstead residence real estate mission to accept if you dare. Too many times the land around the home was sold off by the widow of the last farmer on record to own the place. A neighboring agricultural grower that rented the land makes the purchase of land, no buildings to absorb the fields, pastures and woodlots into their down the road operation.

Buying back land from one or multiple land owners around your investment can be costly or require waiting until the timing improves. Strongly held and currently cultivated farm land does not get sold off but remains cut off from the original spread it use to surround on the family farm in Maine. Fewer but larger farm operations in Maine are the trend but my state does show promise in reversing the trend. More than four times the national average of micro farmers are showing up in the US census information from the last Q & A done on the local population. No farmer, no food is a sobering thought no?

Other things to prepare for that you might not have thought about in the housing repair exercise? Pet smells, the kind you may not remove and definitely are not going to gloss over with some sweet masking replacement odor. Perfectly good walls, floors and other building components can be marred deeply by animals inside a the home that should have been out in the farmyard or in the barn, machine shed, whatever building circles the main dwelling.

Farm Fresh Locally Sourced Food From Maine. Get Healthy Inside And Out In Maine Vacationing In Maine. Ever Thought Of Owning A Maine Farmhouse, Lots Of Land!

The best smell is none. Although the fragrance of flower beds, the smell of a woodshed, a summer kitchen where root cellar shelves create a winter draw grocery at meal time is not to be discouraged or can not be replaced. Burlap in a granary, leather in the tack room and saddle soap. Or disinfectant used to keep clean the milk parlor on an old Maine dairy farm with all the cattle stanchions and box / standing stalls for the smaller animals.

Making sour into a mixture of sweet works with chicken at the local Chinese restaurant. But lighting a candle or baking oven brownies won’t even begin to mask terrible pungent odors that linger in old neglected country homes of Maine.

The nose knows and your sense of smell is the strong of the five we all possess they say. Once the construction projects complete, it is time to move on to the finishing touch that does involve more than what you can see. The sounds of the wind chime on the front open porch, the colorful pinwheel that works in tandem with Mr Scarecrow out in the garden to discourage predatory gleaning. The crackling wood fire in the old Clarion or Home Comfort or whatever brand kitchen cook stove. A grandfather clock ticking in the front parlor. This is part of the lifestyle of country living in your old Maine farm property.

Pantry cabinets that need refinishing, finding original style or genuine imitation door knobs and Christan doors, trim to match the rest of the rooms in the old home out in the Maine countryside. Double wood storm windows with felt and numbered to help know which opening they go to in the fall get ready to a Maine winter ritual. All part of the bring it back to the way it was in the re-construction time machine that you pilot.

Outdoors, That’s Where People Hang Out In Maine. More Land, Lots Of Wildlife, Less People, No Crime, No Pollution. Want Some Of ME?

A working farm of your own or a gentlemen operation where the fertile fields and pastures are leased out to someone else with the headaches and backaches.

Of watching the weather and hoping for a profitable market to peddle what is grown or raised. You watch others till, plant, cultivate and hoe leading into the fall harvest. For the winter storage and slowly selling off what the good old Earth provided with seed, water, fertilizer, lots of sweat and toil.

The old farm house DIY renovation with a little hired out help along the way can mean putting the rear apartment for the grandparents back into the layout. Or adding a home office so the out of state farm buyer who appreciates the open space and fresh air around it more than a native. So he or she or both can bring their old job online with them and telecommute.

Ever thought of repairing an old Maine farmhouse and be honest. Have you ever caught yourself looking at the Maine farm tractor and machinery section of Uncle Henry’s or on Craig list? I am guilty as charged and am lucky to own the family farm In New England I grew up on. That my Dad and mom purchased from a great uncle who’s first name I use for a middle one. That along with my Great

The Maine Barn Sitting Back On Its Haunches. Leaning, Straining And Recently Went Down Completely Like 52 Pick Up.

Aunt Hettie a world war one nurse made a good living on the patch of dirt. Investing wisely the spoils of the toil with a Bangor Maine stock broker named Banks. It was her pension check though from serving as a Florence Nightingale on medical cases all over creation in and out of Vacationland that put in the running water bathroom plumbing. Into the farm in Maine located up here in the Crown of Maine that had a two holer out in the north end shed. Up here in Houlton, the oldest town in Aroostook County dubbed “The Shiretown” where the glacier gave us an edge blessing growers with Caribou loam soil to play in with the horse than tractor dragging longer and longer lengths of machinery.

Country properties are a special kind of Maine real estate offering.

Looking out when you do up the supper dishes and watching another setting sun at dusk. Sipping lemonade or slurping hot coffee on the open or glassed porch at the rural property with no neighbor in sight. That’s off the main drag and where road noise is missing from too much traffic that city dwellers get tone deaf to with the constant exposure.

Read up on the topic and learn this is how they did it on this style of property in this particular period of time. If you hanker making it original again or as close as your wallet or available spare time will permit.

I‘m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North Street Houlton Maine 04730 USA

April 1, 2018
Maine Is Over Half Unorganized Townships

Unorganized townships in Maine. Over half the state is township this, range that and just not organized

Didn’t even get a name. With no school colors or mascot or basketball team to maybe get to go to the tournaments during Maine February vacation. The “town office” is in the Maine bureau of taxation’s unorganized townships division. Or in the unorganized division of the county government that the territory in question Maine land resides. The deed to the real estate title of all the acreage is recorded in one of the sixteen Maine counties.

Maine Fall Colors, See Them Shine Brightly Four Wheeling On An ATV Seat. More Scenery, No People, Lots Of Wildlife.

Like people you meet who have no middle name, the unorganized townships are like that.

Oh sure there are nicknames like TA R2 is affectionately called Letter “A”. Or Township 6 north of Weld in Franklin County Maine, and others have handles so every local knows where you are referring on the Maine map. When you break down on a snow sled or ATV four wheeler. Or describing the best place ever to hunt and fish or hike or tap into the wilderness lake where no camps hug the shoreline.

Very big in land mass area in this vast New England state but coupled with such a sparse population. Maine is extremes. The 39th largest state and the USA’s 9th least populated.

Elbow room, Maine sure does have plenty the further inland and north you go. Oh sure, Maine has 22 cities, a whopping 435 towns but the number of unorganized townships number 424 and another 33 entities are labeled plantations. Don’t forget 3 Indian reservations too. More on early Maine history. Life is definitely simpler living with low or no population areas. Where wildlife in the and out of the waterfront run the show unopposed.

But what about something else, a settlement in Maine?

What are those? Well the Plymouth Company of Popham Maine showed up in the same year as the famous Jamestown Virginia settlement. The year was 1607 but the Popham colony now present day Phippsburg in Sagadahoc County Maine on the Kennebec River settlement had a down hill slide because of a harsh winter. The new to this land landing party could not sustain. Petered out the following year. That put Jamestown in the history books as the first American permanent settlement. Along the Maine coast, other settlements sprung up in the 1620’s but not all lasted due to a the climate, the being on the look out for Indian attacks and just plain lack of provisions in the pantry. The early Maine settlers were used to easier living conditions and taking a step back in the Maine landing new life.

Several French explorers including Verrazano reached Maine in 1524. Champlain discovered and named Mount Desert, the largest island off the coast of Maine. The first English settlement of Popham Plantation was near the mouth of the Kennebec River.

Baxter State Park, Local Jewel Created By Governor Percival Baxter Back In The 1930’s! Maine, Over Half Of The State Is Unorganized Townships In The “UT”.

Massachusetts gobbled up most of the Maine land claims in what was a wilderness territory of the USA and by 1820 when Vacationland became a state, only about six settlements had survived.

1820 was the year the state of Maine pulled away from the Bay State. Even though despite a few New York Yankee fans among us, most are still in Red Sox Nation after the separation from Massachusetts. Early fishing settlements and tradings posts had their share of ups and downs in this New World. Not everyone was cut out for starting from scratch and totally new undeveloped surroundings.

The price of furs that soared high and low made trade with the native trappers feel cheated. The new settlement band of newcomers were used to open field line them up and mow them down warfare. They did not react well to hit and run raiding party spur of the moment attacks from the natives who knew the landscape so well. The locals always have a home court advantage. They had tamed daily conditions to make life in their area of Maine easier. For safety sake, it was mostly coastal fishing and river side settlements in Maine locations as a rule. And the existing native tribes headed inland. To blend in with the forest where they felt right at home trapping, farming, respecting the land and natural resources.

If you visit Maine you will learn of areas called settlements.

You could think they were a township, a plantation or just dubbed a little more interesting nick name for an unorganized township location. But low and behold you will find a place like Robinson Settlement in Aroostook County Maine that sounds like a municipality is really just an area of the township of Blaine (formerly Township Letter B, 1st Range; Alva Plantation). The name changed from Alva Plantation in honor of James G. Blaine, the current US House Of Representatives Speaker. Who never delivered on the promise of a town bell for a carrot if the locals did switch to his last name. Often a grist or lumber mill was the reason for the settlement name, like Whitlock Mills. Whitlock Mills near Calais in Washington County is the northern most lighthouse location in Maine.

Moose Not People, Other Wildlife Too Hide In The Woods, Waterways Of Maine.

Here is a list of Maine communities, some that are no longer here and are alive in history records only. Another list of towns in Maine which is very long. And check out the list of Maine plantations.

Sometimes besides the name sticking for a settlement location in early Maine the locals knew from sight where you were from because of your clothing. It was not uncommon for the few families that carved out a new Maine farmstead in a new territory to buy their cloth material in bulk for the cost savings. For clothing production by hand from a large quantity bolt to save money. So when these settlement members did come to a population center to trade in commerce, to buy some feed, seed or pasture fencing, coffee, sugar, etc the color of their clothes defined where they were from out in the country.

In Hancock County Maine alone there are 1522 islands under the unorganized territories heading. In Maine’s unorganized territories, the UT, there are roughly 9000 year round residents. Lots of seasonal ones in the UT of Maine.

Can you imagine living in Drew Plantation Penobscot County Maine population just 46 people?

Rich Where It Counts, Maine Is Unspoiled, Drop Dead Gorgeous.

I listed a log home for sale with 25 acres of land in Hersey ME recently and that town’s six mile by six mile population is just 79 people. No, there won’t be a Walmart super center breaking ground or a set of golden arches rolling in to this very small Maine township anytime soon. Traffic lights, gangs fighting turf wars, drive by shootings or high crime or pollution just not happening in Hersey or other the very small Maine towns like it. Where there are not layers of players.

But look up, see the stars at night in one brilliant sky back drop. The woods infested with wildlife too. No people, no problems. Fresh air, clean water. Listen. Hear birds chirp, loons cry, woodpeckers knock or just the wind in the trees. The rain on the cabin roof. Not emergency response vehicles or heavy highway traffic or airplanes lifting off or landing. The other sounds of the city that never sleeps.

Peace and quiet happens in these small Maine town or plantation or unorganized settlement locations.

But employment to pay those property taxes, register the car and pump the fuel to make it move. That’s the catch. Maine is a great place to live if you can make a living. Or have a knack of removing money out of your approach to frugal living. Where bartering happens. It’s a long long ways to town pulled by the horse team or in the buggy or farm wagon.

Just water down that buttered rum laddled out to the men friends and male neighbors who are coming over this weekend to help you with the barn raising in Maine. They climb high and are cat like quickly putting the hand hewn 8×8’s mortised into place in the barn skeleton. The folks you work with the same you helped one by one with their community building projects on their homesteads weeks earlier and in future projects scheduled ahead.

Other small population centers are disbanding and electing to try to deorganize because there are just not enough folks to fill the elected offices to to keep the area running.

To keep it marked on the Maine map. In these small areas, the animal control officer for the dog chasing deer serves as a selectmen, on the district school board and mows the ground around the cemetery plots. His wife or her husband is on the planning board and heads up the recreation department and is serves a term on the board of property value assessing and zoning board. Oh and they serve on the local volunteer fire department, down at the local grange hall or snow sled club. They may be a licensed, registered Maine Guide and can help guide you in the hunting, fishing, maybe canoe or kayak or rafting trip.

Maine Is Real, Peaceful, Not Crowded. One Of The Lowest Crime States.

More than one hat is worn in the teeny weeny small Maine population centers that often were once large bustling lumber cutting forestry communities.

Or railroad communities, mill towns in an earlier time in Maine history. When they herded logs down the Maine rivers. Where the commerce was local before Interstate and Internet happened. Blacksmiths, local clothing stores, drug stores with ice cream soda fountains, phone company with party lines and Mabel helping make the call. Sometimes listening to the conversation.

Often if one more person dies and lets go of the local reins of control, that’s it. All she wrote. Deorganization or annexing, absorption in another municipality are the only options. To lower property taxes from over 30 mill to say 6 mill is another reason to wave the white flag in the legislature. That is fueling the dismantling of local government control at a increasing pace.

Looking for small itty bitty population centers but incredible large areas to roam?

You must be thinking about a place like Maine, the way life should be. Letting the state and the county government take over the municipality or plantation to absorb the tiny population. It is a last gasp surrender, is a last resort when the declining, aging population just continues to slide uncontrolled. We have room for you… all kinds in all four directions. Well maybe not so much to the east where our Canadian cousins hold down the Atlantic Provinces. Could you imagine living in an unorganized township in Maine? A recreational sporting camp or woodlot land owner is the biggest component of who does in Maine’s UT or unorganized townships.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

February 25, 2018
Up North In Maine

Heading North to Maine. Heading into the North Maine woods

What is the magic of just the location, that one word North? Heading into the North Maine woods. Pointing whatever you drive or piling in with a group of friends to head North to ski, snow sled, hunt, fish or get out on the water.

North Sign, What’s The Buzz, The Big Deal About Up North?

On a compass or a map, the first thing the user wants to determine is where is North. Because the needle better seek north. Not have a mind of its own. And after rolling out the tightly curled up map, you look first and foremost for the arrow pointing in the direction of North. The orientation of North trumps all the west. You have to know where is North first to get your bearings and avoid vertigo.

The North star, Polaris used for navigation unless pesky cloud cover messes up the exercise to know if you are still heading in the right direction.

Up North in Maine. Each quadrant of the circle conjures up an image or two of the other regions. Causes the dream maker insider all of us to consider what if we headed in that particular direction armed with knowledge from the grapevine. Just hearing, seeing, thinking about one word from books, the boob tube or conversations.

West, heading out west.

Panning for gold. Laying claim to free land, a new start for your family in the wagon train. Or smelling like soot. Riding the iron rails in the steel horse gnawing on beef jerky. New unspoiled fertile land, heavily wooded with incredible scenery out West awaits you. All aboard.

Someone in your family’s past headed West to make their fame and fortune right? Hoping they were not a gun slinger or horse thief. Cowboys, rodeos, branding irons, lasso roping scared little Hereford calves. Waving a branding iron for the circle K tattoo. Surf boards, 409’s, Rodeo Drive, Route 66, Area 51 are what you find out West. Hope we don’t have one big final Earthquake.

Pass me that harmonica Cookie. We get to the Rockies by night fall tomorrow if the bag balm works like a charm on lame old on Lightning here. I got a dose of the joint paint myself. Hand me that little green square tin will you? (Rattlesnake sound, hungry wolf howling, cactus shadows around campfire perimeter). Another splash of coffee or a long haul on the flask filled with the recipe?

South, down south.

You might picture mint juleps, Southern hospitality, cotton and tobacco and moonshine. Gray colored material pitted against dark blue. Sitting a spell on a huge mansion porch held up by large pillar columns. Pleasant weather in the sunny South where snow shovels are not needed. Kentucky blue grass music fills the air. Is that a banjo in the mix?

Chasing white golf balls, fishing for red snapper, liberally applying sun screen on your kids at the sandy seashore. Visiting glove wearing cartoon characters at the Magic Kingdom. Pour me another tall glass of the orange juice Anita Bryant. Leave in lots of the pulp and make it country style. Boll weevil and termites and Tennessee walkers. We’re down south.

East, Far east.

Sounds exotic, I can hear zitars and harp strings and pan flutes. Where we have a serious shortage of four legged chairs. Lots of pillows though all over the flooring. You might think about spices, smooth shiny silk, the fragrance pretty blue lotus flower and sitting cross legged clearing your mind. (Snap) Need another pair of chop sticks to chase your rice cakes and raw fish around the plate? Those waxed paper thin sliding house doors would not stand up to a gale force Maine wind.

North. Due North.

Unfortunately for some, the first thought that pops in your head is snow. Lots of white stuff. Maybe reindeer that go air born. The cheerful short round guy dressed in red velvet / white fur trimming. Ho ho ho Santa, Mrs. Claus and their low to the ground gang with the pointed ears. Dog sleds and float planes for transport and igloos for housing. Polar bears of white riding on ice floes.

Heading North, Hitting The ITS Trails In Maine.

Maine is parked up North.

But you can go way way further climbing up the lines of latitude on the spinning globe. Extreme north can be the vision of Maine for those who have never set foot in the Vacationland state. Maine shares borders with Canadian provinces which causes a cultural exchange missing at the North Pole. There are no polar bears in Maine.

When you live in Maine, West becomes Jackman, Sugarloaf Or Sunday River. Your South orientation becomes the Wells, York Beaches, the Old Port, Kittery Trading post.

Your Downeast Maine a winding trip up US Route One to get your fill of lobsters, steamers filled with clams and fresh native corn on the cob. Look, was that a distant lighthouse, hump back whale or eagle spotted off the bow of the schooner?

I live in Northern Maine.

Snow Is Not An Evil Four Letter Word. Not In Maine.

But where I blog from you can travel two hours north and still be in Maine. Up in the St John River Valley in the Crown of Maine. Aroostook County is the largest of Maine’s sixteen. Aroostook the garden of Maine known for its potato fields. The heavily wooded forest land, the clean lakes and rivers. The fresh air and winter is just one of the four months. And there is lots to be said about your wood burning stove, the charm of winter living in Maine.

What is your image of Maine? Hopeful more than winter snow flakes, icicles and hand knit mittens and hat. Sample ME for yourself. You fill up your mental slate with experiences in Maine. Any chance you can get, sneak or steal away to Maine. Easy to find and always due north from most places. Define Maine in your own words and from personal experiences you collect and cherish any of the four seasons.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North Street Houlton Maine 04730 USA

February 12, 2018
McMansion To McCottage | How Big A House Works Best In Maine?

How big a home is best for you depends on area housing stock economics and whether you really are ready for a Murphy bed or farm house sized kitchen.

There are pros and cons for tiny homes, larger housing floor plans and it is a personal choice. But what about the local area real estate options and pricing in a state as vast as Maine? Is it best for a home on wheels or a big smashing Victorian house in Maine that works best for your real estate needs?

Know House Thomaston Maine Is One Big Residence With Rich History, Plenty Of Bedrooms.

For starters, the average price of a home in Northern Maine weighing in at $71,000 and reality that the SAME home would fetch $210,000 in Southern Maine. That fact alone makes the folks in the market for a Maine house do a quick check of their finances. Before considering the plus and minus evaluation of what size home is best for me.

Debt ratios, how much of your income can go to housing and the associated maintenance to carry the sticks and bricks. Spending habits, not just your income shows where your priorities are when opening up the wallet or purse wide to pay for daily expenditures. Saving for kids to attend college impacts how high a house price range you filter the real estate search when just sneaking a peek at what is currently for sale in your market.

If 28% of your income or less should be dedicated to housing, there is one ceiling in place on what you plan to buy today for a house of any size.

If housing stock is larger in rural Maine, those homes cost less and are more plentiful. Yes, more to heat and a bigger square footage for maintenance, to clean, but cheaper than plopping down a starting price of $46,000 for a tiny home on a trailer that are out there.

Micro housing, the proponents brag up you will save on utilities, less to heat and cool. That smaller castles mean time freed up for other endeavors besides cleaning and maintenance keeping the house straight and sound. If you live a couple blocks from a gym, why would you need the corner den or space in the cellar rec room for a treadmill or stair stepper? In rural Maine, your “gym” is outdoor exercise cutting, stacking, splitting wood to heat your home. Or climbing on a tractor to plow the back field to get it ready for spring planting. Or maybe the all out aerobics of producing square or round bales of hay to feed your own livestock and the animals of others with whatever is tucked away in your barn. For a methodical draw from the deposits as the calendar pages cycle through from fall, winter, another spring in Maine.

One Beach Is Not Exactly Like The Next. This One In Maine In Kennebunkport At Dusk.

Larger homes in Maine, what space is used for when there is extra to go around? Home schooling desks, wall charts, science labs and the reading resource library. Or work from the home office space where the Internet connection allows telecommuting. In laws living in the converted farm house shed or Victorian home carriage house. Or using a series of water front or rustic wood camps seasonally before the move south. To places you won’t need a snow shovel or an windshield ice scraper.

The open outdoor and glassed in porches one more common space for more family members to consider hanging out or shelling peas, sipping coffee on. Renting out the extra space for Airbnb or to provide areas for exchange students or to run an inn, a Maine B&B.

The US Census uncovered that the average size of a house in this country is 2657 square feet.

How do you fit into that statistic? Maine is not a state flush with cash, or filled with residences that boast three bedrooms but eight bathrooms. That’s HGTV west coast Hollywood talking. Could you pare it all down and squeeze into a tinier you 500 square foot leaner, greener four walls? They say smaller, tiny homes mean less decorating, force you not to accumulate so much. Tips for moving what and when regardless we hammered out in an earlier real estate blog post on relocating to Maine. The local Amish settlements produce small buildings that many use as “tiny homes” that get modified by the owner. Lots of folks for vacation or homesteading combine more than one Amish storage shed to make them into living area. Here is another Maine tiny home link.

There was a time in the early 1980’s when the Farmer’s Home Administration (FmHA) made the decision to lighten the load. Of housing stock 1400 square foot or larger that came into foreclosure inventory. And that was to be financed for a dollar down and the 33 year loan with 396 payments. The subsidized housing program shifted to a ranch style 1008 square foot goal that was one floor, insulated to the hilt. And the folks buying them made to look hard at their housing budget to make sure they were taught economics 101 to hang onto the home not lose it to come back to Uncle Sam in foreclosure.

Small Maine Farm Sustainable Agriculture. Hard Work, A Highly Rewarding Lifestyle.

The 1400 square foot houses that were priced low, financed for 10% down for a ten year loan were so cheap to buy. That it allowed the new home owner of a foreclosed home to have money left over from the payment load to channel it into whatever maintenance the big and beautiful housing stock required to be ship shape.

Or to fix up, flip and move on up the real estate housing food chain. To try on something different for the house around them. To adapt to a new to them home with a different set of features, size and location that worked best at the time for whatever life cycle they swam in today. Your real estate needs change and not just because you use a walker to get around or the chicks have flown the coop. Divorce, death, disease and on a brighter note promotions, more stork deliveries can cause the itch that needs to be scratched to make the move to something new and different. To impact your quality of life. Being self-sufficient working on fencing, puttering on farm buildings from hen houses to tractor sheds and storage barns.

Home too large, a big house scaring you from purchase? Consider an income generating apartment in one section and if you ask lots of questions going in, you can get a quality renter for the rental portion of the down sized home. Also tax deduction write offs because a portion of maintenance, maybe heating, other items can be used to sweeten the renting out part of your Maine home.

Do you run the roads, do you entertain at home, do you enjoy sitting in a den in front of a roaring fire? In a kitchen rocker not far from a wood cook stove?

Are the kids on every sport’s team known to man and summer camps, year round tune up clinics are part of your daily experience? Is being home a joy or torture? Are you anxious, feeling like you are missing out on something that is not happening in your own backyard? Had it up to here with neighbors? Or long for a few good ones? Would you consider buying then tearing down the house next to you if it came up for sale? Or approaching the neighbor on the other side of the eye sore to purchase it together and have it hauled away with the remaining house lot split down the middle. For one less neighbor in the hood.

Christmas Reflections In Houlton Maine. Small Town Proud Makes The Holiday Colors Brighter, Spirits Higher. Ready, Want A House In A Small Maine Town Setting?

Where the house in Maine is big or small or somewhere in between. To add a water front element. To have a view, to add to the property acreage to own fields, pasture, your own wood lot to heat the house. Or the option to add on easily with a pay as you go, DIY using some bartering skills. Beyond the size, features in a Maine house you can afford to enhance your lifestyle is a big part of why you might want to move. To experience living in a yesteryear grand old larger home in small rural Maine is possible where the same elegance in an urban area is not so common and priced out of reach.

Formal dinners at home, not at Bonanza sliding a plastic cafeteria tray with triangular numbers riding on them or dining on the daily special at Governors or a Pat’s Pizza.

Using a butler’s pantry, the servant’s corner nooks and crannies, overseeing the canning and preserving operation in the summer kitchen. Sneaking up hidden rear stairway passages. Watching your cat bask in the stained glass natural lighting spilling on the floor where he or she naps. Wainscoting, raised panel ceilings, tin, marble, granite, exotic maintained or not patterned multi toned woods of all kinds. Using the upstairs sleeping porch on a hot summer night.

Converting the walk up attic space into a teenager’s hideaway or media room. Drawing from the root cellar provisions and wood just the size of the heating chamber it feeds through out the day and night. As Old Man Winter loses his gas. And Jack Frost packs up his weather tools for another year. And the early flowers poke their heads through the ground signaling spring is knocking. Bring out the porch furniture, refill the gas grill canister. Service the lawnmower. Fill those driveway potholes and re-hang the rain gutters.

Or on your knees in the spiritual flower beds and tasty vegetable gardens. Enjoying bird feeders, your pets of all sizes with space to hang out in and outside of home. Why you live where you do and was it inherited, where you grew up? Or a house that Jack built without a large mortgage hanging around your neck. Built slowly calling in favors and watching you tube videos on house construction. Tapping into skills honed back in shop class. But the table saw in the living room for years until the housing project turned the corner at least. And earlier work is time to replace because the kid’s grew up and out they went. It’s been a couple decades filtering out of the hour glass revolutions. What size house is best for you if you relocated to Maine or already live here but thinking of changing it up when the real estate market is favorable?

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North Street Houlton Maine 04730 USA

January 1, 2018
The Menu For Thanksgiving Dinner When You Dine In Maine

The holidays are not the time to diet

Loosen the belt, put away the Zumba fitness CD. It was not just the Pilgrims who sampled quite the feast put on by the native first settlers. Maine food dishes prepared with local ingredients taste so much better too after being outside in the fresh crisp air too. Whether working on a farm, tramping the woods while hunting looking for game or splitting, stacking firewood.

Mountain Ash Berries Wrapped In Ice On A Maine Lake Today.

So Thanksgiving dinner, what to serve up for the gathering around your table? Traditions for Thanksgiving mean much of what you create in the kitchen or ask others to contribute is from memories of what you remember growing up. Everyone likes green bean casserole with the onions on top and the yummy sauce right? But what is the best recipe for green bean casserole? Do you want it crunchy, cheesy, jazzy?

On our farm table growing up Maine potatoes were a given. When you grow them, you are exposed to many ways to enjoy spuds. Whipped potatoes seemed to be the choice by my mom. The pearled onions, the squash, sweet potato all steaming in bowls escorted from the pantry to the formal dining room table used on special occasions. Cinnamon rolls like any breads take a special touch I have been told. And growing up, whenever my Mom asked what should she bring to a family or social dinner, it was hand’s down always her cinnamon rolls. They were to die for and akin to the nectar of the Gods.

Layered jello salads, watergate salads. Not only the sweet potatoes had marshmallow swimming in them. Never was a fan of the jello with the carrots and who knows what else mixed and chilled inside. But some likes them because they are a constant.The plate is only so large and what to fill it with in the eenie meenie miney moe of Thanksgiving food offerings.

Peas and yellow beans with cream could show up as a vegetable choice for some. Peas were a standard entry that you could bank on. Ambrosia salad with the cherries, mandarin oranges, orchard apples. pineapple, peaches, everything plucked from a fruit tree. The dinnerware not used but a handful of times a year added to the celebration remembrance. So did the decorations, the floral arrangements that were all natural, from the local seasonal surrroundings.

Turkey with the stuffing, gravy to lather the taters the standard, spiral ham could debut at Christmas. Deer meat venison. It’s what’s for Thanksgiving dinner for some.

But Delmonico steaks grilled on the charcoal outside the farmhouse porch entry could make their way to our Maine family feast. The meat not parked for days and price stickered. Not the kind clear wrapped and hoisted out of the cooler but something different. Hidden like a present in white paper, tied with string. A pencil marking the price, what was hiding inside. After a special request was made ringing the bell. to relay the order to the hunched over butcher with the red stained white frock. Who hand delivered it to you as you continued to fill the wire basket grocery cart with the one squeaky obstinate wheel.

Lots Of Public Suppers, Ones At Thanksgiving Happen In Small Maine Towns. Across The Baked Beans, Coleslaw, Brown Bread And Potato Salad Table Conversations.

Mince meat pie, pecan, coconut cream, lemon meringue or cherry were not the norm but were on the holiday menu besides your year round standards of strawberry, raspberry, apple, pumpkin or blueberry pies. Or hot about another mocca ball, a little fudge or mixed nuts for grazing before or after the feast? Squares come in so many flavors and the cookies were not the kind you buy wrapped in cellophane with elves painted on the store bought packages.

Seafood from Maine got invited to Christmas celebrations and Thanksgiving more the bounty harvested from the local farm fields. Oyster stew or crab cakes served up Christmas Eve. No reason why a Maine lobster or steamer clams or salmon could be provided table space to celebrate the guy in white fur and red velvet and roof top tap dancing reindeer’s visit right? Ho ho happy holidays.

Thanksgiving dining to give thanks, to count your blessings even it is pizza, bologna and cheese sandwiches. Being thankful to have any food, for the fellowship and a time of reflection on the past year.

Thanksgiving meant who sits where, who carves the bird. The guest list created new. To include first time diners to the table, to include the regulars still living and the lost ones in your bow your head, holding hands blessing prayers.

It’s your holiday to celebrate the best way possible. Pass the cranberry sauce, the bread and butter pickles, the many relishes please. There is no shortage of the extras like lady ashburnham or beet pickles as your eyes scanned the family table. That is like a culinary tetris game to find open table space for one more dish or platter. The buffet loaded up with the overflow, the cold drinks, coffee urns and what could not be parked on the dining room table. That would only straight jacket diners and only serve to interfere with available elbow room.

Home Made Maine Pies, What’s Your Favorite Kind?

The Thanksgiving dinner spread seemed to be more harvest gold theme because we had just put the turnip, squashes, carrots, pumpkins in the root cellar. Fiddle heads to douse with vinegar could show up at Thanksgiving or Christmas or both. Picked from along brook and river side banks back in early spring and frozen for the special occasion family dining.

What’s for dinner this Thanksgiving at your home? Have you ever worked a free Thanksgiving dinner for the public members that have no family? Whether Veterans who served, shut ins house house bound and afraid of ice when using walkers. Or folks just missing any living or close by family members, Thanksgiving should not be spent alone. I think about the truck drivers, soldiers overseas who have to adopt new family to share the time of gratitude, the holiday called Thanksgiving.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North Street Houlton Maine 04730 USA

November 14, 2017
The State Of Maine Soap Box Derby Race Is In Houlton Maine.

The state venue for the Maine Soap Box Derby Race is Houlton Maine.

Derby racing is not new to the Pine Tree State. Since 1934 when the big national race started in Akron Ohio, through out the years Maine fielded a crop of new racers. Boys and girls that competed for the chance to head out to the mid west to represent their local town on the bigger stage.

Waiting For His Turn Down Derby Hill In Houlton Maine. Stomach Butterflies Happen.

Derby racing in Maine was big in the 1950’s, 1960’s when the parents or sponsor only ordered wheels and axles, a helmet . That was it with the rest of derby car building left up to the racing team. To collectively figure out what to construct for the driver to slide into for the hang on, strap in, get down.

Here we go down the derby race hill in one of two lanes. A street shut down for the day of racing in Maine to determine a derby winner took a lot of work in the build the hill and tear it down to put it back into its original intended use for local vehicle traffic.

Back in 1995 when the now defunct MBNA was active in the Northport / Camden Maine area, $20,000 was set aside by then rolling high credit card giant.

Even Steven, Heats In Soap Box Derby Race Decided By Electric Eye And Hundredths Of A Second Differences To Determine Who Advances To Make The Trip To Akron, Ohio.

Ear marked for the planning and implementation of a Maine state soap box derby race program. To bring back was had taken a nap. Fueled with money to lubricate the wheels to jump start down hill gravity racing, the strong derby association in New Hampshire was tapped. To help Maine put on a program to create boys and girls to climb into sponsored cars to compete in heats. Down hills in a small Maine town or one of the handful of cities in Vacationland.

So with the help of the Granite State to the south, the wheels started spinning as kit cars were orders from the All American Soap Box Derby Association. Shipping companies started delivery of the stock, super stock cars. And outlined the procedure to build these two classes plus the master derby car division. The latter designed with a tad more latitude to add your own ingenuity and engineering for older derby racers. To keep their interest captive and competitive with the spirit of racing.

Because entire families have kids who derby race in Maine and other state locals.

Take your pick Watch some Maine soap box derby race videos. To see how things rock and roll, for the rattle and hum. The three divisions designed to draw from all the ages and stages of youth in this competitive down hill car racing sport. Where gravity is your engine. Plus lots of applied science to explore more reasons why some kids and their derby race cars are faster to the finish line.

Maine Soap Box Derby Race Videos. Take Your Pick, For The “Thrill Of The Hill”. Just Double Click Search Image Link To Past Race Videos.

Dealing with changing weather is part of soap box derby racing and kids, their families prepare for as one factor of the sport to always consider. Because any kind of wind, rain, snow, blistering heat. Or surprise, all of the above that Maine is famous for that happens during long derby races. Held under skies of all colors in the ever changing weather report on any given day when down hill soap box derby races are held.

In 1995 a resurgence soap box derby race in Maine was held in Camden.

A few families from Houlton Maine with children who raced in the stock division took careful notes. Bringing back what the parents and pioneer racers learned on the coastal town race sponsored by MBNA. To kick off a race in Houlton Maine where a peaceful take over of Drakes Hill, happened. A public US highway not far from the International border crossing into Canada was where the local Northern Maine soap box derby race was held until 1999. The earlier version, not kept up to date Northern Maine Soap Box Derby site shows the history. See link below for new fresh current soap box derby news for the Maine program. Video link for a soap box derby race in Maine.

More on our national champion, the five local soap box derby races in Maine, who they were back in the late 1990’s. And explaining the reason crash and burn out happened in the derby racing in Maine program. The lone soap box derby race venue Houlton Maine is where the state competition is held each June. Why did this small Aroostook County town derby racing program survive? Because of the wisdom of locals to build an engineered hill specifically for down hill racing events. For local races and derby rallies held around the calendar to sharpen driving skills. To provide opportunities for racers to log more time behind the wheel. For youngsters filled with “the thrill of the hill” fever to compete in downhill soap box derby car racing.

Good Work Out. Some Soap Box Derby Race Cars Heavier Than Others. Small Driver Equals Heavy Car.

The Houlton Maine local, now state race dual purpose competition is June 17th, 2017.

The day before used to safety check derby race cars and check weights, educate new racers. And to make sure everything is kept fair in the spirit of racing where every driver hops out of their cars, meets in the middle of lane one and two to shake hands, congratulate. As someone moves on up into the medal rounds of the heat sheet for derby racing. To eventually create a new winner to represent the state of Maine in the world series, triple crown of racing in Akron Ohio the following month of July each year.

Your Me In Maine author is lucky to hail from Aroostook County where the state derby race is held.

I have enjoyed fielding two local soap box derby race winners, a son and a daughter who headed to Akron for the big race. Helping create four more drivers who won and went onto Ohio. All four of my kids were involved in kit car downhill racing on the local, and down state, New Hampshire soap box derby race circuit. With a Jeep pulling a loaded trailer with four derby cars, all the tools, weights, etc needed to race at many events around New England.

Houlton Maine’s Soap Box Derby Race The Largest In The Country Five Years In A Row!

I stayed with what was the largest race in the nation five years in a row because the derby program has been so good to my family. And the excitement of new racers who don’t want to wait until they are sixteen to drive a car is infectious.

Once you hear the launch release topside on derby hill looking down the track, and the sound of wheels rolling, derby mania returns deep down inside for me and others who have stuck with the Northern Maine soap box derby program.

Each car and driver has plenty of personality and it is fun for an adult to be a little kid and share in the racing excitement.

There is nothing like an 8 year old who is terrified at the top of Derby Hill that transforms to all grins and a desire to dig in and learn how to win at the bottom of the hill. When the zoo crew by the timer and cones hollers “BBbbrake”. And the driver pops up, asks did I win, was it me? As he or she looks back over their shoulder up at the timer lights to see which lane has the winning light shining.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North Street Houlton Maine 04730 USA

June 15, 2017