[GreenMan]

Hi All,

I have my first question which I hope you can all help with; I see all of the posts on various forums about having a small holding and having to keep your day job because a smallholding does not generate enough income. I see people asking how to make money from 5 acres so they can give up their day job but this is always met with the answer – “you can not give up your day job because you can’t make enough on a smallholding” unless you come up with some specialist food or service or craft etc etc…

Is this a land size issue? Surely there has to be a point at which you start to become profitable e.g. If you only have 5 acres and 10 sheep then maybe you cant support yourself  but if that same holding was 30 acres with 100 sheep would it make enough.

My question therefore would be how much land do I need to buy to enable me to have enough animals to make a living, not necessarily profit but to completely support myself including mortgage etc? 

I am not asking for an absolute answer, just your rough opinion on what size of land you think you could completely support yourself on? Or is it not a land size issue at all?

Many thanks,

Nick

[Rosemary]

Land size is an issue but not the only one. The type of land, proximity to markets, what enterprises you enjoy (no point keeping sheep if you hate them - that kind of flies in the face of having a lifestyle you enjoy!) and how you want to live. It's probably not realistic to think you can manage with no cash income - you can't barter or grow everything, but you can reduce your requirement for cash either by reducing your need for "stuff" or by producing your own. And if you need a mortgage to set up your smallholding, the bank won't take payment in eggs!

If you don't need much cash income, and you can devise a profitable enterprise on your land, then you woudl need less. It's not as simple as saying if you have 30 acres you can give up the day job. If only.

Others will have advice and comment on this too, I'm sure.

[RUSTYME]

Hello Nick,
             I think your question is a bit like asking " how long is a piece of string ? " . The answer will be different for everyone who owns a smallholding .Therefore the 'one answer fits all' cannot apply . One man may have 5 acres and 10 sheep and be unable to survive , yet another man may well have the same acreage and number of animals , and get along fine .
 Each situation will be very different . One person may have a £400,000 mortgage on their holding another may have no mortgage at all . Also some people want every gadget that is known to man , others gets along fine with none.  One person may dig his plot by hand, another buys a tractor and all the ensuing bits and bobs, to do the same job , yet another may get someone in to do the job.
 However a basic answer can be given in that if you have a mortgage on a smallholding , then you are almost certain to need money from elsewhere to pay the bill.... unless your holding is in Afghanistan and you are growing 5 acres of poppies , then harvesting the opium and processing it into it's final product and then selling it on the streets of the UK for retail £ .  
 I can't think of anything legal, that would pay enough money to keep anyone afloat , if there was, we would all be doing it !!!!
If however you are like me , no mortgage , you can feed yourself very well on 5 acres . Grow all your own veg , all your own meat if you so desire . How much money you made from there on in would depend on what you wanted to do . Start a garden nursery, grow willow and make baskets , grow crocuses and harvest saffron , breed Llamas !!! there really is no ONE answer .
 Many of the others on this forum will have their own ideas on this , but most will say somewhat the same as me I think . But if anyone has got a money tree going spare ?
 Sorry I couldn't be more help , but hope it does help a bit !!!


 cheers

Russ

[Rosemary]

If there was a lucrative market for docks, we'd be rolling in cash!!

[Pigtails]

I regularly speak with other farmers, some have large tracts of land, others have just a few acres.
One thing we all have in common is that farming, large or small scale is not profitable, you might break even if you are lucky.
We have pigs and are having a real hard time shifting them, we offered pork, ready for freezing and there is little interest, I was speaking with a cattle farmer just yesterday, he said he was doing the same, offering meat as opposed to live beast and he cannot get rid.

It's the times we live in, and not so much the size of the land.

[carl]

When do you stop being a smallholder and become a farmer?  Russ is right, no definite answer, every situation is different. work out what makes you happy, and try to acheive it.

[doganjo]

An old farmer once told me that 60 acres was the minimum size for a viable croft but that was about 15 years ago and what he meant by viable I don't know.  I do think it depends what you do with the land.  After all 10 acres of good grazing and a large barn makes an awful lot more money in DIY horse livery than a couple of hundred sheep

[GreenMan]

Thank you very much for these responses, I know my question was largely unanswerable with any degree of accuracy but your answers are enough to enable me to draw some conclusions. It seems to me that the only ways to be a full time smallholder in the UK is to:

(a)   Have lots of cash and buy it outright.
(b)   Retire there.
(c)   Have 2 poly tunnels full of Cannabis.

I was kind of hoping that just one person would be able to say, e.g. I have a £150K mortgage, 20 acre with 30 sheep, 4 cows & 6 pigs, I buy them here and sell them here and make my own hay etc etc etc etc and I make ends meet working full time on my holding - But that’s not going to happen!

So to conclude, there is no way I am going to come up with a viable business plan given my lack of experience in agri business when people with much experience and market knowledge are struggling.  It seems that smallholding is more of a hobby than a viable business if no one is managing to do full time without subsidising their income with savings etc…. I may as well forget my dream until I retire.

Or.

There are holdings in France with a fair bit of land that I could buy outright, meaning I just have to make my living costs and bill money. Would any of you recommend looking at this Route because often you can get a holding with a Gite to supplement some income as well? Is it more viable to go to France, I know there are lots of different regulations and new language to learn and land pitfalls etc but it must be a viable solution if you do not have £400K cash to buy a UK holding outright? I have read many web sites about French holdings but what do you all think of the French idea for someone that does not have a fortune yet?

[RUSTYME]

you wouldn't need the poly tunnels .... but you would need to be ready for your front door to get smashed in at 4am and have 20 plod dressed in black storm trooper suits screaming POLICE !!! POLICE !!! POLICE !!! and to have 3 of them smash you to the floor and sit on you while they put those plastic tree clippy things on you !!  Anyway...
  There are many people on here in France and will give you all details needed . As you say in the former UK , you either need  to buy outright , or work full time as well if you have a mortgage . That is unless you are a politician or a banker , in which case just wait for your yearly bonuses or your expenses to come through  !!! Problem solved !!

cheers

Russ

[sellickbhoy]

another way to look at the problem is to consider what JOB you have to supplement your smallholding lifestyle....

for example - i have half an acre, i live 4 miles from my office but i can work from home. Also, my work allows me to have flexible hours - so i start early in the morning working with people in Japan and Holland, have a wee "break" in the middle of the day and work in the afternoon/evening dealing with people in the US.

So i essentially have a full time, full salary job - but from home and i'm free to tend to my wee bit of garden as it needs it (though i am way behind on the garden at the moment)

So, you could look for a new/different type of job that gives you the flexibility to work around your smallholding

I'm also in the process of starting up my own small business that will run from my home and it ties in nicely with my interest in growing my own fruit and veg.  Though neither is reliant on each other. So that is an income which (hopefully) lets me enjoy a job more as a lifestyle choice yet still paying the mortgage and utility bills

obviously that is not a solution for everyone - but working 10 acres might not be for everyone either!

[little blue]

another way to look at the problem is to consider what JOB you have to supplement your smallholding lifestyle....

And your circumstances... I work full time, and get school holidays off, my husband is 1) A full time carer    2)Self employed    3) Agorophobic after a breakdown                so...   he does the day-time stuff, I work damn hard once I'm home (and at work too of course!) and so we keep things bobbing along.
Very little time, very little money, lots of muck and lots of fun!

So if theres a 'Greenman spouse'  or family/friends willing to help out, and you plan the kind of set-up, size and type of livestock you want, you may find its not as hard as you think

Good luck!

[Hilarysmum]

There are holdings in France with a fair bit of land that I could buy outright, meaning I just have to make my living costs and bill money. Would any of you recommend looking at this Route because often you can get a holding with a Gite to supplement some income as well? Is it more viable to go to France, I know there are lots of different regulations and new language to learn and land pitfalls etc but it must be a viable solution if you do not have £400K cash to buy a UK holding outright? I have read many web sites about French holdings but what do you all think of the French idea for someone that does not have a fortune yet?

As a pig producer myself, I speak from the heart, if you are going to move over here with a view to smallholding/existing please, please, please really do your research.  My OH works to support our holding, which a couple of years ago was self supporting.  Pork on promo in the supermarkets sells for 2 euros a kilo.  Pork producers are paid 1 euro per kilo (dw) generally pigs in elevages cost 1.25 per kilo dw to produce.  In our case our free range pork costs 3.45 per kilo dw.  (Just redone all the sums so figures were at hand).  Unless you get to a certain number of pigs there are no subsidies, just large social charges.  You need to find the land suited to your particular speciality.  No point in trying to raise sheep in boggy land, or pigs on rock.  Use the time in the UK to research, research, research.  Although the rules are different here, they are the same enough to give you an idea.  Most importanly of all, before you even decide which area you want to live, research you markets.  Believe me, you cant rely on the local English to buy your products, there just arent enough with the income, or the inclination to pay a premium for a niche / superior product.  There are a few very small farmers markets here, its very, very hard to get into them.  If selling meat you will have to meet all the hygiene and h&s rules, (these are heavily policed) will need a chill counter to display goods, and a refrigerated van or trailer to transport them to the venues.  Lastly dont forget that for every money making idea there are a 100 others who may already have thought of it 90 of them French farmers with all the back up that implies. 

Not trying to put you off, its very hard work, it is possible  you do need to research the area you want to locate to, and the products you want to sell.

You might start by contacting all those advertising your chosen product in your chosen area on the web, ask them a few discreet questions to discover whether there is a market and maybe even visit them at a later date to see how it is done. 

France is a beautiful country, the french are very welcoming, its a great life, you do have to be aware of the pitfalls before you take the plunge. 

This has gone on far too long, if you want further information and can stand my pessimism please dont hesitate to pm me.

[doganjo]

And at least know some French.  I have always found that as a nation they will come more than half way if you speak to them in their own tongue. Even if your French isn't very good - do try, you will probably find they will break into a combination of franglais and sign language, in order to communicate.  But speak in English and you'll get blank looks

[Hilarysmum]

Sooo  true.  And for the bureaucracy you need someone both fluent in french and educated in the skills of navigating through the maze of paperwork, and who knows what questions to ask. 

[Roxy]

I would love nothing more than to live off the land so to speak and make my farm a viable enterprise.  Maybe in years gone by, it could have.  My two uncles used to live here, and my auntie.  One uncle worked elsewhere full time, but helped on the farm at weekends, and haymaking etc - sometimes doing another days work when he arrived home from his job!  The other uncle worked full time on the farm, with my auntie helping as she could, but mainly keeping house and her chickens etc.

They did have a lot of land at one time, but cut down to 25 acres as they got older, to make it a bit easier on them.  They did things the old fashioned way, no fancy milking parlours, but eventually used a tractor instead of their farm horses.  Once the milking cows went, they kept suckler cows, and bought weaned calves to rear to sell next spring.  As they cut their own hay, they only had to buy hard feed in, and of course house the cows in winter.  They appeared to make a living out of doing this, plus my auntie had a big free range egg business, that was in the days when she could go round the local corner shops with a basket of eggs every week.

Like I said, they did not have a mortgage, and did live probably a modest lifestyle.  Holidays were likely to be at a seaside resort in the UK, rather than jetting off, and they did not splash out on posh furniture etc.

We now have a large mortgage on the same farm, but less acreage, probably 20 acres.  I think we could probably be classed as hobby farmers.  My OH works full time, and has another job part time in the evenings.  I work three days a week.  If we sell a cow, goat, sheep or whatever, there is no way we could live on what money that brought in .....and on our acreage, I doubt we could in this day and age give up our jobs and just farm.

The only way we could probably do it, is by having a dozen horses on full livery .....but then you are entering the business tax area, so you have to charge clients a lot to cover this and make a living.