Selling/buying properties, new property found

So we are seriously considering trying to "upgrade" our property. We currently have 4 acres which is adequate pastures but no extra.
Reasons are 1. More ground with potential hay fields (currently we make hay on shares) 2. Need a barn and shop (husband is a mechanic by trade and hobbies include garden tractor pulling, wood working, ect and while we have shelters for the livestock but we need a better solution for hay storage, tack, definitely could expand our rabbitry ) 3. Would love a place with less traffic and neighbors, we are rural but live on a corner, and traffic moves plenty fast on the paved road.
4. Prefer a house with a basement
Obstacles 1. Have to sell current property to have down payment for new property 2. Suitable local properties only come on the market occasionally and the ones within our price range either sell Quickly or need a Ton of work to the house.
So need a small miracle to make it happen. But I do believe in miracles. So any tips or "how we did a similar move" story?

That is rough. Not too hard to do a "domino" move when there is an active market for all sizes and types of properties. But when there are few properties selling, not so easy. UNLESS your property happens to be something people will fall all over themselves to get. In that case, you might have a Real Estate agent all lined up with a listing, but not put it out until you find a property you want to buy. Not sure how you convince a seller of the "sell quickly" properties you would be interested in that YOUR property would be under contract within days of listing.

Having farm animals doesn't make it easier since you can't just sell and move into an apartment while you shop.

Um, ideas, thinking, um. May not even be feasible but maybe:

• Find a place that is for rent that has at least the minimum of what you need for your current animals. Sell current property.
• Sell to someone who will let you stay there and rent the place, hopefully on a month by month basis

Start looking for something to buy. Since you would have the proceeds of the sale in the bank, you can be at the top of the list compared to people who submit an offer with a "and we sell our house at the same time" clause. If you end up with a "needs a ton of work" property, you can work on it while still living in one of those rented places. Easier thought up than done I know!

Maybe find one with a lease/option to buy and then sell yours.

Our home was paid for, so we got a loan on the new place we bought. Finance is a process straight out of the pits of misery and hell. Awful. Lots of things went wrong, wrong, wrong. But we made it through it and couldn't be happier that we moved. Look for HUD repos, you can get a ridiculous deal if you can stand the buying process. Land here is stupid high. At the price we paid, we either got the home free and paid for the land or we got the land free and paid for the home. We closed on the new place in September of 2014, but didn't move until February 2015. We sold our old house, closed on Feb 11, moved Feb 14, it was fast. Then we paid off the new place.

You might not be able to do things the way we did. I like @Bruce 's idea of selling your place and renting until you find what you want. Especially if you need the money from selling your present home to pay down on the new home. You could buy a fixer upper and live in the rented home while you fixed it up.

HUD repos go up for bid for 9 days. Highest bidder is the winner.


http://www.theeasygarden.com/threads/we-won-the-bid-bought-the-farm.15593/

http://www.theeasygarden.com/threads/call-1-800-com-plain.15782/

http://www.theeasygarden.com/threads/signed-papers-on-house-today.16053/

http://www.theeasygarden.com/threads/mobile-home-goddess.16253/

We did rent to get this place of course we were had an acceptable offer on our property when we made an offer on it. The property we are going to look at is empty, I think...
going to get our place sale ready, some projects need finishing. I used to think it would sell quickly but neighbors similar property (no fencing)has been on the market since July so who knows.

Ok . Here's more of our story. We drove by 2 properties over the weekend. 1 we scratched completely, needed way too much work, had a run down house, shop, barn was gone except some poles. 1 we looked at last night. Location was nice, but house needs rewired. Frankly doubt it would pass many inspections. That combined with it being overpriced. We are passing at this time. BUT with encouragement from our agent (frankly she's a friend, helped us get our current property and a horse person so understands our wants and needs) we are getting preapproval for various different loans. Many which need little to no down payments. And I hope we continue having a mild fall so we can get 5,6 projects finished up on our place. These 2 things will have us posed and ready if the perfect place comes up.
Husband still isn't 100% sold on moving, as it would be a huge undertaking (he would want to bring every scrap of metal and piece of firewood ) but he's mostly willing. He does want the things I mentioned previously of why we want to move. Idk if we don't find anything we may just buckled down and look at building him a shop.

I can so identify with your husband.....I made a LOT of trips, bringing my precious crap with me. Since then, my DH has stood in awe at me as I have took my crap/scrap piles and built things around here. We hired our 36'x36' barn built because that is above my area of expertise, but the only thing we had to buy was twenty two 20'x2"x6" rafter pieces and the metal for the roof/outside walls.

In VA you can put a deposit on a place with it being contingent on the sale of your property, usually 90 days...a friend has his place for sale, his wife passed away and doesn't want the headaches anymore and wants to move closer to his daughter & family. Had an offer on his place, countered and they agreed with the contract being contingent on the buyer selling their place in 90 days....It's 25 acres, big beautiful house, completely redone bank barn, good perimeter fence; around $350,000.

Another option is to find a small farm that isn't being used as a farm and see if they'll rent the facilities to you monthly for your animals. Then concentrate on getting your place fixed to the nines and ready for market. Get it sold for as much as you can. Now, this time of year, is not exactly the ideal time to be putting a house on the market. Holidays right around the corner tend to slow home sales down a bit. But if you work through the winter to have it ready to go late spring for a summer close next year, the market should be perfect. Most families who plan to move try to do it in the July/August time frame to avoid disrupting school schedules. I believe you home school, so not much of an issue for you.

If the ideal replacement home isn't available, see if the buyer will allow you to lease back from them month to month, or find the cheapest place to rent that you can month to month and just wait for the ideal place to come on the market. You can put out the word that you're looking at hubby's work, the church, etc. You never know, word of mouth might find you an ideal place before it's ever available on the open market.

Well. Talking a different route. Our neighbor has her 4 acres and moduler for sale. We've offered to buy 2 to 3 acres but she won't separate. But talking to our agent, maybe we could swing buying her entire property then selling a small portion of land with her house..... it would give us 2 to 3 more acres.... which would give us our own hay fields to support our herd.