For Sale?

My little portable garden had to come inside Wednesday and Thursday nights.  After Mike talked to a friend who lives near Boston, we can only be thankful we are able to have a garden this time of year!

We took a ride down to Naples on Wednesday and visited our land at the eastern edge of Golden Gate Estates.  It is still there--a massively overgrown patch in what is now a fairly well developed neighborhood with paved streets and electricity and everything.  When we bought the land years ago, there were only two or three houses there.  Even now, to go just a half mile further east is to be in acres and acres of orange groves and tomato farms.  Most of the houses are built within the last five years--although I'm pretty sure no new houses were put in in the last three years.  The house on property right next to ours, however, has been there for over twenty years.  The family that owns it built way, way out in the wilderness at the time.  There were no paved roads, no electricity, no nearby grocery stores or schools, no cable.  So I am pretty sure that there is one family in the neighborhood that is not completely distressed by our wild patch.

On paper, we have made and lost a couple hundred thousand on that land.  We bought the land for relatively little money; it went way up in value;  now it has dropped back down nearly to what we paid.  We thought we were well set for retirement with our wise investments and our land holdings.  Of course, right when we thought we could start using the interest, the market did a belly up.  Still, it is kind of true that you don't miss what you never had.  But, hey, anybody looking for 2.7 acres of southern Florida swampland OR ten acres of northern Vermont swampland, I mean woodland, call me.  We'll talk!