It never ceases to amaze me how many people fail to put in place a proper overall plan for their ranch, farm, or recreational property. They decide where they will put the house and maybe a barn but never think further down the road and ask themselves “What do I want my property to look like in twenty years and how do I plan to utilize it?”
When putting a property plan together you need to consider at the very minimum:
1. What do I want to utilize the property for? Raising cattle or horses, hunting, recreational….
2. What type of facilities will I need? Barns, corrals, cattle working facilities, fencing, feed storage, etc. You will want to plan out placement of facilities as far out as you can even if you cannot afford to build all of the facilities at once.
3. How will the facilities work together? ie. You would want your feed storage close to where you will do most of your feeding yet allow for easy access for trucks for unloading. You will want your cattle working facilities to work with your pasture layout so that you can drive cattle to them easily.
4. Where will your utilities be located?
5. Where will your water wells and storage be located and how will I transport water to where I need it?
Depending upon the use planned for your property you will need to consider other factors. Planning in advance will save you many headaches and result in an aesthetically appealing, well planned property instead of a hodgepodge property. You may be limited on what you can do if you purchase a property that already has facilities in place. However, you will still want to layout an overall use plan. For example you may have bought a Montana ranch that already has facilities built for working cattle but you plan to utilize the ranch for a horse breeding, boarding, and training property. Therefore, in your plan you will want to address the change in use and determine what existing facilities can be used, which existing facilities will need to be replaced and which facilities will need to be added in order to utilize the property to the fullest extent as a Montana Horse Ranch.
