Cleaning up farm property and buildings opinions

JOCCO · Feb 24, 2015

The post on taxable buildings brought me to this. Do any of you use the fire department to remove delapated structures??? The DEPT gets training you get building burnt. Seems to happen here some. Any thoughts on this any pitfalls or liability??? In this case they need to go and I want to get them off the tax role.

Dave H (MI) · Feb 24, 2015

We used to burn old buildings when I was on the department. Houses were the best training. Smoldering hay in the bathtub made for a pretty realistic search and rescue scenario. Set a room on fire, put it out, do some demo with the pike poles etc. Then burn the thing to the ground as per instructions.

50# of tannerite seems to work pretty good if you believe Youtube.

I would use discretion on those old buildings. If they have any use at all or are salvageable I would not tear them down. You can check with the assessor, but if they are so old that you would tear them down then they might not be affecting your taxes much. Might even get them raised if they decide to consider it an improvement. My point is that a few rustic buildings are not the worst things a property can have. Putting up a new building is very expensive and starts the taxation cycle going all over again.

onefarmer · Feb 24, 2015

It's been done many times around here. St Johns Mi. I've seen many old barns removed by fire.

Wouldn't hurt one bit for you to call your local FD and ask

Donald Lehman · Feb 24, 2015

That is a fairly common practice around here, too.

DeltaRed · Feb 24, 2015

Our (volunteer)fire department does that sometimes.They seem to be happy for the practice.But WAIT! That old 'barnwood' is in high demand.People pay high dollar for it.Especially if has some old dried manure on it!The resort/ski areas/places with money will pay big for it.

Ron-MO · Feb 24, 2015

I know some fire dept's have stopped that practice. One instance I know of that a local fire dept had already gone through the legal paperwork that they would remove the house form someone's property, and signed all the release forms, then discovered there was asbestos siding on the house. As I understand it the house could not be burned unless the asbestos was removed first, and the local fire dept/city had to eat that cost. I do not believe they burn houses any longer. I had one on my property and spoke with the local rural fire chief, and asked him if they could send a truck to monitor while I burned the house, which they did, but they only watched to make sure the fire did not get into the surrounding vegetation, etc. Otherwise it was up to me to burn, but saved quite a bit of money by not hiring someone to remove. I did rent a bobcat to bury and level the site afterward.

Bryce Frazier · Feb 24, 2015

YES SIR!

The neighbor sold $2000 worth of lumber and stuff out of a barn built in 1924. Hasn't been used in about 40 years, and was finally ready to take it down.

A bunch of cabinet makers went through and took all kinds of stuff, then they OFFERED him the $2000 (he thought that they were just going to "take it off his hands") They were all stoked at getting the wood.

One guy told me that cabinets with that kind of "patina" can go for upwards of $300 a cabinet!

WHAT!!!!!!! :O

rrlund · Feb 24, 2015

They burned the house just to the south of me two or three years ago. Did it in late December for the sole purpose of getting it off the tax roles by December 31st.

DMP62 · Feb 24, 2015

They still do it here with houses, don't think they'll do a simple outbuilding, not sure if it can be done with asphalt shingles in place.

That said make sure you check with your tax guy about a deductible expense. You may be able to deduct the value of the building as a donation to the Fire Dept. You may be able to deduct an amount equal to what it is on the tax role. Had a friend who did this with a house on his property, got a nice write off on his taxes.

Dave H (MI) · Feb 24, 2015

You know, I forgot! Just about the time I moved to this house the Milford FD had a controlled burn go bad. Three firefighters were killed. If memory serves me it was near the intersection of Commerce and, ironically, Burns Rd. Not real relevant to your post, but the report is interesting. You would not think things could go bad that quickly.
Interesting reading

JOCCO · Feb 24, 2015

Guys just to clearify: These buildings have no value for use. No high dollar boards in them They are somewhat of a safty concern/fire hazard to begin with. They are not a big part of the tax role but of course some. I doubt any "tax donation credit" would be much.

James Babcock · Feb 24, 2015

Our chief won't sign up to do that any more. Before I joined up, they burned one that was too close to the neighbor's and melted his vinyl siding on that side. That story lives on every time a newbie asks if we ever do that.

IowaJohn · Feb 24, 2015

Wanted them to burn down my folk's house after both had passed. Wouldn't touch it said I had to break it down, take the shingles off and take them to a landfill. Well we pulled it down with a excavator then burned it. It took a day and a half to burn everything, if it'd been standing would've been out in a couple of hours.

Dave H (MI) · Feb 24, 2015

Just sayin...I have most of $50K into the new barn here. But if they are not salvageable then probably not safe for fire training either. Sounds like an excellent chance to experiment with some Tannerite. Take video. If you can lure a few wild boar onto the scene first you may just go viral.

pete 23 · Feb 24, 2015

Local guy, knew him when he was a frustrating kid, tears down barns and builds furniture. You would not believe what he sells that stuff for. He sold a dining room table for several thousand dollars. Has a store in Dawson, Mn.

Ray · Feb 24, 2015

In ohio they have a program that pays to tear down old houses.I saw several torn down last summer and knew some of the people wouldn't have paid to do that.Some kind of government program that tore them down with a track hoe and seeded the area.

rustyacres sd · Feb 24, 2015

When the tornado took most of my place and damaged the house enough that the insurance said it was a total lose, the local FD did a training on it. Out in the country and the nearest building was about a hundred feet away. The only one left standing. When it was burning, went to move my car and the song that came on the radio was by the talking heads and it was "burnin down the house"

Doug Cotton · Feb 24, 2015

That is exactly what we did with my grandparents house. Donated it to fire dept for training. One weekend they cut holes in roof and did some other exercises on it, the next weekend, it got real warm, real fast.

Dick2 · Feb 24, 2015

When we decided to clear the grandparent's farm building, we dozed the small outbuilings into the side of the large barn. We waited for a real foggy morning and set all the buildings on fire.

By the time the fog lifted, all the buildings were burned down without anyone even seeing the smoke. Dozed the nails and foundations into a pit and covered them over so we could farm the land.

Chuck (CA) · Feb 24, 2015

Yes indeed. Check this out.
Barn Doors on CL

Chuck (CA) · Feb 24, 2015

And this
Barn Wood

Dave Sherburne, NY · Feb 24, 2015

Fire Dept did that in a small town nearby. When it was done the code enforcement officer wanted to know why they didn't have a demolition permit. That idea didn't get very far.

RodinNS · Feb 24, 2015

I guess it depends on where you are and how close the department follows codes.... around here, live burn on donated property has been a BIG NO NO for quite some time. The worry is first and foremost about someone getting hurt, secondly about it getting away and causing other property damage... and third... a worry about an actual emergency while all local resources are fully committed to a live burn. Bottom line.. it just doesn't happen here anymore.

I guess if I wanted rid of something like that I'd probably wait for a good foggy day and preferably run a hoe or dozer through them first... but if expediency is a must, just lite them up in the fog. Half an hour they'll be in the hole anyway. Other trick is to wait for a day when there's a good fire rolling in the other end of the district and all the rats and rubber neckers are all watching that... then lite her up. And so long as there's no danger to anything... take your leave of the premesis promptly. LOL
You weren't home and you have no idea what happened.

Rod

Cory Schmidt · Feb 24, 2015

Same around here too, people go nuts over the rough, weathered stuff. Neighbor had a old barn taken down. We talked to the guy tearing down, and got all the "non-salvageable" wood for firewood.

Neighbor was mad at us for not asking him(even though we did) about getting the wood that the salvager/crafter didn't want.

We have a few more on lists ,if people ever get back to us, about letting us pull remaining wood (after salvage buyer is done) out for firewood(we burn almost anything).

Fullers Farmalls · Feb 24, 2015

We had them do a mobile home at my parents. Went up real quick. It was neat to watch.

showcrop · Feb 24, 2015

Our department used to do that every other year or so. It was usually to make way for a subdivision. One time a local troublemaker was in jail, it was in the winter, his little shack of a house was badly run down and the land had been taken for taxes. The selectmen asked the FD to burn it down so he had no place to come back to. We did it on a day when there was a bad snow storm. The jerk never came back. Air pollution laws was one of the things that made it very difficult to get state approval to burn them.

Cleaning up farm property and buildings opinions

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