We bought 8acres and a wrecked bungalow in Jan 96,sold an acre and the bungalow with planning for a new house for double in 2001.
Bought everything I could afford for dairying off my dad in 2002 ,this included everything down to the kick bar in the parlour and all his buildings on his tenanted farm,he sold his cows and I started with 17 milking,my biggest ingoing was milk quota (£100k
)
I bought various cows,mostly cheap end cows with faults,fed them well and if anything went wrong I culled them.
Along the way of farming under my dads tenancy I built new cubicles,slurry lagoon,silage clamps plus a fresh parlour,never had any professional on the farm did all wiring fabrication building either myself or with a brother or my brother in -law.
By 2013 we were milking 170 cows with followers had bought a house in the village,had a couple of new tractors and own silage gear,umbilical set up etc.. when the estate decided to sell the farm,despite not being the tenant We got the chance to buy 164 acres we rented off them,in a good position with no over draft and decent stock levels we jumped at the chance,it took 360 days for the estate to finally agree terms and we paid 80% of market value for it in the end.
In late 14/15 I built a new parlour (32/64 )with help of a good fabricator and a lad doing ground work,we then bought 25 acres off next door,ending up paying £11k /acre for it,currently on with buying another 9 acres off neighbour.
Now milking 270 and last month got cows in the last part of my 280 cow cubicle building,have 420 cow cubicles now (only 42 are original) but have decided to go flying herd as we lost some land we rented in the spring,currently only rent 40 acres and tidy a bit of grass up on my dads farm.
In the early days my wife worked as a postie and milked at night so I could feed up,after about five years of this and ending up giving the tax man her wage she gave up and worked full time on the farm,she is an excellent stockman and when everything is going wrong you can rely on her to get the milk in the tank,she’s great to work with and we never fall out .
So in short property bought our 1st land and were still paying for the rest,we've always been good savers and both like a deal,even if the milk price is good we’ll still push and push for a deal it’s what makes us tick.
Having worked elsewhere in the past I’d struggle going back to commuting,everywhere is so busy now.