Re: [pf] Montana -- FYI

At 18:49 16/9/2000 -0700, Arianna wrote:
>The house in Montana was built in 1930.  It's teensy and well-built, plus
>it's located in a community small enough that I could walk everywhere, if
>necessary.  In the back yard are two old-style posts, ready to support a
>clothesline.  As Diane said awhile back, every place has its tradeoffs.
>Here there are many aware souls who work to protect the planet, while
>fighting their own potential homelessness and dodging the endless SUVs of
>the billionnaire/millionaire/developers.  In the Montana town, the people
>are nice, but the weather is rough and the political climate very
>Republican.  Maybe they need a liberal infusion.
>
>Although I cannot get out and make a difference the way most of you do,
>this move will lessen my environmental impact tremendously, as well as ease
>my own situation. 

· Do you: 
(1) know whether you can _for_sure_ afford whatever the annual heating-oil
cost is for that house? Even with an increase of 50% during the next ~5 years?
(2) know whether at least the ceiling is thickly insulated?  - whether
there are storm windows?  - whether the outer doors seal well?

· I'd hate to think of you sitting there shivering every day, during those
long, long winters.

· I drove through Montana in my Austin-Healey Sprite in the early '60s (in
my first professional job - an electronic engineer on airborne radar) while
I was going from Montreal to represent Canadian Westinghouse on the RCAF
CF-104 airbase at Cold Lake Alberta. (If you travel thousands of kilometres
in a sports-car, /don't/ just put your French Horn {in its case} on the
back "parcel-shelf"; it gets dinged-up!) 

· You say only: "In the Montana town, ... the weather is rough"; I found it
_really_ cold! Had to wrap myself in a car-rug, right down to my ankles,
even with the heater going full-blast!

· I'm sure I speak for the others when I say: 

        Best wishes in your move, and your new home. 

· Have you had any independent estimates of the current value of your
mobile home? If you sell it for (say) half the price you think it's worth,
how long would you have to go on paying the mortgage on your Montana house?
(I presume the land tax up there is relatively low.)

· I admire your willingness to make such a big change; I hope you've got
reasonably OK answers to questions like the above.

David.
(David MacClement) davd@ihug.co.nz 
http://www.emucities.com.au/member/davd/index.html#top
******************************************************

___________________________________________________________
T O P I C A  The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16
Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics