An “Abandoned” Amish Farmhouse (17 Photos)
You should be able to tell right off why I titled this “abandoned” – though not technically the case (it’s up for sale, after all), with the overgrown yard, vacated rooms, and grey sky adding a bleak touch to these photos, it certainly has the feel of an abandoned home.
Unlike most homes we look at, this one is emptied out, with just a few scattered pieces of furniture (appearing to have been added after the Amish family vacated the place).
The condition of this home and property shown in these photos makes me wonder about the story here. The yard is overgrown and the gravel lane has grass showing through. Still it’s hard to say how long it’s stood empty. The location is Gouverneur, New York, and it’s one of the numerous St. Lawrence County settlements (that large Canada-border county contains no fewer than six Amish settlements).
This home just went on the market three days ago. Like the property itself the description is sparse:
Farmhouse situated on 81.7 acres with barn, garage and out building on a quiet & private country road. Previously lived in by the Amish, there is no electric, plumbing or heat source. Metal roof and vinyl siding, covered front and back porch. Great hobby farm if your interested in getting a few animals, lots of wildlife, and the land is great for hunting as well.
Let’s have a look at a few photos here.
You can see Amish-style details and remnants throughout the home. The greyish molding for example, and spartan wooden floors.
What’s that at the upper left corner of the door frame?
Was this once a pantry?
The main living room. That couch was most likely added after the Amish owners were gone.
This appears to have been a bedroom. Several curtains were left behind in this home, among the few signs of Amish family furnishings.
The back porch (with “non-Amish” chair).
A simple clothesline stands in the overgrown backyard.
It looks like a satellite dish has been attached to the corner of the house here. Hmm. Though the description says “no electric”, that and the hodge-podge collection of English style furniture suggests someone non-Amish has occupied this place for at least a little while.
Barn and silo.
As for the details, this is a three bedroom, zero-bathroom home of 1400 square feet. But again, it’s on roughly 82 acres of (way-upstate) land. The price?
This home, a definite fixer-upper, can be had along with the acreage for $109,000 (Erin E. Meyer of Meyer Real Estate).
Door Frame Bar
I thought the bar attached to the door frame was a place to hang a dish towel or dish rag. I noticed that the possible pantry had an entrance in the living room too and a piece of wall missing next to it. Could it be the laundry room?
I thought similarly about that towel-holder-looking thing. Don’t believe I’ve seen one in that spot before though! As for the laundry it’s typically in a utility room area often near a side entrance, or in the basement. Good eye on the missing piece of wall, I missed that. I’m not sure what that is.
Not a laundry room. Their laundry for the most part is done in a space like a garage with a non electric washer. All done basically by a wringer washer.
Mysteries
Oy.
I do love your Amish real estate mysteries. That’s quite the price for 82 acres. I’m surprised a developer hasn’t snapped that up for a subdivision. Otherwise it would be quite an undertaking to establish this farm for an individual. That’s a lot of land for even a modern farm. Yet, some land could be sold off at quite the profit. My niece just bought 30 acres in OH for $350 K & very modest house. I thought THAT was a bargain. So I’m REALLY not understanding this one, unless our “wonderful” state of NY has some healthy regulations concerning this situation that I don’t know about. And that very well may be the case.
Hmm could it be just the sheer location? It’s a pretty far-upstate corner of NY. I haven’t done any land price research for the area. Or perhaps there is some other issue with the land itself but I didn’t detect anything in particular that you might think would hurt values (eg high voltage lines, rendering plant next door, etc).
Love
I sure do love the pics would love to purchase but in NY Not with destruction going on in the hat St.
Upstate NY Land
I live about 45 minutes from Gouverneur and land up here is pretty cheap. Here in Lewis County farms of that size are about the same price. Getting water and electric might not be that expensive, a well and septic can be put in inexpensively but the electric might be a problem if the nearest lines are far away.
Fairly Common
I live in Amish country in Upstate NY and this a fairly common price for older Amish farms even with the land. As long as you aren’t near a city or race track etc, NY has the cheapest good farm land and most farms here are over 100 acres.
Would definitely be looking into $$ needed to meet health department for sewage, water, etc.
That much land here, NW Ohio, Would be 10k to 12.5k per acre.
Side Room
I was just looking at the pictures on Zillow and think that side room could be a wood room. 2 wood stoves to heat the house and cook on need a lot of dry wood, the small platform would keep the wood and chips off the floor and would keep the logs dry if they were snow covered. Most houses up here have a wood shed attached to the house because wood piles are not practical for heavy snow areas. Gouverneur would get lake effect snow from Lake Ontario so 2+ feet could fall in one night and if you don’t have a wood room/shed you will spend all day hauling wet wood that needs a few days to dry.
Towel Holder ?!
That is not a towel holder in fact it’s an antique curtain “rod. They swing back n forth and can be extended out usually there would be 1 on each side and since there was a limited hearing source I’m sure they would close off door wats to keep the heat in. I have a few sets of the curtain “rods” they do look like towel hokders. Anyway that’s my 2 cents
Interesting, not sure I’ve seen anything like it before or just not noticed.