Here’s one that’s not too common – a mobile home put up for sale by an Amish family. Amish do sometimes live in mobile homes, especially young families starting out. This one is located in Pomeroy, Ohio (Meigs County). I hadn’t heard much if anything of Meigs County, and for understandable reasons. The location is well off the beaten Amish path, lying on the West Virginia border. The settlement itself is a tiny one, a single church district of an estimated 40 people according to the latest figures.
Here’s the description from the Zillow listing:
The family said it’s time to move and so it’s time to sell! Peaceful and private location on 3.5 Acres. The land is very usable for farming and raising animals. Mostly fenced & some woods too. The infrastructure is there and could easily be developed even further. An Amish built barn (20X28) with 2 stalls and a hay loft that holds up to 500 bails, a buggy shed (10X12), a brand-newish root cellar (8X10), & storage shed (10X16). Also included is a woodshed, corn crib and outhouse. Plus, a huge garden all set up for you to grow everything you need to feed the whole family.
About the home:
The home is modest with a living room and kitchen area. Three bedrooms and a designated bathroom. A front porch to enjoy the scenic view. There is no electric or water currently to the home. There is electric at the road and a water spicket just outside the house. A septic system is on the property but is not hooked up to the home. The home sits on pillars and could be hooked up to electric and the septic with some imagination.
So no water and the presence of an outhouse suggests it’s quite a plain group. I also like the closing comment “could be hooked up to electric and the septic with some imagination.” Can you imagine?
Barn and animals.
Garden.
There are only two inside photos provided, but you can see many Amish notes here in the mobile home interior:
Toys scattered about the floor suggest it is in fact a young family.
Hickory rocker and floor rug:
Sink with no faucet:
Magazine rack and what looks like a clothes drying tower rack:
Stove, oil lamp, and decorative(?) handsaw. Also note what appears to be a poker tool for the stove hanging on the wall:
Flypaper strung below the ceiling:
Back outside. Terrain looks hilly as you’d expect from this part of the country.
The root cellar.
This is the least expensive home we’ve featured here. The price?
It was sold in late 2019 for $26,000.
You might also like:
Do Amish disapprove of house plants?
Do Amish homes have houseplants?
I don’t know if disapprove is the word but it may be more about the custom in a given group. You don’t really see them in the plainer homes but you can see them in more progressive homes. Here are a couple examples:
https://amishamerica.com/inside-amish-home-relaxation-room/
https://amishamerica.com/tour-an-amish-home-jamesport-missouri/ (a couple of the photos show houseplants)
re house plants
I shouldn’t think that they would frown on houseplants perhaps being too worldly, maybe it’s just something an Amish housewife wouldn’t have much time for considering she has to do more stuff by hand plus mind little kids, speaking of which, houseplants might be something kids could get into and make a big mess which would never do considering how neat and tidy the Amish like things (and I don’t blame them a bit either).
mobile in Ohio for sale
What is the asking price, weather in winter, and acreage. Everything is not downloading properly, so I apologizen in advance if the info was here but I didn’t see it.
This one was sold in 2019 for $26,000. If you want to see the original listing, it is here: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/36850-Kingsbury-Rd-Pomeroy-OH-45769/233684210_zpid/?
Missing trim inside the house and more...
Hi Erik,
The lack of trim inside the house is a puzzle. The silent rule for a newly built house that has been classified as “unfinished” without inside trim, doesn’t apply to this house. Often times men in the community are expert craftsmen in woodworking, so if the man of the house isn’t, then ask a church member or neighbor.
Yes there are little one/ones in the house because in the garden picture you can see diapers hanging on the clothesline. Just an observation!
The cookstove is the same as ours, but we don’t have the water reservoir, and we have a glass in the oven door.
In the cow barn picture you see they are collecting rainwater. Then one has to wonder where the house water is coming from?
Years ago we stopped to visit Amish friends in winter and in the wash house were milk cans with water in them. The waterline between the barn and house had froze up, so the animals had water and the house didn’t. I forget if all of their eleven children were home at the time. In our conversation about hauling water to the house the Mrs had grown weary of the new water system! Laundry day and bath night were just a tad challenging until spring and the pipes thawed out!
Amish ladies love their plants inside and out! š
Blessings from Wisc!
Terry I missed the diapers on the line. As for water there is a spigot near the home. Hauling water makes for a good workout! Health benefits for sure but I think I’ll stick with my English shower.
Refrigerator
There is also no refrigerator though I know some Amish allow it (converted to run on gas). That surprised me so they must be very plain and strict. Also, where does this stove/oven vent to? Wouldnāt it need some kind of a stack. Thereās something above it but it doesnāt seem to be connected. Iād be scared to use it for fear of a fire and mobile/trailer homes like this are quite flammable.
The plainest groups use ice boxes or ice houses. Not seeing either of those in these photos, but the root cellar probably comes into play here for storing food. They can apparently keep food at about 55 degrees and I suppose cooler in cold months. https://www.offthegridnews.com/extreme-survival/root-cellar-cheap-refrigeration/
The stove is vented into a chimney. The chimney support box is normally ceiling mounted, so the connector pipe goes from stove outlet to support box. Code requires the support box to be minimum 2 inches below ceiling surface. This one brings chimney pipe ( inside black box) down closer to stove which is better to keep the chimney hotter and cleaner. The only code violations visible is the use of a non-certified appliance for mobile home use. The stove needs to be UL Listed for factory built housing which has an outside air intake to prevent using indoor oxygen. The floor protection is not adequate unless there is double cement board under floor tile itās on. The floor under these stoves gets quite hot and the carpet may be flame resistant, but that is not non-combustible which it must be, 18 inches in all directions of stove and under pipe.
Something interesting I saw in Delaware. I believe it was near Newark. Maybe 15 minutes from PA border. There was a Lutheran church called Old Apostolic Lutheran Church. The members of this church dressed conservative, similar, but a little different in style to more new order Mennonites. Women were wearing dresses and head coverings. I never heard of this group until I saw it a few weeks ago. Iām wondering what their association is and whether they share any history with the Mennonites.
Iām always surprised by the religious groups you find in America and sometimes theyāre right under our nose and in the most ordinary places.
It looks like The Young Center has also started releasing a Mennonite population table to count the population of OOM groups.
https://groups.etown.edu/amishstudies/files/2021/01/OOMs_horse-and-buggy_2020.pdf
Thanks for letting know, AJ.