The owners are friends of mine. The wife is a fellow journalist and we have worked on projects together. The husband is a former city councilman and we served on the town's open space advisory committee together. It was Andy's dream to own a winery, and when he and Connie met and married, rather late in life, her family money made his dream possible. Their wine is pretty terrific, btw.

They are great people and they are asking only half of what the property is worth without the conservation easement they rushed through before putting the property up for sale, so it can never be developed.

A decent house on a nice lot of half an acre in this neighborhood goes for a million or two. They just gave away real estate gold in service to the community.

https://www.zillow.com/homedet...?utm_medium=referral

I think I’d have to see the financials on the winery before I weigh in.

Nice piece of property, though.

probably one of the very nicest location in all of montana.

Had lunch yesterday with a woman who lives near Whitefish.
She said that locals are openly hostile to newcomers.

You've got really low property taxes there! They pay about $7,000. We pay more on our place in Santa Fe which has only a small fraction of the market value of that place.

quote:

Originally posted by CHAS:
Had lunch yesterday with a woman who lives near Whitefish.
She said that locals are openly hostile to newcomers.

it didn't used to be that way. but when you can't find a place to live, or your kids can't find a place to live near you because of all the rich out-of-staters moving in and driving up prices, you'd be pretty hostile, too.

we just got our new property tax assessment. our taxes just went up 60 percent. according to the dept of revenue, our house's value has more than doubled in just six years.

the average montanan makes about $30k a year. where are they supposed to live?

quote:

Originally posted by Piano*Dad:
You've got really low property taxes there! They pay about $7,000. We pay more on our place in Santa Fe which has only a small fraction of the market value of that place.

i've been looking at the new mexico market a long time. property taxes are vastly cheaper in NM than in MT. connie and andy no doubt have an agricultural exemption on their taxes.

quote:

Originally posted by piqué:

quote:

Originally posted by Piano*Dad:
You've got really low property taxes there! They pay about $7,000. We pay more on our place in Santa Fe which has only a small fraction of the market value of that place.

i've been looking at the new mexico market a long time. property taxes are vastly cheaper in NM than in MT. connie and andy no doubt have an agricultural exemption on their taxes.

Property taxes in CA, oddly enough, were dirt cheap. I pay twice as much in tax here in OH than I did in CA on a house worth 1/3 as much. I also pay a 1% city income tax, which blows my mind.

This is what happens when you let Republicans gain access to the levers of government.

quote:

Originally posted by Steve Miller:

Property taxes in CA, oddly enough, were dirt cheap. I pay twice as much in tax here in OH than I did in CA on a house worth 1/3 as much. I also pay a 1% city income tax, which blows my mind.

This is what happens when you let Republicans gain access to the levers of government.

Wait, I thought Republicans hated taxes.

quote:

Originally posted by piqué:

quote:

Originally posted by Piano*Dad:
You've got really low property taxes there! They pay about $7,000. We pay more on our place in Santa Fe which has only a small fraction of the market value of that place.

i've been looking at the new mexico market a long time. property taxes are vastly cheaper in NM than in MT. connie and andy no doubt have an agricultural exemption on their taxes.

Makes sense. Cents too.