➡ The author is on a hunt for the best property for surviving an apocalypse. He found a promising one in Newfoundland, Canada, priced at 260,000 Canadian dollars. This property includes a house and a water source, but it’s close to a highway and has neighbors. Despite these drawbacks, the author sees potential in the property due to its access to fishing, hunting, and the possibility of creating a preparedness community.
➡ The text discusses the pros and cons of purchasing an off-grid property in Canada for survival purposes. The first property, priced at $170,000, is a remote cabin by a lake with low accessibility and few amenities, requiring significant investment to make it livable. The second property, priced at $1.3 million, is a large, well-equipped farm and recreation retreat in Priestville, Saskatchewan, offering a mix of grasslands and forest, a well, a lake, and abundant wildlife. However, it’s close to a town, which could be a disadvantage in a survival situation.
➡ The article discusses a large, well-built house on a 600-acre property, available for $1.3 million. The property has an easement, limiting logging and building activities, but offers ample space for farming and solar power generation. It’s located near a town, which could lead to issues with trespassers, especially during hunting season. Despite some concerns, the property scores 74 out of 100 on a resilience scale due to its size, potential for food production, and private lake.

I’ve been on a quest to find the best apocalypse property in the world. Today we’re looking at some properties that are so cheap, I was scratching my head wondering how is this even possible? Sure enough there were some drawbacks, but I did find an absolute gem in the province that I live in that I can’t wait to show you. We’re going to be scoring these properties using my property rating scale. Let’s go check them out. Now this first property is located in Newfoundland. This is 260,000 Canadian. Now here’s what you’re getting. You’re getting a house and you’re getting a property that actually has water on the property.

So let’s first situate things. Let’s give you an establishing shot so you know what we’re talking about here. This is what you have access to. So we know immediately water is not going to be a problem. And because this is in a more temperate climate, Newfoundland, we know that on the hierarchy of needs, the base level is pretty much taken care of. Even if your on-grid water or your well is malfunctioning, we know that we have an unlimited source of not only water, but rain catchment potential. Now you’re lucky to find 10 acres of space and a suitable house on it that isn’t a complete dive for 250,000 Canadian.

But we’re talking about the maritimes that they’re not the most prosperous province economically. So this is why you can find some pretty good deals. Now while this water might not look like much, I presume that the water is, you know, with the gravity filter system, like a Berkey system or a pro one system, perfectly drinkable. Now we noticed right away that you’re sharing this pond with some neighbors. So I’m not sure where this 10 acres is going to come into play here. So let’s go over to Google Earth and let’s just try to contextualize this a little bit.

So this is the place right here. So I’m presuming that this lot, if this is really a 10 acre lot, either you’re getting a lot of this property or you’re getting a lot of this property back here. The cool thing about this property, despite the fact that you have a lot of neighbors, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, guys. I know what you’re thinking. You don’t want to be around all these people when the shit hits the fan. But here’s the thing. This has prepping community potential written all over it. You all share one roadway into the community.

If you can create some sort of community board and you can bring people together under the umbrella of preparedness for said community and have that sense of community solidarity, this could actually be a winning situation. For starters, you have a pond right here, which looks deep enough that it would have some fish in it. Plus, take a look at this. You have all of this open space behind you here, which is uninhabited crown land. Now it looks a little marshy, a little boggy. And the only real downside of this property is that it’s off the Trans-Canada Highway.

In my personal opinion, if you’re talking about prepping, you want to be a couple turns off the main highway. Three turns is kind of the sweet spot. So in terms of remoteness, in order to get to the nearest town, which would be St. John’s, Newfoundland, we’re about 50 kilometers from St. John’s. So if you want to have stuff built out on this property, it wouldn’t be that hard to do because you have a major urban center within an hour’s drive, which could potentially be a bad thing if we’re talking about a full-blown SHTF situation.

Now it looks like this was logged at one point historically, which is actually not a bad thing because then you have some natural fire breaks. And remember, we’re talking about Newfoundland, so we’re not too far away from Nova Scotia, where you were disallowed to go into the forest recently, unless it was your own land, of course. And I guess, you know, you can go into your own land and not worry about causing fires. Not sure about the logic of that, but that’s the Canadian government for you. So we’re in area 5B here.

Generally, you can grow all kinds of plants and trees and things of that nature. We even got some 6B on the coastline here. The problem is, when I go and I look at the soil composition, it shows as podzolic. So if you wanted to grow vegetables in this soil, you would probably have to do quite a bit of work to this soil to make it to the right pH level and level of acidity in order for it to be suitable for growing different types of fruits and vegetables. That would be one potential drawback of something like this.

Now, in terms of hunting, there’s a lot of moose in Newfoundland, but there’s not a lot of deer, because it’s not a native species. Where Newfoundland would potentially excel is the fact that you have a giant ocean worth of fish that is within shouting distance. So angling is going to be, you know, a primary means of naturally collecting food from the land if you can’t grow your own food. It looks like you could potentially have some ruminant animals on here, but remember, you only have 10 acres. You know, that’s going to be a bit of a deal breaker, but for 250,000 bucks to have reasonably usable buildings that are not going to have to undergo extensive renovations in order for them to be usable.

I mean, you have a decent looking house here. You have a wood stove. It’s perfectly acceptable as far as, you know, a house goes, but actually looks kind of cool in some respects. It’s got that, you know, log cabin sort of vibe. It feels very rustic and traditional. So the house looks very well maintained. I mean, for 250,000 bucks, like, jeez. Now, according to the description, you do have blueberries on the property. Can get some calories from there. Heating fuel is electric and wood. Heating your home with electric is very expensive, but if you have the wood stove to supplement it, presuming that you’re going to have access to firewood.

Now, the general rule of thumb is that you need somewhere between seven to 10 acres of good wooded forest in order to have sustainable wood fuel. That means you could maybe pull four to six cords out of there a year in order to heat your home and still have enough regeneration and regrowth for that to be a sustainable endeavor indefinitely. You can find out whether or not this is crown land behind here. If it is, you can legally get a permit and use it for the purpose of heating your home.

So you could actually go and harvest the firewood off your property, which is within, you know, reach. And you could potentially be heating your home for free. Well, it’s going to require a lot of work on your part and you’re going to have to find a way to truck it in and truck it out. I’m sure there’s trails that meander through here. So that’s just something to keep in mind. While it’s not absolutely essential to have electricity, you might find it useful not only for heating your home like in this instance, but also for powering a well and a variety of different other amenities.

Solar is not going to be a good option in this region. I’m not sure as you can see my head’s kind of in the way right there. So that’s Newfoundland and it looks as though it is kind of in the middle of the road section in terms of photovoltaic potential. Still acceptable if you have enough solar panels, but that just means you’re going to have to build out twice as much than you would need in a place like, you know, the prairie provinces here. Now, looking on the wind turbine database in Canada, we can see that the maritimes are loaded with various wind farms.

So we know that wind has potential here. Problem with that, of course, you’re going to stick out like a sore thumb with your neighbours and from that Trans-Canada Highway. This is my problem with wind turbines is you can kind of see them from much further distance. So if you’re trying to keep a low profile, wind is not always the most effective thing to do. Now, there are vertical turbines that function closer to ground. But if the reason why wind turbines stand so tall is because it’s windier, the higher off the ground you go, maybe use a combination of both of those things.

So overall, this property gets a 45 out of 100. And the thing that lost it a lot of points are, number one, you’re in this community. You don’t know what that community is going to be like. It’s limited in terms of farmland. There’s no greenhouse on the property. The soil isn’t very good, which is not to say that all of these things can’t be fixed. It’s just going to raise the price significantly for you to build out all of these systems. So we look at the base price of 260, and that’s an incredible price.

You have to tack on another couple hundred thousand dollars to build out all the systems that I’m talking about. And that presumes you’re going to have the space and it’s not going to be to the annoyance and to the dismay of your neighbors. And just pray that they’re not a Karen. Because if they are and you go in there and you start flipping this place upside down, people aren’t probably going to like that too much. They’re going to view it as somewhat disruptive and they might give you a hard time, create dissonance between you and them, and that wouldn’t be good for you in an SHTF situation at all.

Okay. So have you ever wondered what $170,000 Canadian is going to get you in terms of a off-grid preparedness property? Well, this is probably as good as it’s going to get, to be brutally honest. Now, as you can see, this is a shabby little cabin on a lake’s edge. And to give you a little bit of context, let’s first take a look at where exactly this is. So here’s Little Lake. Okay. Now, how do we get to Little Lake? We don’t know because it’s a mystery. How you get there is unknown.

Now, if you’re a hardcore prepper, I mean the hardest, this is probably something that is enticing to you because it’s very unlikely that people are going to venture off the beaten path and bushwhack for several hundred meters just to this lake, unless times are really, really tough. You’re surrounded by all kinds of lakes, some very small villages, and then to your north is just endless expanse of lakes and what appears to be very likely wilderness area, crown land. In terms of, you know, hunting, angling, the possibilities are endless.

But accessibility is incredibly low and in fact, we can’t even find it on the map. Now, I think this is it here, but it’s a very poor resolution. If there are quad trails in here, depending on how dense the forest canopy is, you might not see it. So very remote and it doesn’t really provide any information. So there’s no well on this property. You’re going to be drawing water from the lake and having to filter and purify it. There’s not going to be any sort of heating systems. I presume there’s maybe a wood stove in here.

You’re going to have 33 acres though of forest. Now, what you could potentially do with some land like this is you could just get a shipping container in there. It would probably be a lot of work. Or if you could just build some kind of cache of supplies, you could ride out a short, you know, a several month long emergency just using your supplies. And you’d have 33 acres of forest, which is more than enough forest. And this is going to be, you know, your 5B to 6A type forest. It’s going to be fairly diverse in terms of what you might find in there.

Might even be some maple trees in there that you can tap. You’re going to have your fish for fishing. It’s going to be rocky. So it’s going to be very difficult terrain to build on and to grow food on. And if you’re talking about growing food here, fruits, vegetables, you could probably get away with potatoes and some root vegetables. This soil is not going to be very conducive in its current form to growing food. And in terms of solar power, it’s kind of middle of the road also. So for 160 grand, this is what you’re going to get.

A place where you have to bushwhack through. The bugs are going to be terrible. You’re not going to be able to carry much stuff on your person. You’re probably going to have to build some quad roads and it looks like you’re even going to have to go across a place in order to get in there. But the pictures aren’t entirely accurate. So there may actually be direct water access. Now, if there is, and if you can bring a boat that is big enough, then that could actually be a way that you can transport stuff to this property to build it out a little bit easier.

So for that reason, our system scored this property a 44 out of 100. Very low accessibility, very few amenities. While the potential is there, to build this out, it’s going to take you years. It’s going to take immense amount of resources and that 170,000 is quickly going to 2x, possibly even 3x if you want to really build this into something. Now, it is possible. And it’s a little bit off the beaten path, which is nice. I don’t think there’s going to be too many people north of you by the looks of things.

One of the downsides, though, of living on the East Coast, if we’re talking about full-blown nuclear war, and the Russians and the Chinese take a counter-value approach, and they hit Washington, they hit New York, they hit Boston, all of that radioactive fallout is going right over you in Nova Scotia. This is why the East Coast, because of its dense populations, could potentially be a prime target in a nuclear engagement, which is part of the reason that I personally would rule this specific property out.

Not all, because you can always get a fallout shelter and you can always ride it out. Okay, so I showed you guys a few cost-effective properties. Now, let’s look at one that checks more boxes. This is the Pitt Farm and Recreation Retreat located in Priestville, Saskatchewan. Now, this property is really something else. Let me first contextualize where Priestville is. This is the boreal forest right here. This is the prairies. So, Priestville is smack dab in what’s called the transition zone, okay? So, what that means is that you kind of get the best of both worlds.

You get the enriched soils of the grasslands, but you also get a little hint of the boreal forest. Now, this is where the property is located. This is Lachlamod and this is 560 acres. In terms of water, we can see that there is indeed a well on this property. The well name is Bruce. It shows us the drilling company. So, it was the earth drilling company. It shows us the land location and we can view additional details. We can see the bit diameter, the casing diameter. We can see the pumping rate, the borehole depth, when it was bored.

Saskatchewan has a lot of wells. Just to put in perspective, this well is actually quite remote. When we zoom out, you can see what I mean. Just give it a second to load. So, these are all the wells in one tiny little chunk of Saskatchewan, okay? It’s worth taking a look at that and you can actually request in-depth reports on individual wells. I know it’s a huge, egregious violation of privacy in a way. The government justifies it under the guise of water security and preserving the aquifers and the water tables and all that good stuff.

Not only do we have a well on this property, but we also have this big lake. And let me show you the actual property here. If we zoom in a little closer, these are the five quarter sections that you would own. So, you’re talking about really close to 600 acres of land. I have 160 acres and it’s a lot of land. You’re going to be doing most of the stuff that you’re going to do on five acres. Building your greenhouse, your orchards, your chickens. Maybe if you have some cows and stuff, you have a bit of grazing land up there.

But by and large, most of the magic is going to happen on five acres. So, you got another 555 acres just for recreation and hunting. That’s incredible. Now, this property is valued at 1.3 million, which is crazy because the house is beautiful. We got some pretty tall trees in some places. Now, for some people, if you live out in British Columbia, these are going to look like toothpicks. But apparently, there’s lots of pretty sizable pine trees and spruce trees. In fact, I was tempted to go and look at this property myself because apparently, there’s some pretty decent lumber on the property.

There’s all kinds of wildlife. Because it’s right in that transition zone, you’re going to find the best hunting in the world in this region. You’re going to find everything. Any animal in North America, you’re going to find them here with the exception of grizzly bears and that’s probably a good thing, which is not to say that you won’t see a grizzly bear. There have been grizzly bear sightings in Saskatchewan. You may even find some elusive wildcat populations here. So it is really, really tempting, especially seeing as you have a lake.

That might be a bit of an overstatement because of course, there are other people on this lake and you’re not too far from this town called Priestville, which looks like it’s home to, you know, around a thousand people or so. So it’s not nothing. And you can bet that a lot of the weekend warriors within this region, they probably go here to hang out. If there is angling that happens here, I believe there’s some pike, maybe some pickerel in there. That’s what they’re going to be doing.

And now let’s take a look at the house. Let’s just look at the house first, okay? Because usually I don’t care about the house, but I got to say this is a pretty nice house, even from a defensibility point of view. Now you could be burned out. They could throw a Molotov cocktail and it’s lights out Irene. But if you take a look at how this house is constructed, I mean, they’re using, looks like a four by eight or a four by six or something. That actually is going to have some ballistic resistance.

Now, you know, the likelihood of you getting in a gunfight in the house is very low. But I kind of use that as our, you know, base measure for, in terms of, you know, security and fortifications. This is a house that’s built pretty dang tough. In terms of inside the house, I mean, it’s a beautiful house. Like the house itself probably cost, especially building it way out in this region. Over a million dollars, I would say. Everything is real hardwood by the looks of things. It’s got that kind of, you know, late 90s kind of vibe to it.

But because it has this wood cabin motif, it kind of negates the aging factor. What’s the catch, right? What is the catch, you might be asking. How is it possible that you can get 600 acres of pristine recreational land with a million dollar home on it for only 1.3 million dollars with several outbuildings, I should add. Well, apparently there’s an easement on this property. So what that means is that the previous owner had some conditions on the property that were agreed to to whoever they sold it to.

So I think the easement is that you can only log 40 cords of wood off of this entire region per year, which I should add is a lot. It’s probably more than you’re, you know, ever going to need. But if you wanted to commercially log this place, you could make a few bucks, but it’s not going to be a sustainable income. I wouldn’t worry about that anyways. There is more than enough wood here, but I have to get more information on this because there may be some conservation elements.

The easement stipulates that you can only build on this quarter section here. Okay, you can’t build on these two. This is reserved for recreational use. Now the question is, well, if the owner doesn’t live there anymore, why is this the case? And the problem with a big chunk of land like this, which is so close to a town, is that how are you going to police that, especially come hunting season? Because you can bet that people are going to come and hunt on this property.

It’s very likely that the animals are going to feel safe coming on this property. And that, of course, is going to attract hunters. And it’s just it’s way too much land, in my personal opinion. So just some more details about this property. So you get 1.6 kilometers of shoreline. You have hay and pasture areas. So you could have some cows on this property. You’re in zone 3A. You can pretty much grow most stuff, especially if you have a greenhouse. This land is going to be very arable, thick with rich topsoil and nutrients that you’re going to need to grow food.

This area has a lot of photovoltaic potential and you have more than enough space on this one quarter section here to build out as big of a solar array you want and you’ll barely notice it. In terms of remoteness, it’s not very remote. It’s not as remote as I probably like. Like it’s about three hours from Saskatoon, but it’s only about five minutes from Priestville and then another hour to the other closest city, which is Yorkton, which is around 15-20,000 people last time I checked.

There’s not much topography on the land. So you can see we’re in 3D mode right now and there is barely a hill in sight. So this is a pretty flat landscape. Not a lot of topography. There’s a little bit of gradations in the elevation, but not that much. But in terms of your neighbors, so let’s just check it out. Where’s your nearest neighbors? So here you are here. This is your little chunk of the lake right here. You got neighbors across the way. So you got them on this side and it looks like they’re growing some stuff there.

You have one neighbor over here. We have a Bible camp up here. So that’s only going to be inhabited for very short periods throughout the year. We do have a little community around this lake here, interestingly. So really on this entire lake, like let’s put this in perspective. You get this entire lake, which does have fish in it. There’s only one, maybe two, maybe three, three, four neighbors on the lake itself. Wow. And then over in this little crappy slough over here, where you can practically see the ground underneath the water, you got a whole freaking village here.

Now, you’re not too far from the forest either. This is the transition zone and then right when you go up here, this is where you get into the boreal forest. Okay, all this darker colors here, that’s all boreal forest. You really do get the best of both worlds. You have some nice conifer trees. You even have some creeks, some bog, you have beavers, you got every possible animal you can imagine out here. I tell you, it is really tempting. But the problem I have with this property is the easement and what that necessarily entails and what relationship this property has with the township historically.

You know, you go in there, you think you own this property, but do you really? You know, this land historically has significance for this town. If you had good rapport with the surrounding community, then this could be perfect. But if you don’t and you don’t get on well with them, then this is going to be a nightmare. Overall, our property resilience algorithm rated this as 74 out of 100. That is pretty darn good. And one of the main contributing factors to that is just the size of the land, the ability for you to grow lots of food, to have infinite amounts of firewood, to have your own private lake.

It’s remote enough, but not too remote. So there’s a lot of things that this property has going for it. And the house is probably one of the better ones that I’ve seen in some time. Let me know what you think about these properties in the comment section below. Stay tuned because we got a lot more coming. We’ve barely scratched the surface of trying to find the ideal preparedness bug out retreat. And be sure to go and check out the first two installments of this series where I go over the property resilience scale itself and put it to the test with some properties and also part two, which goes over the different tools that we use to assess these properties.

Take care, guys. Canadian Prepero. [tr:trw].

See more of Canadian Prepper on their Public Channel and the MPN Canadian Prepper channel.