What are the Best States Preppers Choose to live in?
What are the best states Preppers choose to live in is a question that frequently arises. It really depends first where you are and what your goals are. If you are planning to go off the grid then many people prefer the areas around the Rocky Mountains, states such as Montana, Colorado, Utah and Idaho. There are also options in the eastern US such as the Appalachian mountains through states such as Northern Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky and up through West Virginia.
If you are unable to reach these states, you can consider areas such as the Badlands in South Dakota, The Okefenokee swamp in Georgia and Florida, or the everglades in Florida. You also have the back wood swamps of Louisiana and many other similar locations across the US.
So obviously short of the big cities and coastal areas, you have choices. Read on to see what really matters in a Bug out Situation.
Things that determine the best states Preppers Choose
I think the very first thing that determines what is the best state for you is can you access that area. This is important in two ways. First, you are going to want to be able to access your bug out location in order to get it set up and stocked. Second, you need to actually have a hope of being able to reach it in a SHTF scenario. If you cannot afford to head to your bug out location at least three or four times a year then it should probably not be your first choice. On the other hand even if you can afford it if it requires extensive travel to get there either by plane, helicopter or more than one tank of fuel you need to make sure you have plans in place to reach it.
Things to Consider When Buying a Homestead
Now if you are planning to move there and make that your permanent residence then that changes things a bit. Consider things such as how will you get supplies, how many supplies do you actually need and if you want to be able to contact other people. I have seen more instances lately where people are moving to the Canadian wilderness in order to live off grid.
Securing the spot in those best states Preppers love
Bug Out with no Plan
The next thing to consider is how do you plan on securing your ideal space and how much do you need. If you plan to just grab your bug out gear and head to the wilderness, national forest land with no structures may be an option and this would require nothing to secure your rights there beyond exploring on your own time to find a place. However, this method would not allow any advanced placement of supplies.
Land watch and other real estate options
You can search sites such as Landwatch to find land for sell. Going this route you can often find tracts of land for $1500 or less per acre. It just depends on what is for sale at the time. Sometimes these tracts come with some catches though so make sure you look in to that. For instance, one tract I was looking at in Canada prohibited building anything beyond a basic campsite due to its zoning. Some others appeared to be great tracts complete with streams etc, but turned out to be land locked and you would need to negotiate an easement to reach the property by auto.
Rent your Prepper Hideout
Another option is to rent from someone, this is less ideal though as they can come by for “inspections” and discover what you have stored up.
Start a Prepper Co-op to get a leg up
One option that is not often considered but could be quite feasible is finding a few Prepper friends and setting up a coop. I have seen several tracts of land in which they were selling a part interest. These mean that a particular tract has several owners. Perhaps you could go in with a few other Prepper families and split the cost of a very large tract of land. Assuming you hashed out expectations at the beginning this could be very beneficial as you could rest safe in the knowledge that they knew what they were doing and could help with large labor tasks and provide trade partners. Similar to the small communities that sprang up as setters moved west. You would have help for things such as barn raising and even building cabins.
Things to rule out
The only things that I would probably rule out when choosing the best states Preppers might want to live in is areas of high population. While they could be made to work in the short term, I don’t think that they would be feasible beyond the first month or so of a true SHTF scenario. There is also the fact that at that point, fleeing to a secondary location would have become much more difficult.
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