Large acreage is also an insurance policy, because if things go to **** you can raise a large portion of your own food on it.

I’m serious.

The place I’m renting now has a lemon tree in the front and a loquat in the back. Both trees bombard us with way more fruit than we can ever eat. If I had access to enough space to store it (don’t, the one housemate is a pack rat), I could do some serious canning. As it is, we keep half the neighborhood in lemons and they really appreciate it, b/c lemons are expensive in the stores.

San Diego is a great place to raise fruit, potatoes (in the winter), chickens, avocados, you name it. What you don’t eat yourself you can barter off to others for what they’re growing. Farmer’s markets are booming and are all over the county now.

First thing to do when you get that house is to pick a patch of ground and start improving it for growing garden crops in it. Work in lots of compost, that stuff that “breaks up hard soil”, maybe some sand also to loosen the dirt. Start now and in a couple of years you’ll have some pretty good soil. Don’t stint on developing the dirt, then you can get good crops out of it.

Oh, and yes, you could raise chickens. They are legal in San Diego, Poway, Escondido, and quite possibly other municipalities too. Also, you can buy just hens, so you don’t have a rooster crowing to get the neighbors upset. And their are egg-laying breeds (that lay like mad even w/o a rooster) if you are not into killing and plucking chickens.

Although a friend once told me that his neighbors’ home-grown chickens were hands-down the most delicious chicken he had ever eaten.