What can you do if you've purchased a property that doesn't have Internet access? If you have or are thinking about purchasing a rural property, you should know that there are some options you have for establishing Internet service. 

Building Out a Network Yourself

You can always pay to have network cables installed for your home. The cost of this will depend on how rural you are—the cables will need to be wired from the closest data center into your area. In general, building out a network will often cost tens of thousands of dollars. But it is possible to get a home-renovation loan for this type of buildout.

Negotiating with an ISP

If your home is on the edge of a city, it is sometimes possible to negotiate directly with an ISP. Some ISPs already have plans for extending outward; if this is the case, they may be happy to subsidize at least part of your Internet service cost. Naturally, this is only a solution if it's obvious that the ISP has intentions to expand, but many ISPs declare their intentions to expand into certain service areas some time in advance.

Creating a Community Network

Because much of the cost is in running wires to the property, having neighbors nearby who are interested in Internet service can significantly reduce the cost. When you and your neighbors work together as a community, you'll be able to negotiate with the ISP more easily. Further, you can split the cost of the build out among all of your neighbors, making the cost substantially lower than it would be for an individual project. In this way, every neighbor will pay for a part of the build from the data center to the center of the community, and then each neighbor can pay for the connection from the community to their homes.

Using Satellite or Cellular Internet Service

The only alternative to network cable installation is generally using satellite Internet or cellular data services. These can be installed virtually anywhere, but there are two distinct issues: speed and cost. The speed of this type of Internet service is generally very slow and not suited to things like streaming high-definition video. This can also be more expensive than traditional services but not as expensive as attempting to build out a network.

Though Internet service is essentially a public utility, you may need to do some work to establish it on your property. However, once you do get your Internet access set up, you'll probably find that it increases the value of your property.

Talk to a company such as Better WiFi to learn more. 

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