Land pays nothing for years, so I put the tax-and-hold money into a debt fund

I own three parcels I intend to hold for a long time. They generate no income and they cost me property taxes, a mowing contract on one, and liability insurance. About 7,400 a year total. For years I just funded that out of income and treated it as the cost of patience.

Two years ago I moved 90k into a debt fund with the specific job of covering that carrying cost. Residential and small commercial bridge loans, monthly distributions, quarterly redemption with notice.

It's paid between 7.9 and 8.6 percent net depending on the quarter, so call it 7,300 a year on average. The carrying cost is covered and a bit besides. I don't reinvest the distributions, they go into a separate account that pays the tax bills.

What nearly went wrong. In the second year the fund's distribution dropped for two months to about 0.55 percent while they worked through a loan that had gone bad. If it had stayed there I'd have been short on the tax bill in November. I now keep a full year of carrying cost in cash as a buffer and treat the fund as a replenishment source rather than a payment source. That's the change I'd have made on day one.

What I'd keep. Giving the money a job. When it's just yield it's abstract and I second-guess the risk. When it's the thing that pays the tax bill on land I'm never selling, I can tell whether it's working with one look at a bank statement.