
What's the cheapest living situation possible that still has basic utilities? - format997
I&#x27;m curious about possible non-conventional living arrangements to cut out one of my biggest expenses. If location weren&#x27;t a primary concern (I can telecommute as a programmer, but would still want to live within a few hours of a major city), what&#x27;s the cheapest living arrangement possible? Buying cheap land and hooking up utilities to a mobile home? What are the fees like to run utilities to new property? Are there cheaper living structures than mobile homes? Are there completely different ideas I&#x27;m not considering?<p>I&#x27;d be curious if I could set myself up with a basic home for $40,000 or less that would mean I wouldn&#x27;t have to pay any other living expenses going forward besides unavoidable ones (property taxes [though I could pick a state without property tax], maintenance and utilities).
======
delbel
I've been able to do this after re-arranging my life over the past 5 years. I
bought 7 acres of bare land for $35k and built a 200 sqft tiny house for
$4,000. I homestead as much as I can and my bills are approximately $40/DSL,
$40/Electrical, $35/Car insurance (I drive a 90s Honda), and approximately $30
a month in property taxes. I spend about $40 in propane for heat in the winter
and my air conditioning bill is an extra $15/month in the summer. I'm halfway
between Portland and San Francisco and do telecommute node.js/angular work.
I'm saving up to build a nice house and a this summer backhoe. Some projects
I'm working on this summer include a biodigester to supplement my propane for
cooking gas, a rocket mass heater to eliminate my propane, a backyard
blacksmiths area, drip irrigation and cistern system, and more fencing for
livestock. My property search took me several years and I had no experience in
construction but learned most of it from youtube and asking friends. I lived
in a camper trailer while I built my place. So to answer your question, about
$200 a month is the cheapest I can survive on.

~~~
danjayh
$35k for bare land? In Detroit, $35k gets you a lot with a newly renovated, 3
bedroom, 2 bath house. Random example at $37k:
[http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/487-W-Green...](http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/487-W-Greendale_Detroit_MI_48203_M33161-98776?row=26)

Edit: I can just keep going and going with nicely livable ~40k houses in
Detroit:

[http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/13111-Grigg...](http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/13111-Griggs-St_Detroit_MI_48238_M32244-94109?row=29)

[http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/17593-Monic...](http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/17593-Monica-St_Detroit_MI_48221_M42306-30993?row=30)

[http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/427-W-Green...](http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/427-W-Greendale_Detroit_MI_48203_M33136-27426?row=31&ex=MI568676165)

[http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/18461-Sorre...](http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/18461-Sorrento-St_Detroit_MI_48235_M33965-49040?row=33&ex=MI568982665)

[http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/5510-Three-...](http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/5510-Three-Mile-Dr_Detroit_MI_48224_M49776-43411?row=45&ex=MI573820009)

... not sure if this is sad or awesome ...

~~~
LammyL
I wonder if there is a huge hidden accumulation of unpaid property taxes the
buyer would be on the hook for.

~~~
Beached
There likely isn't and risk to the buyer. These houses were most likely
foreclosed or abandoned.

Detroit is auctioning off houses and lots that have not been paid up to the
highest bidder by the dozens. These were likely purchased super cheap for
flipping, and now being resold.

Detroit has a real problem with the city services right now, and as a result
of the lack of services, and large land sales houses are SUPER cheap.

------
patio11
Pick a college town and rent an apartment, optionally with a roommate. In much
of the American midwest this implies an all-in rent & utilities expense in the
$500 range.

If you wanted to try something more exotic, you can do the digital nomad thing
and rent somewhere in Thailand for ~$100 a month, but honestly as a programmer
I feel that optimizing sub-$500 expenses is not the best use of one's time
versus figuring out how to make money in a stable and hopefully increasing-
over-time fashion.

I understand the aesthetic appeal of going off the grid but if you wouldn't
get a job as an electrician or day laborer which paid $400 a month then you
shouldn't take on any major construction project to save $400 a month.

~~~
andyjdavis
>If you wanted to try something more exotic, you can do the digital nomad
thing and rent somewhere in Thailand for ~$100 a month,

I feel like I should point out that getting something that cheap in Thailand
is difficult and certainly will not be pretty. I have previously lived in
Thailand for just under a year and then gone on to be a digital nomad for
three years and counting, mostly in south east Asia.

Its pretty trivial to live on 800-1200/month in Thailand and I have known
people to get it down to $500/month but there is a floor there that, to go
under, you would likely need to move somewhere very remote that is likely to
have an unreliable electricity supply and probably won't have an existing net
connection or a telephone line for you to get access to the net. It would help
to speak reasonable Thai too as you will be living somewhere well away from
the touristy bits of Thailand where the English speakers tend to congregate.

Now, that isn't to say that its impossible. I know someone who, at one point,
was living on the outskirts of Siem Reap (Cambodia) for $200/month total.
$80/month of that was rent. Firstly, he is an extremely experienced nomad.
Secondly, that involved living in an old wooden house with no airconditioning
(Cambodia gets brutally hot) and walking across town to use the wifi at KFC.
It worked for him because he was working on a book so he only required
sporadic net access. He is also from the Philippines and grew up without air
conditioning so apparently the heat and humidity was bearable for him.
Personally I find not having aircon in the tropics a really quick way to take
your productivity to zero. Thirdly, to keep his costs that low an enormous
proportion of his diet was made up of boiled rice with token amounts of
vegetables. When he went to KFC he would purchase a single piece of chicken so
they wouldn't kick him out and so his diet contained some protein. Handy if
you want to lose weight I guess but tightly restricting your vegetable and
protein intake is otherwise not particularly healthy.

Anyhow, just wanted to point out that "rent somewhere in Thailand for ~$100 a
month" isn't something you are just going to walk off the plane and arrange
without making some very serious health and lifestyle sacrifices.

~~~
notahacker
If you're keen on Cambodia even a newly-arrived white person could get a
_good_ hotel room, with wifi (and television) in Battambang or Phnom Penh for
$5 per night for a couple of days a couple of years back, so I'm sure ~$200ish
per month is do-able even for beginners if they're keen on the street food.

If you're keen on Asia mainly to minimise costs, Thailand probably isn't the
best place to start.

------
bruceb
You want to live in a city with great medical, great arts, and sports? Then go
to Cleveland. Homes starting at $10k (some maintenance required)

[http://www.trulia.com/for_sale/Cleveland,OH](http://www.trulia.com/for_sale/Cleveland,OH)

It is cold...but it isn't Detroit.

~~~
percept
How's the crime rate in those neighborhoods?

Sometimes I'll check out these maps, which have the state as a whole ranked
not-so-good for robbery, property crime, burglary, etc.

[http://www.businessinsider.com/maps-on-fbis-uniform-crime-
re...](http://www.businessinsider.com/maps-on-fbis-uniform-crime-
report-2013-9)

(Understanding that these are state and not local rates.)

~~~
hackerboos
There's a crime map on each of the listings.

------
helen842000
If you want to buy a home >
[http://www.tumbleweedhouses.com](http://www.tumbleweedhouses.com)

If you want to travel & rent > [https://nomadlist.io](https://nomadlist.io)

------
jws
Used travel trailers and RVs older than 15 years are ludicrously cheap.
Arrange with the seller to drop it at your property if you don't have a big
enough tow vehicle. You can find small patches of land in rural America for
very little money. Say $10k for an acre in woods of no particular scenic
beauty with power and water. Once you pick an area a real estate agent can
help you find someone's old wilderness retreat or abandoned farmstead.

Speaking as someone with a solar installation, I wouldn't screw with solar if
I were worried about cost. Live like you are on solar and you will buy $0.30
of electricity a day from the power company.

Your limitation is going to be fast enough internet, that will keep you close
enough to be under cable tv or a benevolent telecom.

~~~
percept
I've often wondered about that limitation.

I submitted this one:

[http://www.mprnews.org/story/2014/12/29/yurt](http://www.mprnews.org/story/2014/12/29/yurt)

"high-speed Internet"?

------
toddrew
Move to a cheaper country. I moved to Guatemala a few years ago and live for
around $8000 a year which includes a nice wooden cottage on a lake with three
volcanos, decent internet, and eating out in really great restaurants three
times a day.

3:05 is the lake [https://vimeo.com/87304272](https://vimeo.com/87304272)

~~~
xacaxulu
Agreed. I worked remotely in Mexico for 3 months and saved about 2 grand a
month && lived better than I'd ever lived in the US. Nice rental in the best
part of town, great food, top shelf tequila. I can't wait to go somewhere else
and try it again.

------
cthulhuology
The cheapest way I've found to live was to buy a 4+ unit apartment building
that when the 3+ other apartments are fully rented cover the cost of the
mortgage, and utilities. As a result, net out of pocket each year for housing
+ utilities + taxes + insurance is < $0. (we turn a profit each year) For us,
this means we can reinvest our earnings in our businesses and live a very
comfortable middle class lifestyle. We live in a city, 3 blocks for 3
different cafes, a dozen restaurants, laundrymats, etc.

~~~
ericd
What city?

~~~
shiftpgdn
I've seen 8-10 unit apartment buildings for as little as 300k in Houston and 4
unit buildings for about the same price in a better part of town.

------
api
I met a "prohobo" once. Chatted with him at a coffee shop. He was living in a
squat, had 4G/LTE Internet, and a solar panel for his electronics. Rode
Greyhound and/or the rails around the country (the latter, he said, is hard to
get away with these days). Said he also occasionally stayed in hotels when he
needed to freshen up and get a better nights reset for a while.

I think he made a living doing contract web programming, routed his money to
an electronic bank account.

------
Beached
You may try looking into Tiny houses, they may cause some problems with zoning
in some area's so picking a location will require some research.

A tiny house can easily run under $20,000 fully equipped. Some people have
been able to build them for under $10,000.

Fix the house with solar panels, maybe a small wind turbine for electricity.
tin roof with a rain water collection, you can run is through a 3 stage or 5
stage filter into a small water tank under a couch. Solar or propane hot water
heater, propane gas stove. Grab yourself a 5-mile wifi- antenna to pick up
wifi from coffee shops nearby. Composting toilet or a standard RV backwater
holding tank to take care of the nasty.

A tiny house with this set up can take care of all of your basic utilities and
if you are frugal, resourceful and pick up recyclables, you could drive down
the cost possibly under $10k.

Check out this video for my favorite tiny house build.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VckbqU4kK2I](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VckbqU4kK2I)

Edit: You will need a car/truck that can tow it around. But an automobile
would definitely come in handy if you still want to commute into the city.

~~~
nightcracker
> Grab yourself a 5-mile wifi- antenna to pick up wifi from coffee shops
> nearby.

This sounds incredibly illegal.

~~~
gojomo
_> …illegal…_

Barring access controls (like secured-wifi or a 'captive-portal' requiring
authentication), I doubt this is illegal, at least in the US.

Lots of people and businesses leave their wifi open specifically to share with
anyone within range. The few pennies of marginal cost are outweighed by the
desire to be generous, or by actual goodwill earned from neighbors and
passers-by.

And there may be no marginal cost at all! On typical unmetered broadband-
plans, until the link is saturated, bandwidth is a "marginally-free" resource
that expires worthless every second if it's not used.

So it should be used! An extra person hopping on is (until saturation) as
close to a "free lunch" as you'll find in economics. It's the sort of ultra-
efficient practice that law and culture should encourage, not stigmatize.

------
lordbusiness
You'd do well to consider the life of a digital nomad. Here's some links to
get you started.

[http://nomadlist.io/](http://nomadlist.io/)
[http://nomadjobs.io/](http://nomadjobs.io/)
[https://weworkremotely.com/](https://weworkremotely.com/)

------
EGreg
Move to Thailand but have customers in the USA and Europe

Besides Thailand and other countries with a low cost of living, some towns in
the USA will actually pay you to move there.

[http://www.thepennyhoarder.com/6-cities-that-will-pay-you-
to...](http://www.thepennyhoarder.com/6-cities-that-will-pay-you-to-live-
there/)

You can also join various subsidy programs and grants:

[http://becolorado.org/programs/be-colorado-
move](http://becolorado.org/programs/be-colorado-move)

Finally I recommend the Mr Money Mustache blog. Anyone read it?

~~~
seanmcdirmid
You can go pretty low in Thailand, but it can actually get pretty expensive if
you want a western lifestyle. And anyways, isn't Cambodia or Laos cheaper?

~~~
percept
I'd be more concerned with visa issues.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Ya, you aren't supposed to work with tourist visas, and you should be paying
taxes in your country of residence on your income. Things can get pretty
shady, and you really don't want to wind up in a Thai jail!

~~~
zkhalique
Wait, what? You aren't supposed to work for people in the COUNTRY Just like
you aren't supposed to do business with people in the country No one says you
can't continue working on projects for clients in your home country

~~~
seanmcdirmid
That is very very wrong. Thai law doesn't allow you to work on a tourist visa,
even if you are working for someone outside of Thailand, it is very
unambiguous on this point and they have been cracking down on co-working
spaces accordingly. Almost all countries are like this actually.

~~~
zkhalique
So, a person with a tourist visa isn't able to do any work in their own hotel
room, no matter what it is or for whom? Is it that they aren't supposed to do
a service for anyone else (such as cook for a friend, or translate anything
for a relative back home) or that they can't receive money? What if their
company is generating passive income for them back home? Are they not supposed
to access it? How are they supposed to pay for all the touristy stuff?

"Sorry sir. We noticed you were debugging your iPhone app in your hotel room,
a version of which is being sold in the app store. You will now go to Thai
Jail or be deported."

~~~
seanmcdirmid
> So, a person with a tourist visa isn't able to do any work in their own
> hotel room, no matter what it is or for whom?

Yep.

> Is it that they aren't supposed to do a service for anyone else (such as
> cook for a friend, or translate anything for a relative back home) or that
> they can't receive money?

You just can't get paid. If you were cooking for a "friend" but you were
actually their personal chef...you would need a working visa.

For a visa waver country, you usually have the right to go to that country to
attend conferences or training, but you aren't supposed to do any "work" like
say...programming or writing documentation (again value creation).

> What is their company is generating passive income for them back home?

Passive and investment income don't count, only work that creates value and is
paid accordingly. If you want to make investments in the country, there is a
non tourist visa for that (and sometimes it is allowed on visa waver).

> How are they supposed to pay for all the touristy stuff?

Through the income you earned working hard back home.

> "Sorry sir. We noticed you were debugging your iPhone app in your hotel
> room, a version of which is being sold in the app store. You will now go to
> Thai Jail or be deported."

Yep. It hasn't happened yet, but there was a scare a few months ago:

[http://www.itworld.com/article/2695072/mobile/digital-
nomads...](http://www.itworld.com/article/2695072/mobile/digital-nomads-in-
thailand-get-a-scare.html)

A good description of the situation is here:

[http://ashleyconnor.co.uk/blog/2014/09/07/the-digital-
nomad-...](http://ashleyconnor.co.uk/blog/2014/09/07/the-digital-nomad-and-
immigration-law/)

~~~
_delirium
I can see immigration authorities getting peeved over people who are
essentially running a freelance business from the country (hence cracking down
on coworking spaces). That looks more like working in the country rather than
really working back home: even if all your customers are abroad, the place of
your self-employment as a freelancer is where you customarily actually reside
and do the work. So if you maintain an office much of the year in Thailand and
don't maintain one in the U.S., that sure looks like you're working in
Thailand.

But most countries don't categorically exclude doing work for a foreign
employer while on a visa-free visit. The U.S. visa-waiver program explicitly
allows "travel for business or pleasure" up to 90 days, and the EU has an
analogous "business travel" exemption. Doing work for your normal "home"
employer is expected under the definition of "business travel", which can and
usually does include on-site work in the country (not only remote work for
your home office). That's what the business travel visa exemption is largely
intended to facilitate: things like BP London sending staff to Houston for 3
weeks to supervise plant startup, or Microsoft sending some staff from Redmond
to Ireland to hash out a product design in person. As long as it's temporary
(typically <90 days) and the employee continues to be employed normally by the
home office (not paid by the local office), it doesn't have to be confined to
training or conferences, and can include actual work.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
So much is wrong here. There is a difference between what people do and what
they are technically allowed to do. Enforcement is also quite difficult if you
are working under the radar. Non immigration business visas don't allow you to
do more than attend trainng and meetings, this includes wavers. Now, you might
code, that is technically illegal, but they probably won't catch you. But for
gods sake, if the immigration officer asks you what you will do, or what you
did, just say "attend meetings and training," or you'll be deported so fast
you won't know what happened (especially in the US and Switzerland).

It might not matter so much going from Ireland to Redmond, but going to
Redmond it's a huge Pain in the ass, so much so that we have visa training for
employees that do it (I work for Microsoft china) to make sure that US laws
are followed (thankfully, I'm a US citizen, but unfortunately that also means
I'm subject to double tax whenever I work in the states).

~~~
_delirium
Interesting. My dad used to work for BP, and their lawyers were of the opinion
that short-term engineering exchanges between the US and EU, either between
corporate offices or to/from their engineering contractors, qualified as visa-
waiver business travel. I wouldn't think they'd be trying to fly under the
radar, since BP is a huge company that's often subject to regulatory scrutiny,
but who knows. As far as I can find, the exemption is somewhat broader than
just training, and also includes "business meetings" and meetings for the
purpose of contract negotiation/supervision.

The thing the lawyers _were_ really worried about was any kind of on-site
visit to an operating plant, but that was for reasons of health/safety law,
not immigration law. The non-operating engineering staff (local or foreign)
had specific rules about what they couldn't do, so they wouldn't count as
"operating" the plant, or get remotely implicated in anything safety-related.
But for visits between corporate offices, they were very un-worried. Even
visits to their Chinese joint-venture partner were pretty hassle-free, just
requiring an "M" visa arranged by the partner.

------
bikamonki
My advice: don't take a radical path until you control/manage your current
path. I am also a web developer and can/have worked remotely but I think that
deep down one needs social interaction (even more so if you have kids!). I was
also looking to minimize expenses but instead of taking a radical path I
decided to control my expenses while keeping most of my lifestyle and guess
what? With enough discipline and team work (your partner, if any, must agree
with the plan) you may get very low on expenses without having to change too
much your routine. The formula was dead obvious for me and you've heard it a
thousand times: pay down debt, get rid of credit cards (keep a couple for
EMERGENCIES), get rid of unnecessary expenses, buy used, reuse, don't buy
toys, don't eat out too much, buy wholesale, bike to work, walk to groceries,
etc. Many times the solution to a problem/want/need is not money but
creativity and rational thinking, e.g. do you need a backyard b/c you want a
bbq on your 'own' place? You will do that bbq maybe 10 times/year. Is it worth
it to buy the land/house for that reason? How about a public park for the bbq,
or the outdoors? One final word: a mortgage is 99% of the time a bad
(financial) decision.

------
dionidium
If you're serious about _cheapest_ as the most important variable, then the
sort of glib (but true) answer to this question is to observe where people who
have _no other choice_ end up living, which means a trailer in a rural area or
housing in the cheapest parts of any large U.S. metro.

If you're lucky enough to have startup capital, then you can reduce your
recurring expenses to practically nothing. You can find a trailer for a few
grand, for example, and functional houses can be found for less than $20k in
many American cities. You can probably find parks charging only a couple
hundred a month for lot rent, if you go the trailer route, and property taxes
will be minimal on houses in the described range, if you choose that, instead.

If you don't want to invest anything up front, you can still find housing for
around $350/mo in the worst parts of the Midwestern city I live in. (But you
shouldn't expect a very _hands-on_ landlord.) You might even find weekly- or
daily-rate housing that's cheaper, but I've never personally looked into that
sort of thing.

Obviously, there's a reason that these areas are so inexpensive, but I've
optimized only for cost.

~~~
percept
I think that reason is the most important consideration. It looks like you may
be referring to the worst parts of #4 on this list!

[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/11/12/highest-murder-
rate...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/11/12/highest-murder-rate-us-
cities-2013_n_6145404.html)

~~~
dionidium
Indeed, I am. Incidentally, the worst parts of St. Louis account for basically
_all_ of that ranking. People here like to focus on the separation of the City
of St. Louis from the surrounding St. Louis County (which is critical in
understanding St. Louis's ranking on that list), but even within the City
itself there are large areas that have basically none or few homicides every
year. The most violent areas are extremely violent, in other words.

------
Exenith
Keep the regular job. Just buy a cheap van, and rent a 24/7 parking space.

You can figure out the rest. Buy takeaways or use a gas stove for food, use a
24/7 gym for showering/toilet, and go to your job for the internet
(alternatively, the library, free WiFi places, or mobile net).

That's probably the cheapest way to live without being entirely homeless (or
just buying land/house).

------
rjdagost
The cost to run utilities to a property varies considerably with location.
Typically it depends on the distance of your property from existing electrical
lines. If you purchase land way off grid it can cost > $100K to get an
electrical connection. So you need to do some research before buying any land.
At some point it is cheaper to generate your own electricity. If you generate
your own electricity then you need to research what form of energy is most
plentiful for your region (solar, wind, hydro, or a gas / diesel generator).
You might consider getting a property with decent hydroelectric "head" (water
flowing with a significant elevation drop) as microhydro power tends to be
more reliable than solar or wind. I advise you to research this site for more
options: [http://www.homepower.com/](http://www.homepower.com/)

------
1971genocide
Trying to go completely off grid - building your own house - is way too much
hassle.

I think of it as an optimization problem. you do not want inconvenience
yourself too much with having to worry about your own home being towed !. It
will add unwanted stress to your life.

The best approach as someone said - "college town with a roomate" \- this is
the lowest you should go since college dorms are really fancy these days and
are super cheap. the extra saving you will get by going below this ( becoming
essentially homeless ) is not worth the other problems associated with it (
security, winter, etc )

Money is not the end of it all. Mental wellbeing and physical wellbeing is
always more important.

The other great advantage of college town is its filled with people who want
to socialize. You dont want to be 50 and look back at your life as someone who
saved a lot of money and lived in a car.

------
maratd
> (I can telecommute as a programmer, but would still want to live within a
> few hours of a major city)

and

> I'd be curious if I could set myself up with a basic home for $40,000 or
> less

As others have mentioned, it's not too hard to build an off-the-grid small
house. If you want to go with new, that's certainly an option.

Since you don't mind being a couple hours from a major city, may I suggest
spending a bit more and buying used? You can buy yourself a decent one family
home within that distance span. Add some solar panels and you're good to go.

You can also buy a two-family, rent out one of the units, and actually make
money. Lots of options in real estate if you don't want to spend a ton.

------
NamTaf
Cheapest for whom? Many of my mates worked at mines, and therefore lived on
site with all expenes paid - utilities, meals, boarding, etc. In the off time,
I'm sure you could find some way to minimise many of those expenses too.

Basically, any job that requires you to relocate will minimise YOUR expenses,
because your company will pay for it all. But I get the feeling that's not
what you were after.

~~~
electromagnetic
I know a guy who works trucking the chemicals for the oil fracking. He makes a
lot of money, and when on the job all expenses are paid.

Once his rotation is over, he hops on a plane to Thailand. He owns a house
there that he paid comparatively nothing for, has a housekeeper that he pays a
good wage to for the area - but really a pittance here - and he chills out
drinking on the beach until his next rotation comes up.

~~~
akg_67
This used to be very common with offshore oil drilling too. You work 21 days
straight on an oil platform and then get 14 days off. Company paid all
expenses while on the platform and also paid air travel to/from your home base
to the town nearest to the offshore oil platform and from where company will
ferry you to/from oil platform on a chopper.

------
lo_fye
the generic term for "tumbleweed houses" is "tiny homes" or "tiny houses".
there's also a couple in New York? who built a great house out of a shipping
container.

------
webnrrd2k
How about living in a van or RV? Check out
[http://www.reddit.com/r/vandwellers](http://www.reddit.com/r/vandwellers).

------
percept
@dang/HN admin: It was disappointing to see this thread instantly go from Page
1/Top Ten to Page 3/#64.

Did some auto-filter get triggered?

------
Spooky23
Draw a fifty mile circle from a mid sized city, and look for a recent vintage
double wide trailer.

------
kirk21
1 ) college town / sharing flat 2 ) short period: live in your office building

------
Pxtl
Move to a big city in a poor country.

~~~
talles
I hope that's a joke, that's a terrible advice.

------
electromagnetic
As an aspiring writer (read as: as someone aspiring to earn less money) I've
looked into this quite a bit.

I'm married with kids (well soon to be plural anyway) so the cheap rents are
out of the question, and despite their generally lower cost apartments aren't
ideal. Not only is there a high risk of bedbug infestation, which will set you
back significantly if you get hit, but the costs are fixed and will increase
every year.

From what I've figured out reading other peoples stories, the best way is to
go nearly-off-grid. If your area allows mobile homes as a primary dwelling,
then this is generally the ideal. They're generally cheaply available, they're
normally of a size comparable to a single bed apartment, but they also come up
to 3 and 4 bedroom models with two bath.

In rural areas these often have wood stoves as the primary heating with small
propane/electric ones as backup so your pipes don't freeze if you go away for
a weekend.

If you're setting up in a rural area, with 5+ acres of land you can easily be
self-sustaining on your own wood supply. You can set yourself up with a small
wind turbine and solar rig for your electricity.

Honestly though, the majority of my work experience is from various
construction fields. I want to go this way to maximize my freedom. Cutting
wood and tilling soil is just exercise to me so I don't have a problem growing
my own vegetables and managing my own wood lot. The only thing I've spent
money on owning my house was getting my furnace replaced, and only then
because I didn't have the equipment to do the piping due to the age of my
house.

My dream is to build my own house from the foundation up, and if possible
using lumber I harvest myself.

So really you need to quantify what your reasons for doing this are. If it's
just reduce expenses for a few years to maximize your savings you're probably
best going for a college town apartment. If you want to escape the city and
are merely using your skills as a means to an end to fund this endeavour, then
I'd say learn the skills and go rural.

There's people in Alaska and elsewhere who can make ends meet at $10 a month.
You need soap? Save your stove ashes, put them in a lye barrel and you make
your own lye that you can mix with fat you've saved from cooking or - if
you're really into it - your own hunting, or your own animals.

When you pay for a burger at McDonalds you're paying for the guy who grew the
corn, the guy who fed the cow, the guy who drove it to the slaughter house,
for the slaughter, for the processing, for the guy who drives the delivery
truck, for the kid who cooks and makes the burger, and for the kid who serves
you - and for every owner, manager and foreman along the way.

You can pay nothing at all for a burger by growing your own corn, raising your
own cows and slaughtering them, growing your own wheat, raising your own
chickens and making your own bread.

So: Earn a shit ton of money, buy a $750,000 house and never do anything
around the house. Gardener does the outside, maid does the inside and takes
the garbage out on garbage day. You pick up most of your food from
restaurants, or you can even hire a housekeeper that does the groceries and
prepares an evening meal for you.

You can earn good money, buy a $250,000 house. You'll mow your own lawn,
you'll do your own cleaning and cooking. You'll do small repairs around the
house, etc.

Or you can do what off-grid can do. You earn nothing, you sell what you have
to. You grow your own food, hunt/raise your own meats, and you make pretty
much everything you want.

The question is, how far down the rabbit hole does your happiness lie?

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danielbnelson
Yurts!

~~~
format997
Just google yurts and see what I find?

~~~
oftenwrong
I think the intended suggestion is: If you are going to build a dwelling, a
yurt is one of the most cost-effective structures you could construct. They
can be lived in year-round in almost any climate. In some locations they may
be regarded as temporary structures, and therefore would not be held to the
same building requirements as a standard house. Furthermore, if you decide to
move, you can take the yurt with you, since it can be dismantled.

Also, the hexayurts linked by the sibling comment are probably not what you
should be looking for. They are not designed for wet or cold weather
conditions. They are designed as temporary shelters for festivals and such,
not as permanent dwellings.

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fartclops
Buy a property with separate unit(s) in the back and rent them out. You're now
living near-free or even making a profit.

