How to earn a living off grid?

[delia_peterson]

I need a week at Camp Aly also. Also at Camp Bee! What are your fees Aly?

I dunno! I haven't figured it out yet! LOL

But, jeeze, if ya'll are serious....I'm gonna need a pig pen hillbillied up so....

But it won't be like going to band camp...more like camp uh...sheeoot what's that movie where they go to camp and the camp next door has all the cool new gadgets and the lake and skiiing etc..etc....

Yea, well, we'd be the camp that doesn't have the cool gadgets and stuff.

You would be the camp teaching the life skills....

 

[Dace]

Great thoughts so let me rephrase my question.......

How does one unplug from their current lifestyle and move out of the area where you know no one and are in the boonies and still make a living?

I guess I do not mean completely off grid, but I do mean a radical change from suburbia where everything is only 3-10 minutes away to a life where everything is 40 minutes away. A life that does not include waking up putting on a suit and driving to work.

So Cal is so expensive it requires a high income. If we were to go else where I do not know that Hubby can find work that he is suited for. But we are very entrepreneurial so we would need/want to come up with something self sustaining. The question is .......what?

Is that a better question?

 

[delia_peterson]

Would you want to stay in your area? How much could you spend to get some livestock going? I would think if you have chickens, eggs, beef,garden etc to maybe sustain your family and sale also would be a start ?

 

[Quail_Antwerp]

Great thoughts so let me rephrase my question.......

How does one unplug from their current lifestyle and move out of the area where you know no one and are in the boonies and still make a living?

I guess I do not mean completely off grid, but I do mean a radical change from suburbia where everything is only 3-10 minutes away to a life where everything is 40 minutes away. A life that does not include waking up putting on a suit and driving to work.

So Cal is so expensive it requires a high income. If we were to go else where I do not know that Hubby can find work that he is suited for. But we are very entrepreneurial so we would need/want to come up with something self sustaining. The question is .......what?

Is that a better question?

I live where everything is 40 minutes away.

I raise chickens, ducks, turkeys, and rabbits and from March to October I sell almost weekly at the local auction.

Winter is hard, because poultry and rabbits don't really sell at auction those months, but they do buy farm fresh eggs and homebaked wares all winter long. (I haven't tried the eggs and baked goods myself yet, but I've been thinking on it).

The cost of living here is l o w.

Our place is paid for, so that helps a lot. Our monthly bills (electric, insurance, phone, and internet) only run about $200 a month.

We plant a large garden every year. This year we're hoping our garden does well enough to take fresh produce to the farmer's market.

We also set up and sell at flea markets in the summer. Not farm related items, but anything and everything else. On a good day, you can make several hundred dollars in just 6 hours set up at the flea market.

Anyway....does that give you any ideas?

 

[freemotion]

Making soap, handmade cards and pictures with pressed wildflowers, herbs from the garden fresh and dried and made into mixes with recipe cards, dog treats, eggs (PolyFace Farm style....very efficient!), etc. Depending on where you live....there are a handful of people here who raise chickens and other fowl and sell birds for $10 each! I actually bought my three guineas from them, because I didn't want an order of 30, so I spent a few dollars more and just got three, which I raised with a hatchery order of cheap cheeping chicks.

Classes on a variety of things if you like to teach......I have discovered that if you talk up whatever you want to do, it eventually pays off. This week I had two different massage therapists ask me if I teach canine and equine massage classes. I had the same question for each....can you put together a group for me? If so, I will teach it. Both left excited....me, too!

 

[Blackbird]

Join a commune.

 

[hwillm1977]

I live where everything is 40 minutes away... and I put on a suit (or skirt ) and drive 40 minutes to work

It certainly makes you plan ahead a lot more, there's no longer 'I'll just run down to the store and pick ____ up'... if you run out of something, it waits until the next time someone heads to town.

Cost of living here is also low... land, houses, taxes, etc. are all low. Our biggest expense is gas and vehicle costs...

Chicken meat sells for $4.00/pound for a whole bird, so maybe selling meat would be a good idea (that also depends on regulations)

We sell kindling wood for $4/bundle... it's easy, and people just stop in when they want some... we've been buying old pallets, breaking them up and making 500% profit selling them as kindling I'm hoping to find some campgrounds to sell them to in the summer. Really dry wood is hard to find here, so people are always looking for kindling.

Freemotion has some great ideas too...

Eventually I want to stay home and draw portraits, make kindling, build chicken coops, sell eggs... etc... with a few small streams of income I can probably replace my current income, and then I won't have travel expenses

 

[Wifezilla]

Maybe you need to think in terms of baby steps.

Maybe hubby will have to commute for a while. If you move 30-40 minutes away, will your expenses drop enough to make it worth that kind of move?

Will that allow you to save up? Possibly both be SS and earn an income in your new area?

 

[freemotion]

One useful exercise is to ask yourself "What if?"

What if you both lost your jobs tomorrow?

What if your house burned down....and you lost your jobs?

Sometimes that kind of question clears my head enough to make something scary suddenly seem more doable. I have to play out the steps in my mind, after eliminating the safety net...in theory.

 

[Up-the-Creek]

Great thoughts so let me rephrase my question.......

How does one unplug from their current lifestyle and move out of the area where you know no one and are in the boonies and still make a living?

I guess I do not mean completely off grid, but I do mean a radical change from suburbia where everything is only 3-10 minutes away to a life where everything is 40 minutes away. A life that does not include waking up putting on a suit and driving to work.

So Cal is so expensive it requires a high income. If we were to go else where I do not know that Hubby can find work that he is suited for. But we are very entrepreneurial so we would need/want to come up with something self sustaining. The question is .......what?

Is that a better question?

Dace, my answer to your question would be just do it and worry about the details later,..but that is me. Life is what you make it,..and sometimes you have to change it to be happy.

We live very comfortable here. The cost of living is low in WV, but we don't make much money. We can afford for me to stay at home and DH to work seasonly. There is always a way to make a living if you really want to. Here we cut firewood, my DH does mechanic work and body work, I sell chickens and eggs, and 6 months out of the year DH drives a dumptuck for an asphalt company. With that job we all have insurance and he has a nice retirement plan. We have a small mortgage on our place and we have some other small debts. We have a new home, it is small but we built it and we live very comfortable in it. We have no new vehicles, just what we can pay cash for or trade for.
Its all in what you want and how you want to spend your life. It can be done.