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Not wanting "stuff" is a gamble that your present and future is secure and safe. Having been homeless at one point, I've become a bit of a hoarder, because you

by ck2 11y ago

Not wanting "stuff" is a gamble that your present and future is secure and safe. Having been homeless at one point, I've become a bit of a hoarder, because you never know when things will go south and you are one month away from being homeless (again). Also we'll see how often you keep erasing things and starting from scratch as you get older and find that remembering things is a lot harder and takes a lot longer to rebuild. Youth can cause foolishness.

castis 11y ago
How would having "stuff" benefit the scenario of becoming homeless?
- lfowles 11y ago
  More float time before becoming homeless. You already have the toiletries and food staples for the next 3 months, so you can focus money towards that rent payment and job interviews. Not sure what "stuff" the parent was referring too though..
lfowles 11y ago
> Having been homeless at one point, I've become a bit of a hoarder, because you never know when things will go south and you are one month away from being homeless (again). It goes both ways, though, doesn't it? Now you need to find a larger apartment to keep around your dining table, toilet paper collection, books. Was that worth keeping them around? Some things yes, other things no.
adevine 11y ago
I take the opposite conclusion. If god forbid things do go south and you become homeless, it's much worse having to figure out what to do with a lot of stuff, than if you have minimal stuff to begin with. There was recently a story in the Austin subreddit about a guy who was evicted, and all of his furniture and other stuff was put out on the apartment complex lawn, to be quickly picked up and carted off by his neighbors...
- tome 11y ago
  Yeah, I've moved frequently enough in the past few years that I dare not buy very much in case I have to move again!
edgarvaldes 11y ago
Folks here are focusing too much in the "homeless" part. But I think the other ideas are adding something interesting to the discussion. How prevalent is/will be being minimalistic when people get older? Is the correct approach to saving to include only cash/bank accounts?
SyneRyder 11y ago
That's an interesting perspective, as Derek's future is quite secure. He had a large personal exit from his business CD Baby, and put all the money into a charitable trust[1] that will be given away when he dies, but in the meantime pays him a (very) good annual income out of the interest for the rest of his life. "Why I gave away my company to charity" [1] https://sivers.org/trust https://sivers.org/trust
- draw_down 11y ago
  I agree with both of you - this minimalistic getting rid of all your stuff is an affluent-person thing. That doesn't make it wrong, but it is an important piece of the background, I think. This is part of why I wrote in my other comment that we should not conflate this minimalism stuff with some sort of higher virtue. It's just affluent people prioritizing a certain type of convenience over other types of convenience, because they can afford to.
hnal943 11y ago
I've never been homeless, but if I knew I was coming into hard times, I would rather have savings instead of stuff.
lsc 11y ago
Eh, it varies by location, but everywhere I've been, the cost of rent was dramatically higher than any sort of minimum stuff I might need... in fact, the primary reason for me to cut down on 'stuff' is to get rid of the expense of storing it. I mean, personally, I like having 'stuff' - especially the sort of stuff I need at a moment's notice that I can't get amazon to overnight me, but if you live in a major metro, it's more of an expense than it is a cushion. Of course, if I owned a big house with a garage, the equation would be somewhat different, but in areas where I want to live, that is somewhat unrealistic.

by ck2 11y ago

castis 11y ago

How would having "stuff" benefit the scenario of becoming homeless?

lfowles 11y ago
More float time before becoming homeless. You already have the toiletries and food staples for the next 3 months, so you can focus money towards that rent payment and job interviews. Not sure what "stuff" the parent was referring too though..

lfowles 11y ago

> Having been homeless at one point, I've become a bit of a hoarder, because you never know when things will go south and you are one month away from being homeless (again). It goes both ways, though, doesn't it? Now you need to find a larger apartment to keep around your dining table, toilet paper collection, books. Was that worth keeping them around? Some things yes, other things no.

adevine 11y ago

I take the opposite conclusion. If god forbid things do go south and you become homeless, it's much worse having to figure out what to do with a lot of stuff, than if you have minimal stuff to begin with. There was recently a story in the Austin subreddit about a guy who was evicted, and all of his furniture and other stuff was put out on the apartment complex lawn, to be quickly picked up and carted off by his neighbors...

tome 11y ago
Yeah, I've moved frequently enough in the past few years that I dare not buy very much in case I have to move again!

edgarvaldes 11y ago

Folks here are focusing too much in the "homeless" part. But I think the other ideas are adding something interesting to the discussion. How prevalent is/will be being minimalistic when people get older? Is the correct approach to saving to include only cash/bank accounts?

SyneRyder 11y ago

That's an interesting perspective, as Derek's future is quite secure. He had a large personal exit from his business CD Baby, and put all the money into a charitable trust[1] that will be given away when he dies, but in the meantime pays him a (very) good annual income out of the interest for the rest of his life. "Why I gave away my company to charity" [1] https://sivers.org/trust https://sivers.org/trust

draw_down 11y ago
I agree with both of you - this minimalistic getting rid of all your stuff is an affluent-person thing. That doesn't make it wrong, but it is an important piece of the background, I think. This is part of why I wrote in my other comment that we should not conflate this minimalism stuff with some sort of higher virtue. It's just affluent people prioritizing a certain type of convenience over other types of convenience, because they can afford to.

hnal943 11y ago

I've never been homeless, but if I knew I was coming into hard times, I would rather have savings instead of stuff.

lsc 11y ago

Eh, it varies by location, but everywhere I've been, the cost of rent was dramatically higher than any sort of minimum stuff I might need... in fact, the primary reason for me to cut down on 'stuff' is to get rid of the expense of storing it. I mean, personally, I like having 'stuff' - especially the sort of stuff I need at a moment's notice that I can't get amazon to overnight me, but if you live in a major metro, it's more of an expense than it is a cushion. Of course, if I owned a big house with a garage, the equation would be somewhat different, but in areas where I want to live, that is somewhat unrealistic.