5 ms·
> 5) You don’t need as much house as you’ve been lead to believe. Instead of trading up for a larger fancier house with more debt as you age, consider living si
by fideloper 5y ago
> 5) You don’t need as much house as you’ve been lead to believe. Instead of trading up for a larger fancier house with more debt as you age, consider living simply and buying additional homes for diversified income.
IMO (in the process of doing this myself), this is the most important point
- rekabis 5y ago> 5) You don’t need as much house as you’ve been lead to believe. For living arrangements, you are mostly correct. I can exist very comfortably in about 1,000ft². Heck, even 800ft² would be comfy and cosy. My problem involves my hobbies and domestic activities: I need a 200ft² cool room for the enormous amounts of fruits and vegetables I harvest every year, canning all that shit needs a 150ft² summer kitchen so I don’t seize up my regular kitchen with all that processing (I use that summer kitchen consistently at least six months out of the year), I need a library the size of a master bedroom (at least another 200ft²) for my books (including the movable stacks on rails), I do enough woodworking to need a garage-sized shop (500ft²) , and my IT work requires no small office (180ft² and an attached server room (80ft²) with its own cooling. Plus, I regularly use a wet sauna, which needs the same amount of room as a laundry. So that balloons my requirements by _at least_ another 1,500ft², to say nothing of the needs of my wife.
- alphabettsy 5y agoMany of the needs seem like wants and then it just depends on how much you these things are worth to you.
- xyzzyz 5y ago> Many of the needs seem like wants This is true of initial 800 sq ft as well.
- bradlys 5y agoTrue of anything beyond simplistic shelter that barely keeps you alive. Everything is a want when you want it to be. Is even living really a need? After all - you can just die and then you don’t definitely don’t need/want anything then for sure!
- hellbannedguy 5y agoI am so tempted to get rid of my books. I will keep the 1st editions, and most reference books. I feel can toss everyone of my computer books. (Not one did I find well written, or worth keeping. If anyone decided to write a computer/programming book take out every unneeded word. Maybe take a technical writing course if you live near a good university?) It's just hard to get rid of reference books.
- d1lanka 5y agoYeah, get rid of those computer books. That's what the internet + ebooks are for. Unless a book has a special meaning to me personally or is considered life changing, I rarely keep any physical books.
- tacocataco 5y agoThe same is true for music with me as well. It's either Vinyl or free car radio/streaming.
- ggsp 5y agoInteresting—I find I have a hard time reading technical books on my ebook reader. When I read fiction, it’s usually a linear process, making the reader ideal: read, swipe, repeat until done. With technical books, I often need to jump to another section, which is so much slower and more painful than with dead trees. Code formatting also tends to be abysmal on my reader—although books are not the best for this either. Maybe I’m not using my device to the fullest?
- barnabee 5y agoI have never found a solution for this. At my desk, with multiple extra screens and a keyboard and mouse for searching and rapid navigation, a PDF is sometimes a decent enough alternative but for non-computer based hobbies as well as reading reference books more casually / when not actually needing to be at my computer I have been unable to find anything close to paper books.
- 5y ago
- cammikebrown 5y agoYou don’t “need” any of that.
- xboxnolifes 5y agoYou don't "need" very much of anything. People get by with a 100-200sqft room shared with other people, but that doesn't mean it's what I would want to live in.
- asdfasgasdgasdg 5y agoI feel like it's kinda missing the point of the article to say that you "need" 500sqft for canning. That is a want, plain and simple. Wants can be expensive. Indulging wants like this is something that rich people can afford to do, and if you are rich that is good for you! But indulging this want is far from economically efficient, especially in a high cost of living real estate market. It's basically the exact opposite of the point of the article.
- strken 5y agoYou don't strictly speaking need indoor plumbing, a private bedroom, windows, or paint that doesn't have lead in it. If you're rich enough to afford windows, a bedroom you don't share with another family, and to not have your kids die from heavy metal poisoning, then good for you! But indulging many of these wants is hardly economically efficient.
- onion2k 5y agoAre you seriously suggesting that the need for a "summer kitchen for canning fruit" and a "private bedroom" represent the same human needs? Because if you are that might be the funniest, most entitled thing I've ever read on HN.
- strken 5y agoNope, I'm suggesting that wants and needs are a sliding scale with no clear dividing line except subsistence, and that it's therefore a bad idea to argue for lowering your standard of living to only what you strictly need. This is pretty obvious if you don't take a deliberately uncharitable perspective on what I wrote.
- cma 5y agoEasy solutions: $10 sauna bag and a Kindle, get your veggies canned from an efficient factory.
- Luc 5y agoSome might call it trolling…
- wheybags 5y ago240m2 is a compromise... Consider the possibility that you're out of touch.
- AYBABTME 5y agoAnd here I was thinking 950sqft was going to be cavernous for my family and my hobbies. We're currently in 750sqft and that's fine, in the Oakland/Berkeley area.