4 ms·

This is exactly my dilemma. I've come up with numerous novel ways to live cheaply but all of them require a plot of land which always ruins the budget. Further

This is exactly my dilemma. I've come up with numerous novel ways to live cheaply but all of them require a plot of land which always ruins the budget. Further compounding the problem is few banks will loan money for unbuilt land. Strangely the land is worth more than houses but in the eyes of a bank the house is what you secure the loan against.

franklovecchio 13y ago
Not true! I purchased 5 acres in Southwestern CO (with mountain views!) for 2 grand in cash. I built a small cabin, and program out of it. But, it lacks luxuries for my many "projects", so now I'm building a house. http://frank.lovecch.io/projects/walden-ranch.html http://frank.lovecch.io/projects/walden-ranch.html
- molsongolden 13y ago
  The SLV! I am strongly considering buying a plot there but the lack of water is the trade off. Can you provide a ballpark for your construction costs? Are you drilling a well, burying a tank and hauling water, or something else? What's the nearest town? Have you had trouble with burglars/vandals while leaving your cabin unattended for long periods of time?
  - franklovecchio 13y ago
    The finite numbers I have are thus: Land: I purchased 5 acres for $2,000 of Craigslist. It's worth about 5-6 getting it from a real-estate company. Slab: 4" deep, 8" deep around a 1' perimeter..1100 sq ft total - 18 yards concrete, $2200 - Bobcat rental (days w/ gas), $450 - Rented tools (concrete blankets for cold, et), $150 - Rebar/tongue-groove insulation: $1000 Solar: Currently, I run off a generator, which was about $500. On the cheap end they seem to last a few years. Solar is cheap, though, and a decent setup from Arizona Wind Solar would cost about $2500 (4-5 panels, controllers, converters, wire, and extra batteries). You'd have to be careful with what appliances you used, though. Heat: I purchased a wood stove for $200 for the small cabin. Eventually, a nice Morso one will run me about $1500. Framing: - 16, 16' 13/12 gable trusses (building this by myself, so it's a modern pole barn), $1500 Windows: - 15 3'x 5' picture windows (it's fucking dusty here), $2500 Well: $8,000 50' out, piped 4' down to the house. That's as far as I've gotten on the new build costs and well forecast. The costs are in the _slab_ (which will be stained for the floor) and the _well_. Initially, I did not know about the "theft" problem. In 4 years owning this property (and having an unfinished cabin w/ easy entry for about 2 of those), nothing has been stolen. I'm not sure there is one, but I have heard stories. That said, I'm 3 miles off the highway, and you can't see me from the road. I'm half-way in b/t San Luis and Fort Garland, which are each about 15 minutes either way. Currently, I bring in water. It sucks!
    - jorgem 13y ago
      How deep is the water table? Is that why the land was so cheap?
      - franklovecchio 13y ago
        Wells are drilled to 125'. Land is so cheap because you don't get trees, there's not really much commerce out here, and it's _quite_ rocky.
      - molsongolden 13y ago
        There is a large aquifer in the valley so wells do pretty well but the water rights are tight. A residential well permit is for interior water use only. With 35 acres you get the right to irrigate one acre. You aren't supposed to recapture grey water or rain. There's a lot of potato farming in the valley and the old farmers have most of the good water rights, the rest of the water is owed to new Mexico and Texas and has to be left to flow downstream. Rainfall is very minimal, sub-9 inches per year IIRC. Weather easily hits double digit negatives in the winter but is mild in the summer. Some land has Limited road access and public service are minimal with few sheriffs to cover a large amount of land. Some of the land was sold to hopeful retirees sight unseen in the past and has been let go extra cheap once they realize it is a tougher living than expected. All of those things said, I personally think it is worth the money and will probably purchase a small parcel just as a getaway and play space.
        franklovecchio 13y ago
        You're absolutely right about the water rights; I don't _think_ I'll end up getting animals, but purchasing another 30 acres would be a good investment if I did want to homestead in that fashion and use water for other reasons. The weather extremes are actually a good thing! Plenty of sunshine for solar-powered anything. That, combined with the 30 degree temperature difference in day and night helps ease the load on fridges running off solar; during the winter you just pull in cold air :)
        bostonvaulter2 13y ago
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- monkeynotes 13y ago
  You obviously do not have the requirement of living close to Vancouver BC in order to maintain an income. As said elsewhere if one is willing to move out into a remote area you can definitely pick up land for less money ($2k cash for your own land with mountain views is blowing my mind and making me cry on the inside). Unfortunately, so much IT work is centred around metro areas and property is very expensive.
  - franklovecchio 13y ago
    Yea, you're absolutely correct on this one! I do drive to Denver (3 hours there) a couple times a month, though, and I work at my company's HQ while visiting/staying with friends, etc.
    - HeyLaughingBoy 13y ago
      I started reading your blog because I love stuff like this. The cabin looks cool. Do you live in an area with building codes? I live out in the country and have a bunch of building projects that I never seem to get to. I need to see stuff like this to get me off my ass :-)
      - franklovecchio 13y ago
        Thanks! Yes, there are building codes (which I meet). Colorado actually has some sheisty codes compared to Chicago (where I'm from), so in many places I went overboard, which I think is OK. It's still a bit like the Wild West out here! For me, getting down to the cabin full-time was the hardest part. 4 years of trying to build a small cabin and building myself up professionally took its toll on what I _wanted_ to accomplish with this project. So, now the house design and CAD consumes my evenings - I want to be able to document it like the dome chap!
  - rwmj 13y ago
    This idea you need to live physically near a place to have an IT job needs to die. I'm working (at Red Hat) with a large team, several of whom I have never met, many of them I will only meet twice a year at most. We've got the internet - video conferencing, chatrooms, asynch messaging, distributed source repositories, distributed code review, remote shells. We all can and do work very well remotely.
- effbott 13y ago
  Wow.. this is amazing. I'm kind of blown away by how cheap it is. Is this your permanent residence or a vacation home? Does it feel weird to not have neighbors?
  - franklovecchio 13y ago
    As of this month, the cabin has become my permanent residence while I build the house throughout the rest of the fall/winter/spring. I actually have neighbors...sort of. There is a permanent resident of _extremely_ poor individuals 1.5 miles from me (they're quite nice when I've run into them), and next to them is a vacation residence put up years ago inhabited by a retiree on occasion. This land is "open range", and there is a large cattle farm I can see about ~5 miles away whose cows occasionally wander out this way and graze.
  - franklovecchio 13y ago
    And the land is pretty cheap! But, costs anywhere in the mountains _do_ increase even the shittiest of goods, including labor, which is why it's as much DIY as I can. Living out here means monthly trips to larger cities to visit friends, check in with work HQ in Denver, and pickup all the decent food I can (I can't stand the markup at Whole Foods, but they have the best bulk foods of anywhere I've been).
- e12e 13y ago
  Nice. What do you do for connectivity/internet? Water?
  - franklovecchio 13y ago
    15 GB Data plan, and I tether. Water is brought in until the well is dug!
- e12e 13y ago
  For those interested in buying cheap land in the US and constructing a permanent residence I also recommend checking out "earthships": http://earthship.com/ http://earthship.com/ Will be more expensive than a dome, but they have ideas and systems for building a complete off the grid house. See also: http://www.garbagewarrior.com/ http://www.garbagewarrior.com/
  - franklovecchio 13y ago
    Call me Victorian, but I have seen some earthships near Taos..and they just don't catch the eye like a normal house. I guess that's relative. They _do_ have great passive qualities to them, but this _can_ be done with stick-frame construction, it will just cost you more (and be slightly less "environmentally friendly").

franklovecchio 13y ago

Not true! I purchased 5 acres in Southwestern CO (with mountain views!) for 2 grand in cash. I built a small cabin, and program out of it. But, it lacks luxuries for my many "projects", so now I'm building a house. http://frank.lovecch.io/projects/walden-ranch.html http://frank.lovecch.io/projects/walden-ranch.html

molsongolden 13y ago
The SLV! I am strongly considering buying a plot there but the lack of water is the trade off. Can you provide a ballpark for your construction costs? Are you drilling a well, burying a tank and hauling water, or something else? What's the nearest town? Have you had trouble with burglars/vandals while leaving your cabin unattended for long periods of time?
- franklovecchio 13y ago
  The finite numbers I have are thus: Land: I purchased 5 acres for $2,000 of Craigslist. It's worth about 5-6 getting it from a real-estate company. Slab: 4" deep, 8" deep around a 1' perimeter..1100 sq ft total - 18 yards concrete, $2200 - Bobcat rental (days w/ gas), $450 - Rented tools (concrete blankets for cold, et), $150 - Rebar/tongue-groove insulation: $1000 Solar: Currently, I run off a generator, which was about $500. On the cheap end they seem to last a few years. Solar is cheap, though, and a decent setup from Arizona Wind Solar would cost about $2500 (4-5 panels, controllers, converters, wire, and extra batteries). You'd have to be careful with what appliances you used, though. Heat: I purchased a wood stove for $200 for the small cabin. Eventually, a nice Morso one will run me about $1500. Framing: - 16, 16' 13/12 gable trusses (building this by myself, so it's a modern pole barn), $1500 Windows: - 15 3'x 5' picture windows (it's fucking dusty here), $2500 Well: $8,000 50' out, piped 4' down to the house. That's as far as I've gotten on the new build costs and well forecast. The costs are in the _slab_ (which will be stained for the floor) and the _well_. Initially, I did not know about the "theft" problem. In 4 years owning this property (and having an unfinished cabin w/ easy entry for about 2 of those), nothing has been stolen. I'm not sure there is one, but I have heard stories. That said, I'm 3 miles off the highway, and you can't see me from the road. I'm half-way in b/t San Luis and Fort Garland, which are each about 15 minutes either way. Currently, I bring in water. It sucks!
  - jorgem 13y ago
    How deep is the water table? Is that why the land was so cheap?
    - franklovecchio 13y ago
      Wells are drilled to 125'. Land is so cheap because you don't get trees, there's not really much commerce out here, and it's _quite_ rocky.
    - molsongolden 13y ago
      There is a large aquifer in the valley so wells do pretty well but the water rights are tight. A residential well permit is for interior water use only. With 35 acres you get the right to irrigate one acre. You aren't supposed to recapture grey water or rain. There's a lot of potato farming in the valley and the old farmers have most of the good water rights, the rest of the water is owed to new Mexico and Texas and has to be left to flow downstream. Rainfall is very minimal, sub-9 inches per year IIRC. Weather easily hits double digit negatives in the winter but is mild in the summer. Some land has Limited road access and public service are minimal with few sheriffs to cover a large amount of land. Some of the land was sold to hopeful retirees sight unseen in the past and has been let go extra cheap once they realize it is a tougher living than expected. All of those things said, I personally think it is worth the money and will probably purchase a small parcel just as a getaway and play space.
      - franklovecchio 13y ago
        You're absolutely right about the water rights; I don't _think_ I'll end up getting animals, but purchasing another 30 acres would be a good investment if I did want to homestead in that fashion and use water for other reasons. The weather extremes are actually a good thing! Plenty of sunshine for solar-powered anything. That, combined with the 30 degree temperature difference in day and night helps ease the load on fridges running off solar; during the winter you just pull in cold air :)
      - bostonvaulter2 13y ago
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
monkeynotes 13y ago
You obviously do not have the requirement of living close to Vancouver BC in order to maintain an income. As said elsewhere if one is willing to move out into a remote area you can definitely pick up land for less money ($2k cash for your own land with mountain views is blowing my mind and making me cry on the inside). Unfortunately, so much IT work is centred around metro areas and property is very expensive.
- franklovecchio 13y ago
  Yea, you're absolutely correct on this one! I do drive to Denver (3 hours there) a couple times a month, though, and I work at my company's HQ while visiting/staying with friends, etc.
  - HeyLaughingBoy 13y ago
    I started reading your blog because I love stuff like this. The cabin looks cool. Do you live in an area with building codes? I live out in the country and have a bunch of building projects that I never seem to get to. I need to see stuff like this to get me off my ass :-)
    - franklovecchio 13y ago
      Thanks! Yes, there are building codes (which I meet). Colorado actually has some sheisty codes compared to Chicago (where I'm from), so in many places I went overboard, which I think is OK. It's still a bit like the Wild West out here! For me, getting down to the cabin full-time was the hardest part. 4 years of trying to build a small cabin and building myself up professionally took its toll on what I _wanted_ to accomplish with this project. So, now the house design and CAD consumes my evenings - I want to be able to document it like the dome chap!
- rwmj 13y ago
  This idea you need to live physically near a place to have an IT job needs to die. I'm working (at Red Hat) with a large team, several of whom I have never met, many of them I will only meet twice a year at most. We've got the internet - video conferencing, chatrooms, asynch messaging, distributed source repositories, distributed code review, remote shells. We all can and do work very well remotely.
effbott 13y ago
Wow.. this is amazing. I'm kind of blown away by how cheap it is. Is this your permanent residence or a vacation home? Does it feel weird to not have neighbors?
- franklovecchio 13y ago
  As of this month, the cabin has become my permanent residence while I build the house throughout the rest of the fall/winter/spring. I actually have neighbors...sort of. There is a permanent resident of _extremely_ poor individuals 1.5 miles from me (they're quite nice when I've run into them), and next to them is a vacation residence put up years ago inhabited by a retiree on occasion. This land is "open range", and there is a large cattle farm I can see about ~5 miles away whose cows occasionally wander out this way and graze.
- franklovecchio 13y ago
  And the land is pretty cheap! But, costs anywhere in the mountains _do_ increase even the shittiest of goods, including labor, which is why it's as much DIY as I can. Living out here means monthly trips to larger cities to visit friends, check in with work HQ in Denver, and pickup all the decent food I can (I can't stand the markup at Whole Foods, but they have the best bulk foods of anywhere I've been).
e12e 13y ago
Nice. What do you do for connectivity/internet? Water?
- franklovecchio 13y ago
  15 GB Data plan, and I tether. Water is brought in until the well is dug!
e12e 13y ago
For those interested in buying cheap land in the US and constructing a permanent residence I also recommend checking out "earthships": http://earthship.com/ http://earthship.com/ Will be more expensive than a dome, but they have ideas and systems for building a complete off the grid house. See also: http://www.garbagewarrior.com/ http://www.garbagewarrior.com/
- franklovecchio 13y ago
  Call me Victorian, but I have seen some earthships near Taos..and they just don't catch the eye like a normal house. I guess that's relative. They _do_ have great passive qualities to them, but this _can_ be done with stick-frame construction, it will just cost you more (and be slightly less "environmentally friendly").