This is a weird one. And a long one.
I've worked hard to live simply, and to a big extent I do. Over the last couple years I've started to really hate being at the mercy of utility companies and...well most companies. It felt, and still feels weird - I'm not a prepper or anything, I don't own any tinfoil hats, I just hated thinking that these monthly expenses were something we had to pay forever. Plus I had a few run in's with big companies and I stopped wanting to support them with my money. I just kept having this feeling I was being used. The tipping point was a fuse blowing in one phase at the pole by my house, and the power company not believing me for 10 days...and then the internet company refusing to fix service to my town so internet drops 4x a day...oh and town water randomly shutting off...well ok a lot of tipping points. They were jerks, I stopped wanting to work with them.
I decided I wanted to get out at almost any cost. I wanted to get rid of as many monthly bills/public utilities as possible.
I'm a millennial in most typical ways, I like internet, netflix, etc. So I wanted to get rid of bills and keep conveniences. I drive old japanese cars and pay cash for them, plus I paid off my student loans a while back, so those weren't an issue to start.
First thing I did was move. I went from paying sewer/water/electricity/oil/internet to electricity/internet by finding a place with a well and septic. It was also smaller and thus cheaper.
Next thing I did was install a wood stove. It was $300 in the local paper, only 2 years old. Bye bye oil bill, hello Craigslist free section for almost 3 cords of wood just to come remove it from people's property. Since my new place is small I didn't even go through half of that this year, and the 1/2th tank of oil my house came with is now showing 1/3rd tank after a full year of just running the water heater.
Next, I built a small solar setup for power outages. I feel like more people need to do this, because it was super super easy. I got three electric car lithium batteries from a chevy volt at local scrap yard for $100, because it's cheaper to give them away cheap than recycle them. Then I got a 200W solar panel/charge controller/fuse box/inverter kit on Amazon. For around $500 I built 2 days worth of electricity for most of my house - I even got a small chest freezer for free on craigslist and built a circuit I found online to turn it into a fridge. It uses 1/10th the power of my regular fridge. If the power goes out I'm pretty much good to go, right? Well I ended up just running almost my entire house on this setup permanently. Besides the water heater, well pump, and washer/dryer, I'm completely off grid on this tiny setup and it's totally fine. It also dropped my electricity bill by about $30/mo in the new smaller place.
$500 is a chunk of change, but that came from canceling Comcast who is the only option for wired internet here. I found a non-profit that offers a $500/year unlimited 4gLTE hotspot (Calyx Institute), and I got one...and it works great, 30mbps down all day long. So the $90/mo basic internet only plan got kicked to the curb. And since my internet fits in my pocket, goes anywhere with me, and keeps a 10 hour charge? Bye Bye cell phone plan. I can do everything I need over wifi, another $80/mo gone and one less bullshit corporation supported with my dollars.
So the score right now:
before: $300/mo oil bill, $80/mo cell phone, $90/mo internet, $60/mo water, $80/mo electric = about $7,000/yr and 5 bills.
now: $500/year internet, $300 wood stove, $500 solar, $22/mo electric, 0 cell phone, 0 oil, 0 water = about $1600. Minus one time cost stuff = about $750/yr over one bill and one yearly payment.
I didn't even set out to save money, to be honest I'm willing to spend a bit more if it means I'm self sufficient. However by doing these things I cut my expenses by 90%.
I'm almost there, and it feels great. Dependable internet, dependable electricity and heat. Keep in mind I don't even live in a super rural area of the US - just an area run by dipshits who like the roads to look pretty so they don't trim the trees away from the powerlines.
The last step happens next year - I build my own home. It's small, hyper insulated and completely electric and off grid. Almost every system will have a backup - solar and a battery bank of more EV batteries will power everything, but if that goes down there's a wood stove and a hand pump for the well. The solar generator I built can be expanded and it'll plug right in, so triple backup in some spots. And for the property tax, insurance, and mortgage? I'll have a nice garden level apartment that will rent for the entire cost of the home. by building on a piece of land that's "small" by the standards of the area (half acre), it will be cheaper than any home I could purchase in 80 miles of where I live.
So I just wanted to make a post, because a year ago I was feeling very down about having all these expenses for the rest of my life. Just know, it does not need to be that way, and it does not need to be expensive to get to a better place. In fact it's often wayyyy cheaper.
Ultimately I will end up with a few bills that I can't give up without loosing convenience. Car insurance, health insurance, Netflix and the hotspot. However...well that's it. And for three of those, I get to choose moral companies that treat their customers well, which I really really value.
The final step for me, which is a couple years out, is converting my car to electric. That gets rid of weekly gas station trips, oil changes, and a lot of maintenance costs. But that's a whole other story for a whole other day.
Has anyone else simplified their bills and become more self sufficient? I'd love to hear other people's solutions to sort of checking out from the system in that way while keeping modern conveniences, because I'm sure there are other interesting ways to do it!
Submitted April 17, 2018 at 03:03AM by longdrivehome https://ift.tt/2vqIQok
