How many other rural and/or off-grid folks here?

[RetiredAt63]

+1 on water.  Even in the east.  My house in south-western Quebec had the pump at 220', I don't know how deep the well was.  In that area there were 2 kinds of wells - low flow lovely soft water which meant very careful water use, or high volume hard water with lot of iron that needed a water softener or everything (including laundry) turned bright orange.  If you have a deep well with a submersible pump, be sure to have a torque arrestor on the pump.  Otherwise every time the pump starts it twists a bit, and eventually the wires break.  The bad contact means the pump burns out early and you are hauling it out of a deep well at a time not decided by you (i.e. Murphy's law, probably Christmas Day or some other bad timing).

LCOL areas are low for many reasons - as mtngrl said, there is definitely less social pressure to keep up with the Jones.  Of course there may well be other social pressures - I think my job (College and then University teacher) threw some people off.  The old "ivory tower" image.  That took a lot of low-key work to counteract.  At least no-one expected me to have any money, everyone in this area of Ontario knows how crummy teacher salaries are in Quebec.

[ender]

Bought the land in 2008, built the house in 2011, retired and moved here in 2014. We have always lived in rural areas and small towns, so never considered any other lifestyle.

This is something my wife and I are somewhat wrestling with - my job right now is not in an area that "allows" much rural life without a considerable commute.

Neither of us really wants to wait until we retire, though. We're both in our 20s now so we're still pretty young and the idea of waiting 15-20 years to move rural is... less than appealing.

I'm curious how folks in similar situations ended up where they are. Did you just decide at some point you were going to live in a more rural area and moved away from a city (or were actively looking for a job in that area)?

[Mtngrl]

Ender, living rural was a choice we made early in our marriage. My husband always commuted 45 minutes to an hour. It's not for everyone, but the tradeoffs were worth it for us. Where we live now, our neighbors are either retired, work at home, or commute. A few work in local government or for the school district, but for any other jobs it's a 30-50 minute drive.

[Ellsie Equanimity]

What exactly qualifies as off-grid? I would have thought having internet disqualifies you.

I grew up rural, on the grid. We had a neighborhood well, and our own septic, but electricity was "on the grid". No cable and we never did satellite, just the 5 or so stations that came in with an antenna.

Though we lived in a neighborhood, we were on the dead end of the road and our land extended back behind it. My parents owned 20+ acres of woods, which my dad hunted. Too shady for a garden but my mom was very connected with local farmer's market people. We made homemade jams and froze vegetables and stocked the freezer with chickens a friend raised.

My dad worked in a small town about 10 minutes away. There was a small grocery store there which we used a bit, but for cheaper prices and better selection and any more substantial shopping you had to drive 30 minutes to one of two larger towns nearby. A 30 minute drive for anything you needed in town always felt normal to me.

I now feel rather spoiled for the awesome lifestyle I grew up with. Basically had an awesome view of my own private park to play in my whole life.

I want the peacefulness of that feeling of being in my own woods still, but there aren't too many wooded places where we are now. We live in what many would consider a rural area (50k seems like a decently large city to me, but some consider it a small town, and it's surrounded by farmland so it does get rural without driving too far). But the farmland is mostly not for sale and what is gets rather expensive for all the others like us who work in town and want to be close for that but also want that bit of country living. (At least that's what I assume for why it's pricey, but then I assume everyone wants that. However, we're in a pretty rural state, too, with mostly small towns and farmland so I would guess it actually is quite common here.)

Ideally we'd be close enough for Ender to bike but far enough out to feel private, with woods and space for a garden. But that's looking like a tall order in this area.

[Poeirenta]

What did you do with your concrete? Not that I'm likely to tackle anything now, but when our acid etch and stain wouldn't take in the spot I tested (under the tub), I just hit the whole place with a semigloss sealant and called it a floor.

We used EcoProCoat products, soy based. We etched the new concrete and then stained with a charcoal black. It was brand new concrete, so the stain took well. Haven't been that thrilled with their top coat- it's failing on the outside porches, but doing ok inside. Our floor is flourescing the lime still, so the look of it is slowly changing from a total black to more of a marbled gray and black. We had to decide pretty early in the process to be ok with however it turned out...even though the contractor was told repeatedly that this was going to be our finish floor, it still shows trowel marks and other idiosyncrasies.

What exactly qualifies as off-grid? I would have thought having internet disqualifies you.

To me (OP) off-grid is off the electrical grid, not "off the grid where no one can find me not connected to anything". Believe me, we are tightly attached to the propane grid, the gasoline grid, and the cell phone (which is also our internet) grid!

[sailinlight]

Also rural.  All the obvious life factors - well and septic system, high cost of electricity, no public transport, city an hour's drive (smaller towns are 5-10 minutes) away.  Basically this means activities/errands are planned (if i am going someplace anyway, I want to get as much done as possible on one drive) and the weather is a decisive factor in planning outside activities (home or away).  So of course there are trade-offs, some things are easier or less expensive, others are harder or more expensive, than the same thing for a city dweller.

I'm not off-grid but I know of people who are.  A local paper just had an article about an off-grid farm family.

I remember mentioning to a coworker that my parents keep a really shitty minivan around for taking trash to the dump. He didn't understand why you wouldn't have a trash service. I decided not to explain about how you can't do laundry on rainy days if you have a septic system.

Can you explain the laundry and rain thing to me?  I have a septic system and it has no bearing whatesover on when or how I do laundry.  Just curious...

[serpentstooth]

Also rural.  All the obvious life factors - well and septic system, high cost of electricity, no public transport, city an hour's drive (smaller towns are 5-10 minutes) away.  Basically this means activities/errands are planned (if i am going someplace anyway, I want to get as much done as possible on one drive) and the weather is a decisive factor in planning outside activities (home or away).  So of course there are trade-offs, some things are easier or less expensive, others are harder or more expensive, than the same thing for a city dweller.

I'm not off-grid but I know of people who are.  A local paper just had an article about an off-grid farm family.

I remember mentioning to a coworker that my parents keep a really shitty minivan around for taking trash to the dump. He didn't understand why you wouldn't have a trash service. I decided not to explain about how you can't do laundry on rainy days if you have a septic system.

Can you explain the laundry and rain thing to me?  I have a septic system and it has no bearing whatesover on when or how I do laundry.  Just curious...

Our septic could only handle so much water and if the ground around it was soaked that capacity dropped, so you couldn't add too much more water via laundry or baths or it would back up.

[RetiredAt63]

I do laundry on rainy days.  I do laundry all winter, and the ground is frozen to a few feet deep.  Leach fields have to have good drainage - here they tend to raise them and then bury them in sand, since clay doesn't drain well.  If a lot fails a percolation test it can't be sold as a building lot - that is basic for buying/selling country property, do you have a good perc test and where is the water table?

Around here off-grid means off the power grid.  My internet is rural, which means a little box on the house picks up from a local tower (line of sight).  One of the realities of rural life is that the houses are far enough apart that cable companies don't like us, and phone companies tend not to have the bells and whistles available.  Yes Bell, I am looking at you, no voice mail.  Thanks Fido.

Interesting fact for Canada - if the first number of your postal code is "0", you are rural.  Really small towns may share the same postal code as their rural neighbours, so you can live in town and have the "0", but then you know you are in a really small town.  ;-)

Santa is H0H 0H0 (run that together and what do you have?) and he is definitely rural, up at the North Pole.

Also rural.  All the obvious life factors - well and septic system, high cost of electricity, no public transport, city an hour's drive (smaller towns are 5-10 minutes) away.  Basically this means activities/errands are planned (if i am going someplace anyway, I want to get as much done as possible on one drive) and the weather is a decisive factor in planning outside activities (home or away).  So of course there are trade-offs, some things are easier or less expensive, others are harder or more expensive, than the same thing for a city dweller.

I'm not off-grid but I know of people who are.  A local paper just had an article about an off-grid farm family.

I remember mentioning to a coworker that my parents keep a really shitty minivan around for taking trash to the dump. He didn't understand why you wouldn't have a trash service. I decided not to explain about how you can't do laundry on rainy days if you have a septic system.

Can you explain the laundry and rain thing to me?  I have a septic system and it has no bearing whatesover on when or how I do laundry.  Just curious...

[Rural]

What did you do with your concrete? Not that I'm likely to tackle anything now, but when our acid etch and stain wouldn't take in the spot I tested (under the tub), I just hit the whole place with a semigloss sealant and called it a floor.

We used EcoProCoat products, soy based. We etched the new concrete and then stained with a charcoal black. It was brand new concrete, so the stain took well. Haven't been that thrilled with their top coat- it's failing on the outside porches, but doing ok inside. Our floor is flourescing the lime still, so the look of it is slowly changing from a total black to more of a marbled gray and black. We had to decide pretty early in the process to be ok with however it turned out...even though the contractor was told repeatedly that this was going to be our finish floor, it still shows trowel marks and other idiosyncrasies.

 Oh, well. Ours was brand-new when I tried, too. But it wasn't troweled; it was polished with a whirligig. (I'm sure there's a real name for those ride-on concrete smoothing devices, but I've never heard them called anything other than whirligig.) Anyway,  it was too polished, or too hard, or too something for even the acid etch to do much, let alone the stain. It looks pretty good; it's just that it's gray. 


Our top coat is Eagle brand, and it's held up pretty well. But none of it is outside; the porch is wood.  I did the topcoat myself, and it's not hard, but I wouldn't recommend trying it on a lived-in-house unless you have somewhere else to sleep for at least a couple of nights. Also you would need every window open and a bunch of fans going.  I did ours before we had the front wall completed, and it still got a little overwhelming in the back corners.  As you may have guessed, it's neither eco nor soy-based. :-)

[Sweetloveginger]

Food is a big one. Where I grew up there was a tiny, EXPENSIVE IGA and that was it for grocery shopping, unless you were willing to drive at least 20 minutes, if not more. Most people I knew just kept a list and went "into town" once every week or two.

On the flip side, you almost certainly have room for a nice deep freezer or two, so you can store larger quantities of food, and go in with some friends on a quarter cow or something every six months.

Well, I live in NYC now and crammed a chest freezer into my apartment (apparently I'm the only person in the building with one), but everyone I knew had one growing up.

We have the chest freezer (plus 2 more) full most of the time. I can't imagine life without it.

We garden, hunt often and forage some, the only time I really need to hit the grocery store is for the dried goods (rice, beans, flour), and big sales really. Yes it takes quite a bit of planning, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I've been experimenting with winter gardening so soon I would really like reduce my grocery shopping to the barest necessities. It's a process, but I love it.

[max924]

My family, (me, wife, and 2 yr old daughter) live rural, and have for last 5 years. I grew up 20 minutes away also in the country but my wife grew up in the city. We both turn 32 this year. Our property is a 50 acre wooded lot with an esker running the length of it.

I have pondered over the idea of rural living quite a bit after embracing a more 'mustachian' lifestyle (we always were frugal).

Some of the biggest cons i've been able to come up with:

-10-15min drive to town for groceries etc. As well as getting socialization in for the little one with others her age.
- 30 min drive to work for me, 15 min for wife.
- cost of ownership of cars for commuting, tractor to clear driveway, etc.
- I recently took 9 months off work for parental leave and found myself missing the socialization aspect of work (solved this by going to town regularly for volunteer work, but required commuting)
-mice (if you live in the country you know what I mean)

Pros (really too many to list)
- true privacy
- see the stars
- ski/hike/snowshoe/whatever out back door
- heat house for free with wood I cut on property ( have electric baseboard for when away more than a day)
- property taxes are 1/2 to 1/3 what they would be in town since we are considered a managed forest. (Tax incentive program).
- only one utility bill, elecrtric at $150/ mth average.
- all the other stuff already mentioned here, grow your own food, etc.

My biggest issues with rural living seem to be having money tied up in items like cars and tractors and equipment I wouldnt need in town, as well as the socialization part of it. Being off with my daughter I realized how convenient it can be to live in town and just walk to the park, or play group, or library etc. We have to drive 10 min to get there when living rural.

Overall I feel life in the country is still worth it. In the end my expenses would probably be the same for the most part between town and country, maybe a bit less in town, but everytime I walk outside it reminds me why I moved here.

 As far as mustachianism goes one size does not fit all. You need to do what works best for you to maintain a fulfilling lifestyle while working towards an early retirement/FI goal.

Max

[Fishindude]

with an esker running the length of it.

What is an "esker" ?

[max924]

At the risk of upsetting some Geologists, an esker is a ridge formed on the earth from when a river was flowing through the glaciers, when everything melts what you have left is all the river rock from the river bed which creates this ridge. They come in various sizes, ours being maybe 2-3 storeys tall at its highest and very steep. Our land is fairly wet so it provides the perfect road to access all parts of the property. Obviously it winds like any stream/river would.

Google might provide a better answer...

M

[backyardfeast]

We have the chest freezer (plus 2 more) full most of the time. I can't imagine life without it.

We garden, hunt often and forage some, the only time I really need to hit the grocery store is for the dried goods (rice, beans, flour), and big sales really. Yes it takes quite a bit of planning, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I've been experimenting with winter gardening so soon I would really like reduce my grocery shopping to the barest necessities. It's a process, but I love it.

I don't know if anyone else here reads Ben Hewitt's books or blog, but one of the things I found really fascinating in his latest book, Nourishing Homestead, was his discussion of his family's choice to go on the grid after decades living off-grid with solar hot water, solar power and a wind turbine.  The decision to tie back in to the electrical grid centred on 3 things: 1) over the intervening years, power lines had gotten closer and closer to their property, so the cost to connect went down enough to become reasonable. 2) They found they had to replace their batteries every 5-7 years, so that cost started to equalize with the cost of connecting to the local grid; and 3) chest freezers! :)  Hewitt writes that he doesn't know anyone who is producing as much food as they are for their family while off-grid, because the freezers are such an important storage component.  While they could keep a small one going on their solar/wind system, the truth was that they also were keeping 2 more freezers at a nearby friends' property, essentially "mooching" power from them to do so.

As someone who's considered a solar system carefully over the last few years, I found his discussion really thought-provoking.  Especially because we don't have a cold enough winter here to preserve anything outdoors through the darker months.  And our grid is hydro-electric, so any carbon reduction from shifting to solar is pretty negligible...

[Apples]

I have seen this too, as I have lived in suburbs, exurbs, and now farm country.  I think when people are crowded together they put up social barriers, but when they are not forced to be in close contact with others, they can then relax and get to know people.  I find that between all my activities I am acquainted with more people here, in the boonies, than I was when I lived in the suburbs. Plus as an introvert, when I am done having fun with people (yay meetups!) I can retreat to my quiet country place and recharge.  I can't ever see living in a city, too many people too close.  Ottawa is about as large as I can be OK with living near, I actively avoid Montreal and Toronto.

It's funny when you think about it - the community is more physically dispersed, the houses are far apart, and the school district covers 90 square miles, but you get to know a much greater percentage of the population than even a neighborhood in the 'burbs.

It took until college for me to realize that actually I'm an introvert, I'm just outgoing when around other people-but I need my space!  I grew up (and now live) in farm country and a rural school district (though probably more like 50 sq miles than 90!) and love hanging out with people at community events, sports/musicals, and hangouts...but I also spend a lot of time in my own house/room ALONE recharging.  Having a roommate in college, and a lot more face time with people throughout the day, made me realize how much I really like having my own place to go home to.  Though I had a 4 person apartment my senior year, I had my own room and roommates considerate enough to not make loud noise in the living room all the time.

And yes, we get to know a lot of people.  That is a double-edged sword, but I do think it's easier to relax and chat with other people when you know that later on you get to go back to your own place and do your own thing anyway.

[GreenSheep]

I had a similar later-in-life realization that I'm an introvert. I think that's a big part of the reason that early retirement appeals to me. My job involves talking to people all day long. I rarely go more than 10 seconds without talking to someone. I also meet new people all day, so I'm not even talking to people with whom I have an established relationship. That is absolutely exhausting for an introvert! I like people, and I enjoy some of the conversations I have (particularly with coworkers, who are obviously not new every day), but it really wears me out.

(No, changing jobs/careers is not an option. I spent years and a gigantic amount of money getting to my current career, and there's nothing that I have the skills for that would pay anywhere near as much as I make now. Better to just push on through.)

Part of the appeal of a rural area, for me, is that you do get to know people better, and you get to know them on a more in-depth basis. In cities, it seems that you're dealing with people all the time, but most of them are not people you'll ever see again. I hate small talk. I've gotten good at it because I have to be, but if I'm going to use my energy to talk to someone, I'd prefer that it be someone who will be a part of my life, to at least some extent, for more than the next 5 minutes. Rural people also seem more genuine. And helpful. I remember pulling over to use my cell phone when I reached the main road after leaving my uncle's ranch in Montana (no cell service on the ranch). The very next vehicle to come along pulled over to ask if I was all right.

[serpentstooth]

I had a similar later-in-life realization that I'm an introvert. I think that's a big part of the reason that early retirement appeals to me. My job involves talking to people all day long. I rarely go more than 10 seconds without talking to someone. I also meet new people all day, so I'm not even talking to people with whom I have an established relationship. That is absolutely exhausting for an introvert! I like people, and I enjoy some of the conversations I have (particularly with coworkers, who are obviously not new every day), but it really wears me out.

(No, changing jobs/careers is not an option. I spent years and a gigantic amount of money getting to my current career, and there's nothing that I have the skills for that would pay anywhere near as much as I make now. Better to just push on through.)

Part of the appeal of a rural area, for me, is that you do get to know people better, and you get to know them on a more in-depth basis. In cities, it seems that you're dealing with people all the time, but most of them are not people you'll ever see again. I hate small talk. I've gotten good at it because I have to be, but if I'm going to use my energy to talk to someone, I'd prefer that it be someone who will be a part of my life, to at least some extent, for more than the next 5 minutes. Rural people also seem more genuine. And helpful. I remember pulling over to use my cell phone when I reached the main road after leaving my uncle's ranch in Montana (no cell service on the ranch). The very next vehicle to come along pulled over to ask if I was all right.

My late in life revelation wasn't being an introvert (Duh. My entire family is). It's that I made an extroverted kid. WTH? I walk into Starbucks, she makes friends with half the cafe before my drink is done, and she has two introverted parents and four introverted grandparents. If she didn't look exactly like me, I'd be seeking genetic testing. =P

[Sweetloveginger]

We have the chest freezer (plus 2 more) full most of the time. I can't imagine life without it.

We garden, hunt often and forage some, the only time I really need to hit the grocery store is for the dried goods (rice, beans, flour), and big sales really. Yes it takes quite a bit of planning, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I've been experimenting with winter gardening so soon I would really like reduce my grocery shopping to the barest necessities. It's a process, but I love it.

I don't know if anyone else here reads Ben Hewitt's books or blog, but one of the things I found really fascinating in his latest book, Nourishing Homestead, was his discussion of his family's choice to go on the grid after decades living off-grid with solar hot water, solar power and a wind turbine.  The decision to tie back in to the electrical grid centred on 3 things: 1) over the intervening years, power lines had gotten closer and closer to their property, so the cost to connect went down enough to become reasonable. 2) They found they had to replace their batteries every 5-7 years, so that cost started to equalize with the cost of connecting to the local grid; and 3) chest freezers! :)  Hewitt writes that he doesn't know anyone who is producing as much food as they are for their family while off-grid, because the freezers are such an important storage component.  While they could keep a small one going on their solar/wind system, the truth was that they also were keeping 2 more freezers at a nearby friends' property, essentially "mooching" power from them to do so.

As someone who's considered a solar system carefully over the last few years, I found his discussion really thought-provoking.  Especially because we don't have a cold enough winter here to preserve anything outdoors through the darker months.  And our grid is hydro-electric, so any carbon reduction from shifting to solar is pretty negligible...

That is a very interesting. I'd actually like to get away from using the freezer as much as we do, be learning better smoking and canning methods, but we are just starting out and have a lot to learn. We have no plans to go off the grid in our current situation, upon FIRE I think it is definitely something we will want to do, but more from a hobby/challenge/optimization standpoint than a money saving stand point. It's just the kind of thing my husband and I are interested in.

[jfisher3]

Bought the land in 2008, built the house in 2011, retired and moved here in 2014. We have always lived in rural areas and small towns, so never considered any other lifestyle.

This is something my wife and I are somewhat wrestling with - my job right now is not in an area that "allows" much rural life without a considerable commute.

Neither of us really wants to wait until we retire, though. We're both in our 20s now so we're still pretty young and the idea of waiting 15-20 years to move rural is... less than appealing.

I'm curious how folks in similar situations ended up where they are. Did you just decide at some point you were going to live in a more rural area and moved away from a city (or were actively looking for a job in that area)?

I'm 27 and just made the more rural move. My wife was all about living in the city to be close to 'people and stuff to do'. Then she started having to deal with people, and within a year was more than happy moving far away from the zombie masses.

We did the math, and even using $0.51/mile cost estimation, moving to a LCOL area that we absolutely adore, with lower taxes etc, and being 45 miles away from work ends up being cheaper than living 10 miles from work in an area that we absolutely despise.

Even if it wasn't "cheaper" the benefit of living out 'in the country' outweighed being miserable in the city.

It's all in what you value more. I'd rather work another year or two and enjoy my 15 (vice 13) years of working for someone else than to be at 13 but hate where I live.

[WranglerBowman]

While we only live on just over 3 acres in a sprawl neighborhood in a rural area I def consider myself to be a homesteader.  The only hard line connections we have are internet (which we just got 4 months ago, life changing) and electricity, the rest is wood/oil, well, and septic.  We live a much more rural life than most people with lots of land in the middle of no where.  While in most cases it is more expensive to live a rural life I really feel it's only as expensive as YOU ALLOW IT TO BE.  You don't need a perfectly manicured yard (pet peeve) and a white picket fence.  I would be happy as a clown living in a mobile home on 5 acres, and besides driving my expenses would be almost nothing living off the fat of the land.  I have an 1.5 hour commute, one way, which I hate with a passion, and I waste a lot of my life in a car, but at the same time I feel like a bandit of sorts taking money from the city, living like a poor rural person, and stashing the rest away.  The commute does afford me opportunities for hustles and I regularly buy stuff from city folks, who need the room, and flip it for double or triple what I paid, which really covers the cost of commuting and then some.  This horrible commute also allows me to live the rural lifestyle I want, while at the same time dramatically reduces my retirement date.  I have no plans either to live anything but a homesteader lifestyle, which is generally cheap, so why am I working!!!  ...because I want to one day hand my kids a family farm (land is expensive in my area) and a nice stache (less to worry about when you have an emergency fund) and give them the advantages I wish I had had.