Income

[Wolf]

How much of an annual income do you find yourself needing to maintain your homestead?

[idigbeets]

Not including food or gasoline which varies so much sometimes, about $600/month. That includes insurances, taxes, etc.

[geo in mi]

Originally Posted by Wolf

How much of an annual income do you find yourself needing to maintain your homestead?

A couple of times more than what I've got. There's always more month than money. If it's true that a man's home is his castle, the north ramports are crumbling on mine.....

geo

[ldc]

Wolf, you might want to check the archives, b/c this question comes up often. The problem is that homesteading is expensive in terms of overhead; there is so much fencing, tools, animals and their feed required. With only a handful of exceptions on HT, the rest still work off farm for income, if only to pay annaul taxes and medical.

While I just finished up a 16 yr caretaking position of land and an elderly gent, now I'm in a small apt. trying to get things in order to look for a long-term land with shelter. I work 1/2 time in a public library, w no bennies. Until recently, I had 5 other income streams/side jobs, but the national economy finally caught up w us here, and they have recently vanished. I do, however, grow about half of what I eat per year. And am trying to learn new fix-it skills.

All the best to you in your quest! ldc

[ErinP]

My "homestead" is self-supporting. The calves we sell more than pay their own way, as well as taxes, etc.
It doesn't support US, though, which is what we're working toward.

[chewie]

my goats pay for their way with their milk, and I think our hens do too with eggs. we prolly pay well for the broiler chix but feel its worth the payback of such good meat.

the horses however are money pits most of the time but well worth every cent iykwim.

and yeah, the money never reaches enough. ever. but I dont' think its just homesteaders who say this, either. I am in hopes that once things are more settled (this homestead is new yet, only a few years old) like fencing, fruit trees planted, etc., it will even out a bit in both money and work. but i'm not holding my breath for that either!

[Heritagefarm]

Unless you're an accounting whiz and people are willing to give you lots of money, do not expect to make much money at all the first 5 years of operation.

[Beeman]

You'll find that most shall we say stretch the truth and the dollars when addressing questions like this.

[mozarkian]

That question means something different to each of us. Once thing we learned is that if you produce and store most of what you eat, then the dollars that you have can be applied to other things and it feels like you have more of them. We now spend about $80 / month at the store for coffee, sugar, salt, chocolate, orange juice, bananas etc--things we cannot produce, and we live and eat better than folks that spend much more than that.

[Ross]

About a million three per year is what we'd like but we have to make, on the fly, cuts to the planning constantly! I'm not sure there is a cut and dry answer to this. My goal is for the homestead to be profitable and therefore self sustaining. Buying needed items is just a reflection of why we earn extra when we can. Aim for making money and you'll be OK.

[Betho]

this really varies depending on if you have a mortgage, if you are able to grow all your own food, etc. Forgetting about HOW we plan on supporting ourselves when we do move out to the property, we've estimated that a monthly income of about $1500 will allow us a comfortable (not scraping by) life which includes putting some money aside and also assumes we produce most of our own food. It also includes a mortgage payment since we will be paying that for some time still, but seeing as how we are currently paying the mortgage payment AND rent so we can live near the city where "the job" is, it'll still be a big savings. I imagine if you can have no mortgage it's a whole lot cheaper.

As far as how that income will be made, well that remains to be seen. There's ONE employer within a 30 minutes that could potentially be in Dh's career field, so we're thinking that self-employment will be what gets us out there.

[HilltopDaisy]

It depends. My needs will differ greatly from your own.

We don't know where you are located, or where you plan on homesteading.

Here in my neck of the woods, 6' T posts are almost $5 apiece. If you need 200, it will cost you $1000. If you are fencing in critters or fencing out predators, you'll need some sort of posts and some sort of fence. Red Brand sheep and goat fence is now $279 for a 330' roll. If you have cows or horses you can get away with a strand or 2 of hot wire but the AC charger can run you $150, DC with the battery around $225. Will you need LGD's?

Are you thinking of growing animals for meat? Or selling animals? I have Nigerian Dwarf goats, and I did very well for the first 8 years. I've saturated the market.... another thread, me thinks.

You need shelter for any type of animal, whether it be a egg layer or a rabbit or a milk cow/goat. Can you kill a rabbit? Do you have carpentry skills or will you need to hire it done?

Calling the vet for an emergency on Easter Sunday could cost a million dollars/or your favorite dairy animals life. You have to have a way to pay for the vet, or you are irresponsible. You must have the $$ put aside for an emergency euthanasia if you can't do it yourself. I am unable to kill anything. When things go wrong, I run to the vet and pay big bucks, but I accept the fact that I can't do it. And if anyone is wondering, I don't eat meat.

I will say the first 10 years are the most expensive. Pay off the mortgage, fence everything (3 times over, sigh), there is a huge learning curve for many of us, even with the garden. It's hard to actually feed a family from what you can grow, year after year. Some years the garden does GREAT, then you might have 2 years of bad weather; too much rain, not enough rain, etc.

Keep in mind your land taxes. I have 5 acres in NY with a crappy old trailer, and the taxes are over $1500 per year. I also have 5 unimproved acres in MO, the taxes are less than $50 per year. Point being that you may need to figure in a couple hundred per month just for taxes.

How will you heat your homestead? A decent wood stove, and the installment, can cost a small fortune. If you can harvest your wood from your land, that would be great, but I don't think you could do this on a small acreage, depending on where you live. You don't have your state listed, so of course NY would use more firewood than Florida. Just saying.

How will you pay for health insurance? I think that someone on the homestead needs to work at a real job, as little as possible, of course, to provide health insurance.

Off the cuff, figure at least 5 times what you are thinking right now.

Sorry that this is so long, but I'm trying to paint the real picture...

[lonelyfarmgirl]

It really depends on what you do. If we cut it down to bills only, ie: no food no animal expense, etc, maybe 3000 a month, but the reality is, with livestock and the shop, more like 20,000 a month.

[willow_girl]

Being trashy ain't cheap!

Just feeding my four cows costs upwards of $700 a month. That's because land is very expensive here; I couldn't afford pasture, so have to buy in all my hay. But I like living close to my husband, even if I hardly get to see him because I'm always working so I can afford to live here! LOL

about $400 a month, more or less 5k a year. My biggest expense is real estate taxes.

[Jolly]

Lots of qualifiers in this thread, as it should be. Everyone has their own unique idea of what constitutes an acceptable rural lifestyle.

I think the guys who do it the most efficiently, are the scroungers, the barterers, the innovative, the resourceful, the niche-seekers.

I knew a guy who built his small home for less than $10K. He helped tear down houses for material. He worked for a bandsaw mill owner in exchange for lumber. Even his house piers were made from salvaged bricks that were given to him. At the end of the day, I think the only things he bought were the nails, electrical material, pipes and septic tank, window A/C units, a second hand woodstove, a stove and a refrigerator. He and his friends drove every nail on that house, did all their own plumbing and wiring, hiring pretty much nothing out.

Other folks do their gardening very inexpensively. They make their own compost, save their seeds, do without expensive machinery, etc. They pick up canning jars or freezer boxes at garage sales.

Some people can raise livestock without a lot of money...maybe they grow most of their own feed or sell meat and eggs to offset the cost of their animals.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that this type of lifestyle can vary greatly in cost, depending on how you want to work it...so there's no reliable answer on how much this could or should cost...

[HilltopDaisy]

Originally Posted by lonelyfarmgirl

It really depends on what you do. If we cut it down to bills only, ie: no food no animal expense, etc, maybe 3000 a month, but the reality is, with livestock and the shop, more like 20,000 a month.

Is this a typo? $20,000 a month?

[lonelyfarmgirl]

yep, thats accurate. monthly shop expenses alone run an average of 10K a month. But bear in mind, that is gross expense. customer purchases pay for a lot of that.
house and misc. bills run about 3-5K ( we don't have a car payment either) and farm expense is about 3K a month. of course it varies depending on level of business in the shop and time of year.
( I include the shop in this total, because it is here on the farm)
There have been times when it was only 10K and there have been times when it was 30K.

Now when I just had a 3 acre mini-farm, with only goats chickens and rabbits, total monthly expense was an average of 1000-1200 a month. That was when I worked outside the home.

Different now. large livestock and a full service shop. Shop expenses are huge, but incoming money for the shop is also high. It balances out.

That really brings into perspective the whole stupidity of Obama saying people that gross over 250,000 a year should be considered wealthy now doesn't it?
We have a shop and few dozen pigs, a dozen dairy goats and 50 head of cattle, plus small animals.

Think about the farmer milking 100 cows, or the cash cropper that runs 500 acres of chemical corn with a land payment of 7500 an acre, or rental payments of $250 per acre per year. You think they're wealthy because they are getting 9$ a bushel for corn and 150 bushels to the acre? Obama is stupid.

We sure aren't wealthy by a long shot. We do ok, but some months, especially late winter, we scrape by. It would be really cool to be able to say our bills are only 1000$ a month, but that wont happen for a while.

Like I said, it all really depends on what you do with your farm.
There are a lot of things that can be done to cut down expenses, especially with feeding yourself and your animals, buying supplies wholesale or at auction, building and fixing yourself, etc...

[sidepasser]

Originally Posted by ErinP

My "homestead" is self-supporting. The calves we sell more than pay their own way, as well as taxes, etc.
It doesn't support US, though, which is what we're working toward.

This! When I managed my property as a horse hotel/boarding stable, it covered all the homestead expenses plus taxes and any maintenance. However, I never could "grow it" to the point where it would support me, three children and my DH, as I could never get adequate barn help (paid ten bucks an hour for a forty hour week and still people would not show up!)..
so closed the doors and went back to being a private property.

The "stable" expenses were approximately 4500 per month. I brought in around 5,000 a month for boarding, lessons, training, foaling out, standing stallions, etc. Boarding never really paid more than what it cost after I considered the expense of barn help. We made our $$ on lessons, training, standing stallions, foaling out, etc. Boarding was just a means to bring the rest of the money in.

I'd rather rely on an outside job which I do to support my 'stead. I know how much is coming in and now that the 'stead is paid for, the expenses are much less.

[maplehollow]

Ok, I'll bite. I rarely respond and I know this subject comes up now and then, so maybe there are a lot of others spinning their wheels too. I agree with Hilltop Daisy and some others...a lot of things affect how much you need year to year and month to month. I absolutely LOVE this life in some ways and hate other aspects because I never seem to get it right. Without my two day a week job to help our family with unplanned expenses we really can struggle. Dh makes about 35,000 before taxes and we have pd. off our mortgage. However, we pay for health insurance which isn't the best. We still have two kids at home. We have chickens-which free range and pay their way for us in fresh eggs and selling a few dozen a week. I have 10 goats and would desperately love to get to 5 very soon, but unless I give them away (which I very well may, any takers?) will be too many to have through the winter . I want milk, but can't keep all these and still breed for milkers in spring. We just pd. to have a small pasture area made from some woods this year, but still haul a lot of hay. We need to still cut lots of wood and repair a barn roof where part of a tree fell, and finish clearing a new garden area....you get the idea. I have developed high blood pressure and bad discs in my back. Even two days away from home makes it hard to accomplish the work needed, but we can't get taxes, medical bills, and car repairs paid otherwise. Dh has pretty much supported me running with this homestead idea, but works long and weird hrs. and doesn't do a lot here physically. One son still in high school helps a lot but may be gone in a year or so. I will NOT give it up but desperately need to find balance. I keep hoping I can get the garden producing enough soon...sigh. Interesting topic to me no matter how many times we rehash it. I appreciate others experience and advice. However, each situation is unique.