Has Anyone Ever Done This?

No, that's not crazy at all. It's probably the most sensible thing you can do.

It's exactly what we did.

double post

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~*~Erin~*~
SAHM, ranch wife, sub and quilt shop proprietress
the Back Gate Country Quilt Shop

We did (are doing) exactly that, too.
From June until November, we lived in a friend's 16' camper and a corner of our uninsulated pole-shed.
In November, we bought a 30 year old trailer house for $500.

We have power, but no running water or septic. We're planning to drill a well this spring. For now, we have a large poly tank that holds our water and just daylight our greywater. Since an outhouse is illegal in most states, including Kansas, we have a sawdust toilet which works just as well as everyone said it would. We've actually talked about keeping it, even once we get septic installed.

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~*~Erin~*~
SAHM, ranch wife, sub and quilt shop proprietress
the Back Gate Country Quilt Shop

I see some pretty big travel trailers pretty cheep every time that fuel goes up.
Id also think about getting a Port-a-pot till the septic is in...just one reason to put it in early!

Wow! I guess I am not crazy after all, although I think it will take dh a little while to totally warm up to the idea.

We only have one still at home, although the older 2 visit frequently. The one still at home is 17 and is very easy going and pretty compliant. I think he will deal well with it, especially if he knows the situation is only temporary.

Thankfully, dh is a civil/environmental engineer, so he knows all about dealing with this type of thing, as far as permits, septic systems if needed, all that stuff. He's a project manager so this is his thing, although usually on a much larger scale. One thing that he likes about the idea is that we will be able to keep an eye on the building process. I guarantee the first thing he will do when he comes home every day is check the days progress, probably before he even walks in our front door!

I really appreciate all the suggestions and I especially like the ones about building the garage first and using that as temporary living quarters, or building a barn and doing the same. We are even hoping to find some land with an existing barn, so that could definitely be an option.

Thanks for being so helpful and welcoming to newcomer!

I've done it. I was in an area with good weather, though.

Space wasn't an issue, because we were outside working or playing all day, so only needed a space to cook and sleep.

If you can start early spring and have a house ready by late fall, you'll be quite happy with the idea. If you have to over-winter in the travel trailer, then you'll have to put more work into the trailer to make it habitable.

What the folks do around here is to set the septic a ways from the house and put a travel trailer sewer line hook-up into the septic line. That includes a place to park the trailer. Then the house has a permanent travel trailer hook-up for visiting relatives or if it is ever sold. It's a nice bonus feature and costs virtually nothing additional, just the planning.

Another option is to live in the trailer for 3 seasons and then move into a cheap apartment for the winter if your house won't be finished.

Have you considered doing the work yourselves??

__________________
~*~Erin~*~
SAHM, ranch wife, sub and quilt shop proprietress
the Back Gate Country Quilt Shop

i did it as a 40yo woman. 16' OLD pull camper. dh and kiddos lived in a house several miles away, so i used that shower, laundry. but, i had too many animals to just dump off unattended incl. very pregger goats. so i lived there in a s.d. winter. in fact, 3 years ago next monday was the day i started packing it up for full time. lived there for almost 10 months. cooked on a coleman stove, grilled alot, crockpot in the barn. baked bread in a big turkey roaster, cakes too.

there were hard parts, like someone said, when it's wet out, its terrible damp in the camper too. the dirt just was everywhere, no getting away from it. COLD. i used a sawdust toilet, that was just fine. when a snowstorm came, i was just there for 2-3 days without anyone being able to get to me. it was fine. used library for internet, books and a movie to play on my tiny portable unit. a tracfone for 'in case.' those parts were perfectly acceptable, in fact, some days now i miss them, as i hear the tv blaring, phone ringing and many other loud intrusive thing thru the day in a normal house.

the part i didn't expect was how much i learned about myself. i rather enjoy quiet, as in no tv, but didn't realize what i was missing by simply not having one. it was so peaceful. having my morning coffee while sitting in a lawnchair, with a rabbitfur bomber hat on, bibs, the whole works. hearing the owls and other animals usually missed when in a real house. no need to hear a blaring phone either, didn't have one. spent my days with my animals, reading, and painting (i'm an artist). i cannot tell you how peaceful it was. in the evenings, i'd head over to the house to greet the kids off the bus, make supper, shower, laundry. then back to the camper when they went to bed. i even had a few ppl comment on how mellow i was.

i say DO IT!!

Wow! I never thought of a travel trailer.... woulda been so much better than the two tents I moved onto my first homestead with!!

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits." Mark Twain

I didn't read the other replies , but we made it in a travel trailer for a year with FIVE children under 9 years old ! Plus , we did it in North Dakota where the actual temp hit -70 in the winter . It's totally possible ,think of it as an adventure , that's what we did and we don't regret it one bit . Gave us enough time to save up the downpayment for our place we have now !

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-Amy
~Helpmeet to my best friend~
~Keeper at home with 6 little blessings~

I don't know if you are planning on building you homestead in PA, but there are a few things to think about here. First, I am a small home builder, and I'm at the tipping point in this business. Five years ago, the state adopted the International Residential Code. Since things were booming, and most local builders were building garbage quality McMansions, it had an interesting effect. The cost of building a big, poorly insulated and build trophy home went up by about $8+10K. Now a lot of this was simply being forced to build a proper structure, and most of these guys were making obscene amounts of profit, so I had little sympathy. However, what few knew at the time is that the code would be used to enrich various special interests and eventually, to destroy the rural building industry, creating a situation where only the wealthy will be able to afford building a single family home. This day is rapidly approaching.

The corrupt morons that we call legislators have allowed fire sprinklers to become mandatory. Sprinklers fail to provide any meaningful improvement in life safety over smoke alarms, Naturally, they provide BILLIONS in additional profits to the sprinkler industry. My small modest homes will require an additional cost of roughly $6-8K for the sprinkler system. Another local builder builds a modest home that, due to some difficult design issues, will cost $21K to sprinkler. Want to guess how many of these will be bought this year? The other issue is that every three years a new version of the code is issued, and other special interests "lobby" their way to thousands of dollars in additional changes from needless structural improvements, to massively increased levels on energy efficiency. Next year will see a 30% increase in energy efficiency through additional insulation, upgraded electrical systems etc.

The bottom line is that the building industry here, and in may other states that are also being crushed by these mandates, is really in deep trouble. I am currently just squeaking by. The value of my work is dropping in step with the resale market and every three years the bureaucracy adds 5-10% additional cost to the bottom line. All of this in the worst housing market in eight decades. The whole system is based on greed. Greed is also what will destroy the ability for most of use to move to rural areas and build a new home. Want to build your own? Great idea, if you can follow the rules in a 2000 page code book, and you are OK with overdoing everything to the point that the cost far exceeds the price of buying an existing place, and fixing it up. Want to have a builder do it for you? It's going to be a little tough in the near future when existing homes are selling for less than the builder's cost to build you a new one. You can have whatever you want, and the bank will finance 70% of it, since in their minds that's all it's worth.

As for moving into a travel trailer, even temporarily, in this state? I doubt you will pull it off. I know that it is specifically forbidden in our local municipality. I have a friend who wanted to add a single set of RV hook-ups to his farm, so he could return for a few months in the summer to spend time with his children and grandchildren. He is a full time RVer living in a fifth wheel. He would of had to get a zoning exemption to build a campground. It would of taken years of planning commission meetings and tens of thousands in fees to park a camper next to his farm house.
You may have a chance in a very rural area by using the "recreational permit" angle, which allows for a cabin or other part time use structure to be built.

I hope it all goes well for you, but I would really think hard about where you want to be, and how much of your life you want to surrender to bureaucrats. It is getting so bad that the latest laws now require that any material being moved on or off a property needs to be "certified clean". You find a nice patch of ground and want to bring fill in? Great, hire a geologist to certify it, BEFORE it arrives on site. Everything, in or out, stone, fill, topsoil etc.....needs to be inspected, tested and certified. It is now to the point that taking a big rural tract and getting a permit to build a new place will probably be cost prohibitive. New laws require tens of thousands in additional engineering fees and state DEP fees to do a small sub-division or development project. Want to build a new road into your homestead? After thousands in fees and a year or two of application processing, you have to PAY the engineer or geologist to be on-site while "earth disturbance" is taking place. A friend just move to a house we built him on a few acres of the family farm. It took three years and $20K in fees and engineering to get his permit. With the new laws in place this year, it really wouldn't be worth the effort to bother. You can buy a nice approved building lot in the neighborhood for less than $50K and start building in a few months. Why spend three years (or longer) and more than $50k, to buy the bureaucrat's blessing to build on your own farm.

I hate to depress anybody, Lord knows I do a great job of doing that to myself, but this is the reality of 2011 here in PA. Good luck with whatever you decide.

DH and I started by building a 30x40ft. pole building. We divided it in half and used 1/2 to store most of our household goods plus tools and building materials.

We wired, insulated and drywalled the other half, installed a toilet, shower stall, utility sink, electric baseboard heat, kitchen appliances and basic furniture. Lived in it for 9 months while we built the house. Later it became my husband's workshop.

It was a little chilly in the winter because of the cement floor, but all-in-all it worked out well. I'd recommend going this route as when you're done, you'll have an useful building, vs. a camper that you have to sell (unless you like it and had planned on keeping it anyway!).

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"I love all of this mud," said no one, ever.