James, if you have kids they will be your biggest expense. School expense that is, and clothing expense! I live on $834. a month and have 3 teenage kids with me. The oldest one just recently started college. My house and 2 acres is bought and paid for. $834. a month and another $300 in food stamps and I just barely, barely scrape by. What's helped me the most is getting a big tax refund once a year. It's the only time I can replace worn out appliances, home repairs, or vehicle repairs. And finally treat myself to my favorite Mexican food resturant. Then it's back to poor city till next years tax refund.

I'm hurtin worse this year then in the past. 1. Expenses keep rising and they're expecting another 3 % increase in the cost of living this next year. 2. Due to the summer droughts and grasshopper plague, I have not been able to grow a decent garden in about 4 years or so.

I'm telling you all this cause $1000 a month is not going to be much funner then $834 a month. You may have to use that other $50,000 to put yourself in some kind of at home business and hope it succeeds to be lucrative somewhat. Or, look for a better plan!

I've done this with kid goats and almost double my money. However, I don't own a big enough place to do it on a large scale to make good money.

Thank you for serving our country. Stay in. Take your 30 day leave and go look at the areas you are thinking about retiring to. Once you find an area you like, get to know the town and people. Take you 30 days at different times of the year. If you can spend 30 days at the coldest and the hottest time of the year, find your land and buy it. Start the improvements, buildings and fencing. If you have a house on it rent it. Or have a neighbor rent the land.

Good Luck to you.

The only thing that I haven't seen mentioned (unless I missed it) is that we are still in wars. What are the chances of being deployed to a war zone? Living on $1000.00 a month would be a cake walk compared to coming back maimed or in a metal box.

That was a very eye opening post TxMex. Thanks for posting it.

Three very important words. DO YOUR HOMEWORK. Grab a topo map of the West. Idaho has it's share of the great American desert.

All you have to do is google 5 acres in Idaho and see what the choices are.

Five acres will start at 40K and go up if power, water, phone are available at the boundary of the property.

Remember, most of Idaho is mountainous right till you get to the desert.

I'm not trying to chase you off, please be prepared, and 1000k a month won't do it.

that would not cover our health or property taxes let alone basic utilities or any other taxes or ins think car and property ins..

It is entirely possible to live on next to nothing. A guy I know lives in a 16' trailer on his brothers property just over a mile from town. The trailer is about 30 years old. The trailer is set up in a field. No running water. No electricity. His mode of transportation is a bicycle. No health insurance or insurance of any kind.
He survives on food stamps.

No cell phone. No computer/internet access. No television. No motor vehicle. In short, little human interaction.

Its called bare bones survival. This person is 61. He will start receiving Social Security in the future. I would guess $700 or $800 per month.

I happen to think that a single person, so inclined to live in such a horrific manner.....can do so.
A couple, IMHO, won't last given the strain of trying to survive in such a harsh manner.

I know many many people that survive on less than $1000/month. It is not by there chosing. Most went through life and did work which didn't provide any sort of retirement funding.....and they worked jobs where they contributed minimal amounts into there Social Security fund. Now they survive on $700/month. Basically, they are housebound. No recreation. No trips. A vehicle that is on its last legs.

Ask yourself if this is path in life to wish to establish for yourself.

It would be tough for 2 people, but I know I can live off less than $1,000 per month. In fact, that's my goal. I sure can't see purchasing 20 acres, installing well, septic, and power, and building a house for $50k however. That seems absolutely impossible. In fact, it'd be hard to do if the land were free. My 209' drilled well and septic system alone total at least $25k. Building materials prices are out of sight. I am considering cutting down some beautiful Western Red Cedar just so I can have some materials for a possible cordwood home. Taxes, insurance, utilities, fuel, and food (myself and dog) will cost me roughly $550 per month. The rest will cover other stuff I determine is necessary. I don't have health insurance because I cannot afford it. Over the course of the next year I will find out just how little I can make out with. I have some things I can sell if I face a cash crunch. It is a little scary, but nothing ventured nothing gained. I hope to generate income from ornamental plant sales at farmers markets.

In my line of work many people live like this. I'd say the majority of them are OK with their lifestyle, they like being on the fringe of society, or they don't know anything different. But, their health is usually horrible and they die much younger due to delaying healthcare or smoking and drinking heavily.

I agree with everyone here that could you live an $1,000/mo? Probably. Would you want to? No.

I have to take notable exception to many of these posts. I do not want to be argumentative, and refuse to argue. Furthermore, I apologize in advance if anyone sees my statements as argumentative or inflammatory. So, without further ado, this is from my personal experience, real life, not supposition, living on less than $1,000 a month.

Everything I have is paid for. I have more land than I use. The concept of it taking acres and acres to be self sustaining is incredibly wrong. I have a nice orchard with 40-some fruit trees, countless strawberries, well over a hundred thornless blackberries canes trained to the fence, and half dozen grape vines. More or less 7,000 square feet. 1/6 of an acre. My garden is substantial, on about the same square footage. I can well over a thousand jars every summer, which is much more than I can eat. All sorts of fruit, jams, etc, along with every kind of vegetable canning you can imagine. Salsa is a favorite, and I've done so much tweaking that my salsa is pretty well known. As a result, I trade jars of salsa for sugar, flour, coffee, other such staples. When I was living alone, I bought those staples, very little for a can of coffee, 10 pounds of flour, and a 4 pound bag of sugar a month. a pound of extra sharp cheddar cheese. Yeah, sometimes I'd get some other spices or something, but $20-$50 a month always did me.

I use some of my fruit, along with some of the sugar and yeast I get in trade, to make wine. I use some of my spoiled fruit and vegetables to feed chickens. The chickens give eggs, and the extra roosters give meat. I eat very little meat, but when I do, it's either the chickens, deer or squirrel. I lack for nothing, food wise.

I built this house myself, after the previous house burned in an electrical fire. My electric bill averages, over the past 24 months, according to Duke power, $70.59. I have DSL at 8 mps for $51 and unlimited cell phone use for $49. My automobile insurance is $19 a month, and homeowners is $30. Real estate tax, my biggest bill, is $84 per month.

So, $304 pays all my bills every month. I've already accounted for my eating, and even my alcohol use above. Everything here is paid for, and relatively new. I have no health insurance, neither do I want any. I've not been sick, at all, in well over 30 years. You call it luck, I call it eating right, drinking plenty of water, and getting plenty of exercise. Doesn't matter, it just is. I have no insurance, and I've not needed it.

When it's time to die, it's time to die. So what? Everybody will get there. I'm as healthy as possible to be, considering my age(63). I've done good, I have few regrets.

So, $304 a month. Sure, you can nitpick and ask "what if the well pump burns out?" Good question. I bought a brand new Grundfos at a plumbing supply house closeout. Car breaks down? I'll fix it. Or use the other car, I always have a spare everything. I do have funds other than my social security check. I just don't need to dig into them.

So, I live cheap. I don't go anywhere because I don't want to. If I wanted to, I would. Not a problem. The main thing is that I am living the life I want. Which is worth more than any amount of money. After my late wife died, I was alone for a while, but eventually found this young, beautiful woman who, guess what? Wanted to live the stress free life that I do. So, she is now my wife, and everywhere I said "I" should be "we"

Yes. You can live a fantastically happy and unbelievably healthy life on less than a thousand dollars a month. Make your dreams come true.

Zong for the win! Excellent post, sir! You are my role model, and live the sort of life I am striving for. The reason I can be happy with so little is because I absolutely love gardening, and more than hard work it is a labor of love and a lifestyle, and what brings me happiness on a daily basis. While I will grow many fruits and vegetables, it is the ornamentals which bring me the most satisfaction. There is nothing like the exhilaration felt when a perennial, believed to be hopelessly lost during a rough winter, emerges from the ground in all its glory, or when the fragrant first blooms of a favored shrub fill the garden air. I cannot wait to start putting stuff in the ground.

The key to being able to live well on 1000.00 a month is to have everything paid for. If you are setting up a homestead, you are spending money.

The cost of land with well and electricity in the nicer parts of ID will cost more than $50,000.00.

What you've got is good, Zong, but it didn't ALL just pop up overnight. Takes time, learning, and $$$ to get to that place. IOW, it's a little difficult to START there!

Mon

I totally agree, your not going to get 20 acres for 50K. In fact I just checked zillow, they have 10 properties with those parameters and all of them are deep into the mountains. So you spend 50k on the property, then what? Well 10K, septic, power, building materials, your 100K is GONE before you blink.

STAY IN and get your 20. NO bank is going to pay you 12K per year on a 50K deposit. As to making a good living, that is possible, BUT most people have to have an off farm job to make ends meet. If you have that retirement check coming every month you might make it.

Remember, the way to make a small fortune in farming is to start with a large fortune...

At least stay till you get your 20 and that bit of funding should be there the rest of your life.

We bought our 20 acre place and fixer up house in south middle Tennessee last year for just under $35K knowing it needed a bunch of work but it had good bones. We have done the grunt work ourselves over the last dozen months and contracted things beyond our ability/available time and right now are sitting at $50K invested. That includes all new laminate flooring, and HVAC system and brick underpinning for the house. We haven't even started fencing yet but will do one paddock at a time until we finally move there in October.

We still need to find a tractor with FEL and bush hog but we will be hopefully under $80 total when we are ready to start putting live stock on the land. We are lucky in that I make a better than average income but have been living on what we expect to have available when we move but have something to fall back on.

Like others, I know we can live on $1000 a month but everything we own will be paid for and not need repair when we get there.

some bits here that may be of interest to the OP/others:

http://earlyretirementextreme.com/about-the-blog

The best suggestion I can give would be too keep track of every dime you are spending now. Make categories on a spread sheet, or a piece of paper. Break down everything as much as possible. Don't just say Food, but break it down to types of food, Veggies, meat, eating out, candy, fruit, ect... Keep track of all this for at least a month, 6 months or a year would be even better. Don't leave things out, if you spend it, write it down. Make sure you write those things down that you may only pay for once per year, or twice a year, (Insurance, Taxes?) Don't forget the things you may have set up too automatically be paid. Then you can look at how much you are living on now, what you might not have to have once you move. You also have to think about those things that you will need on a farm, that you don't need now. (animal feed, tools, repairs?) This is the best way I know of too see how much you are really going to need to live on. The biggest thing you have to do is be honest with yourself as you fill the sheet out, and include every thing you pay for. You need to be honest with yourself when it comes to looking over the info too. Its easy to look at animals you might get and say that you can make x amount of money off of them, but not consider the cost of feed, or to think you can just graze animals on you property year around without any extra cost. Its also a mistake to say that you will plant fruit trees, so you will no longer have to buy fruit. To start with, it takes a few years after planting to get fruit from your trees, but you also have to think about the fruit you may eat now that you can't grow. I have my spread sheet broke down to 97 different categories, and sometimes I think there should be more. I break down my meat, fruit and veggies in items that I plan to grow myself, and things I will always need to buy. I have been doing this for more than a year now. It really helps to see where you are at in your plans, and to make a plan to where you are wanting to get to. I hope this makes since, and helps you out some.

Yes it doable, but you have to be willing to forgo the amenities of the easy life. No cable or satellite tv, no convenience store purchases, do town no no more than once a week. I like it. My monthly bills are always less than $200. The amount of money spent on gasoline depends on my desire to go to town. I can easily cut my gasoline needs to $100 or less. That takes me up to $300 for the month making $700 discretionary. This is divided with my animals and other things I want to do. I've got a couple semi annual bumps such as insurance and taxes which are very manageable.

I buy some clothes at the 2nd hand shop. I've got no need to impress people. I don't do the local snot club anymore. My shirts are now good heavy quality which I pay a $1 or less for. My work coat cost me $3 3 years ago. My impress you coat cost me less than $20 on sale. If it ain't on sale I usually don't buy it including food. Kinda gripes em at the grocery store. Who cares? I don't.

Yeah ya gotta feel sorry for them not living the party life.;) Those that do don't have much time for things that matter. Ya got it spend it. No thanks.

I retired last October after 23 yrs in military, problem is that except for my tour of Iraq all of it was in the Guard.

In the Guard you will not get your retirement pay until you are 60 yrs old, no matter how many yrs after 20 that you put in. As with any Service your retirement is based on how many years in as percentage of your base pay. So if you put in 20 yrs and your base pay is 2,000 a month then you will get 1,000 a month ret. 30 yrs is 60%, 40 yrs is 70% ect.

The higher the rank you are and the yrs you are in means higher base pay. Ret. as a top Sargent, top warrant officer or mid level officer w/ 20 yrs and your ret. pay could be 1,500 or more a month. And you will get tri-care for life at no charge for you and your spouse, in the guard with monthly drill pay it will cost you most if not all of it for tri-care.

But there. Is a way for you to have your cake and eat it to.

Decide exactly where it is that you want to locate to, if it is near family the better. Start looking for full time positions in the guard or reserve around the area, there are always very good full time jobs in the Guard.

This way you would still be at home to build your homestead and still be working towards ret. and after 20 yrs of full time Guard you will get technician ret. w/ bennies and mil. Ret.

And as far as property is concerned start looking for foreclosed farms or land and get it for a still.

If you have not started already, learn as much as you can about homesteading. Learn how to can, make cheese and butter. As said before, start buying as many things now as you can.

You can do this if you really want to.

Good luck.

It depends on a lot of things. My family of 4 has lived on $800 a month for the last 3 years. You can do it... heck, you could live on a third of that, probably. But it will depend on your (and your partner's!) willingness to alter your lifestyle accordingly.

I live off way less then $1k a month without gardening or having livestock or alternative power production... If I nullify the mortgages with my rental incomes, which does happen, I can pretend to have my properties paid for. I have no TV service or land line phone. My biggest expense is my cell phone at $100 a month but that is due to running a business and needing reliable service and unlimited everything. My power bill is rarely over $65 but in the cold weather I keep my truck plugged in at nights so right now its around $80. Water bill is $15, Internet $60 and I heat my house completely with wood which is found free through out the year. I have no insurances except car insurance, which runs $50 a month. I do not have life insurance or health insurance which I guess is bad but here is the way I justify it.... I KNOW one major thing could put everything at risk but then again I think things through very well and dont do backflips on trampolines or dirtbikes anymore.... If I would be injured they would be partially covered in auto insurance or business insurance ($28 a month).... The money I save by NOT paying insurances I put toward mortgages! Insurance companies make money and pay out claims still. I had insurance for 6 years and NEVER used it once! I stock pile my own money to gain equity in things and pay as little interest as I can. I have plenty of equity to cover a very large medical bill, yes I know it takes time to sell assets to raise money and is not as liquid as cash. Is the value of the dollar dropping as fast as my assets?
Life insurance I dont worry about cause once again I have enough assets and will not leave my family with any burdens financially (in fact I will leave them with an income).

Ok, for an experiment over the last month food wise I have had this going. My budget is $3.50 a day = $24.50 a week. I bought everything at the store and my receipts the first week were $16.44 (ham shank, milk, jalapeno peppers, cheese and onion) and $1.83 dozen eggs. I did have a few things at the house already but worked them into the costs for the week as I used them (flour and potatoes). First meal was homemade noodles with sauteed onions in butter ($0.94 and made 2 meals), the next day the ham was cooked n the crockpot to save all the juice and fat to make gravy and fry my eggs in the morning. Breakfast every day was eggs and ham or hashbrowns... Made a big pan of scalloped potatoes with ham for dinners and with the noodles was able to not have the same thing every night if I didnt want to. All in all I totaled under $20 for the entire week.

Being creative with how you live can be the biggest way to save $. By cooking I didnt need a lot of entertainment for I was always planning or preparing my next meals.

Can't wait to have my own chickens, pigs, cow, goats and garden.... the only food I would have bought would have been King Arthur Flour then! My solar panels installed and well will get rid of 2 monthly bills. I do live on less than $1000 a month! (property taxes $720yr for those that want to add things up...let me know if you think I missed anything)

$1000 a month is only $12,000 a year. If you are serious then start living this way now. If you currently have obligations such as rent or mortgage then discount this but live on $1000 for everything else. This will give you time to experiment, learn new skills such as gardening and find out exactly what you can do without.

Get your 20.. other government opportunities
 

There is nothing worse than waking up in the morning and dreading going to work because you hate your job. You have 9 years invested working with the government. There are many nonmilitary jobs with the government and having been in the military you will score higher than non military people applying for the same position. I would search www.usajobs.com and find a location/job you are interested in. I am sure there are several positions with Department of Ag (Forest Service) or the Dept of the Interior (National Park Service, BLM, etc) in the State of Idaho.

taxes and insurance health, property etc. are going to be at least that, the nicer the area higher everything is. the more remote it is the higher property ins. will be.... never mind all other expenses.

What are your total expenses now? If they are much over $500/mo now, trying to get a homestead off the ground is going to be tough. Living on $1000/mo can be done, you just have to adjust your idea of normal. Normal will probably be a lot like a camping trip that lasts for years, no extras for a long time. With low cash flow, everything will need to be done the hard, slow, manual way. If your wife is willing, strike that, eager to take on a such an adventure it might be doable. Kids will certainly complicate thing in terms of expenses and if DSS catches wind of your adventure, watch out. Start small, don't borrow any money and be very selective with your equipment purchases, with an emphasis on equipment you can repair yourself. Worst case scenario, If you are somewhere close to jobs you can mothball the homestead, move to town, get a job and commute out to the homestead on the weekend to work on projects.

So the one thing about not having a mortgage is you have to pay the taxes at the end of the year. I have 3 acres, granted it is St Louis county and the taxes are relatively high compared to other parts of Missouri, they are $2,300 a year. I bet 20 acres in Idaho would cost you more than that. So that gives you more like $800 a month. $200 a week even if everything you eat is produced on the land you own doesn't seem possible to me.

Especially if you have children, kids are expensive. Even if you bought every piece of clothing at garage sales it still adds up, and so do the things kids need much less want.

Heating a home in Idaho seems like it could be expensive too. We have a 1400 sq foot home, no basement and the gas bill is $250 a month. A wood burning fireplace would take 1k of wood to heat all winter unless you cut it down on your property which is insane amount of work.

Being poor sucks, keep aiming high, it will happen eventually.

I live on less than 1K per month. Not a big problem but I have money put away for emergencies, equipment repair and etc. I think you can do it and dont forget you or your wife can always get a part time town job to bring in extra. I dont like your idea of playing markets to make a return on your 50K...that is a losing proposition. I have tried it and seen others try it and fail. Nobody can time the short term trends in this volatile market, and one crash will wipe out a good portion of your savings. The whole thing is rigged and the house always wins.

I don't see how you can get 20 decent acres and a home for 50K in Idaho, but you may know something I don't.

Overall, while I know you can live on 1k per month if you are self reliant I don't see you making that much with your plan, and I think you're estimates for land prices in Idaho are too low. My advice is to stay in and scrimp every penny. When you get 200K or more you'll be getting more realistic, also plan for one or both of you to work in town. If you both work part time you'll still have plenty of time for the farm and you'll be bringing in a solid income of 16-18K.

Dreams are the priceless. And there is more than one way to skin a cat. Start now living on 700 a month. Make it a game. Learn how to check county assessor and treasurer web sites. Learn about back tax. Learn about leased ground. Check out pricing for actual farmsteads even if you think there isn't enough ground. Buy the book 5 acres and independence. Read the book. Plan an escape to help you hang on. Good luck... God bless. If you are not liking what you do get out. Life is short.

We (myself, my wife, and 5 kids) live on way less than $1000 A MONTH and have a better lifestyle than most. It is all about getting out of the whole consumer life. I explained how, the last time this topic came up and got blasted for it, so if you are interested do a search. Bottom line is people have lived with little or no money for thousands of years. Just because they built Walmart, doesnt mean you have to go there. Good luck

I agree with Vanet. I feed a family of 7 on way less than $1000 per month. In summertime our costs are less than $10 per day.

You're going to have to convert labor to calories though. That's just how life works. If you have to supply all of your basic needs from your wallet then it may cost you well above the $1000.

And a lot of those things that some people think are normal and required (like health insurance, second vehicles, etc.) just don't apply to the person who wants simple living on the cheap.

There ain't nothing you CAN'T do, if you're willing. But there are a lot of false steps which will bump up your expenses.

I have a hard time figuring out how some spend so much yet have so little to show for it . :shrug: I'v said for years some stay poor trying to make others think they are rich :icecream: Now days We do fine on a $1,000 a month :bow: