If you're new here, this blog will give you the tools to become financially independent in 5 years on a median salary. The wiki page gives a good summary of the principles of the strategy. The key to success is to run your personal finances much like a business, thinking about assets and inventory and focusing on efficiency and value for money. Not just any business but a business that's flexible, agile, and adaptable. Conversely most consumers run their personal finances like an inflexible money-losing anti-business always in danger of losing their jobs.
Here's almost a thousand online journals from people, who are following the ERE strategy tailored to their particular situation (age, children, location, education, goals, ...). Increasing their savings from the usual 5-15% of their income to tens of thousands of dollars each year or typically 40-80% of their income, many accumulate six-figure net-worths within a few years.
Since everybody's situation is different (age, education, location, children, goals, ...) I suggest only spending a brief moment on this blog, which can be thought of as my personal journal, before looking for the crowd's wisdom for your particular situation in the forum journals.
If you enjoy the blog, also consider the book which is much better organized and more complete. You can read the first chapter for free, listen to the preamble, or see the reviews (1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9, A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I,J,K,L,M,N,O,P,Q,R,S,T,U,V,W,Z). Subscribe to the blog via email or RSS. Get updates on the facebook page, join the forums, and look for tactics on the ERE wiki. Here's a list of all the ERE blog posts.
I would actually much prefer to gain my income directly from housing (or my own business) rather than the stock market (REIT’s being a decent compromise). So far I have thought of buying an N-plex and living in one of the units. However, I just found out that it is possible to buy mobile home and/or RV parks.
The price range runs from a few hundred k (which is my kind of money) to several million bucks which I’ll reserve for another lifetime or at least another decade.
I could absolutely envision buying an RV-park and tailoring it towards tiny houses; most likely on wheels, but a mixed park could allow tiny houses built on larger trailers like mobile homes—I haven’t seen any designs of the latter kind.
Furthermore, I think it would be possible for the owner’s to build the tiny house on site and have lots of help once we reached critical mass. I would certainly learn how to build them.
The only thing I don’t know is whether tiny house owners would prefer to reside in someone’s backyard or on a plot of land or whether they would prefer to be in a park with other tiny house dwellers?
I also wonder whether one can put any limits against 40′ diesel pushers? Also, where to locate it. Everything can’t be in Portland, Oregon 😛 .
I’d reserve space for garden plots and plant trees (not pine!!) on the south side of the sites to shade the houses in the summer. We’d have a dog park. I wonder what else could be done.
Originally posted 2009-07-07 00:02:24.