Is A Nomadic Lifestyle Cheaper Than Living In One Place?

http://locationindependent.com/blog/2009/04/16/is-a-nomadic-location-independent-lifestyle-cheaper-than-living-in-one-place-a-12-month-breakdown-for-2008/

by swombat • 17 years ago

75 70 17 years ago

locationindependent.com

swombat4• 17 years ago

Personally, as I'm about to embark on a similar life, I find these articles (as in, the articles on this blog, as well as this specific one) extremely interesting.

It's good to see numbers that prove that it's possible to leave more cheaply in an idyllic location while still working on my start-up, blog, etc.

I wonder why more start-up founders don't take that option. What ties you to a specific place? For me, until recently, it was a relationship..

fortes2• 17 years ago

Relationships are a big one. Not just dating, but being isolated from family and friends can be hard (I lived in Beijing for 4 months, and enjoyed it, but it does get lonely).

Also, not every one is ready to live somewhere foreign. Especially if they don't speak the language.

swombat4• 17 years ago

I guess I feel that less since I jumped country (from Switzerland to the UK) once already, so I feel less attached to where I am (though I do have many friends around here).

With respect to language, it seems to me there are so many ways to learn common languages these days, that this should not really be an excuse. Anyone can go on Bit-Torrent and download some language courses, and speak a language passably well in a few months... (well, unless it's a ridiculously hard language like Chinese...) Btw, for that, I recommend a combination of the Pimsleur courses, + a book about grammar, followed by reading a fiction book in the target language, before actually moving there.

HeyLaughingBoy• 17 years ago

Very simply: some people like where they live enough that being a 'traveller' isn't very appealing.

I make a distinction between "travelling" and "being a traveller." The former means you like to go places on vacation for a short time. The latter is actually living in a location for a while long enough to assimilate the culture, live like the natives, etc. and requires much more time.

Besides, who would feed my chickens while I was away :-)

ph0rque• 17 years ago

Besides, who would feed my chickens while I was away :-)

The thing that dissuades me the most from a nomadic lifestyle is the inability to engage in long-term hobbies like planting/tending fruit trees long enough to enjoy the results.

donw2• 17 years ago

I'll be doing so at the end of the year -- ping me if you're in SE Asia around then.

banned_man• 17 years ago

Although it's not quite the same thing, this reminds me my semester in Budapest (undergrad math program). I actually saved a few thousand dollars by doing so. American tuition is just really expensive.

marbletiles• 17 years ago

The figures aren't quite honest: the UK prices are extravagantly high for mortgage anywhere apart from London, which is one of the world's most expensive cities. Elsewhere in the country you can expect to pay c. £700 or less, which brings the yearly total down to £15k -- well below the travelling costs.

chromoose• 17 years ago

Likewise it isn't really honest to look at UK mortgage repayments versus rest-of-the-world renting costs.

_b8r02• 17 years ago

I agree. I live less than an hour from london and my mortgage is in the £900s. Renting in the same area would be about £700-£800 mth here.

sdragon• 17 years ago

I don't get this. I live in London, on the edge of zone 1-2; renting a room. Expenses: 510 pounds / month for rent including utilities; 300 pound for food (granted, I haven't really upgraded my lifestyle ever since college -I simply don't feel the need.).

So this comes to 800 pounds + occasional funtime = 1K -still below what they've calculated for most places. Are they really that bad at negotiation?

swombat4• 17 years ago

I think they're looking at the costs for 2 people, and also they've clearly pointed out that they're living fairly comfortably.

loc_independent2• 17 years ago

Author of the article here - as the post states, the mortgage figures include other items too, not just the mortgage. The figures include: Council tax, contents insurance, buildings insurance, all utility bills (including phone/internet & mobile phones), TV licence etc. etc.

We recently came back to the UK for a few months and had to go through all this setting up of bills etc. again and were shocked at how much all the extras add up, which you just don't get when you live overseas in furnished rental apartments. I think many people would be shocked if they added up all these extra little bits too.

_b8r02• 17 years ago

If you don't mind me asking, where in the UK were you came back?

Also it sounds like you were buying somewhere, not renting. A furnished rental apartment shouldn't require buildings insurance, contents should either be part of the rent or not at all (as the landlord is required to insure their equipment by law - but not yours - you'd do that separately but you'd certainly have to do that anywhere else I've been), a TV licence is optional - you only need it to watch live TV and all the major channels have on-demand Internet equivalents that are perfectly fine unlike other countries you may have been (we're looking at ditching the licence when the Digital TV switch kicks in). I'm surprised you're putting phone, internet and mobile phone in there - unless you're flatsharing I'm not aware of anyone that would include those as part of the rent, especially mobile phones?

I guess my point is that it's not a like for like comparison to compare your rental costs in one country with mortgage + all inclusive of everything, even secondaries in another. Rather than defending it, and I appreciate it's a PITA to do what I'd suggest and may contradict what you're trying to achieve, I'd like to suggest that you write a followup comparing like for like costs with their equivalents and provide explicit examples alongside the benefits and drawbacks of each - e.g. being near the beach at Cape Town versus being near the beach at Blackpool.

wallflower• 17 years ago

As the old saying goes, whereever you go, there you are.

As someone who does not have an Internet-based income stream (e.g. has a job) and has been close to pulling the trigger on this several times, I think you have to consider why you want to be in a different location. I think I was thinking that I'd do a radical lifestyle/social makeover (e.g. all-in = quitting job+going abroad) but that probably would not be the case.

colinplamondon2• 17 years ago

Totally works.

Just stay at a hostel for the first month in the new country. You'll meet a ton of people from all over world, including some who will be staying in the country, so you'll have friends for at least six months. Hostel folks tend to move around a lot :)

For meeting people, it'll be lifechanging just to see how easy it is- "where are you from?" "how long are you traveling for?" "where are you going next?" "where have you been so far?"

Everyone's in a foreign country, everyone's looking to meet people, so everyone makes themselves super easy to meet. If you're in a good hostel (I'd HIGHLY recommend Hostel Suites Palermo in Buenos Aires, ~$10/night) then this won't be something you'll consciously be thinking about, it'll just happen.

I worked from the patio of the hostel the first day and wound up going to dinner with eight folks from all over the world, by the end of the night you'd have thought we had all known eachother for years. Give it a shot!

rgrieselhuber• 17 years ago

I've had similar experience. My wife and I did a RTW trip for about $27K (and we lived it up quite a bit) covering 12 months. We were surprised at just how affordable it is to travel, and it's cheaper to travel long term than short term.

mixmax7• 17 years ago

I live on a boat, and find it to be the ultimate in nomadic and independent lifestyle. Just fill her up with diesel and water, and I can go wherever I want. The biggest advantage is that I don't need a lot of planning to go somewhere - I've got my whole home, clothes, personal belongings etc. packed up and ready to go at any time. It's pretty cheap too, since I don't need to eat out all the time, and the only rent I need to pay is when I'm in a foreign harbour somewhere. And I still have the comfort of my own home.

The disadvantage is that I can't go across the globe, partly because it would take too long and partly because my boat and lacking sailing experience would make it a dangerous endeavour to sail across large oceans.

dougp• 17 years ago

I am very interested in this but what do you about internet. Do many ports have wireless?

mixmax7• 17 years ago

Most do, otherwise you can just get a 3G phone, coverage is OK even when you're at anchor a mile or so off the coast.

yummyfajitas4• 17 years ago

Except for landlocked areas.

Nevertheless, I really like this idea. Could you explain more about how it works? I.e., what are the costs, and what skills are needed?

mixmax7• 17 years ago

You'd be surprised at how many canals and rivers there are across Europe (and presumably the US and Asia too). Since almost all major cities are either by the shore or have a river running through them it isn't really a problem.

It's really not as hard as it sounds: Buy a boat and learn as you go. Holland is great for boats if you're in Europe - I found mine on http://www.botentekoop.nl and paid someone to help me sail it to Copenhagen where I live. The trip across the Netherlands, Germany and Denmark helped me get acquainted with how a boat handles, what you have to be aware of, navigation, signalling, etc.

When I got to Copenhagen I started disassembling a lot of the insides. A lot of boats seem to have an emphasis on having as many bunks as possible so that ten people can sail somewhere or whatever. This isn't really what you want when you're living on it though, so I tore down some bunks and built a proper toilet, kitchen, dining area and office instead.

I got a place at a nice harbour and found that the people there were really nice and had a lot of knowledge of what to do whenever I had a problem. Don't go for an upscale place, they are snobbish and aren't very helpful. I found a harbour with half pleasure yachts and half fishing boats, the fishermen know everything there is to know about boats, and they'll gladly help. Spare anchors, hydraulics, and fishing nets lying around is a good sign.

There is, of course some maintenance depending on what you buy. You can buy steel, fibreglass or wooden ships. Fibreglass is the easiest to maintain. Steel corrodes and gets rusty so it has to be painted every now and then, but not really a big deal. I wouldn't recommend a wooden ship - it's lots and lots of work and it deteriorates quickly if you don't keep it up to standards with oil, lacquer, polishing ans what have you. Every three years or so you have to get the ship on land and bottom-paint it. It'll take a weekend and cost around $1000.

I pay $1200 a year for the harbour where I'm living, and paid $30.000 for the boat. I spent $10.000 refurbishing and redoing it.

I'm planning on going to Berlin this fall, it's only a few days sailing :-)

feel free to e-mail me if you want to know more, my mail is in my profile.

asciilifeform• 17 years ago

What do you eat?

kirubakaran• 17 years ago

I would say fish :-) Joking aside, of course he can eat anything he wants, as he can perhaps bike to the grocery store nearest to the shore. I guess living in a boat is like living in a water-front property that has better view than other water-front properties.

There is something really cool about torrenting recent Johnny Depp movies using a Swedish website while you are sailing.

herdrick2• 17 years ago

Are you kidding? What kind of futuristic non-money-sucking boat do you have?

electromagnetic4• 17 years ago

It all depends on the engine and the boat. You'll probably only get a mile or two to the gallon, but then you're not driving it around like a car. You then also have to consider that people regularly drive around in vehicles on a daily basis that aren't all that more fuel efficient.

If you actually care that much, you could always spend a bit more money and go solar. Boats is one of the few vehicles where solar power works well and has proven itself (for example, the first usable solar boat is thought to have been made in 1975). You also don't have to go just solar, boats have been powered by wind for centuries and the water generally has much stronger wind than land anyway.

I wouldn't doubt that it would be easy to go green and make your fuel cost zero.

donw2• 17 years ago

You, T-Pain, and who else?

shalmanese• 17 years ago

This is a disingenuous article. The real comparison is between the difference of what you make vs what you spend. While travelling in the 3rd/2nd world is cheaper than staying at home, unless you have a very particular job, it's also hard to pull in the same amount of income.

loc_independent2• 17 years ago

The business we run whilst we're doing this pulls in more than enough to support the outgoings; whilst it's not easy to set up a business that does this, it is more achievable than many people think.

TimothyFitz• 17 years ago

I'd love to see posts about this side of things: how did you build that business, what were the challenges, etc.

RobGR• 17 years ago

It seems that your location independent business consists mainly of making web sites abouthow to run a location independent business.

It used to be possible for a good writer such as Samuel Clemens to simply travel the world and fund it by filing reports from abroad, or writing articles for travel magazines or travel guides. In a lot of ways what you are doing is similar.

However, do you know of anyone living a similar lifestyle that is not funded by writing, whether for the print media or its successor ? Perhaps by seeking out niche items in each place they visit, and selling them on ebay to Americans (perhaps through a partner still in the US) ? I have heard of people doing that in Argentina when that economy was worse off. Or by supervising the manufacture of something through mfgquote.com and its sales and delivery via the internet ?

edu• 17 years ago

No, living in cheaper countries is cheaper. Be Nomadic in UK, Ireland, France, Germany, Austria... and it would be much more expensive than doing a sedentary life in Thailand.

listic• 17 years ago

I think your answer is right in regard to OP. But it seems to be not so interesting to everyone :)

colinplamondon2• 17 years ago

The problem is that environment really does matter.

I worked from Thailand for three months on Koh Tao, had a great experience and learned a lot, but at the end of the day sketchy wireless + drunk spring breakers really put a damper on things. In Argentina everyone I knew was supportive of what I was working on, and all my friends always wanted to know what was up, take me out to grab drinks at a tango club, go to a drum concert on Monday evenings- my environment made it frictionless to work on a

startup. (obligatory pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/copla201)

Being in Thailand on the island of Koh Tao, though, had the downside that 70% of the population turned over every couple of weeks, and the people that live there are there to escape from the world. Now, I completely respect that- if you're choosing between a 9-5 and scuba instructor on a beautiful Thai island, easy choice. And there's a lot of cool people who make that decision- however, those aren't the same people who are gung-ho on building a great business, or necessarily think that doing so is a worthwhile undertaking. It was an environment where just going to work was an exercise in friction.

That doesn't mean that I didn't head out to the cafe to make progress every day, or get to read up on the topics that allow me to build what I build today from the gorgeous Echo Bar, but it does mean that the environment wasn't conducive to building a startup. I saved money, I had some great experiences, and I wouldn't take it back, if only for the learning experience- environment matters.

Yes, you can work from anywhere, but that doesn't mean you should. However, as I write this I'm packing up my things to move to Budapest on Sunday- my co-founder is Hungarian and after working together online for seven months we're going to push to launch working in-person. The difference between Budapest and Koh Tao is that in Budapest there's already a support network in place- all the friends of my co-founder's who have already supported us at every turn. And it's that support network that's so crucial when building a startup.

It's ok to take on the world, I wouldn't work on anything that didn't take on the world, but you damn well need to have an effective environment to work in when you move halfway across the world.

acgourley• 17 years ago

What about the costs of constantly finding new accommodations/services in unfamiliar countries?

I'm sure there are certain time savings from not having a long term domestic existence, but it seems like overall you're spending a lot of time to make the nomadic life work. I'd like to see this time cost broken down in a similar fashion.

bemmu• 17 years ago

I can only comment that in Thailand it is super easy to find accommodation in the island, at least off-season. We could just walk around and just run into places that were very affordable. We found clean hotel rooms, small cottages right at the beach and nicer bungalows a bit farther inland all for $10-$20 per night. I imagine with more knowledge of our options we could have had even nicer places for the price. One thing I learned is that the 3G Internet connectivity advertised does not actually work in any usable way at least in Koh Samui / Koh Tao / Koh Phangan where we tried it, and had to rely on wifi. It was kind of a fun pastime to try to find places to stay in by scanning for wifi spots and walk to the direction where it gets stronger.

outscape• 17 years ago

for something more stationary, but somewhat similar in spirit, check out this place built right on the ocean on a tropical island in Panama:

www.cocovivo.com

drinian• 17 years ago

Similar in spirit: Bemmu posted this idea on Hacker News some time ago, but to the best of my understanding, he had to pull out. http://www.coworkthailand.com/

Is A Nomadic Lifestyle Cheaper Than Living In One Place?

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