Lately, as my job has been really stressful and I’m frankly not all that happy with it, I’ve been thinking about throwing in the towel and moving out to the lake house once it’s done. (My wife would love to do this) In a sense, we’d be checking out of the rat race we are in to find new opportunities and a slower pace. Of course, I can’t jus
t make a decision like this lightly so I’ve been running lots of scenarios through my mind:
- What would we do for income? Where could we find jobs?
- How much interest income could we generate off of our current assets?
- What would the schools be like for my daughter and would we be risking her future success?
- Would I like living out there full time?
- Could we possibly get used to living in 1000 square feet?
- Should we consider selling both our houses and buying something a little bigger than 1K square feet out there?
- Would we dislike living farther away from family?
- What would we do about health insurance?
All these things are serious considerations when making a drastic lifestyle change. Of course the fact that we are considering taking a risk like this must mean we anticipate a positive payback to doing it. Here are some of the reasons we think it might be a good idea:
- Slower pace
- Less intensity in our day to day lives
- Much lower cost of living – less requirement for larger incomes
- Spend more time in a place we’ve come to love
What’s interesting is that the risks seem to be more plentiful than the potential benefits. Of course some of the benefits mean more to us than some of the risks above. It could be worth it to live in a smaller space in order to experience a slower pace. Other risks are things that are more important to us though. I don’t want to make a foolish decision while my daughter is so young, only to deprive her of better opportunities to learn and go off to college later on. I don’t know if that would happen, but it could. Regardless of what we make for income, I’m confident that we could live below our means and still save for our future and my daughter’s college. If we aren’t making enough to do that out there, we’ll adapt and figure out a way to live below our means. It’s really very easy to live below our means now, but that’s because we’ve made it a priority. With no house payment out there and no debt, we could easily generate enough income to live on and save for the future.
Needless to say, our minds are spinning fast on this one. Even if we decide not to do it soon, we can still keep this in our toolbox as an option if I ever got laid off, or our circumstances changed.
I applaud your investigation of this alternative. We are contemplating this as well with our hopeful move to Taos, NM. As for health insurance, if you are healthy, you should find that the cost of private insurance is not that bad with a high deductible; that’s how we afford it now that I freelance at home.
I think everyone should take a step back once in a while and reevaluate. It’s a good thing, and keep us posted on your progress!
Hi. Hubby and I did this. We owned a townhouse up in the Catskill mts for 9 years and always dreamed of quitting rat race. We did it and were extremely disappointed. #1, our neighbors were all poor. Eventually we became poor like them. Jobs pd minimum wage, even though we were consultants, clients couldn’t pay us. Eventually we couldn’t even afford to go out to dinner. You think you want a slower life pace, but you can’t sustain it. Kids couldn’t shop or buy the styles they wanted. In was aweful. We only lasted 9 months before we had to sell everything and move back to reality.
Sounds to me you just need time off, like a year. Spend a year at the lake and see how you like it before you make a major move. People in Catskills had awful health coverage, lousy doctor choices, hospital, dentists and so on.
It was frightening.
YOU BETTER THINK!
Thanks for the comments. We will certainly make the decision very carefully. It helps that we still have some time to think since our place is not done yet.
I’ve been thinking about something similar also. My situation is a little different, since I’m a consultant that works from home anyway. I could be on a mountain in Brazil and it wouldn’t be any different. I only have to travel once every few months, so it really doesn’t matter.
I’ve lived in a very small country town, and in the middle of a large city (Houston). I think I would get bored in a real rural area if I was there too long.
Sounds like you have the best of both worlds now. Maybe you can work something out where you can work remotely sometimes.
Have you read ‘The 4-Hour Work Week”? There’s an action plan to get your boss to agree to it, or if you own your business, to set it up so you can work it remotely.
Nice — I hope to be thinking this way in about 4 years. I need a lakehouse 1st though.
Perhaps it is time to try something different in the career-front? Something ambitious, something you’ve always wanted to do, something previously scary? Just a thought.
I’m still not sure what I’d do in “retirement” besides travel. Fix up cars, run a tour company, teach community college, something…
Tough questions, but really I just have to say how nice your lake house and its location look! I’m jealous.
Thanks MadameX,
I really do love it out there. It’s a slower pace and so peaceful. That being said, it’s still a tough decision and really kind of scary to move out there. I’m guessing we’ll chicken out but we’ve still got some time to consider it while we finish the place.
Hazzard