Captain Catlova's Log

[nature lover]

Welcome to the forum. Sure seems you’re thinking things out with the pro and con list. That’s good. That $1400 a month is a massive amount of rent to pay you must be in a my class area. For about a year I rented a one room apartment with bathroom in Lebanon PA for $550.

Saving money is the key. If your parents don’t mind you being there and helping them salting away as much money as you can not just to buy a van but I have a “ cushion” on the road. I’m living dangerously with no cushion but still loving the van life. My only regret is that there’s not money to fall back on if I have an emergency. I had an accident several weeks ago and with Pennsylvania inspection is going to cost me $1600 to get it inspected. So now my budget has to be paired down quite a bit more. Saving money is a key to being able to live this lifestyle. Stop spending on anything that isn’t absolutely necessary. That’s my humble opinion. God bless you and I hope you find what you want and need.

 

[carovan]

Thanks everyone for your input. It's been a while so I'll get you all up to date. I did move in and have been caring for my mom at home since we took her out of skilled nursing (sadly she was somewhat neglected there) and it has been ok. I've had 2 design gigs but lost one this month; that said it was hard to have 2 and be a caregiver for my mom. Sometimes I'd stay up most of the night helping her but then could not immediately make up sleep because work would be due soon. So I'm both sad and ok with it to see the client go.

The good news is my parents and I get along pretty well. I want to be better about budgeting because I have a lot of little expenses, from charities to Pimsleur, Hulu, Costco, and Amazon Prime. I want to get more organized around money but some good things are happening there - like I'm being put on my parents' car insurance which costs them almost nothing but saves me around $500+ a year, and I'll have better coverage. So that's a win.

Also busy helping my parents with a lot of home projects including helping them declutter their home. I hurt my foot so that's going slower than I want but I'm still making progress.

Going to try to use this year to save up money and get some courses done. I have a Design track from Skillcrush I want to finish and also some other more meditation-like courses.

When I have time I'll do more research about what can to get eventually. Actually I'm thinking school buses are cool and spacious. I have 1 cat but I feed a bunch of garden cats and 1 is beginning to bond well with me. So time will tell how many cats I end up with.