havesomejoe
New member
Hi all, I'm a software developer (working remote) and I have recently purchased a van and have been upgrading it for off-grid living over the last couple months.
My plan is to move into it when my lease ends in 10 months and do a bit of the snowbird thing to both save money and be a bit closer to nature (when I want to be).
For the longest time I felt trapped by my student debt and after recently paying that off (and paying my car off) I ran with it and got a thirst to eliminate not just debt but also any large bills. My only real large bill now is rent! So that's where this idea came to be.
Further, I've always loved forests and mountains but I don't care for Maine's long winters (where I'm originally from, although I live in Texas now) so I've been doing the snowbird thing for many years via car, plane, airbnbs, and apartment rentals. I'm hoping vanliving will get me closer to nature, much more often than I get to be lately. I imagine I'll try to stay in the north until it gets too cold, then go somewhere not too hot for the winter months.
I thru-hiked the Appalachian trail 9 years ago so I'm familiar with bare-bones living, so actually a van will be an upgrade from that perspective.
Upgrading my van has been pretty intense but I'm happy I've been able to learn so much about electrical systems, something I had zero knowledge of before but now feel pretty damn handy on the topic!
If you care to follow my journey towards "vanlife" and beyond I also just created a youtube channel "rent free van plan" at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLcZ3zMxWAmBenI1Cw3w44g
thanks for having me!
~Joe
My plan is to move into it when my lease ends in 10 months and do a bit of the snowbird thing to both save money and be a bit closer to nature (when I want to be).
For the longest time I felt trapped by my student debt and after recently paying that off (and paying my car off) I ran with it and got a thirst to eliminate not just debt but also any large bills. My only real large bill now is rent! So that's where this idea came to be.
Further, I've always loved forests and mountains but I don't care for Maine's long winters (where I'm originally from, although I live in Texas now) so I've been doing the snowbird thing for many years via car, plane, airbnbs, and apartment rentals. I'm hoping vanliving will get me closer to nature, much more often than I get to be lately. I imagine I'll try to stay in the north until it gets too cold, then go somewhere not too hot for the winter months.
I thru-hiked the Appalachian trail 9 years ago so I'm familiar with bare-bones living, so actually a van will be an upgrade from that perspective.
Upgrading my van has been pretty intense but I'm happy I've been able to learn so much about electrical systems, something I had zero knowledge of before but now feel pretty damn handy on the topic!
If you care to follow my journey towards "vanlife" and beyond I also just created a youtube channel "rent free van plan" at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLcZ3zMxWAmBenI1Cw3w44g
thanks for having me!
~Joe
