1/ a young person (college aged) recently DMed to ask something in the space of "I don't know what I want to do with my life, but your homesteading lifestyle looks awesome ... how do I get from where I am now to something like that?" I'm going to make my response public >>>
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7/ and start picking up basic hand tools like hammers, levels, screwdrivers, a dill, drill bits. Maybe find a local "maker space" and practice your welding, build a table. Spend the first few year after college doing this, hooking up w the local community gardening group.
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8/ Your 20s are a time of minimal skills, minimal income, minimal options. It sucks, but that's how it was for me, and that's how it is for most of you too. Ever watch a rocket launch? Acceleration is more or less constant, but it starts at a speed of zero.
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9/ Your first 5 to 10 years aren't going to get you a farm and a house and a barn and livestock and a tractor and and and and I'm sorry, but they're not. But you can accelerate from your slow start. Picking up tools is cheap (ish). Picking up skills, even cheaper.
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10/ Also, if you're an oddball, an outlier, or a weirdo, it's a LOT harder to meet people in the boonies than it is in the city or the burbs. If you're a middle-of-the-bellcurve normie, sure, in the country you can meet someone in high school or at the ("the" not "a") local bar
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11/ ...but if you're an outlier, man, it's gonna be hard. So I am counselling that you stick close to civilization for 5 or 10 years. But these aren't wasted years - this is the acceleration stage! Learn, save, find your mate if you can. Then, with career established >
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12/ ...maybe start sticking your nose further out into the country a decade or so after college. If you're in a position where you can work remotely, or if you can find a job w a reasonable commute, you're good to go. Start house / farm hunting.
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13/ followup question "but where, exactly?" that's up to you - no wrong answers here. Are you in the south west? Do you like it? Look there. In Michigan? Like it? Look there. It's a big wide country and every corner of it (yes, CA and NY included) has rural outback areas.
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14/ followup "but what about the social pressure?" I find this a bit harder to answer because I've usually had a GFY attitude. I'd maybe start telling family and friends that this is your dream. Let them internalize that and get comfortable with it. That way in 5 or 10 yrs >
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15/ when you start to enact your plan, they won't respond with "WHERE DID THIS COME FROM !??!" but instead with "ah, great, Frank is finally acting on his dream!" Most people are supportive, if they're friends or family. But use marketing techniques and help frame it for them
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16/ you can forward an article from the WSJ on how there's a new young white collar back-to-the-land movement or tell mom and dad about this thing you read in the NYT about professionals doing artisinal high quality food they don't have any real opinion yet, I bet help form it
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18/ I don't have any specific link, but I've read this article a half dozen times at a variety of outlets.https://twitter.com/NotWesleyWelker/status/1254846881949200386 …
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19/ "these two quirky white collar professionals gave up the rate race - he, a marketing execute, she a high powered trader at XYZ bank - for a more authentic lifestyle raising goats and selling their own artisinal goat cheese at farmers markets" this article runs over and over
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20/ re meeting people and dating:https://twitter.com/JASutherlandBks/status/1254846813166882816 …
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21/ also, I believe that there's a dating website for rural folks http://farmersonly.com no idea what the selection is like, though
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22/ hey, dude, my pleasure also, if you've got all that - wife, house, kids- you're doing GREAThttps://twitter.com/Face_Almighty44/status/1254847981162987521 …
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23/ Can't emphasize enough the capital accumulation aspect. Homesteading is capital intensive. Farming - if you're born into it, have the land already, learned the skills at dad's knee - is a cut throat low margin enterprise. You are a "price taker" not a "price setter".
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24/ and you are competing with people who have a lot of skill eeking out a living with marginal equipment, and with all the advantages of a local friend network, local reputation, local market knowledge. You can't move out here and, I dunno, start logging in competition w real
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25/ ...loggers, and hope to use the profits ("profits") from that to bootstrap the homestead. Likewise raising corn, raising beef, etc I'm not saying that you can't get some cash flow from those activities, but that's after they're up and running with a heavy capital injection
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26/ ...and that cash flow is more going to subsidize your money-losing lifestyle (which you adopt for reasons like anti-fragility / prepping, creating a lifestyle for your children, etc.) than it is going to be a positive income stream.
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27/ So, again, my advice: establish your career in the city or burbs. Become a coder. Become an electrician. A graphic designer. A welder. THEN move that career to the country, and either work remotely, or ply your trade, if it's a TRADE trade (e.g. welding, etc) locally
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28/ OK, I've answered all the questions that OP threw at me via DM. Any other questions before I wrap up the thread and get back to writing my
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30/ yep. You all know my situation: city boy on the homestead for ~ 7 years. I've got a friend in similar boat. Both of us white collar, so can throw capital in. Both of us have. HUGE capital sinks. He's got a massive 50 ton loader & big tractor >https://twitter.com/EricRichards22/status/1254850385593929730 …
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31/ and I've been throwing similar capital in but in a different mix: smaller machines, but lots of them, and maybe more spent on land improvement (I think? not sure). I've got a tractor and maybe 15 implements. Old family farm prob has 4 tractors and 40, plus junk/scrap piles
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32/ And there's so much stuff that's gated by either owning the right tool, or by having the wrong tool plus a welder, or by having a buddy who has the right tool and can loan it to your for a week.
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34/ Yep, strongly agree. US was already moving at a steady clip towards a work-remotely job ecosystem, and covid as turbocharged that. Pick a career that allows remote work, if you can. https://twitter.com/ZeroBolusZero/status/1254851871564394497 …
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35/ this is an excellent point related: probably the thing that most prepared me for homesteading was ... running a 10 person ecommerce companyhttps://twitter.com/ngvrnd/status/1254852223529619458 …
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36/ your customer support person tells you that database queries are running slower and slower, the website is becoming less responsive ...and you're the only person who knows database stuff at all...and you don't know much TOO BAD SOLVE THE PROBLEM, SOMEHOW
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