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Home Repair Book Store > Home Repair books beginning with M
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Mortgage-Free!: Radical Strategies for Home Ownership (Real Goods Solar Living Book) |
Author: Robert L. Roy
Published: 1998-06-01 |
List price: $30.00
Our price: $17.95
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As of: November 21st, 2008 10:06:29 AM
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Customer comments on this selection.
 Quaint in 2004, Prescient in 2008
Honestly, I thought this book was a bit 'quaint' back in 2004 when I purchased--having a home mortgage, and even a second mortgage, seemed like the best thing ever!
Now, I would love to own my home outright--even a smaller home. There are many of us who would never be able to get our wives and kids into a 12' by 24' starter shed. But the general ideas and money saving tips are needed now in 2008 more than ever.
 Make Sure You're Up To It
By "Up to it" I mean spending at least 15 to 20 years of your adult life building your house because it will never be "finished". I grew up in a house that my parents built and I saw first hand how it consumes your life. As a six year old I watched my parents race around the footer with rakes and shovels trying to spread out the concrete before it hardened because the trucker didn't want to pour in two different spots. We shoveled snow out of the living room during the first year because winter came before the roof was finished. We had an outhouse the first year and after we had an official bathroom the toilet wouldn't flush when it rained because the vent was at the bottom of the sewer line instead of part way up the stack and the line to the septic tank was sealed with oakum instead of lead. I could go on about the roof, the electricity, insulation, etc., but just make sure you're up to it. It's not for the faint of heart. I lived it. I know how to do it. But I would never build my own house. Subcontract it maybe on a pay as you go basis, but never do it myself.
 READ ME! Home ownership and mortgage freedom is the American dream
Let's face it. It is the American dream -- having no mortgage and owning the property that you have. The book describes how to live within your means and being happy. Other urban places that people pay millions of dollars for a condo might find their busy lives as something to live for, but an equal amount of unhappy people in urban places are committing suicide because they don't know how to get out of the hole. Buying land cheap, building a cabin, and living in it is the best way to go, especially with cheap wireless Internet these days.
Other recommended titles that helped me purchase land cheaply:
Investing Without Losing (ISBN: 0978834607 NOT on amazn, on other stores)
Excellent resource for those who want to live debt free!
Very encouraging to know that it can be done. Rob gives a lot of useful info on how live mortgage free. My husband and I are going to do it!
I'm halfway through - and already I can tell this book's a keeper!
So I was reading today our of "Mortgage-free, radical strategies for home ownership." I like the book, the author gives a pretty round view on ways you can get away with doing exactly what the title tells you. Almost all of his ideas start out with you gathering up a grubstake and buying a piece of land - which is okay, but I can't even afford the land I want, so that's a bit of a problem for me. Perhaps I should think more modularly and buy a small piece and acquire more adjacent to it when I have more cash.
Anyhow, today he discussed underground homes. That was an interesting subject - basically this is just taking house berming to the maximum and setting your house down so far that once you backfill around the home, the roof is still enough below the original grade that you can plant a living roof - or just cover the damn thing with dirt and let biology ensue, with native plants reclaiming the disturbed environment. Very low environmental footprint - great way to hide from spyplanes and helicopters, but does require some industrial strength digging to get down to to where you need to be, and we've already noted that digging like taht costs money and what's more its not a remote-friendly technology. But, if you had an underground home with a masonry stove you'd be pretty set for whatever the weather could throw at you and I would expect the dwelling to last quite a long time indeed.
He also stressed the importance of being fluid, or rather the foolishness of planning what type of home you want before you've acquired your homesite. So much of what type of home, building technique, power source and siting is dependent upon your homesite and its ammenities, topography, harvestable and recyclable resources that really doing any kind of planning before you're onsite is likely to be more of a hindrance then a help when it comes to getting the best house for your situation. This was something I was already thinking (it is how I've been trained to look at gardening and orcharding: live with the land for a year before planting to find where the plants should go) but it was nice to see it written out elegantly by the author.
I still think I'm leaning towards a strawbale or cordwood dwelling. Cordwood could actually be reasonably remote-friendly and is easier than building a log cabin by a long site. Really you're just going to have to get your cement in - you can handsaw the cordwood rounds for the walls and move them about easily enough. I think I should start small, and get a small piece of land and build a little living shed on it and see what I can do. Like the book says - its better to use the same technique and screw up on a small dwelling at a cost of $500, than on the main house at a cost of $5000.
I'm learning a lot - and I feel the book was definitely worth the purchase price already.
Dominic Ebacher
ebacherdom.blogspot.com
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