I can't help from noticing that an increasing number of so called nomads are talking about and some are even purchasing real estate. My thinking about this trend is that i'm seeing a large proportion of the folks contemplating this are not original nomads at all. They are people that grew up in middle class homes and have now that they've gotten older, and made a couple bucks with their YouTube channels and figured out how to sell online merchandise. Now that they've lived that wave and their youth has passed them by, are now wanting to settle down, and go back to their roots as the coddled privileged kids they are, and the lifestyle they are really accustomed too. Their parents are getting older and have pretty much told them that enough is enough and the party's over with.
For the small percentage of real nomads, and I'm talking about people that don't own property, and actually do real work or who are either retired or disabled while living on the road. Such as over the road truckers, cell tower tech's, oil company workers, nurses, the list can go on and on. Then you have the folks that are displaced by our capitalist society in numerous ways such as, lost property because of economic down turns, bad divorce, women that got tired of physical and mental abuse in this male dominated society. Then you have people that are from rural areas of the country that saw a way out and made the choice of either staying in place and living in poverty, or living a more fulfilled life by traveling and living in a vehicle being a nomad by choice.
A whole lot of the folks I just mentioned didn't own property to start with, and especially the folks that did own property and houses realized very quick after losing everything, that it was a great burden lifted from their shoulders and they had this overwhelming feeling of freedom. The stories I hear from people about having those feelings is universal among all real vehicle dwelling nomads. All the stories are basically the same. The realization of not having to pay real estate taxes, mortgage payments, association fees, ever increasing utility bills, constant lawn and landscaping costs, maintenance costs inside the house and out, the list goes on. The people that are the real nomads are easily recognized. I can tell the difference right away if their on vacation driving their hundred thousand dollar motorhome or if it's a real nomad in a more modest rig. After living a nomad lifestyle for a period time it becomes real easy to see the difference. You'll be able to distinguish between the typical family on vacation or middle class and rich kids with their customized vans that mommy and daddy bought them, from as I keep saying, real people that actually really do live in vehicles.
Now I would like to get around to the topic of this post, which is this one question that I have found has many answers.
Why You Should Never Buy A House
To be clear, real estate investing, like multi-family homes and rental properties, is an entirely different topic for a discussion at another time.
The Number one reason most real vehicle dwelling nomads don't own any property is freedom. A house is a big responsibility that requires a lot of care and attention especially if you want to maintain its value over time. Of course, if your favorite thing to do is is to stay in one place, work on your house or mow the yard, and do landscaping, then go for it! But for me and many others, the inherent obligation in owning and maintaining a home means less time and energy for travel, working on hobbies or passions. You want to direct your money, time, and energy into what's most important to you in life. A house would eat away at all those things, and leave you with less power to choose how you spend them.
The problem with home ownership is that it throws a lot of extra expenses into your cash flow. It also leaves you vulnerable to unpredictable expenses and distractions that eats away at your life and keeps you in the same place working at the same crappy job.
Even if you just own undeveloped land with no house on it, and just a shelter type structure to park your rig by, Your still going to have property taxes, zoning regulations, and sketchy busy body neighbors to contend with. Not to say that when your gone off on your travels that anything you got on your property will likely be plundered and stolen, I'm telling you, people will steal anything.
Typically when you purchase an investment, it doesn’t require an ongoing investment of cash. But a house certainly does. Not only do you have to make monthly mortgage payments, but you also have to pay real estate taxes, homeowners insurance, sometimes private mortgage insurance, and utilities. You also have to maintain the property, which means providing a regular series of repairs and maintenance as necessary. These expenses are called carrying costs, the costs of carrying the investment. In other words, a money pit.
Many people call a house a money pit, and with good reason. The costs just never seem to end. When you buy a house, your initial sums and budget go as far as your average utility bill and the mortgage repayment. Many people neglect to think about maintenance costs or underestimate them. The problem is that unforeseen costs arise without warning.
You may have a good budget saving system going, but the costs often outweigh the best laid plans. Nobody asks for their A/C to break down, or for their garage door motor to seize. Electrical damage is another of those rare occurrences. But the fact is, these things happen. And the costs can quickly mount up to something you couldn’t have planned for.
As the saying goes, if something can go wrong, it will, especially when it comes to your house. Yet these are all costs related to things you have no direct control over. The other expense is renovating. When people buy a house, they might be content and happy with it in the beginning. But, as time goes by, they get this itch to change stuff. Like a kitchen remodel for instance can cost $10,000 dollars or more. Another one is about every 10 years you need to replace the shingles on the roof. Water heaters have to be replaced every 5 to 10 years. Then there's unexpected issues like a pump seal goes bad on the washing machine and floods a couple rooms and now you've got black mold issues.
Before you know it, you could end up raking up ridiculous bills to change and repair your house. The sad thing is that you will almost never see the money you put into your house again. Your home’s value seldom rises above what you spend on it. In other words your going to wind up with more in it than its worth. You have to really think to yourself, Is all this worth it? staying in the same place all your life, never going anywhere, then before you know it 30 years of mortgage payments have went by and finally you got it paid off. But then you realize your old now and got health problems, and you couldn't go anywhere now even if you wanted too. All you can do now is set and watch other people travel the world.
Not being able to just pack up and go, basically your stuck.
Buying a house ties you down to a particular town or city. It binds you there for most of the duration of your mortgage. For the first while, you are paying off the interest and not the capital. That’s why it takes a few years before you can sell and break even, let alone make a profit. It could happen that a few short years after buying a property you find yourself at a crossroads. Say you’ve been offered the job of a lifetime, but to take advantage of it, you’d have to move. If you sell your house now, you’ll be lucky to break even. That means saving up for another deposit and taking out another mortgage that will be a millstone around your neck for the next 20 to 30 years.
While you were weighing up the pros and cons and taking the onerous responsibilities of home ownership into account, the job is given to someone else. And there you sit, having missed out on it all because you own a house. If you know there is a good chance you could be transferred for your job; it’s probably best not to buy a house. You might find yourself needing to pack up and go. What do you do then? You’re faced with two alternatives. You could let the house stand empty and put it on the market. You’d have to hope and pray it doesn’t get broken into and vandalized. And you’d have to put all your trust in a real estate broker to make the sale on your behalf. Or you could rent the property out while you take some time to decide on your next move. The problem with renting out to unfamiliar tenants is that you don’t know what you can expect. They could trash your house and lower its value. Every time something happens your renters are going to be calling you to fix everything from leaky faucets to who knows what.
Aside from being an option for those unable to buy a home outright, one major benefit to financing has been the ability to write off mortgage interest. Each year, when you pay interest, or your mortgage payment, if you have twelve payments to your mortgage company, usually at the end of January, when you get your W-2 or 1099 form from your income, you’re going to receive a 1098 for any mortgage interest that you paid to the bank. That form will tell you how much interest you paid to them, and that’s the amount that you get to tell the IRS, “Don’t tax me on this amount.” What the government says is, “if you make X amount, we’re going to charge you tax on that.” But if you pay interest on a mortgage, you can actually take your X, and you can deduct it. This allows you to reduce the taxable income you have because you pay interest on a house. This is all good, but the thing is you have to be in debt. So think about this, you have to have a mortgage in order to get a deduction for a mortgage and that means being in debt.
I know there are lots of other reasons Why You Should Never Buy A House. And you could probably think of lots of reasons to own a house or property. I also want you to know that you have an alternative to staying in one place, working at the same crappy job surrounded by people that you can't stand and every day you wish you were somewhere else. The alternative is living a mobile lifestyle. Now that we've came through the industrial age and are now in the digital age it is entirely possible to make a living online and live anywhere you want. Just think, when you live mobile you can pack up and go anytime you want and you can park in some of the most beautiful places with outstanding million dollar views.
So why would you want to lock yourself into a 30 year mortgage and invest in something that not only your making payments on, but your paying out all other kinds of fees and taxes on top of the mortgage payments. Then you have maintenance costs and repairs, some that can get into the tens of thousands of dollars. This is all still yet on top of all the mortgage payments, fees and taxes. Then the day comes when you pay off the mortgage but you'll still have all the other costs. Taking into consideration with what all you've read so far these are all the reasons Why You Should Never Buy A House or for that matter any land either.
Now let's talk about living the mobile lifestyle, being a nomad and why its just an all around better quality of life.
This won't take long because there is no comparison when it comes to living mobile and living in a fixed place. Like I mentioned before, now that we're living in the digital age. We can make a living anywhere there is a WiFi signal. Also it won't be long the planet will be covered with high speed internet "Starlink" as it is called. It will open up doors we never thought possible in communications. Such as VoIP telecommunications.
Being a vehicle dwelling nomad you'll be able to travel anywhere you want and park anywhere you want. Oh yes you'll still have expenses when operating a your home on wheels. but they'll be a fraction of what you'd be paying if you lived in a fixed place that most likely won't have a view, and if it does chances are it'll be of other houses, smokestacks or of a road. What comes with a road is traffic, and what comes with traffic is noise. Yeah, go ahead and lock in that 30 year mortgage.
When it comes to vehicles we all know how to take care of them. and we know our way around around them. We don't think about it much but we live in a society that having a vehicle is a right of passage. vehicles are so ingrained in our lives to the point they have become part of us to such a degree, there in our souls and our being. So it's makes perfect sense that we can also live in our vehicles.
"If civilization on earth were to end abruptly and were discovered by archaeologists in the future, they would find extensive road systems and remnants of vehicles, it would be referred to as the great road building society" ~Chaz Patrick~
The main expenses you'll have for a vehicle are what we're already accustomed to. Which is License and Insurance, Fuel, regular maintenance such as oil and filter change, battery, transmission fluid change along with the other things under the hood. have your tires rotated and when that's done it's a good time to look at break wear. All of these are a fraction of the costs of maintaining a house. Whatever vehicle you have, get yourself acquainted with it, and just stay up on the regular maintenance and most likely you'll never have any trouble. Whether it be a car or minivan now the time has come to pull the trigger and become a nomad.
"Just Go For It, A Life Of Travel Adventure Awaits"
~Chaz~
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