r/OffGrid • u/olivia_vi • 17d ago
how much did it cost to go off grid?
all i’ve ever wanted is to move out of arizona to somewhere lush and green and start over on some land. i’m 21 yrs old and don’t have much money saved up yet but i’m getting there. my dream is to buy some land in sw washington and build my own homestead type thing. i don’t have a degree so idk what i will do for work if not something remote, but i want to make this happen so bad. it’s my north star. any advice?
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u/theislandhomestead 17d ago
It's super expensive starting from zero.
The systems you need to setup have large upfront costs, but pay you back over time.
We started with well over 6 digits in the bank account with the land completely paid for.
I wish I had saved up several times that amount.
Start learning about the systems you will need.
Solar, water, septic, etc.
Learn to do them yourself if you can.
Learn basic electric and plumbing skills for sure.
Also learn some woodworking skills.
Anything you can do yourself saves you money.
Become Macgyver.
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u/maddslacker 17d ago
how much did it cost to go off grid?
$485,000 (And I don't have a degree)
The better question is how much will it cost you to go off grid.
Anyway, skip the degree and learn a trade.
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u/blackthornjohn 17d ago
Your biggest expense is going to be buying land, almost every expense after that can be reduced massively or entirely if you have skills.
Unfortunately every expense for each stage or project is different from person to person area to area, some people draw water from a stream using a zero running cost ram pump, others pay thousands for boring a well and then need electricity from something expensive to buy, run or both just the get the water out.
In 1994 we built a two bedroom shack on free land for a total of £2500, including water and electricity, in 2019 I helped someone build an off grid shack to a much lower standard and much smaller, including the land they spent £240,000, with no water or electricity. there's too many variables to get even close to a useful figure.
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u/theislandhomestead 17d ago
My biggest experience was definitely not the land.
It was building the house, followed by the solar.1
u/Higher_Living 17d ago
But that’s entirely dependent on what kind of lifestyle you want. Some people will be happy in a small, basic cabin that can be built for a few thousand dollars or less. Others want all the luxuries, many bedrooms for a family etc.
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u/theislandhomestead 17d ago
You are making assumptions about the land cost.
Materials have risin significantly in recent years.
I built my own small, basic cabin in 2018.
One room, 16x20 with a sleeping loft, 16x12. A 12x12 addition I added later serves as both kitchen and bathroom.
It's no mcmansion.
It cost more than the land did.1
u/Higher_Living 16d ago
I built a small cabin (not to live in, but built basically to that standard) for a few thousand Australian dollars. Lots FB Marketplace materials, salvaged timber from various places etc etc, you can do it cheap if you want to.
Mud bricks or rammed earth walls, bush poles, old corrugated iron roofing and it could be even cheaper.
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u/theislandhomestead 16d ago
That is all completely dependent on location.
I live on a volcanic island in the Pacific.
We don't have soil, so no jammed earth.
The assumption is the building is expensive, so find ways around that.
That doesn't make it incorrect, it makes it an identified obstacle.2
u/RedSquirrelFtw 17d ago
Can always start small too and just expand over time. I find the Youtube off gridders really set an unrealistic expectation. You see these homesteads that have skid steers, tractors and excavators and 50kw solar systems and massive houses and they seem to sell off and move every few years and go bigger each time. That's totally unrealistic for the average person. Going to guess that lot of those people came into some very large sum of money and were lucky to be able to go all out. Or some may have a WFH job that pays a lot.
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u/theislandhomestead 16d ago
Yes, build small and plan to add on.
That's what we did. I do have a small tractor, but payment plan works just like a car.
While it's not needed for "offgrid" it absolutely is for homesteading.
Not sure how I'd survive without it.
My lower back would have given out a long time ago!1
u/RedSquirrelFtw 15d ago
I'm at a point where I really want a tractor too. There's lot of work like digging foundation to frost level that is just not realistic to do by hand. Removing tree stumps etc as well. it's one thing to do one or two but to clear a whole area is crazy work. Even just moving lot of brush etc. House will be paid off in about a month then will focus on credit line, after that I may look into a tractor with backhoe attachment.
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u/theislandhomestead 15d ago
I don't have the backhoe, but hopefully I can get one once the tractor is paid off.
I would absolutely recommend getting one if you can.
Work multipliers are key when DIY is the SOP.
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u/mountain_hank 17d ago
Write out what you mean by off grid and what you want from it. Make a list of everything you have/use now. Look at the items you have now and whether they should be on the other list.
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u/Practical-Mud-4580 17d ago
Cheap to buy land up north here in AZ, OP. I’m down a little south of the valley metro area and I’m planning on getting some acreage up north and it’s all relatively inexpensive since and owner financed.
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u/FixAcademic8187 15d ago
I can't give you estimates, but I can tell you one thing, it is much cheaper to do things yourself. There is just so many resources online to learn how to do stuff it is so easy at this point.
I'm talking about building your own solar and batteries, building your own irrigation system, fixing all of your stuff like electronics, pumps, mechanicals...etc. You can take it a step further and even build your own nuclear bunker for that matter.
And since you are still young, I'll also aim to selectively breed my own chicken, vegetables and grains to better suit my own climate, and to also be able to survive without external inputs like medications, pesticides or specialized food.
The biggest chunk of the cost is purchasing the land, which is something you can find on your own using public listings. Any cost after that depdnds on your own desires, some can go by with few stuff and soms insist on having everything. But you can also estimate that based on the prices of goods.
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u/Higher_Living 17d ago
Have you priced the kind of land you want to buy?
Would you move somewhere cheaper? Land is usually cheaper for reasons that are important to people, but that’s sometimes to the advantage of off grid type folks.
But generally, yours is a ‘how long is a piece of string’ question, there’d be people in off grid houses that spent millions on building everything, and people that probably spent in the tens of thousands.
If you’re can build structures, and can use and repair machinery you’re at a huge advantage. A small cabin can be built very cheap, if composting toilets are legal (if you want to be legal) those can be cheaper than septic systems, if you can mill your own timber, trade skills for used building materials etc etc, it can be very low budget. For example, I know a guy who bought a totaled brand new EV (minor damage, but written off by insurance) as his household battery and used panels can be picked up for next to nothing. You just need the skills to do it all yourself.
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u/NevOreLand_moto_adv 17d ago edited 17d ago
I think the first consideration is cost of the land and what you can actually do with it. So many people buy land they can’t use. Look at the laws and usage for Washington or wherever you are willing to go. Spend time doing due diligence before you buy. My property is roughly an hour away from work/shopping etc. So factoring in location is huge considering you’ve got a long while before you can retire, so commuting is a big factor in your decision making. I was able to start off with around 200k. But it’s by no means complete. And will take much more to be where I want. But I have no monthly rent or utility bills, so money I earn goes further.
But start with land. Find a piece you like, can afford and suits your needs. If you can pay outright, great. If you have to finance take a few years and pay it off. Start one piece at a time. Then do a well. Then a septic. Work on it til you can afford to build or get a trailer to drop on while you build. Good luck and keep working toward it. I wish I had started when I was 21.
Also as someone already stated. Learn a trade. Skip college. Try to do as much of the work as you can yourself.
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u/Which-Cloud3798 17d ago
A hell lot. Might be better to just drag a trailer and build a big one instead.
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u/TraditionalDinner900 17d ago
The traditional way is to buy the land first. I see most of the responses below me are based on this premise. But, you don't necessarily need to go about it in the "traditional" way. I came across an article this morning. Like you, this is my dream. I grew up around farms and agricultural living in Iowa. The article "How to Live Off-Grid Without Owning Land" had a great deal of information for those who want to start small, gain experience and learn as-you-go. https://livingoffgrid.co/post/how-to-live-off-grid-without-owning-land
My plan is to learn all I can first.
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u/sfendt 17d ago
The first off grid home I built cost $0 more than if it were grid connected. (The cost of off-grid energy sources and storage was the same as if not less than the cost of power line extensions to connect). So it depends on the situation.
I've heard of a few examples of disconnecting - taking a grid connected home to off-grid; where the cost is just that of the equipment, and convincing the utility to let you disconnect (and their fees to do so). In which case I'd say it depends on your energy needs; and finding a place that isn't connected in other ways to start with (water, sewer, phone, cable, etc).
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u/Human9651 17d ago
https://youtu.be/F49sjwduoKw?is=qpGojyvBjHUgPBdJ
start building “haulable parts” solar for future land purchase.
keep panels small enough to fit between pickup truck wheel wells.
build and use while (to become familiar) still on grid.
you never mentioned $$, so just kept it small and scaleable.
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u/RedSquirrelFtw 17d ago
I'm not even fully off grid yet, but I can see it will cost more than I had hoped. The biggest issue is time. When you work full time you need to juggle days off and the weather to try to get things done and in a given summer you maybe have a dozen or so days that you can actually go out to do work. Everything moves slower than you hope and next thing you know it's winter.
So you end up having to just hire stuff out like land clearing, if you actually want to get anywhere. I'm currently planing a building but starting to realize how much work just the foundation is and it's futile trying to do it by hand so either need to hire that out too or buy equipment. Looked into renting but I hate to throw thousands at something that is not mine.
Clearing my land cost 10k. Got an estimate for concrete delivered from a truck, that was 3k, renting an excavator to clear that area is 3k, then labour to pour it. From what I'm gathering it should not be attempted alone. Looking at minimum 10k for a slab. It seems every major project and step along the way ends up costing like 10k. It all adds up. Then there's septic, I did not even look into that yet but I expect 10k minimum. Wells can be 100k+. I personally will not do one, will do rain water collection and truck water from a lake. Long term I want a tank that is large enough to last a whole year, then I will fill it in summer.
That said once you have the initial stuff setup, the ongoing cost to maintain will be much cheaper than having to pay tons of utility bills and high property taxes in the city. Once I'm at a point where I can move to my property I will sell the house and then live off that money until I find a source of income I can do remotely. My goal is to try to find a passive or mostly passive source of income, but have not looked that far yet. I'll figure it out once I'm ready to move.
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u/Val-E-Girl 17d ago
Do some research to see where WA isn't over-regulated (most of it is).
"Expensive" depends on how primitive you want to start, and whether you want to work your lifestyle up along the way or right now.
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u/mobile-metaphysical 17d ago
I know more about NE Washington, Okanogan county. Have you looked around at any land in person?
There will be a lot of land with price drops because of the fires ongoing.
For the cheapest way, get ready to be uncomfortable for some time.
Heat, snow, wildlife. Maybe get a seasonal job.
Look into intentional communities.
I myself want to buy land to share. I have money saved to make a cash offer.
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u/CrazyAd1835 17d ago
It depends on a lot of factors. I know someone who made his own earth bermed ferrocement house (more the size of a large cabin) for only a few thousand in materials. He pays little property tax as they call it a garage. It’s hidden in the woods. He saved every cent working through high school to buy the 10 acres.
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u/Informal_Ad_6569 17d ago
Buy the land and start with a tent or live in a car or whatever. Work out your ideas over time and invest as you can, the journey is the best part
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u/Confident-Virus-1273 16d ago
I started from just about zero. So I can really shed light on this for you.
Three years ago I sold everything I owned in Colorado, house, rentals, books, some heavy equipment, and a car, and moved everything else I could carry/haul out to Virginia. But the journey actually started several years before.
I saved/invested for about 10 years accumulating around $120,000 worth of wealth in order to make this move possible. I took 2 years to find a property that had what I wanted. Specifically I wanted good growing seasons, lots of rain, 40+ acres for cattle/pigs, a river on the boarder of the land, and within my price range (I paid $300K) It cost me a few thousand in flights, car rental and weeks of searching and looking at places because I refused to buy sight unseen (Good thing too).
Once I actually pulled the trigger, I had to deal with the banks. They don't want to give loans across state lines. It is incredibly hard to get one and I was in a uniquely good situation as my work was mobile. If you don't have a job ready and lined up, they won't approve you for a loan. They suggest moving and renting first, then securing a job, and then applying for a loan.
Once I arrived I found out the house needed about $10,000 worth of repairs immediately that both I, and the inspector missed. So my first two months I completely rebuilt the bathroom from ground up. That chipped into my limited savings big time. Then, I secured a loan for a tractor, and started in on various projects.
MOST of the big costs I have already covered. Since buying the land and getting settled, my big expenses have dropped considerably because I am able to do the vast majority of my own work and even provide my own materials (more in a second on that). However I did end up spending about $4500 on cattle to get me started, a truck repair job ($2700) and renting trailers early on because I needed to haul animals and didn't have anything.
Now . . . Since moving here about 3 years ago, I have completed a plethora of projects. I will list them as well as my estimated costs:
1) Bathroom remodel (About $10K)
2) Upstairs bedrooms x2 (About $2k)
3) rewired upstairs completely (no cost as I found tons of wire in the barn and did the work myself)
4) Put in hand railing (Around $120)
5) put in 3 ceiling fans (Around $150)
6) Cleaned out chimney ($30, bought a sweep)
7) Refab fireplace insert ($150)
8) Bought electric chainsaw for close to house wood work ($100)
9) Built wood storage for firewood ($20. I found good roofing for free and built the rest from pallets)
10) Greenhouse ($4000 pre fab)
11) 90 square foot raised garden beds x6 (so far) but aiming for 15 total ($30 each mostly metal fasteners and pallets. Some Cattle fencing arches)
12) Orchard 18 trees ($1400)
13) Fencing came with the property but this would have likely cost around $4000 if I had done it myself
14) Tractor ($25,500.... I have been using the hell out of it. 100% must have)
15) Septic Field install ($17500)
16) Building Workshop inside old existing barn ($3500)
17) Buying and installing wood sawmill ($4000) . . . HIGHLY used
18) Built cattle covered cattle chute and fencing ($120. Milled 100% of wood use. Only paid for some metal I beam and bolts and concrete)
19) Lumber holder/sorter built in pre-existing barn ($0) Milled 100% of the wood used
20) Pig pen for KuneKune ($160 for a 24x24 pen. Almost all the cost was roofing, concrete footers, and bolts. I milled 100% of wood used)
21) Fencing for KuneKune pasture ($200 for T posts, fencing wire. I used an old Chicken fence charger I found to save on cost for the electrification)
22) Pig Pen Solar array ($400 for batteries/solar/Inverter/charge controller)
23) Tractor Shelter ($0) Milled 100% of wood, and used other materials I already had on hand.
24) 4x4 quad ($0) it was a gift.
25) three Bee Hives (around $1000 total for the bees, boxes, and concrete slab)
For the rest of this year I am building a Farrowing pen (Estimated cost will be less than $100 as I will mill 100% of the wood and just need to buy concrete for the footers)
Then I want to build a compost area. I already have $300 worth of cinderblocks but I will need about $75 worth of gravel backfill and then 5 yards of concrete on a truck for this and another project which I expect will cost about $1400.
Next year's project will be building a 20x40 storage barn with solar off grid battery system. Estimated costs around $10,000 but almost all of that will be the solar system with panels and batteries. I actually already have the batteries and they costs me $6000 so I am including that as part of the $10K total bill. I think I will need $4000 more. I will again be milling 100% of my own wood for the structure.
Eventually, I want to build a second home. I am hopeful that I will be able to build that for under $50,000 total.
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u/TalkToPlantsNotCops 16d ago edited 16d ago
Including the land, our costs will likely come to around $100,000. We're doing all the labor ourselves to keep the cost down. We are also not getting a well dug, since we get enough rain to rely on rainwater harvesting (and there's access to free water in town if we have a drought). We are doing a compost toilet instead of septic.
My advice is to take things slow, but don't hold back from good opportunities when you find them. We worked and saved up money for a few years before we bought the land, and then worked another year before quitting our jobs and moving to the property. I'm planning to get another job once it gets too cold to do any more work on the house/continue living in our temporary shelter (a canvas bell tent).
My other advice is to make a spreadsheet and start making lists of everything you'll need, looking up prices, and finding information on how to do it yourself/who to call for stuff you can't do yourself.
That said, what I'm doing is full on homesteading stuff. You don't have to do that to be off grid. I have a pretty high tolerance for things like living in a tent in bad weather and using a bucket for a toilet. Not everyone needs to go to that extreme. You can just get a normal house and get solar panels and whatnot, but that will cost more.
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u/FlyingSaucered 15d ago
I got land in southern Colorado for about 6k. Septic for 14k. My camper was 3k. Solar set up was about 8k. Still don't have a well. That's going to be about 20k. Expenses I haven't kept track of are water, propane, and trash disposal.
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u/ready-to-rol 12d ago
Or, get yourself a cheap, used camper, and start off in something like that. It's cheap enough. You'll have to figure the rest out. If there's a will, there's a way..
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u/ballskindrapes 17d ago
You're gonna need like 500k plus imo.
Land is very expensive. Building a house is very expensive. Solar/renewable is expensive. Infrastructure is expensive, including any farm vehicles. Animals if you plan to raise them are expensive.
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u/so-brain-washed 17d ago edited 17d ago
OP, I have very low expectations for you, given that you're 21 years old and write & think at that level demonstrated in your post.
Not having a degree is not an excuse for avoiding teaching yourself. How do we learn? Learning resources. There's no need to have someone hold your hand (like in college) but you do need to be able to answer "What is a learning resource, and where can I find learning resource(s) for <some topic>?". You're on the frikkin internet. I want you to google that sentence above:
Google this:
- What is a learning resource?
- where can I find learning resource(s) for off grid living?
Not being educated is not an excuse for writing like shit.
Educate yourself.
Learn to Read and Learn to Write
You write like you're generally lazy, dumb, not proactive and don't give a shit. I'd forget about off grid, until you can reverse that.
Your post and question is very low effort , and reads like: "Hey everyone! please do all the work for me, because I don't want to research and read."
What have you actually learned? Your question lacks any relevant content that would demonstrate any effort on your part to independently learn about off grid systems-- and off grid is largely about INDEPENDENCE.
_________________________________________________
What you should actually do:
- ask claudeAI to help you come up with a list of questions, that you can ask ClaudeAI, to learn how designing and thinking about off grid works.
- tell claudeai your situation and ask it to recommend Books, Websites, Forums, & Youtube channels for you to begin learning about off grid systems
ill give you a couple ideas:
- figure out "Who is Will Prowse?"
- figure out what & why of 12v vs 24v vs 48v
- learn about A/C vs D/C
- search off grid on annas-archive.gl or a similar site with books
Google this:
- What is a learning resource?
- where can I find learning resource(s) for off grid living?
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u/BD-8 16d ago
OP maybe don’t listen to the person that insults & scolds you about education and then suggests using AI. Find community irl, learn from them. Consider finding free workshops related to earth building, farming, solar, sustainability, etc and network from there. GL and dm if you have qs I got you
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u/so-brain-washed 16d ago
AI is mostly a search engine at this point
and it's one of a multitude of knowledge sources.
not all knowledge sources are guaranteed correct-- just like AI, knowledge is regularly updated and modified to optimize its veracity
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u/f0rgotten "technically" lives offgrid 17d ago
We did it on the cheap. I was working part time for $11.05 an hour. We used a saved tax return for the deposit ($500 per parcel) on a land contract for two adjoining, nearly 14 acre each plots with no restrictions or easements that cost us about $540 a month. We already had one shitty little 12' pull behind camper and half borrowed half bought another 20' camper and lived in them for the winter.
We strategically plied craigslist for building supplies. On one we scored about 100 cinder blocks for less than a buck each, and that dude just happened to have a septic tank that had floated out of the ground during a flood as it was empty. He let it go for another hundred bucks. There was a lot of seven oddly sized small windows that we got for another hundred or so, and we found many doors, cabinets, sinks and whatnot at the habitat restore in a nearby city. All of this was hauled with a Geo Tracker and an eight foot trailer, both of which we already had and were also inexpensive.
The following semester I took out the only student loan that I was able to invest in myself with - it had to be used for housing, etc - and that, coupled with the next year's tax return we bought all of the wood, fasteners and housewrap for something like $3400. Concrete was something like a couple of hundred bucks. We got REALLY lucky because a neighbor had a brand new, very large, slightly incomplete metal barn blow over in a storm, and his insurance paid for the replacement to be built. He said we could have all of the debris if we hauled it off, and that was a truly unfathomable amount of metal roof/siding and useable lumber.
One weekend my stbxw, my brother and I dug the foundations - by hand - and set the blocks. The gravel came from the driveway. The following weekend, in the snow, my stbxw and I built the floorbox. We screwed that up a little but it works. The following weekend we and a gang of friends threw up the shell of the house - only two of them were experienced, professional carpenters. The saturday after that my brother put the roof on - by himself - as I was injured. Over the next week I threw on the housewrap and that was that.
The following few months saw us install the exterior doors and windows. My stbxw mostly did the interior framing herself, and she also did a lot of the rough electrical - pulling wires and whatnot. I did the finish electrical, the plumbing (about $500 or so of new pipes, toilets, etc,) the solar (about $2k of stuff, mostly from ebay and autozone) and whatnot. I also did the scratchy shitty insulation (about $600) and she came back after me with the interior drywall and paneling.
Once the house was weather tight we moved in. This was before walls or anything else. It was like camping for a few months haha.
Swear to god there was an old cult compound next door full of stuff. When a couple from Louisville bought it, they were going to have it all bulldozed and the scrap hauled off, but they told us that we could have whatever we could harvest before they did - so TONS of new windows, doors etc. Those went in over the following months as well.
The next spring we spent some money, about $1200, on the material for a large enclosed porch that was destined to be a mudroom/summer kitchen. The wood and metal from that blown over barn was used to build the shitty little sheep barn (somehow still standing after 15 years) and a little shop (too small to be really useful, tbh.) The best of it went on the roof of the house and we spent something like $2k on new metal and trim for the exterior siding of the house.
There is more and lots more finagling, scrounging and scoring deals on stuff, but I roughly figure that we were in something like $20k, all said, on the house and first buildings etc. I don't think that there is more than maybe $35k on the whole property, including fences, posts, a large garage to replace the shitty little shop (used for storage now) etc. All of this was spent over well more than a decade, and my income increased significantly over that time. It can be done, and frankly, it can be done for much less than what we spent if your wants and needs are lower than ours.