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An overview of the last 4 years living off-grid

This December will be 4 years for us living 100% off-grid, I can tell you it’s been quite the adventure, my only regret is that we didn’t do this earlier. Let me recap what we have been doing these 4 years…

 

Our pre-off-grid life was pretty much like most anyone else, we lived in a regular house, a mobile home actually, in a regular neighborhood in north central Texas. PB owned his own business, taking care of restaurant equipment for several big name companies and a smattering of smaller ones, he was a one-man-band, no employees. I worked 2 jobs, the first as a merchandiser and pricing coordinator for a big box electronics company and the other job was as a trainer in a semi-well known gym for women. We weren’t what you would call well off financially, but we were happy.

We were both empty nesters from previous marriages, in the beginning neither one of us knew the other had a secret desire to live off-grid, when we began to explore the idea of actually doing this, it didn’t take us long to find our perfect plot of land in far west Texas, it was just under 6 acres of unimproved, rough, almost inaccessible land on the side of a mountain in the high desert.

I cashed in my stock from my job and had enough to buy the land and had a little left over to buy some building material for the start of the cabin (soon to be renamed the sky castle). In less than 2 weeks, PB had a minimal structure built, it was enough for us to move in. We were able to get some solar panels, a charge controller, a few deep cycle batteries and a few other things we needed to get started. We began to disassemble our current city lives, PB shut down his business, I quit both of my jobs, and on December 22, 2007 we moved all of our remaining belongings to our new life in west Texas.

The first few months were pretty rough, we lived in a most primitive manner, some might even say our first few years were pretty primitive, I suspect some might even say we still live very primitively, that’s OK, it’s quite wonderful to me. We met a great neighbor who gave us some help, it made life a bit easier, things like access to his water well instead of having to go to the community well, access to his washer and dryer instead of washing by hand and hanging to dry, access to his shower instead of taking spit baths… all things we were prepared to do on our own, but having such a great neighbor we were able to do many things a little easier, in return we do most of the maintenance on his house, we do other things for him too, so it’s a fair trade.

We quickly learned about the barter system and before long we had enough connections with the community that when anyone had some used, scrap or excess building materials, they would contact us first to see if we could use it. Most of the rest of the sky castle was built using this scrap material that would have otherwise gone to the landfill. PB would go and tear down a building at a friend’s property and we would get to take the material home. Please understand, we aren’t tree huggers, we aren’t doing any of this because it’s “green”, for us it was cheap and expedient, the fact that we were in fact being green was merely a bonus.

Little by little we built up our little place into a home, with running water, eventually installing on demand propane powered water heaters, water tanks for more water storage, we built another room, the first one was 16×16, the addition was 12×12, we built on decks and eventually, my favorite addition, the shower. We also began to work on other things, like the garden, putting up out buildings, sheds and such.

All of this has taken time and lots of sweat, we have spent very little money, mainly because we do everything ourselves, and a lot of experimentation, some of which worked great, some which failed miserably. We have been blessed by good health and only minor accidents, mostly scrapes and splinters. We have grown to really love our little community, I’d say that has been as important as anything we have done. No matter how perfect your place might be, if you aren’t happy with or welcome into your community, that will not end up in a good way.

Now we are living like kings, at least that is my opinion, of course by most people’s standards including the government, we live well under the poverty level, but I wouldn’t have it any other way, I love my life, I love living with the freedom I have, I love working hard for what we have, it really does make me appreciate each and every little thing we have. When we first started out, I was hauling 3 one gallon containers of water up the hill from my neighbor’s house every day, sometimes twice a day, I guarantee you that makes me appreciate my 1550 gallon poly plastic water container with all the plumbing involved, doing dishes and laundry by hand inside my sky castle, getting to shower with hot running water…

I look forward to many more years with PB, improving our lives and the sky castle. The last couple of days has been quite fun for PB, one of our friends and neighbors came by, he had been eyeballing the gravel in our creek bed, he offered a trade for a few trailer loads of gravel, he let us use his Bobcat tractor to do some dirt work, PB achieved in a few hours of work what would have taken him weeks if not months of hard manual work, it cost zero dollars, but was priceless for us. I have to say that life is good.

A big part of my happiness is because of my faith, I found a little church in the neighborhood (we are blessed with 2 of them close by), I joined and quickly became active in the church, now I’m on the board of trustees, working to make things better and better. I have been a Christian for many years, most of my life, but living out here and being part of this church and community has helped me grow in my faith and get closer to God. I’m not saying that is necessary for you, (though for me it is), it’s a choice you have to make, I am saying that going to church is a good way to get closer to your community, and hopefully to God too, I am blessed everyday and in every way, even in the bad times, there is always a lesson to learn, a period of growth, a strengthening. Getting to live in and near nature allows me to personally witness Divinity on a daily basis.

I have many people contact me to ask for my advice on how they should go about moving off-grid, how to do it cheaply, how they should do it… it’s difficult to answer because everyone is different, everyone has different standards of how they want to live, everyone has different ideas and circumstances. My biggest advice is to have a dream and set goals, let nothing come between you and your goals, I have found that people will do what they really want to do, and unfortunately there are many who wish but don’t take the action necessary to make their wish a reality. I’m not judging, just stating the facts about what I see.

If you truly want to live off-grid, then do it, you don’t have to do it all at once, but start taking the steps necessary to get you to the place where you want to be. Each step you take is a step closer to your dream, don’t let life get in the way, don’t let family, friends, a job, or anything else get in the way, do what is necessary to make yourself happy and the rest of everything will fall into place. I’m not advocating doing anything illegal, I’m assuming that most of my readers are reasonable, law abiding people. I am advocating living your life to the fullest extent, and if that includes living off-grid, then do it.

If you want to learn more about our lives living off-grid, you can read more of my stories here

https://off-grid.net/section/wretha/

you can also read about us in the book Off the Grid: Inside the Movement for More Space, Less Government, and True Independence in Modern America by Nick Rosen, we are chapter 9 in the book.

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98 Responses

  1. Hi Wretha,
    I think it is great what you two have accomplished.
    I am hoping to start my plan in action by march 2014. I will be in Tennessee area. There is so much to learn. I am grateful for all the information
    Everyone has posted. Thanks! God Bless everyone!

  2. I lived this life when I was growing up and I regret ever leaving it. Good for you for making it happen. The greed and uncaring attitude of society is depressing.

  3. i have longed to “get away from it all” for many years now, and it has always been a dream of mine. i have raised my kids (twins) to be young, responsible adults, as a single parent. now that they are just about on their own, i am researching more seriously on how to be self sufficent, and am starting to set goals. i do not feel as if i belong in our current society of materialism, greed, and addiction to money. i do not agree with our current system of money driven insanity. i would rather raise my own, grow my own, and barter with my neighbor for labor and supplies. i do understand i will need money for taxes, etc..
    but no where near as much as i need now.

    i would love to hear from anyone who has done this solo, as this path to “freedom” i walk, i walk alone. it seems the only doubts i have stem from doing this solo. all stories of going off-grid, etc., i have read involve couples. find it discouraging (sp?) not to find one article on this world wide web of someone doing this solo. i cant be the only one…unibomber doesnt count.

    i have done some research on self sufficent communities and would love to hear any stories, experiences, etc.. one might have. unsure of many i have seen, as you are more or less renting the land from them.

    i offer my congrads to those of you who have worked hard in making your dreams a reality. thank you for sharing your experiences.

  4. Well written, my two cents on living off-grid, you first have to change your life style, then you can change your living style. We’ve been living off-grid in northwest Arizona for four years now, we have 80 acres, and enjoy every min of it. But it wasn’t always fun. We moved there because we had too, not because we wanted to. We had to adapt on the fly, and we did it with a young child, and with the struggles of demanding jobs. The morale of my story, everything is possible, just have to find a way.

    Again great story!

  5. I enjoyed reading about your experience going off-grid. Very inspirational. Myself and my boyfriend are intending to do this as soon as we can find the perfect plot of land :)

  6. I am currently working on getting “off-grid” in TN. I have inherited 8 acres of mostly wooded property attached to my 1 acre I currently live on for which I have a mortgage. I already garden and have milk goats. The property has a spring that feeds a small branch. I am trying to find out how to best harvest this water for cooking and showering. I am considering (and trying to convince the hubby) to rent out our home to someone else, while we live on the other part of the property. I lived free on this property before we met in a small trailer which he hated, and I wish we had never built the house. I am a little more “flexible” than he is on living conditions. Anyway, any ideas on capturing the spring water?

    1. Hi Leikeelin, thanks for asking, I live in the desert so we don’t have flowing water except during the monsoon season, and even that is hit or miss… I don’t have an answer for you, perhaps you could come over to the forum here and post the same question there, there are many off-gridders there and someone might have an answer for you.

      Wretha

  7. Hi Wretha. It has been awhile since I have come on here to read some of the articles. I stayed in Pecos for about three weeks, a week and a half of that camping on my land. i bought a bike and rode 7 miles to town and again back to the property. What a learning experience that was. I have a bike trailer up here in Washington that I use a lot to go to the store and when I go just riding too and I sure wished that I had it down there! I was getting a gallon or two of water from town and had to go in every day. The trailer would have helped so much! We don’t have containers to hold water yet, but plan on having a few. I met a nice woman and her son and daughter in law and stayed with them the other week and a half that I was down there, helped the son and daughter in law with some work and got paid for it. That was nice. My boyfriend and I are planning on going down for a week this summer and staying on our property. :)

  8. Elise, I hope you do blog about it, it’s easy to do, and it is fun too, sometimes I go back to my older posts and re-read them, reminds me how far we have come. Enjoy your trip, I was just in Pecos yesterday, passed through on my way home, it’s pretty there, take some pix and share them if you want to. :)

    Wretha

  9. Thank you Wretha. I have actually been thinking about blogging about our experiences with living off-grid. I am actually heading down by greyhound on Monday to Pecos to get started on a few things on our property. Will be camping on our property while I am there. Should be interesting!

  10. Love reading all these comments! My husband and I are also planning on living off the grid soon! We bought 5 forested acres in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California about 7 years ago. Since then we have installed a septic and a well. The well has a solar powered pump that fills a 1,500 gallon cistern. We will build our house with insulated concrete forms not just for the energy effiency, but also because the house will be less likely to burn in the event of a forest fire. We will have a solar and wind hybrid system and use propane for cooking. We will have a hybrid solar hot water heater, using heat from our masonry fireplace heater to heat water in the winter. We planted our orchard this past winter (2 apples, 2 cherries, 2 apricots, 2 peaches, 1 plum and 1 walnut) and will add another walnut, 2 almonds, another plum and a pear tree this next winter. We are going to raise our vegetables in a raised garden and will have chickens. We will collect rainwater (we already collect rainwater from our 10×12 tool shed for the orchard into two 1,500 gallon cisterns) from the house into cisterns to water the vegetable garden, so that we don’t have to pump water from the well to grow our food. Our house plans are about to be finalized and then next summer or fall we will be applying for our permits from the county. I can’t wait! We already spend most every weekend and vacation up there in our travel trailer because it takes only about 1- 1/2 hours to get there, and because my husband is still working. Soon………

    1. That sounds great Vickie! I hope you are keeping a journal about what you have been doing and what you will do in the future, write in a blog and you will have lots of followers enjoying what you are doing from afar, or if you only do it for yourself, it’s fun to go back and read about how you started out. :)

      Wretha

  11. Hi Wretha. I love reading how you are doing things off-grid and also all the comments that people have posted. My boyfriend and I are buying ten acres in Reeves county and are planning to go off-grid, with solar and possibly wind power- because we still want to be able to watch our movies and have some lights. We have done a lot of research into having animals, I grew up on a 5 acre farm with sheep, goats, chickens and a couple cows, so I know some, but need refreshing on them, and we both want a garden and be pretty much self sufficient. We both have realized that we will need some money to pay property taxes, car insurance and maintanence and also buy a few things from the store that we can’t make ourselves. I have been looking into making my own soap and candles also. I have found a lot of good information on the internet and we hope to be on our property full time within the next couple years! Thank you sooo much for all your good advice!

    1. Good for you Elise! Sounds like you and your boyfriend have things well in hand, I would love to hear more about what you are doing and how you are doing as time goes by. Keep in touch. I would recommend either blogging or at least keeping a journal of your life as you do this, if nothing else, for yourself, it’s fun to go back and read about what you did a year or two later. You can also earn some money this way, people are very interested in reading about how other people live off-grid, I also know that this site is always looking for good writers, especially those living the life.

      Wretha

  12. All this sounds like both work and fun! Maybe one of your readers has an idea how much it costs to dig a 300′ deep well in hudspeth cty? And how big a windmill I’d have to have? Solar powered water pump and purifier didn’t seem to cost much, that was a plus. I’d like to find a landowner down there who can answer questions about all kinds of things, such as hardpan, bedrock, what fenceposts are best, the whole free range thing, etc.

    1. Hi Ann, the best way to find out about well drilling prices and your other questions is to call the local well drillers in that area. Even if you find a landowner who can answer your question, the prices might not be the same as it was when they had it done.

      Wretha

  13. We took a different approach. We live on a Native reserve in Ontario, Canada. We turned our existing home into 5 apartments to rent out for income and moved into our 2,000 sq. ft. cottage on the waterfront of Lake Ontario. It was going to be way too expensive to have regular power put in so we just started buying solar panels and batteries and are doing fine for 2 years now. We wouldn’t have it any other way. Our system is small but we still have all the conviences of modern life by purchasing energy efficient appliances and finding alternate ways of doing things when we have to. Our son in New York followed our lead and he is now off the grid, too. Its just a good thing to do for your family, to teach them about power usage and waste.

  14. So glad to have run across this blog! Kudos Wretha you have accomplished much to be proud of, and incidently I really appreciate your blogging about your experience. I have dreams about living in a more natural existance. I am 58 and have lived in areas where not by choice we lived without electricity or water at times as a result of storms, one right after another. I have also lived in a well thought out home on a mountain on a small island where we caught our water for drinking etc, and tried to live as “naturally” as possible. I say naturally because I don’t believe it was ever my in-laws intent to live “off the grid” or “off the land” etc. It was more that lifestyle was different there. I loved every minute of it!!! I want to retire in the islands and live as naturally as possible. I currently barter and am trying to create a living by using the internet. I have some small online magazines which I am trying to develope for my retirement. I appreciate what all of you are doing, for all of your own personal reasons. The best being for our children to know! Good luck to all..keep up the hard work and keep blogging!

  15. Roscoe…I’m so jealous. What I mean is…I wish I’d had been as smart as you so many years ago to have all that experience (not to mention land/livestock) under my belt. I guess being a girl, then a single mother held me back. Even when I didn’t know what self-sustainability meant, I knew I “felt” it. I yearned for it. The closest I came to living it was packing my kids up every Spring/Summer/Fall living in a tent at a campground. Everyone thought I was nuts, but I needed the quiet, the stars out at night, cooking over a fire. And, didn’t want my kids sitting in front of the TV all day. I still worked, just came home to the small, primitive campground. A few years ago I spent 18 months completely OTG and out of the country, living in southern Mexico, but my kids were adults and I was alone…and in a good climate.
    Central IL is good for growing food, I do garden and a small amount of canning. But, I certainly cannot chop enough wood to keep warm through winter, if need-be. And, after working all day, too tired to do any hard labor in the evening.
    Now I’m almost 50…I see the economy in the tank. If I had any savings, I’d buy a plot of land, get me a big camper or build a small cabin and prep every conceivable necessity for when SHTF. I’d get a place ready for my kids/grandkids to live in a rural area, when it all goes to hell, sooner rather than later. The best I’ve done so far is a 6 month food supply stocked-up in my mother’s basement. No stockpiled propane or other method of cooking, however.
    So…got any advice for a lady who wants the lifestyle and NEEDS the life change? I am a hard worker, I just need some organization in my plan. Actually, I need just a simple emergency plan, and forget the rest. any advice from anyone out there is appreciated. I’ll stop rambling now.

  16. first let me say this—-the entire us is interconnected with an electrical grid (every place is connected to every other place with electric wires) so “living off ” the grid means just that not connected to electric service. thats what the term originally meant and still does, no matter how some of you “newbies” want to change it. NO ELECTRIC SERVICE period. self sustaining means no outside help. !!!file that under need to know!!!

    amanda just found this string, doing good, continue. Doomas, just a little negitive. People the first thing you need to understand is with out some monitary income or savings you WILL fail in the first year so plan well and save hard because it will be hard mentally and phyically (sp?) . Off-Grid possible, self sustaining damn near impossable. I’ve been playing almost 50 years and I’m ready but wont give up some creature comforts until nessary. House and outbuildings 20 acres pasture and 40 acre hay field or expanding room. horses, goats, rabbits, chickens and quail with breeding programs so I can use offspring for barter (I sell for cash now). Have been gathering and storing items for barter as I also belive all our money wont buy doodle soon.
    Havent had a real job since retiring from the military in 1980. Nice to live the way you want to, get up about 5, tend to the stock, eat breakfast about 8, do needed chores til about 2, eat again(what a waste of time), piddle at want to stuff garden, lawn, bees, pen building, machine upkeep til about 6, tend to stock again, then free time reading, record keeping, internet ect. Yep its a good life, keep busy, hard work,good eats and you will enjoy life a long time. So save, plan, save, work, save, do it!!

  17. Hey lady I’m still looking for land here in Texas and in Central Texas these realtors are full of u know what. They want way too much money for the properties here. So west Texas is sounding better. I saw some for sale in Ward County with a good price. Why don’t you send me an email and lets talk.I talked my husband on board with this idea and he seems to be more interested than ever cause his job is getting to him. Stressed out 24/7 and i’m at my wits end. lol but we are looking forward to it. Im getting in the groove with my planting skills and have grown some stuff.We got a good rainstorm tonite.All we need is the land and we got everything else on backup.

  18. Did you factor in the cost for a well being drilled in South East Arizona? Your looking at around $35.00 a foot and a depth of anywhere between 500 feet to 1,500 feet or more.

  19. Wicryeker; Six months planning would not be enough for me. I think things through and try things out before I settle on one thing. I guess I just have to prove to my self how one or the other will work. Good luck and keep us posted!!!

  20. my fiance and i are taking some final steps to get us physically off the grid, in just short of a week now : )

    we have been planning this for about 6 months, the house isnt dried in yet, but we have solar panels and plans to dig our own septic and water well….. we couldnt be happier : ) ill be subbing at the school out there so we will have a little bit of money coming in to help out with everything : )

  21. Wretha; If I remember the window air conditioner uses the ‘dreaded’ electric. You can install earth cooled air and it runs its self. Not needing much at night makes it even better. Uses natural heat convextion. It will run 24-7 on solar so its very cheap. If you have a interest e-mail me.

  22. Wreatha; Hows the heat in the summer in west Texas? Do you have any cool air to live with? You can get a natural air condition system that pretty much runs its self after its built. Not real expence either.

    1. Jeff,

      It can get pretty warm here, 90s to 100 during the hottest part of summer, but being the high desert and in the mountains, it cools off quite a bit at night, sometimes you have to wear something on your arms in the summer evenings. Generally the people out here use swamp coolers (evaporative coolers), most just use fans though, that’s what we do. We brought a small window unit air conditioner with us, but haven’t even taken it out of the box. It’s one of the reasons why we chose this area, mild weather that can get crazy every now and again :)

      Wretha

  23. Just a word to all,,,,, why do I sign Doomas and my e-mail is jeff—–I spent 30 years in the horse shoeing business and everyone called me Doomas.. My wife set the e-mail account up and she don’t like Doomas !!!!!!!!!! I guess you understand.

  24. Wretha; The term ‘off-grid’ was coined when someone was off the electric grid. Now people think you have to be issolated from society and liveing totally ‘untouched by other humans’ I don’t see how anyone could live with out contact with others. I guess if I wake up somemorning and am all alone, I ‘ll find out. I’m all for offering help to others who are trying to cut there liveing expences or in other words provide all they can for them selves. There are many levels to work from and work to. Some people want to get totality ‘out’ and others just want to heat a green house in the spring. You just need to ask questions and show some interest. I for one,and many others, will try to get you started in the right direction. You just need to figure how interested you really are. That will dictate how you should go about the cure for your problem. I look at all things as haveing three levels of cure. First would be bare bones, cheep,lots of baby sitting, alot of hands on. The second would be alittle more refind, relible, hands on to understand and build, proven ideas. You can build this your self and understand it. The third would be built out of store bought goods, high tech electronics, lots of override systems, relible but high dollor. I feel high tech systems can have high tech problems.
    I like people to be involved with the build and purchase of the supplies. Also figureing out how and why things work the way they do so they under stand the system. I would not want to build you a system and have you call one day and say it not working. Travel all the way to your house and find a lose or broked wire! Its better for everyone to understand what they are getting into. That why we plan ahead and share our plan outline. In hope we can learn more to make things better for ourselves. Good luck to you and any one else who reads this post. If you want or need ideas from any one just ask, someone will try to help.

  25. Wretha; If you feel safe and have piece of mind, thats great !!!!! I feel sorry for the group that have made no plans at all. You have acted on your plan and have it working for you. You are so far ahead, and you can make changes as you need. They are still in the infancy of this movement. There is no ideal that I know of, but if it works to some degree for you, Great, good for you, stick to your guns and injoy what live throughs your way !

    1. Thanks Jeff/Doomas, I have been attacked and accused of not really living off-grid before, it usually comes from ignorant people who think that unless one is living in a cave, wearing skins and eating worms, you can’t possibly call yourself off-grid. I don’t mind conversing with people who are willing to have intelligent conversations and ask honest questions, for the rest of them, I’ll leave them to stew in their own misconceptions. I suppose it’s easier for them to point fingers and make accusations rather than DOING something themselves.

      Thanks,
      Wretha

  26. Terry; What you say is so true. I speak to people all the time who think liveing off the grid is just not haveing to pay rent. I feel they have no clue and we will see them in the hunt for food as well. Things are going to get alot worse before they get better. I wish more people would get going on this. There is a real need, NOW.

  27. I didn’t notice any mention of what you had for food or where food came from and using stuff your neighbors provided and propane doesn’t sound like you are really “off the grid” Also, I wonder how someone “off the grid” can post on the Internet?

    I think someone needs to explain what living “off the grid” actually means.

    If you want to actually “live off the grid” you don’t just live like a bum under a bridge and go eat at McDonalds from money you got at the off ramp with your little “will work for food” sign. You got to secure your OWN INDEPENDENT supply of food and water… and medical supplies.

    The MOST likely NEED for anyone to live off the grid is when the government fails …probably due to economic meltdown. Money will be worthless and no one will go to work and police will go home to take care of their families. Anarchy will ensue. Security will be the biggest problem. Hordes of people will leave cities to forage for food when the wheels of transportation stop turning and power goes off. NO national Guard will come to the rescue and the president won’t even fly over and whisper a prayer for your poor wretched soul.

    You are probably more “ready” that than most but just because you don’t have electricity and have built your house out of discarded cardboard boxes doesn’t mean you are ready for the S to hit the fan.

    1. Terry, seems like you have it all figured out so there is really no need to defend or explain my definition of living off-grid. Hope life goes good for you when the SHTF or not, I know it will for me.

      Wretha

  28. John, It would be good for you to fugure were you want to get to, then how to get there. Most people worry about the case of the world comming to an end. I don’t see that. The first place to start generating your own power. Start with 3 batteries. find some cheap 12volt lights from a old camper and hook them up. You will resuse them when you up grade. As you build and figure things out you can buy more and add on.Read my reply to Laurie and put your self in her place. When your ready to jump off, their are people to give advice. You just need to show interest and ask!!!!!!!

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