So it’s probably time to confess that we had been keeping a secret from our followers (and many of our friends and family) for a while now. After a year and a half of being on the road, we were still absolutely in love with traveling but we were beginning realize that having a homebase would be nice. We were entering our second summer and it confirmed a theory that we had been working on….we just don’t like traveling in the summer. Summer months are busier, campgrounds are crowded (and as a result noisier) and often more expensive, attractions have longer wait times, and people tend to be less friendly. We started thinking that it might be nice to have our own private retreat during the summer months.
We also had financial reasons for wanting to buy land…we were running out of money. I have always been completely honest on this blog and have been pretty transparent on our other social media sites so I’m not going to stop now. Traveling was much more expensive than we expected. A lot of it is 100% our fault with frivolous purchases like eating out, admission to zoos and museums and theme parks, our E-bikes, and entertainment like Broadway shows and dinner cruises. All of that is on top of paying for campsites, regular groceries and gas. Harley had that snake bite that she was hospitalized for back in January and then had a lump removed from her chest. Pandora sliced her tail open last summer in Maine which resulted in an emergency ER visit which then led to the discovery that her thyroid was not working properly and that she had advanced dental disease. We had to make vet visits every 6 weeks, then every 3 months, and now every 6 months to recheck her bloodwork and get medication refills. Then she had a dental cleaning and had some teeth pulled once she was healthy enough for that.
We also didn’t realize everything that we would need to be able to travel when we set out back in 2022. We didn’t take into account a portable gray water tank ($300), Star Link internet for when we can’t get Verizon or TMobile service ($450 for equipment and $150 per month), batteries for backup power/solar (around $3500 so far), an RV GPS so we don’t run into bridges ($500), a gazebo so we can be outside when the mosquitoes and biting flies are bad ($300), all new tires on the house and car ($1500), the axle repair ($2500), replacing our air conditioner after it fell off the house during our first move ($1500), a second jack to help lift and level the house ($600), redoing the entire living room because our design wasn’t really effective (around $1300) and the list goes on and on. Buying property (for the right price) would definitely help cut down on campground fees and give us a place to do our own repairs and regular maintenance. Building a shed on our own property and emptying our storage unit will save us an additional $120 per month.
We were also tired. Rushing around the country from state to state, campground to campground, and place to place is a lot of fun but is also kind of exhausting. We usually only have one to two weeks to explore an area before we move on so we feel like we have to keep full calendars and not waste a single moment. We hardly ever take “down days” to just lay around and rest.
Finally, we miss our hobbies. A lot of you probably have realized that I love Halloween and all things spooky….but most of my stuff is packed away in storage. I would also love to get into rock tumbling but there just isn’t room in the tiny house and it would be a giant mess to try to deal with when we move. And then there are John’s hobbies. It’s really hard to carry around tools for woodworking, 3D printing or laser cutting when you live in a tiny house and moving so often makes it impossible to keep machinery calibrated properly. Woodworking is also very loud sometimes-not ideal for campground life.
So, we made the decision back in the spring to start looking for land and John kept his eye on real estate listings. We hadn’t really decided on an area so we were considering several different states – we just needed somewhere with a decent sized yard, that was affordable, and that would allow us to have the tiny house AND our pit bull. Easy, right?
We actually took one of our days in Ohio to drive south to Kentucky to check out a few properties. We really liked one but it was kind of in the middle of nowhere. We visited a few that we could barely get the car down the dirt road to the property- there was no chance for pulling the tiny house in there. And one we couldn’t even find and gave up.
We also started checking out properties as soon as we got to Michigan. We made little evening or afternoon drives to check out bits of land here and there. We even took a drive to Cheboygan to view an old church. It was a beautiful building and was only listed at $40k (and we thought we could get it for less) but would have required SO MUCH work to even make it livable. Plus there was no yard and nowhere to park the tiny house.
Finally, just about 10 minutes from our campground in Bellaire, Michigan, we found a spot that we both loved. It is a beautiful 4.4 acre wooded lot on the corner of a paved road and a dirt road. There is municipal water and electric run along the road at one side of the property so it will be cheaper and easier to run those utilities at this property than at any other we checked out. We will have to install a septic tank, however, before we can move there. And my favorite part – other than the requirement for septic/sewer- there are NO zoning laws. Living in Johnstown for 10 years was enough for me. I never want anyone to be able to tell me what I can and can’t do on or to my own property for as long as I live.
Of course, it doesn’t hurt that we are within 45 minutes of dozens of beaches.
We closed on July 24th in Traverse City and are so excited to start working. We have a lot of trees to clear and a ton of stuff to do before we build anything but we are determined. We probably won’t finish everything this summer so we plan to stay at Chain O Lakes campground for the rest of the season this year and get as much done on the property as possible. In October (when the campground shuts off the water and closes for the year), we will head south to spend the winter. At this point, we are looking at Mobile, Alabama again as we really enjoyed ourselves last year and think that we can stay there pretty affordably. We are going to be paying for campsites AND making our $400 per month payment on the land so that is going to make finances a little strained but we will figure it out. We will return in the spring to finish whatever doesn’t get done this year and hopefully be able to move the tiny house onto our own land next summer.
We will probably slow down a little over the next few years to save money, fix up our property, and rest but at this time we don’t plan to completely stop traveling at any point so we hope that anyone reading this will continue to follow along on our adventures. And even if we aren’t exploring a new state every few weeks – there are a ton of things to see and do in our new home state of Michigan that we are excited to check out. And of course, we can’t wait to share updates on our property with you!
