Watching people go down in flames with subprime loans and having to go bankrupt I thought today that I would give an alternative approach to the situation out of the 1970s.
I guess it all started when my father and the father of a good friend each independently on their own decided to buy land and to build their own houses on weekends. My friends father built a beautiful house on property he bought in Palos Verdes, a very nice place to live near the ocean between Long Beach and Redondo Beach in southern California.
My father decided to buy land and to build his retirement home himself on weekends in Yucca Valley, California even though he worked during the week near San Diego.
So, in 1968 my father bought land up on Yucca Mesa near Yucca Valley. He bought 2 1/2 acres of land. At the time it was high desert land with only cholla cactus and ancient mesquite bushes and creosote bushes and the like and of course the very visible Joshua trees everywhere. Soon, he had power to the land and he hired someone to dig a hole with a tractor for the septic tank. Later after my father and I and a several good friends had dug out the land for a cement foundation for the house and put in place all the plumbing for a bathroom and kitchen we called up a cement company and had them deliver enough yards of cement to pour the cement slab for our house.
At that time I think the land was only $3500 and I know my father didn't pay more than 20,000 dollars for the material to build our house and only bought it as he needed it. He bought the whole house as he built it out of pocket and only bought the land on credit, nothing else and built it himself with me and Mom and friends when they wanted to help over 12 years. All that time we had an old 1946 Spartan Aluminum 28 foot trailer that we stayed in on weekends when we were there. We also built a storage shed that could be drug by truck to a new location as needed to store building material, my off road motorcycles etc. And on top of this flat roofed well built storage shed we put a 1200 gallon water tank so we could have water and bought it from a water company that would deliver potable water at that time for about ten dollars or so a load of water(1200 gallons) by truck.
By 1980, after working on it almost every weekend since 1968, the house was finally finished and built much better than you could likely buy a house at the time. My father overbuilt everything because we live in California and earthquakes are always likely big or small. Though my Dad passed on in 1985 after being retired only 5 years the house has sustained no damage from any of the big quakes that hit there since 1980 because of being so well built.
Because my buddy's father and my father built their own houses, my buddy and I both decided one day we would each buy land and build our own houses too. So after my Buddy got his master's degree from UCLA, he went to the Southern Cascade Mountains and bought land (2 1/2 acres). At the time the land was about $5000 for land at about 3700 feet in elevation where it might snow 3 feet deep or more some winters. I helped him build this house and clear the land for the house before that. Though initially there were trials and tribulations because he was not initially a builder, he didn't give up and learned how to do everything right, got his house passed by the county inspectors, put a well on his land, got electricity and now even cable run to his land and even though his initial investment was 5000 dollars on time for the land and then 20,000 in material for his house and another 20,000 for a music studio and then another 40,000 recently for another music studio, his entire investment in his home and property material wise has been only 85,000 over the last 30 years and his home is worth about 1,000,000 dollars now. But here is the really beautiful part.
HE HAS NOT PAID RENT OR A MORTGAGE PAYMENT SINCE 1976. So, he lived at the house he built that he paid for as he built it and never had a mortgage ever. By 1980 the land was paid for and he has been free and clear ever since. Since my friend is also a musician and successful now, he can travel all over the world and do concerts and write all his expenses in traveling for concerts off as a business expense.
So, would you rather have a subprime or do something like this and completely own your own home on 2 1/2 acres of land outright?
By the way I thought I should tell you of my experience. First of all I sold the land I built an A-Frame on in 1989 while I was living in Hawaii on Maui with my wife and 3 of my kids.
Beginning in 1980 I got married and so my 6 year old son from my first marriage and my wife's 2 kids from her first marriage and I all got together and bought 2 1/2 acres on the side of tall mountain in a remote area at 4000 feet. In this location 7 feet of snow at one time was not unusual between January and March. So, between these months I had to watch the skies very carefully to see when to get my cars or trucks out of there as the roads were not plowed by the county. I found it practical to be there home schooling my kids about 6 to 9 months a year. So in the end it was more like a remote mountain cabin that we loved with a water spring and incredibly beautiful view of the mountain. However, from my present vantage point of age 60, it was pretty remote to consider being there more than about 6 months a year at most.
The land was reasonable in 1980. It was only about $8000. However, since there is still no electricity available there (except solar) now in 2008 the land by itself if undeveloped might only be $10,000 in value now 26 years later.
Since my father and I had built several houses together and since he had trained me as an electrician's helper summers between my ages 12 and 17 he offered to help me set the foundations and build my a-frame house. I had decided upon and A-frame because of the location. It was the only shape I knew for sure that could shed 7 feet of snow or more and wouldn't collapse the roof if no one was there that winter. So we decided upon an A-Frame. Next, they had torn down a sawmill nearby so I went to the dump and found 9 3 foot by 3 foot cement pyramids with the tops cut off for pier block construction. Since they weighed about 300 pounds each, 4 strong male adults could lift these things and put them in the back of a pickup truck.
Next, we sold one of our vehicles, a 1971 VW Camper van and with the money bought enough building materials to build our house. We put a loft in the A-Frame for sleeping and it worked well because all the heat from the wood stove rises so even when it is cold downstairs it was warm up in the loft. We put a lot of windows on the two vertical ends of the A-Frame and faced one toward a breathtaking view of the mountain and placed my wife's and my bed with the head toward the beautiful view. So, every morning I could look at it and be grateful to be there out in the wild.
So, since we paid cash for the land, after we built our A-Frame all we had to pay were the land taxes because everything was paid for. We chose to live off the grid so there were no electrical bills. Water we hauled from our spring. So there was no rent to pay, no mortgage to pay and plenty of time to home school the kids. With the exception of the last ten years of my life, building that house in the wilderness and home schooling my older kids was the happiest time of my life for about 5 years.
Once again, living this way is not for everyone. But for me, my friend, my father and his father it was and is the American Dream!
Why not live the American dream and forget about the subprime loans? Then you will own your home and land outright! Then if you homestead it no one will be able to take it away from you!
Note: The following url tells something about homestead laws in California if you are homesteading land in another state look information up on the internet in regard to homesteading land in your state.
http://www.wwlaw.com/homestd.htm
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