Sell house to become "self sufficient!" Kind of!!

annaangeluk_2

I'm looking for some advice and I hope this is the right place to post this!

First of all a bit of background! I'm 28 and a single mother with a 5 year old dd. I live just outside leeds city centre in a house I bought when I was a few months pregnant. I work part time in an office (pensions! V dull!) and there is a very real threat of redundancy in the near future!

Over the past few years I've been very disallusioned with my life and hopes for dd's future. The area we live in is predominantly council and unfortunately quite rough. On my street alone out of 16 houses we have one flasher, a prostitute, a drug dealer and a young lad in a gang. As you can imagine this is not the ideal area to be bringing up a child.

My father sold life insurance and pensions for a living so always bought me up to believe that buying your own house etc is the only option for your future, which my sister did at 18 and i did at 20! He passed away suddenly at easter aged just 53. He paid into all these things all his life and planned for his retirement yet he never got the chance to enjoy any of it.

My sister and her husband have sold their house and are emmigrating to Canada at the end of this year! I want to change my life and my daughter's but I'v no idea how to do it!

My ideal "dream" would be to buy or rent a little bit of land, live in a caravan, keep a couple of chickens and grow my own fruit and veg! DD would obviously go to school in a nice little village and I would hopefully have enough money in the bank to take a year or two to do a home study course and voluntary work and eventually get a job working with children.

I recently had my house valued and after paying off mortgage, fees etc I would have a lump sum of £50k that i would like to bank the majority of and use some to set myself up. I would also have a monthy income (child maintainence from ex plus child benefit) of £230 pm, although not a lot it would be something, especially if we could cut our cost of livin right down.

Am I being totally unrealistic and ridiculous?????? Is this at all possible with land prices etc? I really feel if I don't do something soon both are lives are never going to amount to anything. I know that sounds overly dramatic but it really does feel like that!

I apologise this is such a long post but changing your life is not a matter for just a couple of words!!

Looking forward to any advice from all of you wonderfully knowledgeable, lovely people!!

Thanks x

Generali

You could almost certainly do something like that in central or eastern Europe or SE Asia if you're prepared to take the leap.

annaangeluk_2

Generali wrote: »

You could almost certainly do something like that in central or eastern Europe or SE Asia if you're prepared to take the leap.

Wow! Thanks for that, although I was thinking of this country!!! I definitely don't think I'm brave enough to go abroad on my own with a small child!! :eek:

PasturesNew

I wish I knew what to tell you. I think you're on the right track about self-improvement. And you can't tell what the future has (your father's early demise).

I think however you might be looking at things through rose-tinted glasses on the plot/caravan idea. It would be hard to find a plot and get permission to put a caravan on it. And then you'd need that caravan to have access to services (electricity/water etc).

Then if you grow stuff ... you have to rely on the weather and wait quite a while.

I hope others with experience can show you a way to attain your dream.

And if this one's not quite a winner, keep thinking ... you'll come up with a plan that'll work for you soon!

Good luck.

mandelbrotlondon

Don't have any experience of this as have never done it before, but just wanted to say it sounds like a fantastic idea so please keep posting on your progress if you decide to go ahead as you may inspire more people!

Just a thought that when people do this whole "downsizing" thing on their lifestyle, they tend to move from more expensive areas to less expensive areas. So people from London move up North and get a bit more bang for their buck there. So you might want to think "where is cheaper than Leeds?". Also, check out this website (no commercial link):

http://www.wwoof.org

The UK section provides opportunites for people to live on organic farms etc in return for helping out-obviously all the advertisers have different requirements but might be a good starting point-try contacting any likely sounding ones and see what they say! Could be better than trying to start up being self sufficient on your own, anyways :-)

cells

You could potentially buy a 2bed outright with 50k in cheaper parts of the country. Such as the north east.


That will just leave you with food/transport/other to pay for. But will 230pcm cover that?


I cant see how you could get by with that little, but you might be able to claim some benefits if you are out of work which might make it possible.

Canucklehead

Good morning: As your sister and BIL are moving to Canada (lovely country and people BTW;) ) would you be able to make a similar move in the future as what you are hoping to achieve is do-able in many parts of Canada. You'll find lots of info on www.britishexpats.com

HTH
Canucklehead

Kez100

Personally, I would be inclined to emigrate with a child so young. On the domestic front you will have a job getting the set up you want in this country. On top of that, we grow our own expensive fruit and veg and this year it has been really difficult.

Jonesya

It sounds a great idea but what'll stop you will be the planning regulations - I don't think you'd get planning permission.

Farm land without pp sells for several grand an acre but planning regs are so restrictive that land with planning permission sells for several hundred thousand an acre! That's a good indicator of how difficult it is to get pp.

The planning controls in this country are insane! We force people into poverty and homelessness to protect the countryside.

Guy_Montag

Normandy

For 28k EUR you can have the one above. DD will pick up french quickly & I'm sure you will to. You would have enough left over to do it up & get yourself on your feet. You should think about what you could do as a part time job out there or what sort of hobbies you have (or had) that could be turned into something financially rewarding.

martyn4764

Guy_Montag wrote: »

Normandy

For 28k EUR you can have the one above. DD will pick up french quickly & I'm sure you will to. You would have enough left over to do it up & get yourself on your feet. You should think about what you could do as a part time job out there or what sort of hobbies you have (or had) that could be turned into something financially rewarding.

Unemployment in France is 11% or more; without fluent French, you're unlikely to be even considered (and don't assume you'll 'pick up' the language as an adult);

The self-employment system makes 'pin money' businesses virtually impossible;

Unemployment benefit isn't paid until you've paid into the system. No child benefit is paid for a single child.