I have 13 acres on an Island,and mine is the only house here. After elevating a couple of acres to avoid tidal floods during storms and putting in a new septic tank for my house and another for my workshop,I bought a repossessed double wide that was 2 years old and had it set up to live in. This was in the early 80's,and I am still living in it.
IIRC,I paid 13 grand for the old,rotten house that was already here on the land,around 15 grand for the repo doublewide,including getting it hauled here and set up,a couple of grand for fill dirt to raise the lot,a couple of grand for two new septic tanks,and a forgotten amount for to buy a 25x50 quonset hut workshop with a cement floor,electric 14x14 foot garage doors at each end,AC,heat,hot water heater,toilet,and shower stall.
I did it all on over a period of time as I had the cash money to do it,and have never had a house payment.
The downside was I had to drive right at 100 miles a day,round trip,to get to work and then get back home,after working the maximum amount of overtime I could get,6 days a week. I did cut back on the overtime after getting all this done,but still had that long round trip drive every day.
Been retired for over 20 years now,so I haven't had a daily trip anywhere I haven't wanted to go for all that time.
Sometimes you just have to do what you HAVE to do to "live free",not what you WANT to do. There were some very nice neighborhoods in the city where I worked that I could have lived,but chances are I would still be paying a mortgage payment every month if I had done that. Which was a price I was not willing to pay.
