Finding Enough

November was definitely a more positive month, as we got our main living spaces sorted and no longer had to do any driving backwards and forwards between our new home and the rental house about an hour away. We handed back the keys to the rental on 1st November, so it’s been nice to be able to focus on one place.

Apologies for the doom and gloom in last month’s update, but I did promise to share our journey warts and all. I have always said that if there weren’t any downs, then the ups wouldn’t be ups. October was mostly a down. Getting out and about to explore our new surroundings in autumnal sunshine and the sense of achievement gained from completing tasks and seeing progress, saw us bounce back in November.

This month mostly revolved around logs, as we tried to get a dry supply of firewood sorted. The previous owner had removed a number of trees, but not done anything with the resultant wood. Apparently sycamore saplings are toxic to donkeys, so she had most of the sycamore trees on the property removed. This meant that there were a LOT of logs lying around in woodland areas which were about a year old and at risk of rotting. With the help of our new farmer neighbour and his tractor and tipper trailer we collected them all up and moved them up a steep hill to the donkey stable which has a concrete floor. We are repurposing it as a log store to allow them all to dry out. It took 3 trailer loads.

Stacking it all in the shed so that air can circulate round it and dry it out has been a bit of a challenge, but we are about 3/4 of the way through that massive pile. We found a few old pallets around the place which we have been stacking them on. Mr Wombat has a log splitting axe, but I see an electric log splitter in our future…….

We have central heating provided by an oil fired Rayburn in most of the house, but the living room only has a multifuel stove. We have some dry wood, but I suspect we will have to buy some more before this lot is ready to use.

As I went to make a start moving the logs from where they had been tipped, a barn owl flew out of the stable! I have since found plenty of evidence that it has returned, in the form of poo and pellets and have seen it a couple of times since then, so we obviously haven’t disturbed it too much. Hopefully it will decide to stay.

The last 2 weeks of the month were dominated by 2 sets of visitors and trying to keep them warm and fed, and showing them some local sights. We did have a couple of days in the middle to tackle another job which we hadn’t planned, but which turned out to be quite urgent.

The previous owner had told us that the pump in the well that supplies our water, had been replaced about 6 months ago. We thought, great, that’s one less thing to worry about as it shouldn’t need replacing for some time. Talking to a neighbour, we uncovered the other half of the story……..the old pump had failed when the pipework froze solid last winter and the pump burnt out trying in vain to move water. With a cold snap forecast, we thought we should get on to that a bit quick, and before my in-laws came to visit. Nearly all the materials were sourced from around the property, so we only had to pay for the foil backed bubble wrap tape. It is working so far, and survived down to -7 deg C last week. Fingers crossed!

In between outdoors jobs, we have also been doing a lot of reading and learning around traditional buildings, breathable insulation and the likely cause of our damp problem. This may be part of the reason I have failed my book reading target again this month.

We have been in touch with a specialist surveyor, who has been incredibly helpful, not only talking us through what they were looking at when they came for a survey, but also in directing us to further reading and case studies and online training opportunities. There is a lot of free information out there. We joined a couple of online webinars in November, both very informative. I am quite enjoying having a new challenge, and am considering writing my own case study to document our journey, doing as much as we possibly can ourselves.

It seems there is a lot of interest in embracing traditional building methods to remedy problems caused by mixing solid wall buildings with modern materials. There are also a lot of people in a very similar position to us. Next year’s goals might include venturing into self-publishing.

I was interested to see how our expenses ended up this month, as it felt like we were spending it like water. That said, we didn’t have the drag of paying rent to contend with which made the end result more palatable than I had feared.

• Freedom Fund Value: £1,171,213 (up £27k after last month’s steep decline)
• Monthly expenses: £3,035* or a withdrawal rate of 3.1% if we were to maintain this rate of spending.
• Earned Income: £0
• Miles walked: 98 vs. a target of 146**
• Books read: 16 vs a target of 22 (2 per month)

The freedom fund recovered a little in November after the big drop at the end of last month. It will be interesting to see where it ends up at the end of the year after our first full year living off it.

Our expenses weren’t quite as bad as I had feared. I reflected on past experience with project management, and reminded myself that a lot of money flowing out reflects a lot of progress being made. The ‘home maintenance & tools’ category in my spreadsheet totalled £785 in November and included all sorts of plumbing and guttering parts and materials, a lot of new tools including a petrol brush cutter, 2 axes, a wheelbarrow and some PPE. Without this house spending, we would have been at £2,250 for the month, which is not far off where we were when we were nomadic and house sitting. I foresee quite a few big home and tools related expenses in the near term, as we replace some of the things we sold rather than store / transport from our old home and purchase thing we need for a different lifestyle. At some point we will need a scaffolding tower and roof ladder, the log splitter I mentioned earlier will be a lot more cost effective to buy rather than hire and we have been putting off getting a new mattress for months. Not to mention clothes storage to replace the built in cupboards we left behind at our old house.

Another big cost this month was £600 to fill up the oil tank. We are not yet sure how long this will last, with all our cooking and hot water and most of our heating relying on it, but we are expecting 2-3 months depending on weather conditions. The long term plan is to replace fossil fuel with something more sustainable, but we need to address insulation first. Our current EPC is officially an F, but we are only one point above a G, so the heat disappears quite fast at the moment! There are certainly plenty of projects to keep us busy and give us a purpose next year.

Once again, there was no earned income this month, but I am still owed for my last coaching and mentoring invoice from September, so will chase that up. I suspect my old employers are playing the year end push-expenses-into-the-new-year accounting game, so I may have to wait until 2024. It is not a large sum though, so maybe not.

It was a bad month for miles walked. I suspect this reflects the exertion of managing all those logs!

I finished one book and started another in November, but with spare time spent reading up on historic building renovation (mainly in digital format), I lagged further behind my reading target.

I am finding the focus on the basics of life (water, warmth, shelter) very fulfilling. It really feels like I have achieved something and I can see the results. The satisfaction from watching the guttering doing what it is supposed to, rather than leaking down walls and overwhelming blocked downpipes is probably not something everyone can relate to, but it gives us a warm feeling on a wet day. With all the trees we have, keeping them clear will certainly be a process akin to painting the Forth bridge, so I expect it will lose it’s appeal over time. For now, there is definitely something to be said for a simpler life, and I am enjoying being physically tired at the end of a busy day rather than the mental exhaustion caused by a hectic day at the office.

A few images of my November are below. There were a lot more photos to choose from on my phone this month, which is always a sign of a good month.

Highlights included exploring the remains of a 6,000 year old chambered cairn, helping the rewilding of a patch of land by planting collected acorns, creating a new strawberry bed from runners, checking out Scotland’s national book town at Wigtown and numerous conversations with the cows at the end of our garden.

*Includes £500 per month personal allowances (£250 each), which may not be spent in the month, but which is not tracked. Some of it may show up in the freedom fund in the future, if savings build up and are invested.

** I completed my challenge to walk the equivalent of Lands End to John O’Groats and back in 2022. This is the longest overland distance between 2 points on the UK mainland or 1748 miles. In 2023 I want to maintain the 146 miles a month this required