This is the first in a series of blog posts in which I hope to share with you all aspects of living in a car. If you have any questions about #CarLiving and #Vanlife please leave them in the comments below and I will try to answer them in subsequent blog posts (I’ll go back to the comments and reply with a link to the relevant blog post).
As some of you who follow me on Twitter will already know, I’ve moved out of my house and begun living in my car. What some of you may not know is why. In this, the first of my blog posts on car living, I will try to explain why I have given up the comforts of house dwelling for the seemingly bonkers confines of living in my car.
The Dream.
7 years ago I gave all my possessions – with the exceptions of my hiking gear and some clothes – to various charities and gave up my home in order to travel Britain living out of my backpack. This was an attempt to realise a long held dream to live more simply, travel slowly and find the solitude I’ve always searched for… more on that here (Solitude).
Due to family issues this adventure was curtailed early on and I found myself needing accommodation again. I won’t bore you with the details of the subsequent years leading to my living in a car: suffice to say my dream of an alternative lifestyle remained with me during those years and coalesced into the certainty that vanlife was the way forward. (Van life is basically living full time in a vehicle).
The most obvious advantage of living in a vehicle is the costs. With no mortgage/rent, no Council Tax, no water rates, no expensive gas/electricity bills etc. I will have more disposal income to enjoy the things that matter to me: travel, hiking, good food and helping my younger family members. However, it’s the freedom of not being confined to one place, the ability to have a different vista when I look out of my windows in the morning, to call the world my home not simply a house stuck on a street somewhere…. these are the key ingredients to my personal wellbeing.
However, a van is expensive. Even before I convert it into my home the cost of purchasing a new van made to my specifications is a wallet busting £35,000! Add the conversion build costs and I’m looking at a £45,000 – £50,000 final bill for my dream home. Not bad compared to the cost of a new bricks’n’morter house, but still a sizeable outlay. So… I need to save as much money as possible. I was paying out an approximate total of £600 a month living in my rented accommodation and decided a year ago that was unacceptable if my van life dream was ever to be realised. After much procrastination (it’s one thing to have a dream, another to make it a reality) I finally decided to move into my car to enable me to save more money towards the van. Thus, on September 3rd 2021 (incidentally my grandson’s 1st birthday) I moved out of my house and into my car.
To summarize then; the reason I’ve moved into my car is in order to enable me to save more money more quickly in order to purchase a van and convert into my home. To enable me to fullfil a long held desire to live the life I want. One of more freedom, more travel and, more solitude.
In part 2 of ‘I’ve Decided To Live In My Car’ I’ll share with you how I managed to make my car my home. I’ll include pictures of my car/home and, in subsequent posts, I’ll detail things such as my bedroom, kitchen, wardrobes, storage, power supply, heating and living room etc. Thanks for reading and if you have any questions or comments please leave them in the comments below – I’ll do my best to answer any queries and turn them into a subsequent blog post.
One reply on “I’ve Decided to Live in My Car. PT 01 – Why?”
We do a lot of van work ,we have a comunatey in the highlands all young girls ,going for work all over the thing they get wrong is the van .The vw is the best but I would go ex hire tesco or asda the iveco chassis. You could then use the aloy body or use a caravan bolted on .