"I'm Living in a CAMPER TO AFFORD HOUSING IN 2024..."

You know right here on the docks of Sausalito, California is a very interesting place to talk about this topic because so many people are being priced out of their current way of living and people have to come up with innovative ideas of ways to live like below their means for a change and you know so many people have been living beyond their means or were living comfortably until inflation really kicked their butt right and you know right here with all these boats you have a lot of people who actually live on these boats. People live on houseboats a little bit down the way here and that's like a cheap way to live. Other people choosing to live in places like this. This is not even planned. This is kind of an interesting coincidence that there's all these RVs here. People live in campers like this now and people are now kind of being forced to live this way whether they want to or not. In fact, I found a story of a family that's doing exactly that because they literally could not afford their house anymore so they decided to sell the house and move into a camper with their kids. You know you're talking husband and wife, kids, plus a dog. I mean that's pretty heavy for just living in a camper guys. So these people are claiming that the cost of living has literally forced them to live in their camper and just this past April they sold their 2,500 square foot home in New Jersey and it was a four-bedroom house with a pool you know a big nice porch, jacuzzi tub, and an acre of land. So it's kind of like the American dream for most people in terms of the type of house you would want to live in one day. And they only lived in the house for two years. They bought the house in 2022, height of the market, probably bought into the FOMO like so many other people like well if we don't buy this house now we'll probably never be able to afford it. So they just went ahead and pulled the trigger on it. So when they bought the house they said they could comfortably afford it and they were both making about $140,000 a year combined. That was their gross household income. After almost two years living in the house they decided they needed to sell because just like I've been talking about here on this channel guys, their cost of living skyrocketed especially when it comes to the expenses of owning this house. They said that their electric bill doubled. They spent $300 a week on groceries and also you have to pay for higher gas prices and everything else going up. They actually said that if they didn't sell this house at the time that they sold it, just now in April, then they probably would be kind of priced out of their own home and really wouldn't be able to afford it anymore and have to go into a more dire situation. Maybe, who knows, they could be the people that end up in the short sale or foreclosure situation. So at least they were smart enough to get out when they did. They recognized they couldn't afford the property anymore which is always something I would recommend people do as well. And unfortunately they don't say the purchase price of the home and how much they sold it for. I wish they would have included that information in this story because I think that's super relevant here and also some of the expenses they don't really go over on how much it went up. But apparently their property taxes, their insurance, and all the other costs related to maintaining the house went up enough to prompt them to sell it and move on with their life and move into an RV. They said their mortgage payment was $2,000 a month and just property taxes alone was another $1,000 a month. So that's $3,000 a month just on the house payment. Now that they're living in the RV they're paying $750 a month for their camper site plus $320 a month for the camper loan. So now they're down to paying $1,100 a month. So they've literally cut their living expenses down by a third, which is tremendous, but it does come with some sacrifices and downsides to say the least. They said that their homeowner's insurance used to be $300 a month for the house, but now it's just $35 a month for the camper. Also their home maintenance budget was about $300 a month. Now it's $150 a month. Their electric bill, they were paying close to $400 a month in the house. Now they pay $156 a month in the camper and the gas in the summer was $160 a month in the house and now in the camper it's just $25 a month for propane and the water is included with the camper site. All in, they said they were paying about $4,160 a month to live in their house and the camper they're paying about $1,436 a month, but that doesn't include things like the car loan, groceries, wifi, any other little luxuries they decide to buy. You have to pay for that stuff too. So I think it's safe to say they probably cut their monthly living budget down by anywhere between two thirds or one half, depending on how much they might splurge each month moving forward. But according to them, they're cutting back big time guys, because obviously living in a camper full time comes with a lot of challenges. Some of the things they talk about is obviously a lack of space. When you're talking two kids, a husband and wife, and a dog in a small RV, things are pretty cramped guys. I don't even think I could do this. If I had a family I could not live in an RV full time. Maybe just me and Lizzie, but even that's a stretch. Just because of the close quarters, you don't really have a space of your own anymore and I think that's the thing I would miss the most personally. They also have to face other issues like when the weather's bad, they're all kind of stuck inside the camper together. There's nowhere to really hang out outside when that's going on. The dog suffers a little bit because the dog can't just run around the campground like it can in the backyard. Privacy is a problem in numerous different ways. I'm sure you can use your imagination on that one. So something I find interesting about this story is that they are looking to buy another house, but clearly a much smaller house with a much smaller footprint and obviously a much smaller monthly payment and maintenance and upkeep schedule is what I imagine. This story to me sounds like a classic example of where people kind of bite off more than they can chew when it comes to buying a house. Things kind of look affordable at the time, but as you own the house things come up. Different expenses that you weren't anticipating. Also the cost of maintaining the house continues to rise with inflation. You also have the property taxes and insurance that seemingly never go anywhere but up. Even though it's all fraud, you still have to pay. And I can't even think about how many times I have warned about this here on the channel guys. Like I have made countless numbers of videos and then people just hammer me and say, oh Michael you're being too repetitive, you're being too negative, you know my house is cheap, I don't know what you're talking about. But clearly there are millions of people out there that are in the same boat and understand this situation. So just because it's not happening to you doesn't mean it doesn't happen to others. This is exactly why people like one of my viewers Ed, he moved to Ecuador guys. I've heard stories from a bunch of people who watch this channel that live all over the world, that used to live in America, you know born and raised in the United States and now they live overseas in lower cost of living areas. And Ed, he wrote me a long email about what his life is like now in Ecuador. So I want to just share a bit of that with you guys to give you a glimpse into how much lower the cost of living can be if you're willing to trade down and move to one of these countries. You know in a lot of ways it's a trade up when you're looking at how far your money goes, but it's probably going to be a trade down for a lot of people in terms of living standards as well as expectations and lifestyle. So he says right now they live in a five-story apartment building. The view is stunning. The apartment has two bedrooms, two bathrooms, and is fully furnished with excellent furniture, appliances, and a TV. Their monthly rent, get this guys, wait for it, $560 a month. And it includes electric, gas, water, internet, building maintenance, two underground parking spaces, a storage unit, and 24-hour security. So let's just think about that for a second. All the amenities that Ed is getting for this luxurious, like it sounds, two-bedroom, two-bath apartment in Ecuador, he's paying less money for that than this family is paying to stay cramped up in an RV and live in a camper here in the U.S. That's how dire the situation has gotten for people that I need you to realize right now. Is everyone in that situation? Of course not, but a lot of people are either choosing to put themselves in this situation temporarily to save money or doing it out of necessity because they've bid off more than they can chew. So he also gave me some examples of how much money they spend on other average household expenses. Their grocery bill is $235 a month. Transportation is only $20 a month. Dining out is another $192 a month. He say also the CDs over there in Ecuador pay between eight and a half and 10% interest on those CDs. I mean, that's pretty incredible. Although when you look at probably having it in local currency and how much you're losing in terms of inflation and purchasing power to the U.S. dollar, you know, maybe that isn't so good, but it sounds good as an American. Because him and his wife are over 65, all the sales tax they pay apparently are returned to them and they live tax-free. Maybe that's an Ecuador thing. I don't know. He didn't specify, but he said medical care is inexpensive and most drugs can be purchased over the counter and are much less expensive than in the U.S., which seems to be the common theme for pretty much everything medical. He also said he had an emergency dental situation with one of his teeth. He was able to get an appointment with a dentist right away. He also had a situation where he ran into one of his doctors on the street and they literally helped him get to the emergency room and didn't charge him a dime. So it sounds like the culture is much more friendly and less money oriented, which is probably a culture shock for pretty much any American living in a place like that. But basically he says he has no desire to move back to the U.S. and I'm sure after hearing a story like this of a family paying more to live in a camper than he pays to live in the lap of luxury, he's probably laughing at all of us right now. Of course, he didn't mention any of the downsides because there are going to be downsides to living in a third world country, guys. Whether it's crime, whether it's standard of living, whether it's amenities that are available to you. We get used to a lot of things here in the U.S. that you just don't have in other countries or if you do have it, it comes at a steep cost. That's up to every individual if they can swallow that change or not. But you know, while Ed's over there paying less than $2,000 a month to live in the lap of luxury, people over here are already being pushed to buy Christmas presents because everything's on sale now at Walmart, guys. In case you didn't hear, Walmart announced its first ever holiday deals event and you can already start shopping as soon as a couple days from now if you have Walmart Plus. So they're also using this opportunity to try and get people to sign up for Walmart Plus, just like Amazon has Amazon Prime. It's like that sort of thing. They give you free delivery, certain benefits for having the Walmart Plus. But I think Walmart's smart because they're trying to get ahead of the game and get an early head start on the holiday shopping season because they know how broke everybody is and they know that, you know, hey, maybe I can get more people to sign up for this service. They're offering free trials for people and maybe a bunch of them forget to pay the bill and now they're stuck with Walmart Plus for a couple of months until they forget about it. Different things like that. And of course, it's a great opportunity to tell everybody they should be buying all of this useless crap that no one needs. Honestly, guys, I loved Christmas growing up. I love waking up, opening up all the Christmas presents and all of this. And I still do love that. But as an adult, I definitely realize how much of a waste of money a lot of this stuff is. And I'm not saying it isn't worth it to make one of your loved ones happy by giving them a nice gift. Of course, that's wonderful and it makes you feel fantastic when you do it. But if you're already struggling financially, you need to be very smart about the type of choices you make when it comes to the gifts you're buying and how much money you're spending on people because it can quickly spiral out of control. You know, a lot of people end up going into debt every holiday season just to put a smile on someone's face. And in the end, is it really worth it? Is it really worth sacrificing your own financial stability? Probably not. Of course, I'm not saying, you know, just forget everybody and don't buy anyone a gift this year and be the Grinch. I'm just saying, be budget conscious with the choices you make. And, you know, sometimes you'd be surprised on how happy you can make someone by spending little or no money and getting creative with your gift ideas. That's all I'm saying. Now, the other day, we talked about the dock worker strike, which is still going on right now. Still no sign of it ending. I think people need to understand the magnitude of this and how many businesses are being affected, guys. Like, literally everything you can think of is shipped into this country. And I have a list. And this is probably just a handful of lists that are being affected by this tremendously right now. But there's probably many other businesses that are being affected too. But when you take a look at this list, check out all the companies that are having delayed shipments right now because of this. You got Ikea, you got RTG Furniture, Adidas, Walmart, Goodyear, Raymors Furniture, QVC, Alibaba, Tractor Supply, City Furniture, Kroger, Mattel, H&M, Dollar General, Ralph Lauren, L'Oreal, Joanne's Doors, Levi Strauss, Estee Lauder, C&J Clark. You know, what do you notice here? Lots of clothing, lots of furniture, even food, maybe some luxuries, some essentials with Goodyear. That's a tire company. You know, Walmart is on this list too. And even though they're having this big sale right now. From what I hear, guys, if this situation doesn't get resolved within the next week or so, this is going to cause such a tremendous problem with all of these businesses, with the amount of stock and the things that they have in stock versus the things they don't have in stock. And also what it can potentially do with inflation and pushing up the price of all these goods that are on delay right now. This could potentially be literally the black swan event that many of us have been talking about that catapults us into the next major economic downturn. As far as I'm concerned, the economic downturn has already begun, especially this year with the amount of layoffs that we've seen and how much unemployment has gone up and how much the job openings have gone down. Those are major indicators that this has already begun. But this could just be the thing that throws us into the next level of a downturn. Who knows? It might get resolved just like, you know, the government debt crisis. They always resolve that every time they need to pass a new budget. No one can agree. But then at the last minute, they pass an emergency budget until the next few months or the end of the year in this case. And then they just keep going on like that. And I saw a lot of people's comments on the video I made saying, you know, these people are, you know, fighting a useless battle, you know, trying to fight against automation. However, some people might agree with that statement. But I think it's a worthy cause to fight for your livelihood and your job just because you can do something doesn't mean that it should be done, you know, and maybe automating dock work isn't one of those things that should be done just because it can be done. Like, at what point do we start putting people before profits? You know, it seems like that may never be the case in this country, because obviously, this is a capitalist country, and it's every man for themselves. And let's make the most money possible. But I think one thing a lot of these companies are missing, it's like, okay, let's say we automate all the docks and no people are there anymore. We got robots driving the forklifts and moving the containers, all that stuff, right? No more people or just a handful of people to manage all that stuff. And all those people lose their jobs. Well, who's going to buy all the stuff that these companies are importing? You know, who's going to be left to pay for all these things if people don't have any money, guys? Like, am I the only one who's thought of that? I don't think so. If more and more jobs are systematically automated, and people lose really good paying jobs to AI or robots or illegal immigrants, whoever or whatever, that's not going to give us the strong, prosperous economy in the future. You know, it might give some instant results right now, these companies might be able to, you know, make some extra money right now. But when it's all said and done, and people don't have the money to buy their goods or services anymore, they're all going to collapse. So I don't know. I mean, I'm not in charge of any of this stuff. I just feel like there needs to be a little more balance in these situations in terms of automation and AI and deciding which roles can be taken over and automated and what's more efficient and what isn't. I mean, obviously, this is the direction we've always gone as humans. We always look for efficiency and try to make things as easy on us as possible. But I think these places should start crunching the numbers on what would actually happen if all these people lost these jobs, and how this could affect their businesses in the future. I know if I was a CEO of a big company, that's something I would be thinking about right now. So if you guys enjoyed this video, make sure you subscribe to the channel. 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