Living an uncommodified life
Wendy
Jehanara
Tremayne and Mikey Sklar explained that rehabbing an old trailer was
part of their quest to live an uncommodified life.
"When we noticed an RV
park for sale, we jumped to buy it. The trailer on site had been
left behind,” Mikey said.
"At first we did not
know we were going to live in it," Wendy added. "We considered
hauling it to the landfill. It was old
and crappy. The insurance company valued the jalopy at
$1,000. The cost to haul it to landfill was estimated at
$5,000. New building came at the cost of $200 
per square
foot. We determined that for $10 a square foot (less than
$10,000) we could remodel it, and so we did."
Mikey said, "We have a saying: 'The greenest house is the one that is
already there.' We didn’t like the idea of hauling a perfectly
usable living space to the dump in order to avoid the stigma of living
in a trailer. Insulation and thermal mass reduce home
utilities. They are not standard issue in trailers. But we
have found that utilities can be reduced by adapting to the
environment. In the winter we wear a sweater and in the summer we
wear shorts."
"Because our trailer was valueless (according to the
insurance company, who said it was worth $1,000), it presented us with
a risk-free starting point and an opportunity to
learn new skills," Wendy said. "The renovation taught us to use
tools and work with building materials. Though the trailer may
not last forever, the skills will!"
To read more about Wendy
and Mikey's adventures in uncommodified living, check out their blog, or the rest of their
profile in Trailersteading.
Wendy's first book, The
Good Life Lab, can
already be preordered on Amazon, and you can stay tuned to its facebook page for updates.
| This post is part of our Trailersteading lunchtime series.
Read all of the entries: |
Or explore more posts by date or by subject.
About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
Want to be notified when new comments are posted on this page? Click on the RSS button after you add a comment to subscribe to the comment feed, or simply check the box beside "email replies to me" while writing your comment.