Didn't Chris Farley have something to say about living in a van, down by the river?
Living in a Van
101–110 of 166 posts
Re: Living in a Van
#102Earlier quoted context omitted.
I heard other people calling this lower class tourism, that doesn't really seem to be the case though. It seems like a perfectly reasonable way to live for a single guy w/ a day job or someone trying to build a company. I'm not single, but if I were I would like to try something similar. Right now, I'm renting out my entire condo. I would like to rent out everything besides the garage and just live in there. The reas…
As a single male, living in a van doesn't seem like it'd go very well with a nice lady-friend that I might wish to get to know better. Especially when she starts speaking with her mother about my living conditions. That's just me, though. Perhaps I'm wrong here. edit: I should probably clarify what I said. Living in a van, in my mind as an outside observer suggests either some sort of inability to commit, or perhaps…
Yea, living in a van is a non starter for long term relationships. That was what I meant by single, someone not interested in long term relationships. Probably not the actual definition of single though.
Re: Living in a Van
#103Earlier quoted context omitted.
Unless they just leave it parked, they are unlikely to recoup the cost of maintaining it over that time: http://www.secretentourage.com/lifestyle/autos/cost-of-owner... I was bit by this in my early 20s when I bought a really nice BMW, I hadn't considered that dealer servicing would end up costing so much. But I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now.
I'm not much of a car guy, why are oil changes on exotics so much more expensive than on your average car?
Exotics have large oil pans. Your typical Murcielago requires 11 liters of oil to change, and that's synthetic, not dinosaur oil. Add to that an oil filter that is shipped from Italy. You're also changing the transmission oil, which also must be synthetic. There may be some other maintenance that the dealer likes to perform (brake fluid? spark plugs?) at the same time as an oil change. Add dealer markup and insurance to all of this and you're easily over $500.
Re: Living in a Van
#104This reminds of a good friend. He got a job making six figures at Google straight out of college, and then lived in his van--in the Google parking lot--while saving every penny he earned. He took showers on campus and only ate free Google food. After a few years, he went into a mini-retirement and devoted his time to traveling around the world and volunteering.
FWIW, he could have rented an apartment and showered at home, and the cost would have been to delay retirement by maybe 10% of his tenure.
Are you factoring in the exorbitant cost of renting an apartment in the bay area when making this calculation?
Re: Living in a Van
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
As a single male, living in a van doesn't seem like it'd go very well with a nice lady-friend that I might wish to get to know better. Especially when she starts speaking with her mother about my living conditions. That's just me, though. Perhaps I'm wrong here. edit: I should probably clarify what I said. Living in a van, in my mind as an outside observer suggests either some sort of inability to commit, or perhaps…
Yea, living in a van is a non starter for long term relationships. That was what I meant by single, someone not interested in long term relationships. Probably not the actual definition of single though.
Ah. That makes more sense --- and I don't think English has a word for that. "Permanent bachelor", maybe?
Re: Living in a Van
#106Earlier quoted context omitted.
So we have someone who didn't play his guitar because it was in another room. And someone who spent 3 hours per day watching a sitcom on netflix. And you wonder why he is living in a van? Watching Netflix for a few hours in a row and having an instrument you don't play as much as you should are incredibly common experiences. I don't know how you extrapolate that into some sort of mental illness or moral failure that…
"I don't know how you extrapolate that into some sort of mental illness" Where did I say that he had a mental illness? Ask yourself this question. If you were on a job interview for a job where the employer was not desperate to fill that job with a "body", and you didn't have some super stupendous big deal advantage, or credentials, would you think that offering that anecdote reflected highly on you? Or do you think…
I think it /should/ portray me as a perfectly normal person who works hard during the day and then relaxes at home at night. God forbid you should have some time to yourself after working for 10-12 hours at work!
Re: Living in a Van
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
Putting money into a house you'll presumably be able to live in rent-free once it's paid off may not be a drastically worse choice than putting your money into savings. Unless it was an impractically huge house, or otherwise somehow not a keeper, I wouldn't consider that a frivolous/non-frugal purchase.
You could always take a mortgage out on the house, rent out the house and live in the van.
Or rent out a room or two and live in the house.
Re: Living in a Van
#108It seems to me that a water reservoir with a tube going near the engine (for heating) and a small water pump, coupled with an inflatable bathtub could solve the shower problem. I've never lived in a van, but my family used to go camping and we used a similar system (inflatable bathtub inside the tent) so that my younger brother could take a bath even if it was too cold outside for him.
It's far simpler than that for most of the year, solar powered showers are $20 and work really well (often, too well, I've been burned by one camping).
http://www.amazon.com/Stearns-SunShower-showers-Capacity-gal...
Re: Living in a Van
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not sure if the allure is necessarily the bohemian way of feeling poor. I think much of it has to do with the minimalism of the experience. The ability to pack up and move on at a moments notice has 'starting over' feel to it, which can be quite nice. Kind of like refactoring crufty code.
>>Kind of like refactoring crufty code. I think you mean "deleting code and starting from scratch". Refactoring code involves making changes to existing code in order to optimize it - I don't think it's analogous to packing up and moving on.
Refactoring code can also include making the code comply with "Don't Repeat Yourself", which would include removing a large amount of code and replacing it with references to a single function, etc. It also includes removing deleting dead code, another thing relateable to minimalism.
Re: Living in a Van
#110This will get much easier when robocars come out. You won't have to worry about police and zoning laws, the car can move every once in a while or continuously be moving. If robocar renting takes off you don't even the cash up front to pay for one. Showers and toilets can be separately moving robocars so this can all be done in small vehicles rather than large RV's. The fuel would electric (robocars recharge themselve…
That would be an interesting future. Go to a bar at night (dropped off by your robocar/house). Get really drunk. Get picked up by your robocar/house. Wake up really hungover, shower, change and then walk out of your robocar/house that is parked right in front of your office. Go to work. Not sure why this was the first thing that came to my mind, but it would be pretty damn cool.