We quit our jobs to build a cabin • Hacker News Board

Re: We quit our jobs to build a cabin

#61

Post by Someone » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 6:31 PM UTC

drewrv wrote: post #29

This reminds me of a similar article I once read: "I opened a charming neighborhood coffee shop. Then it destroyed my life." https://slate.com/human-interest/2005/12/my-coffeehouse-nigh...

Similar: “What happened when I bought a hotel by mistake”

https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/i-bought-a-hotel-by-m...

Take away quote: “But the high summer honeymoon soon give way to an autumnal realization that the list of skills required to really make the business work was topped by secretarial and bookkeeping efficiency, home improvement handiness and a nose for where to source the cheapest toilet paper.“

Re: We quit our jobs to build a cabin

#62

Post by stef25 » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 6:31 PM UTC

drewrv wrote: post #29

This reminds me of a similar article I once read: "I opened a charming neighborhood coffee shop. Then it destroyed my life." https://slate.com/human-interest/2005/12/my-coffeehouse-nigh...

Hmm, I've spent the past few weeks considering starting a coffee truck thing. Better bookmark this.

Re: We quit our jobs to build a cabin

#63

Post by look_lookatme » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 6:31 PM UTC

It does not surprise me that these guys are writers. This reads very much like a project intended to produce a content product as much as a cabin. It's romantic and they have plenty of meticulously framed videos and photos. Maybe they did some youtube videos with dramatic moments -- maybe even the moment they open the piece with -- anger, violence, frustration boiling over. But now they are taking woodworking courses. I'm sure we'll see plenty of content about their experience.

YouTube has upped its recommendations for this kind of stuff in the last few months. Everything is van life, off-grid, travel, tiny home building, etc. It's really curious and I'm not sure what to think about it. Everything is about being a creator and getting an audience for your YouTube, Substack, Patreon, etc. I'm pretty conflicted over this.

Re: We quit our jobs to build a cabin

#64

Post by thehappypm » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 6:32 PM UTC

vidanay wrote: post #7

Animats wrote: post #5

Those guys don't have a building problem. They have a drinking problem.

Yeah, building a cabin isn't a fundamentally complicated project. Think. Measure. Measure. Cut. Nail. Repeat.

Software isn’t fundamentally complicated. Think. Type. Repeat.

Re: We quit our jobs to build a cabin

#65

Post by throwaway0a5e » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 6:32 PM UTC

the-pigeon wrote: post #55

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find the opposite. If you want something done right you have to do it yourself. I try to only pay for labor when it's low/medium skill labor paired with a capital investment I don't want to make (e.g. getting new tires on my car and an alignment) or when I'm paying for a member of a professional club for their reputation and club membership (e.g. a lawyer or realtor)

Building a solid structure is a high skill job! Not as complex as building an application but definitely comparable. I think some people fail to understand how hard it is to be a good contractor. Just like software engineering it requires a lot of education and a lot of experience. You won't get it right your first few tries no matter how smart you are. Just like no software developer ever got things right when they…

Building one structure is a series of low skill tasks.

Building many structures (or any given sub-specialty, e.g. plumbing) on a predetermined schedule and budget and making money doing it without charging so much money that you get undercut out of business is what requires skill.

For N=1 you rarely have to be a pro to do it right.

Re: We quit our jobs to build a cabin

#66

Post by RoyTyrell » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 6:32 PM UTC

duxup wrote: post #38

drewrv wrote: post #29

This reminds me of a similar article I once read: "I opened a charming neighborhood coffee shop. Then it destroyed my life." https://slate.com/human-interest/2005/12/my-coffeehouse-nigh...

Those stories always get me. Anyone who has worked in food service in any way knows that it's brutal. Liking a thing, coffee, coffee shops, or anything ... very much does not mean you'd like making it / running something making that thing. Personally I like video games ... I code web boring apps... for reasons.

Those stories seem to be about half of the restaurants on Gordon Ramsey's show. I know there's a lot of embellishment and added drama on the American version, but the crux of half the restaurants are "we thought it would be a good investment" or "we always dreamed of owning a restaurant" and almost none of them have experience.

Re: We quit our jobs to build a cabin

#67

Post by hinkley » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 6:33 PM UTC

I usually just roll my eyes at stuff like this, despite being dangerously close to the stereotype (however, most of my family is working class, so I actually worked with my hands before becoming a developer), but this line made me angry:

> Sometimes, during those months of toil, our anger burned so intensely that we thought the boards we threw into the woods might never land.

To paraphrase Gandalf, next time throw yourself into the woods and save us all a deal of trouble.

I don’t know who needs to hear this, but Wherever you go, there you are. Few people get the Eat, Pray, Love ending. Usually you come back finding that you shouldn’t have had to leave in the first place. If you feel like chucking it in, live an austere life and save up first. That lowers your cost of living, and focuses you. If you can’t take that, then you won’t handle the next phase. If you can handle that, you may find you don’t even need to go. Evaluate before following through on the rest of your plan out of some sense of completionism.

Re: We quit our jobs to build a cabin

#68

Post by amwelles » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 6:33 PM UTC

CydeWeys wrote: post #54

Havoc wrote: post #26

I think they misjudged the timescale and the complexity added by slope. Good outcome though so clearly wasn't too badly misjudged. Youtube channel Wild Wonderful Offgrid [1] built a much bigger absolutely gorgous house...but on flat terrain and over two years. The other thing I've noticed is that many successful projects have pretty permanent "temporary" accomodation on site that take the pressure off needing to comp…

That's a good point. Buy an old RV for a year, place in it onsite, and live in it as necessary until the structure is inhabitable, and then sell the RV, hopefully at not too big a loss. It can be a towed RV even, whatever those are called.

They are called travel trailers. If you buy used, you’ll have much better luck getting a similar price out of it. Only caveat is that they aren’t made to be lived in full time in most cases, so they’ll have more issues than a regular house might.

Re: We quit our jobs to build a cabin

#69

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 6:33 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: We quit our jobs to build a cabin

#70

Post by m0zg » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 6:33 PM UTC

The resulting cabin actually looks pretty great. I think if they didn't sell it, their appreciation of it would grow over time. It's great to build something "real" and permanent, and not just write transient bullshit for a newspaper all day.