Searching for a way to afford a yurt...

[mackiesyd]

My husband and I both have good paying jobs. Or maybe I don't make as much as him but we work our butts off! Ive been researching living in a yurt full time. We don't think we have good enough credit to get a mortgage on a regular house with my abusive ex husband's taking advantage of me and my husbands father stealing his identitity. To say the least we have had it rough. We have been working hard for years and have fixed most of our credit but I still don't think buying a house would be a possibility for us. Now that Ive done the research I want to live in a yurt anyway! We have tried seeking out opportunities such as habitat housing but your working so so hard and then have to pay full price on the house anyway and then you have a mortgage still. We don't mind having a mortgage but its such a pain working so hard to not have a life. We don't have time for anything of quality that way and sick of paying thousands per month to rent in our area. We have found land we can use forever and want to build a yurt with a loft. With 2 kids and a 3rd on the way we need the biggest possible yurt. We also live in a super cold climate. We are willing to work hard and customize our yurt. We want to get the yurt and work hard from there to make it work for us. Obtaining a big enough yurt with little money up front seams quite impossible. Here are my questions:


How does one afford to buy a yurt without financing?

Is there a financing option for yurts?

Are there any individuals that sell used yurts who would facilitize a payment plan?


ANY INFO AT ALL WILL BE HELPFUL AND NOT JUST IN RESPONSE TO MY QUESTIONS BUT INFORMATION HELPING WITH ANY PART OF MY SITUATION WOULD BE SO GREAT. IM SO HAPPY TO FIND THIS FORUM.

[Jafo]

Here is a thread that might interest you:

http://www.yurtforum.com/forums/buyi...-bank-809.html

In my opinion, be prepared to work closely with cold heartless bankers for a while in order to even get them to think about it.

If it were me, I would save for a bit and get yourself a decent down payment. That will usually grease the wheels with creditors. It sure makes it easier to ask them to put up any risk if you show that you are willing to also.

Myself, I just saved money for a while until I could afford it. I wish it was "one weird trick" that did it, but alas, I just had to do it the old fashion way.

[Rabbit]

No magic answers here either, just an idea:

Why not start with a smaller yurt, then save up to add an additional kid yurt? By the time they are big enough to need the space, you'll want the privacy anyway

[mimzy]

I'm saving for a yurt life as well and I have a couple suggestions based on my own plans. First of all, if you don't have all the money together plan on doing things in pieces. So first you save up and buy the land, then get whatever utilities you're going to need in order (well dug, electricity run, etc.) then save up to get the

yurt platform

and yurt in place with its required

insulation

and heat source, etc. I would worry about getting the loft up and indoor partitioning done last as that could be rather cosmetic.

Also, I would look into the possibility of doing what you want with multiple yurts. The sort of thing that you buy one medium sized yurt to start and you cram everyone inside and it sucks, but since you're no longer paying thousands in rent you quickly save up enough that you're able to buy a smaller yurt to shove the kids in, then another for your own bedroom, etc.

Heating

something like that may be a pain in a cold climate, but it could be far more cost effective in the long term.

I saw one yurt set up that I liked where the family built a central cabin like space that housed the kitchen/bathroom/utility room with two yurts attached for bedrooms. I thought it was rather clever since you could build the expensive plumbed cabin bit and live in that for awhile then expand to more living space as needed. I just wish I could find that website again!

EDIT: Also, you might want to look at the Yurt Foundation. They have plans there for something called the Family Yurt that is supposed to be designed so that it can be built in pieces. They're solid sided yurts so they're not particularly mobile, but you could probably use the plans to get a mortgage since it more closely resembles a traditional house.
http://www.yurtinfo.org/the-yurt-foundation

[mackiesyd]

Originally Posted by Rabbit

No magic answers here either, just an idea:

Why not start with a smaller yurt, then save up to add an additional kid yurt? By the time they are big enough to need the space, you'll want the privacy anyway

We need the space and privacy already. A smaller yurt wouldn't even be a possibility. We need to be able to put a loft in as well or it won't work. Maybe we could buy a smaller one to start but we couldn't live in a smaller one. I know lots of people could but my girls argue and fight and everyone need their space. With a third on the way we wouldn't be happy in a smaller area.

[Bob Rowlands]

If folks had to save to buy land and home there would be very little building going on for working class people like me. Land is outrageous and building costs today are incredibly high.

Post WWII we pretty much in debt for fifteen years minimum. In our own case, thirty years. Dang near everybody is in big debt on their home. I gotta thank our bank and banker or Kathy and I wouldn't have our own home.

That said it would be nice to have alternatives in the 50-100 K range. My guess is that is in the near future here in the U.S. There,s already some interest in ,tiny homes, about the square footage of a 20' yurt. There,s a ,tiny home, subdivision going in here.

[Bob Rowlands]

I don,t like iPad. Forgive all the errors.

[Bob Rowlands]

Anyone else use IPad and how long did it take to adjust?