Anatomy of a semi-automated lifestyle - Part 2

A few days ago I wrote about eliminating your housing expense to free up major financial resources (and mental resources!) for your business. Let’s explore that a bit more and talk about a couple of ways that you can reduce or eliminate the need to pay for housing.

• Work as a housesitter - This is probably the most common way to live without paying rent… and to get paid at the same time! I know a girl who makes $50 a day to take care of a dog for the manager of an incredibly popular rock band. The family travels frequently, but they’re not always able to take the family pet, so they pay for her to live in the home and look after things while they’re away. She also works as a nanny for another family, and when she’s in between work, she visits her mother and sister for a few days. The downside to this situation is that it’s sort of a rootless life. It gets difficult to live out of a duffel bag and the trunk of a car, but if the juice is worth the squeeze for you, then it might make a whole lot of sense to sacrifice the “rent” or “buy” lifestyle to save some coin.
• Get a resident job, like me! - There are plenty of jobs that offer housing, whether its covered in full, or measured as a percentage of your actual salary. Apartments and privately owned hotels might offer this kind of arrangement. With the proper networking, you may also come across wealthy people in your local community who are looking for live-in house cleaners or landscapers (which I’ve also done in the past). Some churches may offer housing in exchange for security or maintanence work.
• Live with family - Seriously, the last thing you might want to do is move back in with mom and dad, but if you approach it correctly, it can make a lot of sense to lean on family for a couple months while you grind out your business idea and get it off the ground. The downside to this is fairly obvious… sharing a home with a family member requires a lot more tact and manners than with a normal run-of-the-mill roommate situation, since you’ll have to face them for years afterwards. But the prospect of sacrificing your lifestyle for the opportunity to kick off an exciting business venture may still appeal to a few of you.
• Take on roommates - Sharing a home with a couple people may seem like a difficult lifestyle choice, but if you’re able to choose the people, it can prove to be a bit more bearable. Networking can lead you to a group of people who share your enthusiasm for business, and the right group might actually jump at the chance to shack up and share both resources and living quarters.

Readers, any other ideas about reducing or eliminating house costs? Have you successfully implemented a living arrangement that saves you money? Leave your thoughts in the comments! Look for the next article in this series in a few days… How to buy your time back.

Check out the first article in this series, Anatomy of a semi-automated lifestyle - Part 1

Other articles you might like are Aim for the “Perfect Day”, once a week, or Seven ways to reduce your overhead.

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