I conceived this blog at the end of 2019, when we had just hit our FIRE number. Back then, it would have been very easy to keep plodding along as before for fear of making a change and getting it wrong. I didn’t want that to happen. What’s the point of all that saving and investing if we didn’t take advantage of it as the freedom fund as the enabler it was intended to be.
In May 2021 I reduced my working hours from full time to 50%, and in July 2022 I stopped being an employee altogether. I guess that means I spent 25% of 2022 working for someone else. It is now almost 6 months since my last salary landed in my account, and I can honestly say I don’t miss working. I do miss some of the people, but have made an effort to stay in touch and meet up with friends when I have been in the right area. That is the one of the major downsides to our current nomadic lifestyle, the amount of time we spend with other people is much reduced. That and the inevitable occasion when it would be really useful to have something to hand that is packed somewhere in a shipping container…..
When we moved out of our home of almost 11 years in July 2022, we expected we would be installed in a new property in a wilder part of the UK by the end of the year. In the mean time, we chose to explore house sitting (with the campervan as back up) for a couple of reasons; it would save money on accommodation, especially in the expensive summer holiday period, and we would get to play with other people’s animals. Some animals have been harder work than others, but generally our experience has been overwhelmingly positive. We have explored some beautiful new places and have stayed in some lovely houses. In fact, I am currently sitting in a large timber framed house in Shropshire, dating back to 1521 according to the owners. I can see how people make a lifestyle out of this.
Our plan hasn’t worked out quite as we had hoped. As I write this, we are waiting to see who finds a new house first, us or the vendor of the property we had an offer accepted on last August, who still has nowhere to go. We are not sure if this transaction still has a chance of going ahead or whether we will have to bail out when something else suitable comes to the market. Life never works out quite how you planned, so we were determined to make the most of the situation, rather than dwell on the negatives. We joked about having a mid-life gap year, but neither of us really expected it to last a whole year.
Since moving out, we have spent 176 nights in ‘temporary accommodation’ or one kind or another. The majority of this (104 nights) has been house sitting – for 7 strangers found through an online platform, and 3 friends and family. Looking back, I am surprised we did not use the campervan more. The holiday lets and travelodges crept in at the end of the year when campsite options were limited and we wimped out of sleeping in the van if the underfloor heating wasn’t going to be plugged in.
Our nomadic 6 months (so far) in numbers:
As well as a lot of change in our lives, the freedom fund saw quite a bit of volatility in 2022 as well. It ended December £20,297 down on the value at the start of the year. This is the first year that the overall value change in a year has been negative, since I started recording. It is also the first year that we have stopped accumulating and started to drawdown. That said, the drop represents 1.7% of the value at the start of the year, so in real terms it was pretty flat. There were several monthly changes much higher than that – in both directions!
From a record high at the end of May, to a low of £1,146,049 at the end of September, the fluctuating value continues to be well above our original FIRE number of just under £900k.
The volatility of our investments is not causing us any concern, as we continue to have more than 3 years’ expenses available in cash (and premium bonds). This does not include the big chunk of cash we realised when we sold the house, which we are keeping completely separate. As we are now almost 6 months on from receiving the proceeds of our house sale, with no move in date in sight, we are starting to move this cash to better paying accounts and with different financial institutions.
When it comes to expenses, 2022 was our lowest spend year since we started keeping records, despite rampant inflation and a cost of living squeeze. If you have been reading this blog for a while, you will know this is down to a complete change of lifestyle in the second half of the year rather than a major frugal living effort. In fact looking at the numbers, just the fact we have not had any pet-associated expenses this year more than makes up the difference, once the adjustment in annual allowances* is normalised.
As you might expect, as we have been ‘homeless’ for 6 months, our utilities spend was less than half of last year, as was the home and garden line. This was offset by increased entertainment spending, which was mostly eating and drinking out with friends and family.
Despite most of our accommodation since July being provided for free through house sits, we still racked up travel spending at just over 2019 levels (with 2020 and 2021 being much lower for obvious pandemic-related reasons).
We didn’t reduce our monthly allowances in 2022 in a deliberate attempt to reign in spending. Rather, we realised at the end of last year that neither of us was spending all of it. Now we are in the spending rather than saving phase of our journey, it seemed rather foolish to draw down more than we needed, only for it to build up in personal current accounts.
The other / misc line is also up considerably this year. This is where I have been accounting for storage charges and removal costs as well as things like National Trust membership and random camping accessories that may come up any year.
Overall we have been pleased with how 2022 has panned out from a spending point of view. We are less pleased it has taken so long to get the next stage of our adventure underway. We continue to do our best to embrace the opportunity this nomadic phase of our lives is bringing, but I think that unless something moves soon on the property front, we will need to find a rental property in the right area. This will increase costs (although we will lose some of the storage costs), but we are increasingly realising that we need a base to be able to feel ‘normal’. I am not sure if it is the lack of certainty of what will happen next, or the practical limitations of not having a space bigger than a campervan (probably a bit of both), but the longer it goes on the more lost we are feeling.
I love house sitting, and will definitely continue to do it, but it would be so much nicer to be able to plan a trip without worrying if we will miss out on a house coming available and finding ourselves in the wrong part of the country at the wrong time. At the moment we are afraid to plan too far ahead, which limits our options.
At the start of 2022, I had not set any New Year resolutions or goals for the year. By the end of the month, I was enjoying getting out walking, especially before and after work on working days. By the end of the month, my fitbit told me I had walked 100miles in January, so I wanted to set a challenge that would encourage me to keep it up. The Lands End to John O’Groats challenge was born. The distance one way wasn’t enough of a stretch for the year, so I committed to walk the equivalent of there and back or an average of 146 miles a month.
By the middle of the year, I was well ahead of target, but a bit of a slip in November meant I was only slightly ahead by the end of the year, but challenge completed 🙂
I have decided to track miles walked every month in 2023 to reinforce the habit. I will aim for 146 miles each month. As well as exercise, getting out in the fresh air really improves my mood, so I want to make sure I don’t go backwards on this front.
It probably won’t surprise you to learn that my main goal for 2023 is to buy a new home. As well as the major milestones, I don’t want to forget the simpler, habit building goals. This year, I want to increase the time I spend reading rather than looking at a screen (she says while tying on a laptop….). I don’t think 1 book a month is much of a challenge, so it has to be at least 2, or 24 this year.
What positives have you taken from 2022? What are your goals for 2023? I believe it is just as important to celebrate the small wins as well as the big ones.
*a sum of £500 per month (£250 each), which is paid into personal accounts. This may not be spent in the month, but is not tracked. Some of it may show up in the freedom fund in the future, if savings build up and are invested.
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