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The Great Escape has Begun
- Thread starter jbolt
- Start date
- Joined
- Dec 3, 2013
- Messages
- 1,844
Thanks Jeff,
Points well taken. I'm glad to see you and your family rebound from your experience.
- Joined
- Dec 3, 2013
- Messages
- 1,844
This thread needs and update!
2020, what a screwy year. I have had a pretty tight plan for our move including time and finances. When our state went into lockdown we were forced to work remotely and work came to a near halt as the industry worked out how to function with the circumstances. In June my company decided to close both offices permanently. My associate, who I was getting 90% of my work from, decided it was a good time to semi-retire. This had never been a discussion between us. He knew my situation and we had had a lot of discussions about working remotely once I made the move. Work was intermittent through October and all but non-existent in November and December. Things were not lookin good. My biggest fear was having to get into my retirement savings which would hinder what improvements we could do to the new place. I decided to keep moving forward and figure it out as we went.
We made six trips to the property in 2020 to move my shop and other non essential household items. In June we had broadband brought into the property. The only broadband options were satellite, cellular or spot beam. My first tenant had cellular and said it was terrible, satellite was to expensive and too slow for my work so my only viable option was spot beam. Because our property sits on top of a knoll we have no clear line of sight to the tower on the mountain 3 miles away. The broadband company came out and did a drone survey. They gave me two options, put in a 100' tower with guaranteed signal or they could try and install the antenna in a tree with an 85% chance of success. The only risk was the $220 fee for an arborist to climb the tree to verify if it would work. At 10 grand for a tower we opted to try the tree install. They carefully picked a tree that would not be blocked in the future by other trees and sent their man up. Works perfect! The only downside (maybe) was the tree was too far from the house to run the Ethernet cable directly so we had to run it to the shop (oh darn). From there we will do a wireless bridge to the house.
My first tenant, who are great people, had been paying their rent on time even though both being out of work since the Covid shutdown. To the displeasure of my property management service I had deferred raising their rent since they were taking exceptional care of the property and were keeping up with the rent. Oregon is allowing renters to defer there rent at the expense of the property owner which is creating a lot of problems. Some people do not seem to grasp, or just don't care that they will still be on the hook for the rent in the future. The extra unemployment they were getting was allowing my tenant to stay. When that ran out in July they made the decision to move to another state where they could afford to buy a home. I was sorry to see them go. The silver lining (for us) was that the terrible fires in the Medford area had displaced so may people that there was a line five deep wanting to rent. Housing was already scarce before the fires. We had a new tenant in within two weeks at a rent 20% higher. She is an IT professional who works from home with two high school age boys that was looking for a place for a year or less while she looks for a home to buy so it worked out perfect for both of us.
Since we had purchased the property I had been looking for a small used tractor to help with yard maintenance. In 2019 we hand raked, loaded and hauled off 20 cubic yards of pine needles, leaves and branches which took a total of 10 days over several trips. I really didn't want to do that again. For whatever reason tractors retain their value and anything worth purchasing was 20 years old and selling for 70% of new. With the current situation and an unknown work future I agonized for a while if this was a good idea right now. My wife gave me that "Look" when I suggested we buy new. Despite some resistance I went with my gut feeling and made the decision to buy new. In August we had a new Kubota compact tractor delivered. With the tractor we raked loaded and hauled 40 cubic yards in two days. The wife is now fully onboard with the decision. The only downside is she now wants a new riding mower.
At home here in the Bay Area I still have a lot of work to do on this house to get it ready to rent after we move. With the extra time with no work I have been able to get a lot of work done. The downside is it still costs money! So I finished painting the house, repainted and reroofed the back patio cover, rebuilt the garden shed. Built, painted and installed a light box for the skylight I put in the kitchen 26 years ago.
Painted the new entry door and sidelight I put in last year. Finished the front landscaping, cleaned out the attic, insulated the ceiling (now that the attic was cleaned out!). Being a construction professional and too cheap to pay someone I usually self perform most tasks, plus it is always a good excuse to buy new tools 
. I can tell you at 56 years old and carrying more weight than I should, crawling and contorting into the tightest recesses of our attic to install batt insulation probably should have been one of those jobs hired out. I could barely move for two days afterward I was so sore. 
2021, a new year. Back in early December with no work in sight I began reaching out to other people I know in the industry for work prospects. The responses were positive but being the holiday season most everyone was winding down for the year. So I crossed my fingers and waited. The first week after new years my phone began ringing. I now have three more companies to do work for and another to meet with this month. The Covid situation has shown that we can work remotely and be productive which has set the stage for me to work from home in another state. My new clients have no problem with where my location will be. January was a full work month and February is looking to be the same. Huge sigh of relief!
7 months and counting!
2020, what a screwy year. I have had a pretty tight plan for our move including time and finances. When our state went into lockdown we were forced to work remotely and work came to a near halt as the industry worked out how to function with the circumstances. In June my company decided to close both offices permanently. My associate, who I was getting 90% of my work from, decided it was a good time to semi-retire. This had never been a discussion between us. He knew my situation and we had had a lot of discussions about working remotely once I made the move. Work was intermittent through October and all but non-existent in November and December. Things were not lookin good. My biggest fear was having to get into my retirement savings which would hinder what improvements we could do to the new place. I decided to keep moving forward and figure it out as we went.
We made six trips to the property in 2020 to move my shop and other non essential household items. In June we had broadband brought into the property. The only broadband options were satellite, cellular or spot beam. My first tenant had cellular and said it was terrible, satellite was to expensive and too slow for my work so my only viable option was spot beam. Because our property sits on top of a knoll we have no clear line of sight to the tower on the mountain 3 miles away. The broadband company came out and did a drone survey. They gave me two options, put in a 100' tower with guaranteed signal or they could try and install the antenna in a tree with an 85% chance of success. The only risk was the $220 fee for an arborist to climb the tree to verify if it would work. At 10 grand for a tower we opted to try the tree install. They carefully picked a tree that would not be blocked in the future by other trees and sent their man up. Works perfect! The only downside (maybe) was the tree was too far from the house to run the Ethernet cable directly so we had to run it to the shop (oh darn). From there we will do a wireless bridge to the house.
My first tenant, who are great people, had been paying their rent on time even though both being out of work since the Covid shutdown. To the displeasure of my property management service I had deferred raising their rent since they were taking exceptional care of the property and were keeping up with the rent. Oregon is allowing renters to defer there rent at the expense of the property owner which is creating a lot of problems. Some people do not seem to grasp, or just don't care that they will still be on the hook for the rent in the future. The extra unemployment they were getting was allowing my tenant to stay. When that ran out in July they made the decision to move to another state where they could afford to buy a home. I was sorry to see them go. The silver lining (for us) was that the terrible fires in the Medford area had displaced so may people that there was a line five deep wanting to rent. Housing was already scarce before the fires. We had a new tenant in within two weeks at a rent 20% higher. She is an IT professional who works from home with two high school age boys that was looking for a place for a year or less while she looks for a home to buy so it worked out perfect for both of us.
Since we had purchased the property I had been looking for a small used tractor to help with yard maintenance. In 2019 we hand raked, loaded and hauled off 20 cubic yards of pine needles, leaves and branches which took a total of 10 days over several trips. I really didn't want to do that again. For whatever reason tractors retain their value and anything worth purchasing was 20 years old and selling for 70% of new. With the current situation and an unknown work future I agonized for a while if this was a good idea right now. My wife gave me that "Look" when I suggested we buy new. Despite some resistance I went with my gut feeling and made the decision to buy new. In August we had a new Kubota compact tractor delivered. With the tractor we raked loaded and hauled 40 cubic yards in two days. The wife is now fully onboard with the decision. The only downside is she now wants a new riding mower.
At home here in the Bay Area I still have a lot of work to do on this house to get it ready to rent after we move. With the extra time with no work I have been able to get a lot of work done. The downside is it still costs money! So I finished painting the house, repainted and reroofed the back patio cover, rebuilt the garden shed. Built, painted and installed a light box for the skylight I put in the kitchen 26 years ago.
Painted the new entry door and sidelight I put in last year. Finished the front landscaping, cleaned out the attic, insulated the ceiling (now that the attic was cleaned out!). Being a construction professional and too cheap to pay someone I usually self perform most tasks, plus it is always a good excuse to buy new tools . I can tell you at 56 years old and carrying more weight than I should, crawling and contorting into the tightest recesses of our attic to install batt insulation probably should have been one of those jobs hired out. I could barely move for two days afterward I was so sore. 2021, a new year. Back in early December with no work in sight I began reaching out to other people I know in the industry for work prospects. The responses were positive but being the holiday season most everyone was winding down for the year. So I crossed my fingers and waited. The first week after new years my phone began ringing. I now have three more companies to do work for and another to meet with this month. The Covid situation has shown that we can work remotely and be productive which has set the stage for me to work from home in another state. My new clients have no problem with where my location will be. January was a full work month and February is looking to be the same. Huge sigh of relief!
7 months and counting!
- Joined
- Jul 20, 2012
- Messages
- 1,238
Consider purchasing a "Cyclone Rake" for those pine needles and grass clippings. Clean up will be a breeze. There are YouTube of it in action. We got one for leaves and it has been really nice and easy. No raking.
Been enjoying your story, thanks for updating! We also are working out our escape from CA and just (today) dropped an offer on a place in Prescott AZ. It has a nice 1064 sqft shop with it's own 200A service, fully insulated & half of it is 2 story providing for storage. Fingers crossed they take our offer. If they do I'll have to start my own escape thread! lol
- Joined
- Nov 26, 2017
- Messages
- 1,517
@jbolt Congratulations, on finding your piece of heaven.
I grew up in Tillamook Oregon and looking forward to retiring in Oregon. For now I am stuck in Washington state, which sadly is not much better than California, at least in the area I am. Won't end up in Northern Oregon this time, but are looking at the South West corner from the Cascades to the the Coast and below Roseburg. We still have just about 17 months left, seems like a long time until you think of all the things we have to get done. Will most likely build from scratch. Depending on what we find that fit our check list.
We moved up to Washington from Antioch, CA in 2010 when work was almost non existent. I know the commutes, not good. Worst was from Napa to S. San Francisco. That was a 126 mile round trip with the majority of it in heavy traffic.
Looks like you might be in Jackson County, nice area. A little warm for me. Wish you all the best in your new home and of course the shop. Nice that you will be able to take your job with you. Probably able to expand into Oregon clientele.
I grew up in Tillamook Oregon and looking forward to retiring in Oregon. For now I am stuck in Washington state, which sadly is not much better than California, at least in the area I am. Won't end up in Northern Oregon this time, but are looking at the South West corner from the Cascades to the the Coast and below Roseburg. We still have just about 17 months left, seems like a long time until you think of all the things we have to get done. Will most likely build from scratch. Depending on what we find that fit our check list.
We moved up to Washington from Antioch, CA in 2010 when work was almost non existent. I know the commutes, not good. Worst was from Napa to S. San Francisco. That was a 126 mile round trip with the majority of it in heavy traffic.
Looks like you might be in Jackson County, nice area. A little warm for me. Wish you all the best in your new home and of course the shop. Nice that you will be able to take your job with you. Probably able to expand into Oregon clientele.
- Joined
- Sep 28, 2013
- Messages
- 4,308
great update and I'm glad you made it through all that stress and mess intact!
- Joined
- Dec 3, 2013
- Messages
- 1,844
Yeah I have looked at those. I have also seen some interesting DIY setups.
Currently I have a 60" straw rake on the back of the tractor. I use that to drag stuff to a path where my wife uses the riding mower and a Agri-Fab sweeper to pick it up and take to the main pile. Anything within a 100' of the main pile I just drag there. The sweeper does a surprisingly good job. I never intended to get the sweeper but our cousin loaned us hers to try and within 10 minutes of use my wife ran over a stump with it damaging the front. I bought our cousin a new one and kept the damaged one. It is now battle reinforced for 'wife' use.