How many of you have moved town / city / state PRIMARILY for prepping reasons?

Bill Masen - December 16, 2021

As per the header, I wonder how many of this particular community actually bit the bullet and decided to relocate with PREPAREDNESS the the primary motivating factor.

Its 20 years since it dawned on myself and my wife that the urban location (pop 270.000) we were living in may have been ideal for affordability and commuting, but its drawbacks outweighed any benefits ( highly urbanised, highly industrialised, high population density, high crime levels and above average pollution levels.

No we could not afford the idylic homestead,not even close, but we could afford to get way out of town to a much smaller very rural village ( pop around 3000)

The benefits were myriad and immediate, cleaner air, freshly grown local foods, smaller schools, very low crime, much more of a community spirit, more room to manouvre etc.

We took a large economic hit with me having to give up my main job and focus only on occasional contracts, but my wife retained her nursing role, but again the overall quality of life / peace of mind outweighed the loss of income.

So have any of you good people made the leap, if so whats your story?

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Preparedness was not our primary motivating factor for moving to our rural homestead… but it was a factor.  No way my wife would have moved further from our kids and her relatives just for preparedness.  She would, and did, move to have a place where we had room for our horses.  We used to live in a suburb of Memphis and boarding 4 horses was very expensive.

Our benefits of moving mirror yours.  In addition, the move gave me room for gardens, orchards, berries, grapes, nut trees, a pond, etc. … all done with the thought of preparedness.

 

We actually did move in order to be more prepared. We lived in a pretty busy city suburb and realized that it would be quite the trek to our bug out location if things were to go south. We also didn’t like how many people were around us and how densely populated it was. That brings it’s own problems such as civil unrest, looting, and increased likelihood of many other threats.

So we looked for quite a while until an opportunity opened up, then we took it. 

The long commute is not ideal but we find comfort in other areas such as being more prepared.

 

I didn’t move for prepping reasons but moved out of the super crowded SE for work to a MUCH more rural area, which in part lead to getting into preparedness. Power outs became a regular winter occurrence and it was a 30 mile round trip to the store – this lead to the realisation that I needed to be more ‘organised’ – it was another 8 years before I really started ‘being prepared’! 

 

Well, I’m going to buck the trend. I moved out of a preppers paradise into an urban setting some 10 years ago. 

It all started with a snow storm that saw us snowed in for nearly three weeks and realisation that I was completely on my own. It was tough. Water lines froze, electricity was intermittent and I had to move the chickens into the garage to give them some respite  from the intense cold. I saw no-one. I decided as I was not getting any younger that it would be foolish to stay and try and find work arounds that wouldn’t work in the long run. What if I had a fall? or a heart attack? I’m a pro active type and rather than wait for someone to come to my aid, I’ll make my life easier for me to control.

After that I swore it would never happen again and the next spring we moved into a suburb of the nearest town.

We have now moved again and this is the forever home, so although we still live in walking distance of just about everything, we are hardly city central. In fact we are probably more rural than a lot of villages. I did consider very carefully where to move to and made a list of likely dangers that I wished to avoid and another of what I wanted to see. We got very lucky with this property and it has everything on the wish list except a large garden and an open fire (this can be rectifed when funds permit). 

So I suppose you could say we have move for prepping reasons, ours are just a different view. 

 

My residences have been determined by my career choices, mostly based on the challenges and opportunities involved.  I have lived at various places in Arizona and California, each time evaluating thee situation and adjusting my preps accordingly, on both a long term and short term basis.

There are hazards for everywhere on this planet and your task is to know them and prepare accordingly.  Doesn’t make any real difference whether it is Death Valley or NYC….

 

@hikermor — “There are hazards for everywhere on this planet and your task is to know them and prepare accordingly.” While not identical, this is similar to our de facto family motto: “There’s no running away from climate change.”

Lately we have been thinking about buying the lot adjacent to our friends’ rural property in the PNW, mainly because we’re worried about lack of water in California in the long run. We looked at the climate models, though, and it dampened our enthusiasm, since the wet, hyper-productive forests of the PNW coast have really high fuel loads that will become dangerous when they dry out during increased summer droughts. That’s not a deal breaker, but it does drive home the reality that everywhere we think about has significant hazards and vulnerabilities.

 

I just read an article some place online a family in the PNW who have expressed similar concerns as yourself over the fire risks from the forests if they dry out again. They decided on a two prong response.  (1) they have fitted a sprinkler system to the room of their house to keep it very well in the dry season if the fire risk is high. Its connected to a borehole well.

But (2) they understand that a sprinkler system may fail or be overwhelmed so they are building a new home, 90% buried into the side of a hill with the remaining 10% being the entrance and full hight window frontage. A large paved patio area to the front and the treeline moved further away.

Damn expensive way of avoiding the fire, but apparently it will cost almost nothing to heat.

 

Oh, interesting! And yeah, sounds expensive to build, but I think we’ll be seeing more things like that pop up in the West, especially as fire insurance becomes harder to get and having a truly fireproof or highly fire resistant home replaces insurance as the most robust defense for your investment. One thing my partner and I have talked about are Q Cabins, which are resilient to seismic threats as well. (I like the Nautilus XP.) That said, we wouldn’t want to build on the property immediately if we bought. That way we could save up for a great fire resistant home and avoid saddling ourselves with the responsibilities and costs of managing a house we’re not living in, neither of which I want any part of.

 

Those Q Cabins look like a good investment in these perilous times.

 

I’ve never ever understood why in some high fire risk  parts of the US people build homes from wood and use flammable shingles on the roof ?

 

Wood frame construction is preferred in earthquake country.  No excuse for flammable shingles, but asphalt shingles are generally fire resistant.

 

I feel the same way on why people live in places like Florida or the Philippines that get slammed by a hurricane or typhoon every year. But some people can’t afford to move, or must have other reasons for living where they do.

 

JennyWren- Good for you realizing and analyzing the dangers of your life and being prepared against it. It seems for you that moving closer to a city would be you being more prepared than out in the middle of no where.

Your story reminds me of the man Bill Masen shared a month ago. He is this 74 year old hermit that has lived for 40 years on his own without electricity or running water. As he is getting older he has been evacuated a few times for health reasons. Instead of moving to the city and getting the care he needs though, he moves right back and says he will just keep going until he dies there.

To each his own, and I respect that man for living how he wants, but I think you are the smarter one here to realize your limits and doing something positive about it to prolong your life.

 

9/11 and aftermath made clear to me that fossil energy had created our lifestyle in the 20th and would abandon us in the 21st.  So I bugged from Cali to a small Missouri farm. 

Or I should say oil was the excuse to do what I’d always wanted.