Cabin Fever

Last year, Dave Canterbury spent a good portion of the winter in a yurt. This time around, looks like he's upgrading to a small cabin. The above video shows the initial tour of the place and runs through some of the features of the cabin. It's not big - single room with a loft, with enough room for some beds, table, gun rack and wood stove.

Dave runs through the cost for the cabin - $4.6k for the cabin kit, plus an estimated $4k for the stuff on the interior - wood stove, furnishings, etc. Though $4k does seem a bit high for the furnishings shown...probably all of the interior wood had to be purchased as well. Plus several days to assemble. So around $9K, more or less, plus a few days of work. That's not bad. You could certainly do it for less without the cabin kit and using/processing raw materials from your land.

Long term, my plan is to buy a plot of land up in the mountains somewhere and build a mostly off-the-grid cabin. It probably would not be a full time residence, at least not initially. If there's an existing cabin that fits the needs and budget, then that's great, but I may end up getting raw land and then building something down the road, so Dave's little cabin got the gears churning.

Dave's cabin is probably a bit small for what I'd like for long term living. A little more elbow room and a basic bathroom would be nice - composting toilet, probably. I'd build the cabin over a root cellar/basement for added storage. Plenty of space for stored food. And a cellar would be easier to fortify for secure storage when we weren't on-site.

A well, pump, water catchment system and cistern would handle the water needs; a spring, stream, etc. on the land would be a good backup. A basic solar or windmill system for lighting, a 12V fridge, comms and some perimeter security stuff. Eventually, we'd add some buried fuels tanks.

Down the road, as the family grows older and expands, we'd probably build an additional cabin or two to allow family and friends to have their own space. An outbuilding for tools and toys. At some point, we'd move to the land full time, and then probably add a hen house and maybe a small barn.

Anyways, nothing too fancy - cozy, simple and functional. A ways down the road, but always interesting to see what others are doing, learn and plan.