2013 - The Year Of Simplification

Laura playing cricket

As 2013 wraps up, it seems to me that we'll look back and see that it was one of the most significant in our quest to simplify our lives.

While this whole process had it's start in 2006, it's really gained some momentum.

This is a bit self-indulgent, but to show how simple this process really is, I started to add up the changes we've made - it's a short list with some big impact.

• The most significant this year was selling the house and investing the majority of the proceeds (we kept some for travel). Renting is slightly more expensive than owning, but it doesn't take into account the investment upside of the equity. Mind you, it doesn't take into account the upside of real estate either - but lately the market has been quite stagnant. If you listen to the prognosticators (who are almost always wrong), real estate is due for a fall anyway. There are upsides and downsides to both real estate and investing.
• Putting the "extra" stuff into a storage facility. Although I was tempted to get a 5'x5' space, we ended up with a 5'x15' storage locker. Cost is about $130/month, which I hope comes down as we whittle away at the stuff we have stored (and move into a smaller locker, or move out completely if we live in a 2 bedroom apartment).
• We moved into a small 1 bedroom basement suite in a large home just up the hill from where we were. It is a bit tight, but as the months roll along, we're getting more and more organized. The only extra we have to pay for is electricity - at less than $50 a month. Cost to rent is $885, which includes high speed internet and cable TV.
• The truck was basically sitting there depreciating, and costing about $200/month to insure and maintain, so Don (my brother) now has it. There go those costs.
• I've shut down my BuildBetterSleep.com site, as it wasn't of interest to me any more (I now sleep pretty well most of the time), and it was time-consuming to maintain. The cost of the website was only about $10/month, but the "psychological costs" were much greater.
• One of the bigger savings has been Travis working for Virgin Australia. We've leveraged off this, and can now get to Oz and back for a reasonable amount (we still have to get to LA, but we can shop the sales). We'd likely go to Australia regardless, but far less frequently.

"Natural Bridge" in Oz

What this downsizing has allowed us to do is travel - we don't have a lot to maintain back in Vancouver.

Now if we can only figure out how to pay for a home only when we're in town? Any ideas?