Generating Cash Flow

#2 March 21, 2008

I’m a stay-at-home dad (SAHD) who also home schools his two kids, ages 4 and 7, in a small rural town in Vermont. Even though we do live out in the country, we are not exactly in the backwoods. My wife and I both work at Dartmouth, which is only about ten miles away, and there is a vibrant community up here of former city folks who are trying their best (or not) to blend in with the Native Vermonters, who look to us with sympathetic eyes. Because there are several universities in the area, there is a definite college-town feel to the Upper Valley, which includes the all the cultural and artistic activities that go along with it.

Most of us have, for the most part, chosen to live up here because the quality of life, bearing in mind it’s distinction from standard of living. The Upper Valley is just a great place to raise a family, for many reason, the simples of which is that there are so many families that fall into the same demographic as us (i.e., young families with small children, mostly college educated parents) and yet, because it is smaller, there is a strong sense of neighborhood and community. Especially where we live.

Now one of the things that struck us about living up here is that it’s not cheap. Having moved from Los Angeles and New York City by way of Providence, RI, we really thought that we’d be sitting pretty when it came to buying a house. After all, how much worse could it get than Los Angeles or New York.

While it is not as ridiculous as the big metropolitan areas, it’s still pretty bad. Housing prices are outrageous up here, a fact that simultaneously surprises us but also, in some perverse way, validates out choice of living up here. This economic pressure that increases land values, however, seems to have the adverse effect of driving young families, the ones like us who are trying to get their lives started, out of the area because of the simple fact that it’s just too expensive to live up here.

Unless, of course, you are a two-working parent household. We had this option just as much as the next person, but decided that one of should be at home for our children. When our daughter was born, and then our son, my wife quit her job and raised them both while I worked full time. We were in Manhattan at the time.

When we moved up here, we decided that it was best for me to be at home while she went back to work full time. I work part-time, as I mentioned, at the university.

Which brings me to my big adventure. Life up here isn’t easy, everything is expensive, from food to real estate, prices are high. We are working hard to make ends meet, and when I look around, I can’t fathom how some people do it.

We live simply: we have one car that’s paid for, we don’t watch TV, and we are not shoppers, so we don’t spend a lot of money on extraneous junk. There are two areas that we do spend money - food and travel, but even still, we are not extravagant by any means.

I honestly don’t know how some people get by. True, we end up with less money at the end of the day because I am at home with the kids, but it just gives you a sense of how things are up here.

Either way, in the interest of making extra income, I’ve pondered many things, even working nights, but decided to give freelance writing a try.

More on this soon.