RPF0330-Nate_Dodson_Interview
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00:00:29.800 | Welcome to Radical Personal Finance, the show dedicated to providing you with the knowledge,
00:00:35.480 | skills, insight, and encouragement you need to live a rich and meaningful life now while
00:00:40.240 | building a plan for financial freedom in 10 years or less.
00:00:43.760 | My guest on today's show is Nate Dodson.
00:00:46.240 | Nate, fascinating guy who is an expert at building a lifestyle of independence.
00:00:54.000 | He's here today to share with us some of his ideas and tips surrounding how to save money
00:00:59.040 | and how to live a low-cost lifestyle, but also, and perhaps more importantly, how to
00:01:03.960 | build an entrepreneurial endeavor online in a way that's perfect for you.
00:01:09.120 | He's an expert at using some of the new tools, and today he's here to share some of his experiences
00:01:15.700 | with you.
00:01:16.700 | Nate, welcome to Radical Personal Finance.
00:01:18.200 | Nate Dodson, Radical Personal Finance
00:01:19.200 | Thanks for having me.
00:01:20.200 | Hey, man.
00:01:21.200 | You're a longtime listener to the show, and I brought you on today to talk about some
00:01:24.320 | of the micro-businesses that you have been able to build.
00:01:28.600 | I think some of the content will be helpful to other listeners of Radical Personal Finance
00:01:32.040 | who are interested in pursuing similar paths.
00:01:35.760 | As we begin, could you share for a few minutes your path to the businesses that you now participate
00:01:41.920 | with?
00:01:42.920 | Nate Dodson Yeah, absolutely.
00:01:44.920 | I've basically been creating micro-businesses since I was in fourth grade, and nothing that
00:01:51.920 | really caught on steam besides selling weed in high school.
00:01:55.680 | Hold on, I've got to ask.
00:02:00.760 | Was this a long-time financial strategy of yours, or was this just a short-term side
00:02:06.080 | gig?
00:02:07.080 | Nate Dodson Well, it was just one of the first ones that
00:02:08.280 | caught on.
00:02:09.280 | I mean, I did ... like fifth grade, I was selling candy and did a school newspaper,
00:02:14.400 | and in high school I got into marijuana and mushrooms, and that was the only thing that
00:02:19.000 | started actually making me money for a business.
00:02:21.920 | So, how did you get started in a drug-dealing business as a high school student?
00:02:29.720 | What was that process like?
00:02:31.200 | Nate Dodson It actually just came out of working at a
00:02:36.440 | skate shop.
00:02:37.440 | I was working at a skate shop and got to know some guys that had the connection to good
00:02:43.400 | marijuana in my little small town and didn't have anything like that, so I started giving
00:02:47.520 | it to my friends.
00:02:48.520 | And pretty soon, you know it, I was working at McDonald's.
00:02:51.200 | I was 15 and a half to 16, and they would always say, "Nate, you have like 10 checks
00:02:57.080 | waiting to be picked up."
00:02:58.080 | I would never pick up my checks because I just didn't even care about the money I was
00:03:01.520 | making at McDonald's.
00:03:02.520 | Dave Boll How much money did you earn?
00:03:05.320 | Nate Dodson I don't know.
00:03:08.520 | I've never been one to really keep track of how much money I've earned, to be completely
00:03:12.360 | honest with you.
00:03:13.360 | I just had money just coming out of my pockets.
00:03:19.280 | I didn't have any bills.
00:03:20.280 | I was living with my parents.
00:03:21.280 | I was just a teenager.
00:03:22.280 | Dave Boll Did you waste it all, or what did you do
00:03:26.280 | with the money?
00:03:27.280 | Nate Dodson Well, I know I've reached a point where I
00:03:30.320 | didn't have any, so I guess I did waste it at some point.
00:03:33.000 | Dave Boll Did you get caught, or how did you get out
00:03:36.520 | of that business, assuming that you have?
00:03:38.080 | Nate Dodson Well, I just got out of it.
00:03:40.600 | I came down to school at IU, Indiana University, and just kind of got out of it from then.
00:03:45.560 | Just grew out of it.
00:03:47.800 | This wasn't something I wanted to be risky anymore, and just got interested in other
00:03:53.160 | things.
00:03:54.160 | I get interested in something new every few months.
00:03:55.680 | Dave Boll Sure, sure.
00:03:56.680 | Well, go for it.
00:03:57.680 | Continue your story.
00:03:58.680 | I just couldn't resist asking about that business, but keep going with your story.
00:04:03.680 | Nate Dodson Yeah, so that was one of the ones that worked.
00:04:07.120 | I had many years when a business didn't work, and I went through college and had several
00:04:13.400 | jobs out of college.
00:04:15.200 | I did actually did some handyman work in college by just putting an ad in the paper, and that
00:04:21.520 | made me a little bit of money.
00:04:24.680 | But then ended up back in Bloomington, where I went to school.
00:04:27.520 | I lived in Portland, Oregon for a little bit, Michigan for a little bit.
00:04:30.280 | Ended up back here, and got a job as a restoration ecologist, which is a fancy word for kind
00:04:38.720 | of a laborer.
00:04:39.720 | I sprayed a lot of herbicide, and worked out in the woods, and did forestry work, cutting
00:04:43.960 | down trees and stuff.
00:04:46.040 | I just started to not feel that healthy.
00:04:48.640 | I was newly married, and I would go out of town a lot, and I would get covered in herbicide
00:04:55.360 | all the time.
00:04:56.360 | I've just always kind of had this entrepreneurial background, or entrepreneurial tendencies,
00:05:04.960 | I guess.
00:05:05.960 | I was exploring stuff on the side the whole time.
00:05:09.000 | Then in, I think it was 2012, my wife got pregnant, and I knew I would have a daughter,
00:05:17.280 | or I didn't know I was a daughter at the time, but I knew I'd have a kid in nine months.
00:05:21.240 | I just started to think about the fact that I would not have time to spend with her if
00:05:26.560 | I was working 55 hours a week, and going out of town all the time.
00:05:31.360 | I just like, I need to get serious about this.
00:05:34.000 | So I started to read a bunch of business books, and looked online, and Etsy just seemed really
00:05:41.920 | easy.
00:05:42.920 | There's a lot of things that make it a really easy kind of gateway business for someone
00:05:46.400 | to get into.
00:05:48.080 | Basically, there's numbers on there, so you can see what people are purchasing on everyone's
00:05:53.360 | site.
00:05:54.360 | So you can see kind of what's in demand just by going through there.
00:06:00.400 | So I just started looking on there, and I saw, "Oh, I make stuff kind of like that already,
00:06:07.440 | just for the fun of it.
00:06:08.720 | So I'll put my stuff online and see if it sells."
00:06:12.280 | Stuff started selling, and it grew into an Etsy business.
00:06:14.760 | I've done a few of them actually since then, two of them which I still actively manage.
00:06:20.800 | >>Steve: So is Etsy now your family's full-time income?
00:06:24.720 | >>Jay: No, it's not our full-time income.
00:06:29.040 | I mean, it actually covers our full-time income, because we live really cheap.
00:06:33.200 | We're really into just radical simplicity.
00:06:38.440 | Our goal for next year actually is to live under $15,000 a year.
00:06:41.360 | >>Steve: That's awesome.
00:06:42.360 | >>Jay: And that'll be for a family of four when my daughter comes to end up, or my new
00:06:46.640 | child comes to end of March.
00:06:51.240 | So it's not a full-time income.
00:06:52.320 | My wife works 10 hours a week as a dietician, give or take.
00:06:57.920 | And then we have the farm.
00:06:59.600 | We earned a little income off of last year, should earn a little more off this year.
00:07:06.680 | And I have a rental house as well.
00:07:08.720 | >>Steve: So you've got a diverse series of income streams, which is awesome.
00:07:14.320 | So what makes Etsy – you mentioned that Etsy is very accessible, and you mentioned
00:07:21.320 | because you can go on there and see what's selling.
00:07:23.360 | So is the trick just to go on Etsy and see who's selling stuff and copy them and rip
00:07:28.480 | off their stuff and create your own?
00:07:30.400 | Or where does somebody start if they're interested in creating an Etsy business?
00:07:34.440 | >>Jay: Well, you probably really could do that if you wanted, but you don't really need
00:07:40.320 | to do that.
00:07:41.320 | You can just kind of – it has an existing audience.
00:07:44.760 | It's a platform.
00:07:45.760 | It's got the infrastructure.
00:07:47.360 | It's easy just to put stuff on there without having to go through the trouble of building
00:07:51.680 | a website or source stuff from China.
00:07:54.200 | I mean, it's just really low risk, and it's a rapid reward.
00:07:58.200 | It doesn't take a lot of upfront things to build out an Etsy store.
00:08:03.440 | But yeah, you can go on there, and I encourage people just to browse around just forever
00:08:08.920 | and find stuff that you think is cool.
00:08:12.320 | And you can look.
00:08:14.280 | There's a number down the side.
00:08:15.280 | You can see how many sales they've had.
00:08:17.560 | When you click on the sales, you can see what actual products they're selling.
00:08:21.400 | So I'm not necessarily advocating that you just copy people and rip them off completely,
00:08:25.520 | but just go on there and get inspired and create something that resonates with you.
00:08:33.440 | And also, the thing about Etsy is that they do allow outside manufacturing.
00:08:38.480 | So you can find products on there that you think are cool that are selling.
00:08:43.520 | There's a proven demand.
00:08:45.760 | And then you can put up an ad on Craigslist and find a local person to make it for you.
00:08:50.160 | And as long as it still has a profit margin, you're good to go.
00:08:53.880 | What types of products do you sell on Etsy?
00:08:58.360 | Right now, my two main ones are prints.
00:09:01.360 | I sell artwork, and I'm getting ready to build those out into more products, actually.
00:09:09.520 | And then I also sell a luxury wedding guest book that sells for $150.
00:09:13.680 | So those are my two main ones.
00:09:16.720 | But I also have experience selling skateboards, custom skateboards, and teepees, like children's
00:09:24.920 | play tents.
00:09:26.760 | And then I've helped a couple other people start Etsy businesses as well.
00:09:31.280 | So one of my goals here, as we record this, is the beginning of 2016.
00:09:35.800 | One of my goals in 2016 is to bring more income opportunities to the listeners of Radical
00:09:44.560 | Personal Finance, to help people diversify their income streams, to help people build
00:09:48.640 | a backup source of income, and just basically more ideas about side hustles.
00:09:56.400 | So talk about if you were advising me and I said, "Hey, I want to start an Etsy business,"
00:10:04.640 | walk me through the whole process.
00:10:06.080 | I've got some ideas on maybe some things that I can create.
00:10:10.040 | I've looked around.
00:10:11.040 | I've got some ideas.
00:10:12.760 | Walk me through the process of doing that.
00:10:16.520 | If you've already got some ideas, I would go onto Etsy and search for what your ideas
00:10:21.320 | are and see if people are making something similar that's actually selling.
00:10:25.040 | Otherwise, you might want to just scrap that idea and go with something that has some proven
00:10:29.280 | demand.
00:10:30.280 | Etsy's been around for a while, and the customers have already decided what they're in the market
00:10:36.520 | for.
00:10:38.160 | When you're starting out as an entrepreneur, you're either an inventor or an innovator.
00:10:42.600 | The inventor part's really hard.
00:10:44.720 | It's hard to get it right.
00:10:47.120 | Innovating is just seeing what the market is already out there in the market and making
00:10:51.200 | it a little better or making it a little appealing.
00:10:56.200 | That's what I would do to start.
00:10:57.760 | The competition on Etsy is pretty weak, I would say.
00:11:01.760 | I've been really successful on there, and I've given it pretty low effort, to be honest
00:11:08.040 | with you.
00:11:10.240 | Both those businesses were a couple months of going at it a little bit hard, and then
00:11:15.840 | now I'm just working on them less than 10 hours a week.
00:11:21.800 | If you can dedicate large chunks of time and just create systems and build a brand and
00:11:27.720 | a sales funnel and do all the legitimate business stuff, you're going to be successful on there.
00:11:33.120 | That's for sure.
00:11:34.120 | Do you have to, on Etsy, do it all yourself, or is it possible to set up this as a more
00:11:39.680 | passive type of business?
00:11:45.640 | You don't have to do it all yourself.
00:11:47.040 | You're allowed to have a company.
00:11:49.320 | You don't have to be just a solopreneur, just building a product yourself.
00:11:55.240 | You definitely want to.
00:11:56.360 | I think any business, you want to make it somewhat scalable and passive.
00:12:00.400 | If you're going to pick a product, I would definitely recommend picking something that
00:12:06.000 | you can create systems that either through human labor or just something you create once
00:12:11.920 | and sell over and over again will still bring you a profit margin, which is what my prints
00:12:18.520 | are.
00:12:19.720 | My prints, I create a print one time, and some of them I've sold hundreds of times.
00:12:25.360 | That hour I took to create that print, if you go out through the rest of my life, I
00:12:31.000 | made $6,000 an hour when I made that print.
00:12:35.960 | Definitely picking something scalable is important and somewhat passive to some degree.
00:12:41.440 | What's not necessarily important, if you love just making necklaces all day, then go for
00:12:45.400 | it.
00:12:46.860 | If you want to free up your time to just follow your passions or tinker, which is pretty much
00:12:50.960 | what I do with all my extra time, then that's what I would recommend for sure.
00:12:56.000 | >> Any other examples of micro businesses that you've built that have worked well?
00:13:05.280 | >> Most of them have failed.
00:13:09.120 | The farm is actually catching on.
00:13:10.640 | I've got an urban farm going here in Bloomington, and it's catching on and brought in a little
00:13:15.840 | bit of income, and I think it should bring in 10 to 20 grand this year.
00:13:23.080 | That's just a rough estimate.
00:13:24.080 | I'm not trying to go too hard on it, because I have another child coming at the end of
00:13:29.040 | March.
00:13:30.040 | Most of my stuff I've done has failed.
00:13:31.440 | The Etsy thing, it's so easy.
00:13:34.720 | I was successful, so it had to be easy, because I'm not all that smart.
00:13:40.760 | I have ADD.
00:13:41.760 | I can't stick with an idea for more than a couple months for sure, and it's done well,
00:13:48.680 | so if that tells you anything.
00:13:51.240 | >> You don't seem to be very bothered by the string of failures that you described.
00:13:56.600 | >> Oh, no.
00:13:59.480 | Not at all.
00:14:01.640 | It's going to be crazy to show my kids one day all of the folders on my computer of the
00:14:07.280 | 150 business ideas I've had.
00:14:11.280 | I was always trying to just invent a new wheel and build something life-changing, but I think
00:14:19.240 | it's really a better strategy to just build something that brings some cash flow.
00:14:24.000 | I don't work for the company anymore.
00:14:25.520 | I'm just home, and it doesn't take me very many hours at all to create a livelihood,
00:14:32.560 | especially since I've cut all our costs down and everything.
00:14:39.280 | I have half the day to be creative and hang out with my family, and that's what it's all
00:14:44.120 | about to me.
00:14:46.640 | I don't think you need to be a millionaire to be happy.
00:14:50.800 | I don't know how I got on that tangent.
00:14:54.840 | >> What are some of the major strategies that allow you to live as a family of four with
00:15:01.360 | a baby soon to be born on such a small amount of annual expenses?
00:15:07.880 | >> Well, we have the farm here.
00:15:14.360 | When you have a farm, you have food waste, which is paid for by your business, essentially.
00:15:22.480 | There's a certain amount of product you can't sell, and instead of composting it, you're
00:15:26.520 | allowed to eat it.
00:15:27.520 | >> Right.
00:15:28.520 | >> One can tell you can't.
00:15:30.360 | Food is a huge thing.
00:15:31.360 | I got into hunting.
00:15:34.800 | I've got a bunch of venison in the freezer.
00:15:38.360 | That was one of our big expenses, and then we just don't buy stuff.
00:15:43.000 | We have a thrift shop just down the street if we want something, or we just do it ourselves.
00:15:49.360 | Let's see.
00:15:51.920 | What else?
00:15:53.000 | I don't have internet at my house, and I make my living online.
00:15:58.280 | That's the whole thing.
00:16:01.640 | Our house has crappy carpets.
00:16:03.800 | There's lots of stuff that we're not doing to impress our friends, basically.
00:16:07.880 | We get on our bikes when we want to go somewhere.
00:16:10.600 | We do have a car, actually, but it's got 220,000 miles on it.
00:16:15.320 | Actually, I just got a new van, too.
00:16:22.000 | Anytime we're going to make a purchase, we just delay it and decide whether we can avoid
00:16:26.840 | it, basically.
00:16:27.840 | >> Are you and your wife on the same page?
00:16:31.280 | Do you guys find it easy to both desire to live this frugal, relaxed lifestyle, or does
00:16:38.080 | it bring conflict in your relationship?
00:16:40.680 | >> Yeah, I would say we're on the same page, where both of us have desires, and then the
00:16:47.880 | other person talks them out of fulfilling their desires, basically, if that makes sense.
00:16:56.440 | We've talked about how we want our life to be centered around connection with our friends,
00:17:02.960 | with each other, with our family, and with nature, and not about becoming millionaires,
00:17:11.800 | having a housekeeper, having a mansion, and having a Mercedes.
00:17:16.840 | We both know that, but with advertising and technology, we both have stuff we want.
00:17:26.280 | We just talk about it.
00:17:27.280 | We're around each other all the time.
00:17:29.000 | I work from home.
00:17:31.240 | She's only gone an hour or two a day, so we have a lot of time to talk.
00:17:35.400 | Whenever we're in the car, our one phone that we ... I'm getting rid of my phone.
00:17:42.840 | It gets shut off, actually, tomorrow, because I thought maybe you might call, but I'll have
00:17:46.560 | no cell phone and no internet at the house besides this patchy connection I get off one
00:17:50.520 | of my neighbors, which I wish they would cancel, so I didn't have internet at home.
00:17:57.400 | We just set up our lives.
00:17:59.280 | Obviously, we look at our expenses and see where we're spending money and just work at
00:18:03.800 | it, cut it, build skills, stuff like that.
00:18:07.320 | How do you run an online business without internet in your house?
00:18:13.520 | Library, coffee shops.
00:18:19.240 | When you have it at your house, it's just too tempting.
00:18:21.480 | You're just always on there, or you're just goofing off.
00:18:24.440 | If you have to go somewhere ... I'm riding my bike in the freezing cold, and I'm sitting
00:18:30.120 | in a coffee shop on an uncomfortable wooden chair, I want to get my work done fast.
00:18:36.920 | I want to get it done in three hours.
00:18:38.600 | I used to have a business building websites, and I didn't know how to build websites, and
00:18:43.080 | I didn't have internet at my house.
00:18:45.040 | These are the kind of things you can do if you're just a little bit creative.
00:18:49.160 | I ran these businesses for the first year and a half, working full-time and going out
00:18:54.920 | of town.
00:18:55.920 | I had products I had to ship.
00:19:01.960 | I started working at home, and I didn't get any more done.
00:19:04.760 | I freed up an average of 65 hours a week, and I didn't get any more done.
00:19:09.960 | A lot of the time we spend, people say they're working.
00:19:13.360 | If they're working from home, they're just goofing off.
00:19:15.560 | >> Don't you feel like it might be easier just to go and get a job and make a little
00:19:22.200 | bit more money and be able to save a little bit more money and have a little bit of an
00:19:26.120 | easier lifestyle?
00:19:28.640 | >> I'm not opposed to getting a job.
00:19:33.560 | If it's something that I somewhat enjoy, and I loved the people I worked with at my old
00:19:38.400 | job, that was definitely the best part about it.
00:19:41.680 | I'm not opposed to getting a job, but I don't want it to interfere with this whole other
00:19:47.320 | part of life, like family and creativity.
00:19:53.080 | When it starts intruding into those areas of my life, then I'm definitely not for it.
00:19:58.440 | Then it starts to feel like slavery.
00:20:01.480 | It starts to feel depressing.
00:20:07.000 | I don't know if that makes sense to you.
00:20:11.560 | >> Last couple of questions.
00:20:13.240 | Obviously for you to be able to live on that low of annual expenses, like you said, next
00:20:23.200 | year you think you'll be under $15,000.
00:20:24.200 | Do you have any guess of what you spent in 2015?
00:20:27.080 | >> About $24,000.
00:20:30.320 | >> Major strategies that have allowed you to save money on housing, what are they?
00:20:33.640 | Do you own a home?
00:20:34.640 | Do you just own an old home?
00:20:37.040 | What are the major strategies that have allowed you to lower your housing costs?
00:20:40.920 | >> We have a rental property that's just four blocks away.
00:20:45.000 | Then we have our house here.
00:20:47.200 | It's a three bedroom.
00:20:48.200 | It has a master bedroom.
00:20:49.200 | I actually turned the master bedroom into a tiny house.
00:20:53.560 | The bedroom beside it now, I'm getting ready to build a wall in the hallway.
00:20:58.640 | It'll be a two bedroom, tiny house, and then another house.
00:21:04.120 | I had someone living in there before that was just working for me for six hours a week
00:21:10.920 | in exchange for free housing.
00:21:13.200 | Now we're thinking of actually renting the other half of our house.
00:21:18.160 | I don't know how legal it really is, but between that and the rental house, it covers both
00:21:23.880 | of our mortgages easily, plus a little bit more actually.
00:21:27.440 | >> You've got a traditional rental house.
00:21:29.400 | You're renting out or intending to rent out part of your house.
00:21:32.360 | Then you're also farming the land on your own property.
00:21:37.440 | That's where you're building your urban farm?
00:21:39.360 | >> Yep, farming the land on my own property and two other plots in town, two and a half
00:21:45.800 | plots in town.
00:21:46.800 | >> These are borrowed backyards, other people, you're just giving them a share of the food
00:21:50.520 | in exchange for the use of their backyard to farm on?
00:21:53.440 | >> Yep, exactly.
00:21:54.960 | I put up ads on Craigslist last year and had 50 people offer up their yards in town.
00:22:00.800 | >> That's cool.
00:22:01.800 | You try to keep your expenses on the house low.
00:22:04.440 | No internet at home, minimal phone service.
00:22:10.080 | Any other special strategies or ideas that you've worked on that have allowed you to
00:22:13.720 | keep your housing expenses low?
00:22:18.640 | >> Not really.
00:22:20.000 | When we were looking to buy a house, we keep an eye on the market and finding a house that
00:22:27.720 | provided an opportunity to live cheaper.
00:22:31.600 | We wanted one that was close to town.
00:22:33.160 | We could ride our bikes easily everywhere, to the grocery especially, and also had space
00:22:40.240 | for gardening.
00:22:41.240 | I have a big, flat, south-facing yard.
00:22:46.040 | I did see the potential to rent out that room.
00:22:48.560 | It has its own little side porch.
00:22:52.160 | It's big enough to turn.
00:22:53.520 | It already had a bathroom off of it.
00:22:56.520 | That's the kind of thing I would look for if you're wanting to reduce your housing.
00:23:00.240 | >> Do you do anything special with regard to energy costs?
00:23:03.440 | I'd imagine being in Indiana, it's not a warm state to live in during the wintertime.
00:23:07.400 | Any special ideas there?
00:23:10.680 | >> We keep our house cold.
00:23:14.440 | Put extra blankets on the bed.
00:23:17.440 | I wear long johns and a thermal shirt all winter long, no matter what.
00:23:23.080 | I have a beanie on when I'm around the house most of the time, a sweatshirt, thick wool
00:23:27.280 | socks and slippers.
00:23:30.920 | It reduces our housing bill a lot.
00:23:32.880 | I actually cut a couple extra windows in the south side too to bring in some sun and some
00:23:36.720 | warmth.
00:23:40.880 | I just think you don't need that heat pumping through your house all day.
00:23:47.240 | It's actually better for your body to be in a little cold.
00:23:50.120 | You start to build brown fat.
00:23:51.680 | You're more likely to just go outside.
00:23:54.120 | When you go outside, it doesn't feel as cold.
00:23:58.000 | I think that's the big one, to save on energy costs.
00:24:02.080 | >> What about the babies?
00:24:03.080 | Don't you get concerned about the babies being too cold?
00:24:05.760 | >> Oh no, Josie doesn't get cold at all.
00:24:09.520 | She runs around naked half the time when it's 60 degrees in here.
00:24:12.880 | >> That youthful energy.
00:24:15.240 | >> Yeah, you make your kids fragile by putting clothes on their whole lives.
00:24:20.440 | They naturally, they're born just, I don't know, they're more durable when they're babies.
00:24:29.800 | I know that sounds weird, but probably after the first year anyways.
00:24:35.920 | She's not bothered at all by it.
00:24:37.160 | Some days I'll be freezing because I'm working in my office for a little bit and I'm not
00:24:40.040 | moving around much.
00:24:41.840 | That's the other thing too, having your house cold.
00:24:45.380 | When we get cold, it's because we know we're not moving.
00:24:49.400 | It's the perfect signal to tell you, get moving.
00:24:52.560 | Do some jumping jacks or go outside and get some exercise.
00:24:56.680 | There's so many benefits, I think, to keeping your house cold.
00:24:58.960 | >> You're hardcore, dude.
00:25:01.560 | Next, transportation.
00:25:03.560 | You have, I guess, two old cars and you just don't drive very much.
00:25:06.960 | Any other unique ideas that might be helpful to other listeners?
00:25:12.880 | >> We have the one old car and then we have a van that I just recently bought.
00:25:16.240 | It's a high roof van.
00:25:17.240 | We're going to do a bunch of traveling in it, turn it into a van dwelling situation.
00:25:23.800 | But no, biking, get a bus pass if you live in a city.
00:25:29.720 | Do whatever you can to avoid being a car clown driving around by yourself burning gas all
00:25:35.040 | day.
00:25:36.040 | >> Food, you have waste from the farm, which is a pretty sweet setup in that your farm
00:25:44.440 | allows you to deduct expenses that are associated with your home and your homestead because
00:25:49.280 | it's part of the business.
00:25:50.280 | And then there is going to be waste and so that waste can help some of your personal
00:25:55.160 | consumption.
00:25:56.160 | Then it also gives you products that you can barter, gives you a greater, stronger network,
00:26:02.640 | allows you to have access to the local producer community where you can get things at wholesale
00:26:08.120 | prices based upon a barter relationship or an exchange of labor.
00:26:12.040 | And then also hunting, which as long as you don't spend thousands of dollars on fancy
00:26:16.960 | hunting gear could be a cost helpful way to acquire food.
00:26:22.040 | Any other unique ideas to lower your food costs?
00:26:27.280 | >> Just avoid food waste is a big one.
00:26:29.960 | Too many people go buy a ton of stuff and they don't have a plan for what they're going
00:26:33.320 | to do with it.
00:26:34.320 | 40% of the food in this country goes to waste.
00:26:39.680 | If you're the typical American, you're blowing 40% of that food budget is just going in the
00:26:46.360 | trash.
00:26:48.160 | So that's a big one.
00:26:49.160 | We also forage.
00:26:50.160 | It's one of our fun activities we do.
00:26:52.000 | Go out in the woods and you can pick tons of stuff.
00:26:55.520 | We make big batches of nettle soup every year and all that stuff's free and it's fun for
00:27:02.360 | the family.
00:27:04.720 | And hunting's great.
00:27:06.600 | It's like meditation, sitting out there in nature, breathing fresh air.
00:27:11.960 | And I got into hunting with, I spent about 20 bucks on bullets.
00:27:19.280 | Got an old gun from my dad and that was it.
00:27:21.400 | But this year I'm going to go even more hardcore and learn to build a bow because I don't think
00:27:25.840 | you really know how to hunt unless you know how to build your weapon.
00:27:28.360 | So I'm going to learn how to build a bow and do some bow hunting.
00:27:34.840 | What else are your biggest expenses right now that you haven't been able to really crack
00:27:42.640 | very well?
00:27:43.640 | What's been the biggest frustration for you?
00:27:46.440 | I blow too much money on domain names, that's for sure.
00:27:53.760 | Every new business I get excited about I buy the domain name before I even have something
00:27:57.840 | built for it.
00:28:01.480 | That's one of the main ones, our healthcare.
00:28:03.800 | We have a $6,000 deductible.
00:28:05.880 | It's not that expensive I would say.
00:28:11.280 | That's pretty much it.
00:28:14.640 | I would have to pull up my thing but I can't think of any other big major expenses we have.
00:28:20.560 | If you were going to try to share encouragement with someone else, just say a young person,
00:28:30.760 | you were going to say about, "Hey, here are the things that are great about my lifestyle
00:28:34.040 | and here are the things that are tough," because you obviously don't live a mainstream lifestyle.
00:28:40.160 | To many listeners, the lifestyle you're describing, to some listeners it sounds awesome, but to
00:28:44.800 | many listeners there will be a sense of like, "Why?
00:28:49.640 | Why do that?"
00:28:51.200 | What would be the sales pitch you would give to somebody to just encourage them that they
00:28:55.200 | could consider practicing some of the things that you do?
00:29:02.240 | The main thing I would say is just look at the direction our culture's in right now by
00:29:09.600 | just this growth mindset.
00:29:12.560 | More money and build things bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger.
00:29:18.080 | It's not sustainable.
00:29:19.680 | There's no way it's sustainable.
00:29:20.880 | I guess maybe if we start mining asteroids it's possibly sustainable or we find another
00:29:25.560 | plant to live on eventually.
00:29:28.040 | If you care at all about, if you have kids or you just care about keeping future generations
00:29:35.240 | out of trouble, you should look at your impact.
00:29:40.560 | The other thing I would say is all of this stuff, it sounds hardcore because it's so
00:29:45.840 | far from mainstream, but just try doing one piece at a time and you'll realize that everything
00:29:51.120 | I'm describing, I think, is amazing.
00:29:55.100 | It's all fun stuff.
00:29:56.980 | It feels good.
00:29:57.980 | It forces you to get exercise, fresh air, movement, connecting more.
00:30:03.260 | You start farming, you're connecting with your community.
00:30:07.040 | You're building soil, which we're depleting at massive, fast rates.
00:30:13.920 | How much frustration do you have by checking your phone a million times a day or getting
00:30:19.500 | on Facebook a million times a day?
00:30:21.120 | I know I used to be in that trap and it was terrible.
00:30:24.660 | It just didn't feel good.
00:30:27.760 | You're working all the time and you're running your kids around to different activities and
00:30:31.520 | you don't have time to connect with them.
00:30:33.940 | Your kids are growing up and you're not there with them.
00:30:40.280 | It makes me cry thinking about it, Josh.
00:30:43.200 | It's so messed up how people are just giving ... I don't know.
00:30:50.080 | Kids don't give a shit about how much money you have.
00:30:56.600 | They just want your time.
00:30:58.280 | Sorry.
00:30:59.280 | >>Ted: It's true.
00:31:02.200 | It's absolutely true.
00:31:06.840 | The time at which they start to care how much money you have, meaning that if you go the
00:31:12.600 | normal path and you get into the middle teenage years, that's generally a societally-induced
00:31:25.240 | care many times.
00:31:28.520 | There are some basic necessities of life, but many times the concern about what kind
00:31:33.640 | of car my parents drive, that's peer pressure.
00:31:36.360 | That's where that enters in.
00:31:37.360 | >>Josh: Oh, yeah.
00:31:39.840 | Your car should just have two wheels.
00:31:41.480 | >>Ted: Two or four?
00:31:43.400 | >>Josh: Just two.
00:31:45.000 | >>Ted: Two.
00:31:46.000 | Okay, bicycle.
00:31:47.000 | Got it.
00:31:48.000 | I'm having trouble picturing a two-wheel car.
00:31:50.480 | Well, Nate, man, thanks for coming on and just sharing a little bit of your story.
00:31:54.920 | Websites, your Etsy store, websites, social stuff, anywhere that you'd like people to
00:32:00.520 | go to check out some of your projects?
00:32:02.480 | >>Josh: Yeah.
00:32:03.920 | Just natedodson.com.
00:32:04.920 | I just started developing that.
00:32:07.080 | I'll put links to all my stuff.
00:32:08.360 | I have a bunch of stores and getting ready to release a new product here in a month that
00:32:12.840 | I think could really change lives.
00:32:15.680 | It's like a journal that you'll get in the mail every month that has, you've got to say
00:32:18.960 | one thing you're grateful for, and you can identify your most important activity, a couple
00:32:23.000 | more tasks, and then just kind of do a brain dump every morning.
00:32:25.960 | It'll come in your mailbox every month for a really low price.
00:32:28.960 | I'm getting ready to release that.
00:32:30.200 | I'm pretty excited about that.
00:32:31.920 | So, yeah, natedodson.com.
00:32:35.120 | Maybe I'll put a special link, like, let me see, maybe natedodson.com/josh.
00:32:42.760 | >>Trey: Do it slash radical.
00:32:46.160 | >>Josh: natedodson.com/radical.
00:32:47.160 | >>Trey: Yeah, put all your info there for those.
00:32:50.160 | >>Josh: natedodson.com/radical.
00:32:51.160 | natedodson.com/radical.
00:32:52.160 | Go there and you can subscribe there instead of the standard homepage.
00:32:57.880 | I'll send everyone the outline to how I do the Etsy business if they want it.
00:33:02.640 | >>Trey: Sweet, dude.
00:33:03.640 | Thanks for coming on, man.
00:33:04.640 | >>Josh: Yeah, no problem, Josh.
00:33:05.920 | I really appreciate it.
00:33:07.200 | You're doing amazing work, man.
00:33:09.280 | I'm really proud of you, and it's just awesome.
00:33:11.720 | I love listening.
00:33:12.720 | >>Trey: Thank you for listening to this episode of Radical Personal Finance.
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