If you must try homesteading on the cheap...

Don't do it on government land. You might end up like the squirrelman in Seattle. Apparently this dude built a tree house on a vacant lot in Seattle that turned out to be owned by the city. Go check it out here

Comments

Anonymous said…
He is an inspiration. The system hates it when people find a way to lay their heads down at night without having to pay for it - be it mortgage, rent, taxes etc.

Expect more and more homeless seeking out unused lots to make into homes. Expect those with money and power to begin cracking down hard.

1930's Hoovervilles.
2000's BushHuts
April 9, 2008 at 6:08 AM
The Urban Survivalist said…
To be fair I'd be pretty pissed off if someone decided to just squat on my land. If you don't own it then what right do you have to it?
April 9, 2008 at 7:07 AM
Anonymous said…
Seems to me he wasn't hurting anything or anybody by squatting here. Not like he was keeping anybody from using the tree (unless they were interested in fire wood anyway).

Shoulda just left him alone, or owner of said property should have approached him to see if they could come to some agreement. Maybe Squirrelman coulda kept an eye out for trouble / performed some menial chores / just something that gave the owner a sense of compensation.

Too bad.
April 9, 2008 at 11:55 AM
Anonymous said…
Agreed (with Survivaltopics and anonymous). If someone wanted to pitch a tend and squat on a corner of my back 40, why should I care? I'm not using it anyway. We could probably come to some kind of mutually beneficial understanding.
April 11, 2008 at 8:49 AM
Rus said…
Locally, there's some land near a local highway that is apparently a squatter camp.

At least, that's what people driving by can tell from the tarps strung near a hill. Seems a decent location, given that it's close to water.
April 20, 2008 at 9:51 AM
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