Family wanted to start over. They're building opt-in village for anyone to apply

We are about 10 miles from town, but it's the dirt road where you have to go slow, so it takes about 45 minutes to get into town. How long have you been out here? Two and a half years. Had you done any of this before? Had you lived off-grid? No. But you can do it in this town. I hesitate to say town because that's not what we're looking to do. It's more of just a community. Is that a structure that's part of the community? Yeah, yep, that's one of our cabins, absolutely. So we would love to have everything available here so we don't have to go into town because I mean you drove that road. That's not great. So if we can get people out here, a team out here, put them in these cabins so like if someone's working on their lot, we can rent it for a little bit. So we would love to have everything available here so we don't have to go into town just in case. If something happens, do we have all these things in place where we'll be okay? I'm a worrier and so I'm like, you know, I need that peace of mind that we will be okay no matter what happens, you know. So yeah, this is the cob house. This is quaint. Doesn't it look like a story, a little fairy tale like Hansel and Gretel maybe? It's definitely unique but you know we like to show people like this is what you can do. You know, this cob house, the walls are super thick and so it does stay cool in the summer and warm in the winter. We do require your house has to be passive solar with, you know, our values just in case EMP comes in and your solar is gone. So that's our goal is like that redundancy after redundancy. Is there some things like this overhang needs to be more because it's... The overhang wasn't big enough. Yeah. You need a big overhang if you see the difference, right? You do. So I get it. It's one of those you live and learn and okay, now you see what could happen. Don't do that. Yeah, get the bigger overhang. So I think this is just kind of pieced together but again, you can do so much with just, you have your south facing window. So in the summer though, you really want an overhang. So when that summer sun, because the summer sun's higher, so it's shaded. So your windows are shaded. So you could have a bed. A twin mattress would totally fit up here. They're nice. They're cozy, you know. And it's nice because people have something to move into when they move here. I mean what a great setup. Yes. And then, you know, you've got a little car vent here. But again, when you're passing solar, the heat rises. And so in the summer, you open that and the heat goes out. So this stays cool. The ventilation, you have different levels, so air can just cross ventilate. Yes. What are the extreme weather here? So the hottest, we've seen it in 110 and then in the teens. So you need to have insulated homes here. You do. So is Cobb one of the ideas for the place? Yeah. You want to do it as long as your, our value is at 40. Is that what is required by codes or? That's our community requirement. Just in case something happens. We, again, we want our community to be happy, healthy, and safe. So. So you're going to require things so people don't mess up. People can still mess up. I mean, I'm, I've done it, been there, done that. But. So we're trying to say, you know, look, just be prepared. You're, you're set. You'll be fine. So what if your solar goes out? Now you're in a house where you're going to be totally fine. Stove. This is like the cutest stove I've ever seen in my life. So is that all that needs to heat the house? That'd be almost too hot for this house. Cause it's so small and so insulated. Yeah. And you're seeing like nowadays with the weather can just be so weird, like not planned, unpredictable. So it's like, you know what? Just be prepared. It's not like an HOA or anything like that. It's like, we're not saying that you can only have this breed of cow and you can only have four dogs maximum. Like, and so it's just, again, it's that redundancy after redundancy. Are you good? Are you, are you going to be okay? Because a lot of people are coming from cities. Yeah. Yes. And, and you don't know, you don't know what you don't know. So it's yeah, that's, that's kind of our goal. Pretty. It's kind of fun, huh? Pretty beautiful. It's not for everybody, but if you're willing to make some sacrifices, now it's not total sacrifices. We do get UPS and FedEx out here. So, you know, and then you have a PO box, you know, in town. Is that all the water? This is for the greenhouse, these cabins or casitas. So 1, 2, 3, 6. So 18,000 gallons. Now our greenhouse, we actually do use quite a bit. It's a big greenhouse. It's a big greenhouse. This is the sauna. And so that's kind of fun. So that'll be a community sauna. Yep. This is another little cabin. It's just got, it's one room. How many total cabins? We have six. That's pretty good for getting started, starter cabins. Yeah. You guys built this? No. The Costlers built this. They wanted to build like a wellness retreat. Fortunately, he got cancer and he died and she just was like, I can't take care of this anymore. And so they sold it. And so most of the structures that you see are theirs. So this was an earth house. Is it buried? Yeah. So these two homes were original, original. I want to say the seventies they were built. So this is our electric grids. For the whole community? For this area and our house. It looks pretty big. It is massive. So we just, we have to switch in between. So the, our pond's right there. So to fill the pond, we have to flip them, fill it. And then we flip them back to, you know, power. But so yeah, so this is the earth house. Look at that. It's underground. It's half buried. Yep. It's cool in here. You imagine it's summer. Oh, this is my favorite in the summer. Wow. Look at the rock here. This feels like you're going down a river bed. I feel like I'm in a fairy tale, honestly, in here. It's, and the rafters and the beams, I really like it. Can you imagine in summer, you've probably been in here in summer, no? Uh-huh. Yeah. No, it stays really cool. Because you're surrounded by the earth and a little ventilation and then some light. So it's kind of has it all. It's a decent amount of space too. The radios must be. Like I'm five feet. So 20, maybe even. Yeah. And it has a stove. Look at that where you're going up though. It's just rock. And it, doesn't it feel almost like a river bed or kind of organic? It really does. That's what I said. Like you, you're, you're in the shire here. This is, you know, this is our shire home. This used to have a bathtub right here, like a clawfoot bathtub. And I don't know where it went, but. And there in the windows, you see where the level of the soil is. Yes. It's all that way down. It's six feet probably. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They probably dug six feet, put the rocks in, and that just lifted it a little bit. So, so I know that this one and the one next door, they were built with zero electric tools, all hand tools, pulleys and all of that. Uh-huh. So people are like, oh, I can't do this. Well, it's, if you're willing to put in the hard work, anything is possible. So this, these two homes are proof of it. So yeah, if you like this one, you're gonna, you're gonna love the other one. It's my favorite. I love it. It's so cool. So this one did not have any electric or, or, you know, anything. The costlers came in and added it afterwards. My favorite. This is my favorite. Oh wow. All the levels you're taking in a lot. It's like, yeah, there's a burrow underground. Then you go up above and then there's this kitchen that's like kind of conventional with the terracotta floor. I mean, yeah. Wow. And all the stone work by hand. This is a real home. I mean, you could actually move This one we could. Yeah. The only problem is we, this is where doing things to code comes in. We turned on, you know, the electricity and we turned on the water, the pipes run into the wires and yeah, get them all wet. So we're like, yeah, and we're turning that off. So it's a fire hazard right now. But once that's done, then you've got this kitchen. I want to turn this into a community bath house type thing. Cause you got a shower. People can wash their dishes. They can do their laundry and it's got a door to the outside. So we, if someone is living there, we could just close off that door and just have outside access. So this is a true, like this one's a house house. Somebody really couldn't live here. So if someone is living in their RV, they could come here and they could be comfortable. So this pantry is cool. So you got, you got to go in and look up. Okay. Oh my God. It keeps going. Oh my God. It's a huge pantry. So this could be like community self-sufficiency backup emergency food storage for everybody. It's huge. It is so big. Actually, the lady that grew up here, she told us that their dining room table was up here. They would pass the food through that little hole for their table. Oh my God. It goes to the kitchen. Yeah. Go to the kitchen. There's a hole. I don't see any hole. Right here. Okay. So they would have their dining room table up in here and they would pass the food through here and someone would just take it and yeah, they'd eat up here. So it was prepped there, but their table was here. I mean, Hey, I'd rather pass it there than go up those stairs with food. So in a little closet, it does feel like there's a lot of infrastructure. I mean, you really do have a lot of opportunity for right. And the costlers really did great giving the foundation. And that's we called it Costco, just kind of, you know, as homage to them, like, you know, thanks. Thanks for getting us started because they really gave us a leg up. It takes a lot to start a town or a community or whatever village. Yes. But even it just takes a lot, even if you're doing this on your own, getting started where we could just come out here and start, we could start getting animals. We could start growing. We can start living lifestyle now. This is a big greenhouse. It is huge. Unfortunately, you're at the, my dying green, like this is the winter stuff. I got to go through and clean it all out now for spring plantings. You see how much was here. So what were you growing? Like how much can you get out of like? Oh, so much. We've got chard and parsley growing here. We tried doing a citrus trees in here and they just, I think it just gets too cold. So we've got to figure something out because I know you can do it. But I had my onions, my turmeric and my tomatoes were there. These are my tomatoes and peppers. Again, I've got stuff hanging over it. So I'm getting a lot. I mean, it grew up like you must've gotten quite a bit of it. We did. I mean, you can see the vent system up there. And so that's another thing is birds will get in and eat stuff. So we're learning this one. Nope. We're not doing the whole. I'm in my pioneer dress with my flower garden. It's not pretty. There's beautiful elements of it, but this is not the Instagram worthy lifestyle. So it vents the top and it did have a drip system, but the drip system was corroded and now we have to water by hand. It's well, we'll get that. We're getting there, but it's oh, I see some trees. Yeah. So this more citrus and citrus trees. So again, we're alive somehow. Maybe I'm a baby trees. Hopefully they're just dormant and not completely dead. We're learning. Yeah, it's all new. Probably right. It really is. You didn't have a garden in your townhouse. No, no. Yep. You can't do that in a town home. You're relying on all the infrastructure of the city and the economy. So would you feel safer? Oh yeah. Because if the power goes out in the city, I'm good. I'm, I'm totally good. This is our solar room. We don't have utility bills. That's kind of nice. Yeah. I mean, you pay for it upfront when you're putting in your solar, but that peace of mind to me is worth it. Genius shipping container, but it got that super thick insulation foam. The idea is that this is like your power station. Yep. This is our power station. The thing that I do not like about this is it's so far away from the house. There's an app that you can use for this, but this has to be able to connect and there's no signal out here. So that's what, you know, I tell people, I'm like, just make sure it's close to your house. You can get signal. Cause like, I don't know when I use the washing machine and I, you know, the lights are on, how much are we using? How much do we have left? So we're playing the guessing game right now. We've run out three times now. So we've learned that heating elements suck a lot of power. We had a heater on one night and that did it. But the idea is this will provide solar for, or this will be sort of the power station for how, like just part of the, just for the cabins and the greenhouse and the main house. Okay. So we'd put our goats away, but we just put them in this. Another thing about communities is I don't have to be a jack of all trades now. Bob can learn plumbing. I can be the goat person. This is a barn, but it'll eventually be our co-op store. Okay. But for right now, hi. Hi babies. You know, like we can each have different things that we're good at and we can all come together and help each other. Again, this is your thick walls. They're going to be so sad when we move them. Cause they're like living the life of luxury right now. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. She left the tractor and we have had to go and find all the parts. So this is our grater. The community bought the grater. The grater to make the roads? Yeah. The community asked that there's safety in numbers. So if things, heaven forbid, go to pot and you know, things happen, I think we're going to be safe. So this is our, another one of our cabins. It used to be an old chicken coop. Just wanted to get as much housing as possible. Yeah. Wow. So this will be sort of the cabins area and then all around there are lots people can buy. Yep. So really what it is, it's a POA. So you're buying into a membership and then you're allotted a specific area. So it's like a co-op. That's exactly what it is. It is a co-op and we say, here's your little area that you can do whatever you want with within, you know, just meet our five building requirements. You have to build your well, you have to build your septic, your house has to be passive solar. Again, it's that redundancy. Are you good? Are you, are you going to be okay? And so this one does have power to it. From the solar again. Exactly. It's from our solar bank panels. Oh, so it has everything set up. I mean, it has a whole kitchen. So this is my favorite. I don't, don't ask me. Don't ask me what's going on. Oh, shower in the kitchen. Right. Don't, don't ask me. And then this side looks like it could be earthen walls. Yes. That's the cob right there. Yeah. You have your south facing window. So in the summer though, this is not awesome. And so what I would recommend to people is put shutters on the outside to cover it, or you really want an overhang. So in that summer sun, cause the summer sun's higher. So it's shaded. So your windows are shaded. So yeah, the foundation is here. It just needs a little bit of tweaks. And so they're nice. They're cozy, but we do, we love it. Love it. Love it out here. I know we had people think they didn't come out right and say it, but I know we had people think we were crazy for doing this. And I mean, be able to like get out of a townhouse into this much land is a big change. Oh, huge, huge change. And so it's, it's a nice, I feel like I can breathe. If you're willing to put in the time and the effort, you can do whatever you want. What we're learning is like, Oh yeah. You want to do that? Okay. Because there's not a lot of codes or things out here. Not really. For safety though, when we do build our homes, we do require that it be inspected. So like the house that we're living in right now, it was not inspected and we like our dryer went out and we went to go look at the electric box and there were sparks because the wires weren't connected correctly. And then like we had to get a plumber in to fix the pipes because they weren't done up to code and they were leaking. And, you know, for me, I'm like, Oh, I would want it to be inspected just because I would like to know if, you know, I've done something that might cause my house to burn down. This water, this is our water tank. This is from the well. So we just come out here and just kind of where, where is it at? Actually, that's full. So we just have to be careful. One morning we woke up and the water wasn't turning on, but we had let it get down pretty low and it was so cold that it just froze. So you gotta be careful. You gotta really be on your toes because you're in charge of your own everything. I'm turning these into grow boxes. We're getting stuff done, but it looks trashy right now. Just using what we can find around here, garbage cans. We got some of these old watering troughs for free. They had holes and they were rusty. We just lined them with our feed bags and then filled them with dirt and some stuff starting to grow. This one didn't even have a bottom. So that was fun. And I painted them because this Arizona summer sun will cook my roots. Just experimenting with which ones work best out here. You got potatoes growing. Got some onions going in there. Hopefully we can get some alfalfa growing here to break up. Got soil. I've been experimenting with some drip systems. Here's that time of year where we get to plant. I'm gonna dump some rabbit poop because y'all know we got gazillion of those. This is my favorite time of the year. I love it. Have you done any of this before? No. My parents gardened, but that's about the extent of it. I don't think we could have done this 20 years ago because internet. Like we are learning everything online and there's so much out there. And then I always cover it because the Arizona sun cooks. Another thing we planted last fall was this garlic and these walking onions. These are doing great and I do an irrigation watering system. It dips in right here and so I just fill that up and it feeds that. Onions are coming in. And then you have chicken? Oh yeah, yep. So you're getting eggs? Oh yeah, yeah. Okay, but no meat. Just eggs. We do have meat because we have our rabbits. You eat a lot of rabbit meat? We're learning. I think it tastes great. It's just the bones. I'm learning how to... So I usually can them. I almost got you. Come here. Why are you guys being skittish? I don't have food, huh? Is that hard to raise them and then have to kill them? I don't do the culling Joe does. So we've kind of made that separation. Like he does not really feed or do anything. You know, me and the kids take care of them. He does the butchering. Hi mama. Hi mom. I know. Oh, you know me. What is going on? Do I not have food? Hey babies. Hey babies. Come here. Come here. Yeah. Oh, I know. I know. I gotcha. I gotcha. How long do they live? How long do you keep them alive for? 12 weeks. So actually it's a pretty quick source of meat. Yeah, it really is. And we did the math and they're actually the biggest pig for your buck when it comes to feed. The feed to meat ratio is the best. You got it better though. She is like the softest. Do you use the fur too? I have frozen the fur. I'm learning to do that because I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing, but use every part. We don't want to waste. But it, honestly, I, I appreciate food so much more now. You know, it's like before there's just that disconnect. You just go buy it off the shelves and it's pink stuff. How does he know how to kill a rabbit? He looked online, researched it, and then we did it. So like I said, like, I don't think we could have done this 20 years ago. This is the time to do it. So this was the original coop. She had like 40 meat birds. It's like a house. It is a house. It is overkill. And when we move these guys, they're going to be so sad. Yeah, I know. There's our other rooster. So these are just for laying eggs? Yes. Yep. But we love them. Hi babies. Here. Hi, come here. Where's? Hi babies. Oh yeah. Okay, come here baby. Come here. Yeah. You think it's much work? No. Collect the eggs. Feed them. Feed them. Check on them. Collect the eggs. But yeah, they're so easy. Yep. So every night they come in here and they roost. Hi babies. Need some more water? And I did have this swept up a couple days ago and I like to put all the manure under here because when you pile it up, it kind of heats it up as well. But of course they were like, no, we want it everywhere else. So there we go. All right, who laid that one? That was massive. You know, people have asked me in the past, what's the hardest thing about living out here? And I used to say the dust, the dirt, like because dirt gets everywhere. Oh wow. So that one compared to those ones, pretty big. Good job ladies. But I would change my mind now. I say it's the death. Sorry. All right, let's go. There's death. Like last year we lost over 30 baby bunnies from disease, to being trampled, to being born too early. That was really, really hard. And then just coming out here and your chicken's missing its head, you know, because of a hawk. The death has been something that's really, I think that's the hardest. And people don't understand like, oh, I got cute little bunnies. Oh, I've got cute little chickens. But they die. You know, that's, and people don't really think about what do you do. Because we modern life, we just get away from all that, right? That gets like, yes, literally hidden from us. Yes, you're detached. It's so detached. And then all my crops are getting eaten from, you know, so it's like, I was talking with the death of plants, you know, so it was just like, are you kidding me? Like, it's still worth getting up a homestead in the frontier, right? It's like, you have to really find your way to. Yes. Yep. But it's my time, my turn to talk. But it's, it's so rewarding, though. And so I know, hey, hey, he's your friend, okay? He's your friend. And once you get through that, again, like my appreciation for food, my appreciation for life, my appreciation for our ancestors, you know, like, holy cow, they did it. You want to see the swanky outhouse. People don't believe me. They're like, what is a swanky outhouse? And they seem like, oh, that's a swanky outhouse. And here I am whining because I don't have water because the pipes are frozen, but I'll get it at three o'clock once they warm up. You really have a deeper and greater appreciation for life. So it does go down, but yeah, check it out. So this is a composting toilet. This looks like a regular bathroom. And the cedar, like it never stinks. We do have a bucket of ashes that I'll put down to make sure, but it's... No, it smells good. Like, I don't like to say, hey, go smell my outhouse, but you can, you can go smell my outhouse. That's your toilet. Well, we do have a bathroom inside, but I've got three kids, so a family of five with one bathroom can get a little, well, it's yeah, a little crazy. So this is a backup and we use it all the time, but this is the composting part down here. And so this wasn't quite finished, but it goes into that container, but we've lived here two and a half years and have not had to empty that thing yet. So it's, it's doing its work. Yeah. The theory is you can use that and use it as compost on your plants and animals, but if you're taking any medications, it cannot be used in which I am. So I'm like, well, it's fine. It's fine. You're like, we can dump it on a junior person. This is a swanky outhouse. I mean, this doesn't look like it's not messy or smelly or... It's just an out, outside bathroom. It's not really an outhouse. So you picked this place? Just because this was the only one that was like, had the water and the electric and everything ready to go. So you could just come out and start living here in return for maintaining the roads, helping out, whatever. And so they said, you can live here in exchange for being the caretakers. So we have our little area that we're going to be building on. So we're renting it right now. They had this, it was going to be an orchard, but you know, everything was dead because when we first came out here, it had been five years since he had passed. Nobody was taking care of it. And it's not piped either. So you have to hand water everything. And that's a huge thing. I mean, an orchard would be great because if you get it going, then it's sort of permaculture, self-sufficient, right? Does its own thing. And that's really the hardest part is just getting it started. Then it's just maintenance. Do we see the edge of the property? Cause it's probably a big property. Oh, it's 1300 acres. Yeah. You could have how many people could live out here on this, on the property? I think about 240 homesteads can be out here. And that still leaves, we used to have parks, wilderness areas. You know, there's the washes that we've got to steer clear of. Nothing we're learning is about, you know, berms and swells and using the land and the water. Cause we don't get a lot of water, but when it does come, it just washes everything off. So like seeds have a hard time staying because they just get washed away. But so my husband has started building. This is our first pond over here. You kind of grade it up and then you dig a little ditch. So the water goes into the ditch and it stops and it hits that berm and it stays there. And then you kind of direct it, like in a serpentine pattern or whatever you want. And so it slows the water down, but it's also feeding that water back into your soil. And so there's not so much runoff. So right here, we've got, we actually have a culvert that goes from up there, right through our area. But we're like, you know, we're going to use that. So the culvert kind of just dug a ditch and then that's going to be a pond. And then it's going to go over here to another pond. Then it's going to snake around to another pond and just slowly going to guide that water down to the main wash. You're just, you're slowing it down. So it's not washing all that good soil. Cause I mean, the soil is hard. We have to amend it. Oh, you see gardens here. Yeah. We usually put the goats here. In fact, we didn't know any of this was here because the weeds were so, I mean, they were up to the top of the thing. And then we put them in there like, Oh, look at that. That's lovely. If you're doing it alone and not in a community that can be really scary. Let's say my greenhouse burns down. I lost all my food. Now if I'm my community and my neighbors, I'll have their greenhouses. They can donate a little bit and it doesn't put a burden on them either. And so in a community, you're safe. I didn't show you the pond. So it's again, you know, that, that redundancy factor. And that's why we really did want to come and be with the community. There was just so many good things about it that I was like, you know, that makes my worrying heart feel a lot better. It's like a pot, like it's a pond. Yeah. It's a pond for recreation as well. I mean, so they had fish in here at one point. However, the birds of prey ate them all. So we got to figure out like a netting situation or something. We can't put fish cause it's 15 feet in the We haven't swum in it yet. You could. There's an aerator in the middle. It's awesome. It's so beautiful. I mean, I guess you're not making big sacrifices though. Not, not really. I mean, some of them are huge. Some of them are not. Some are huge you feel? Yeah. If you are an extrovert, this is an awful life for you, you know, cause it's living off grid by yourself. Luckily, I'm more of an introvert. My kids are more introverted, but leaving friends, leaving family, that was really, really hard. Cause you really did leave a community. You had a community. We really did. I had skin cancer, lost my nose, had to go through 15 reconstructive surgeries. And so my community was my family. So for three years, I, we had meals brought in, my kids were taken care of. So these, they were my family, you know? And so to leave them like really, really got, it was the hardest thing ever. But I mean, it's, it was one of those like, okay, it's time to turn a new chapter. And I really try to keep connected with them. But that was, that was really, really, really hard. That I think was the hardest thing was to leave people that we loved. It wasn't so much leaving the city, you know, not getting my Amazon packages the next day. That's fine. But it was leaving that community for this community. And I know this will be the type of people that are going to be coming, you know, here. So I'm really excited. But right now we're the county we're trying to work with zoning changes because they want us to be a subdivision. We're like, no, we're not a subdivision because with a subdivision, you have all of these other county rules where you have to be connected to the set, the city stuff, the city water, all that stuff. And then they regulate so much. Like we take care of the roads and we have to do this. There's so much more regulations. And then you have to pay for all these different fees to do that. And we're like, that's not what we're looking for. We want just to build homes. So it's, it's something that nobody's done before out here. So we've, we've submitted a zoning law change and so far they love it. This is your land then? A little bit of this. And then yes, on the left. Yep. Yep. Yep. This right here is our other neighbor. So another family bought land? So they bought into the co-op. So now when somebody comes in, they're actually buying into the lot. So it's going to be everybody. So 1300 acres is everybody's it's ours. Everybody owns the land, but we all get our own units and you know, we have it kind of sectioned off. And so when people do come, we show them like, okay, so there's this area, there's this area. So the area is already distinguished. You just pick. So this is their, their place. All the units let's call them that for lack of a better word are two to four acres. So, all right. So this is their septic and they had to do a special septic because about a foot in it's like pure rock. And so it's a septic that can sit higher up. There's that. And then this is where their house will be. And their barn's right over here. It's high because they have an RV and they're going to live in it while they're building their house. This is the solar to their well pump. And this is their water storage? Yep. So it's it's full. Yeah. We're kind of like their neighbors, their neighbors there and there. And to be the pioneer in the family. You have a responsibility. We're trying. We're trying. It's really like the old times of homes getting in a way. Yeah. When you look at like these Amish communities and how they just all come together. It's so good. It's going to be nice. This isn't a political statement. This isn't a religious statement. We're just, we're trying to create a place where people feel safe and they can be healthy and happy.