Letters: Readers respond to an article about quitting the rat race, with some saying their generation was handed an untenable position and others saying the struggle is nothing new
it’s more work, but you can absolutely do it for less money. You need to have a realistic scope and be able to meet your own needs, and nothing more. You probably don’t need the shit that exists in a suburban home for example. So don’t build one. Build something to specifically serve you.
It’s a little different for boats naturally, but that was just an example.
I bought a 12 year old thinkpad laptop to be used as my daily driver laptop. It’s not fast, it’s not small, it’s not light, but it’s a fucking trooper of a machine, and i love it. It does exactly what i need a machine to do. And all in, including the screen upgrade which i got from another used machine i’m probably about 200 dollars in. And have two batteries that i managed to get from either machine. Did i get lucky? sure, unrealistically lucky? No, i was just eyeing ebay every now and then. And i have a spare parts machine.
Like in what case? Even just in terms of material and ignoring the cost of one’s own time and the tools required, it’s usually cheaper to buy.
There is legit only a few things where it makes sense from an economic point of view to make on your own. Most hobby craftsman don’t do it for the money. There’s something to be said about quality but that takes practice and hence, more money.
idk man, i’ve found it vastly cheaper to buy lumber and build tables from that lumber, which are going to be vastly more durable than anything you can buy for that price.
You do need tools of course, but you might know someone that has some, or you can simply get into wood working, and start saving more money. They’ll pay for themselves eventually.
PCs? You can often build those specifically to your needs, much cheaper than what can be found on the existing market. Especially for servers. Sure i spent 600 dollars on 36 TB of hard drives. How expensive is 18TB of cloud storage over the period of 5 years? (you might say 36TB* actually, but it’s redundant for backup purposes. Trust me, it’s worth it.)
I agree with the general sentiment but it’s almost always much more work and money to build something from scratch, especially a boat.
it’s more work, but you can absolutely do it for less money. You need to have a realistic scope and be able to meet your own needs, and nothing more. You probably don’t need the shit that exists in a suburban home for example. So don’t build one. Build something to specifically serve you.
It’s a little different for boats naturally, but that was just an example.
I bought a 12 year old thinkpad laptop to be used as my daily driver laptop. It’s not fast, it’s not small, it’s not light, but it’s a fucking trooper of a machine, and i love it. It does exactly what i need a machine to do. And all in, including the screen upgrade which i got from another used machine i’m probably about 200 dollars in. And have two batteries that i managed to get from either machine. Did i get lucky? sure, unrealistically lucky? No, i was just eyeing ebay every now and then. And i have a spare parts machine.
My point is it fucking should be, with modern tech and skilled specialists and economies of scale, but rarely actually is.
That all that shit isn’t for us, we do not see the benefit of it.
Like in what case? Even just in terms of material and ignoring the cost of one’s own time and the tools required, it’s usually cheaper to buy.
There is legit only a few things where it makes sense from an economic point of view to make on your own. Most hobby craftsman don’t do it for the money. There’s something to be said about quality but that takes practice and hence, more money.
idk man, i’ve found it vastly cheaper to buy lumber and build tables from that lumber, which are going to be vastly more durable than anything you can buy for that price.
You do need tools of course, but you might know someone that has some, or you can simply get into wood working, and start saving more money. They’ll pay for themselves eventually.
PCs? You can often build those specifically to your needs, much cheaper than what can be found on the existing market. Especially for servers. Sure i spent 600 dollars on 36 TB of hard drives. How expensive is 18TB of cloud storage over the period of 5 years? (you might say 36TB* actually, but it’s redundant for backup purposes. Trust me, it’s worth it.)