When hearing Dancing Rabbit's ambitious project plan, one question many people ask us is "how are you going to pay for all that?" The easy answer is, "hard work, perseverance, cleverness, and of course luck." A more complete answer would flesh out some of the details involved! We've been here in Missouri just long enough to start getting the lay of the economic landscape and we're beginning to have some opinions on what work is sustainable, rewarding, and profitable.
There are two main types of expenses that need paying. First, we need to pay rent, buy food, maintain our vehicles, and generally support ourselves here at Skyhouse. Second, we need to save for land, to build homes and other structures, and be plan how we'll pay the mortgages on that land and houses. A rough budget suggests we need about $25,000-$35,000 per year for the former ($3,000-$5,000 per capita) and $12,000-$20,000 per year for the latter. In addition, that same guesswork calculation indicates that we have plenty of money to keep us supported in the lifestyle to which we're accustomed, but that we'll need to increase our overall income to pay for the land and new buildings. This can mean making more money per capita, or expanding our businesses to support an increased population.
Essentially, a mix of cottage industries and outside employment should meet our economic needs for the foreseeable future. Of course, since we don't want to commute with cars, "outside employment" often means working from home for a remote employer. In addition, one of the benefits of choosing Rutledge as a site is the opportunity to work with the FIC and Sandhill Farm in income-earning capacities. What does all this mean in simple terms?
Star, Tony, and Cecil are all employed by the FIC in one way or another. Star and Tony work in the FIC office (located in a mobile home at Sandhill) as administrative managers. Their wages are enough to pay our base level of expenses (rent, food, utilities), so we enjoy a certain level of financial security. Cecil writes the "Directory Update" column for Communities Magazine which only brings in a small amount of cash income, but any opportunity to find work here in remote Scotland County is useful. Halle is teaching childbirth education classes and plans to build a local clientele for her midwifery practice.
We have also started participating in a longtime Sandhill business, tempeh production. Sandhill grows the soybeans, makes and packages the 8-oz. tempeh pieces, and markets the product to health food stores and a major Midwestern natural food distributor. They've always been able to sell as much as they can make so we're expecting that the addition of Skyhouse labor will mean the ability to expand the whole business, to everybody's benefit. Cecil's been doing most of the tempeh work but Star, Halle, and Aaron all help out. Doing tempeh provides us with a nice way to interact with Sandhill, a ready-made business opportunity with all the hassles of starting a new business from scratch, and the fulfillment of selling organic, wholesome food.
We still make a substantial portion of our income from telecommuting. We have a love-hate relationship with computer work; the money is nice, but it's not work people tend to find ultimately satisfying or particularly in line with our ideal lifestyle and goals. Tony has just accepted a job from an old work associate in California that should keep him busy almost full time for a few months. If possible, we'd like to view this money as a bonus that will go toward paying off the land mortgage early or progressing faster towards ecological sustainability and try to meet our ongoing expenses with non-computer work.
The above list is just the ways we currently make money. There's a score of other sources of income that we're exploring as well! These include:
- an Internet consulting business that Cecil is starting
- selling the jewelry that Aaron and Halle make (Star's learning this skill too)
- producing organic dog biscuits (yum, yum)
- book indexing, currently being done profitably by both Twin Oaks and Sunnyside communities
- "adding value" to Sandhill farm products, i.e. honey mustard dressing with Sandhill honey and mustard
- weatherizing local homes to save energy and money
- donations
and many more.
Our ideal business would be profitable, help (or at least not harm) the environment, not require toxic inputs, be pleasant work to perform, be expandable as we grow, be low in capital costs, and be amenable to incorporating help from our many visitors. If you have any ideas, be sure to let us know!
Although in some ways we view earning cash income to be a necessary evil to support our dream of building an ecovillage where cash won't be necessary, we've been lucky to have income opportunities that are not unpleasant and not too far away from the ideals we hold. Starting new businesses is a good way for our community to draw together and share labor and support each other. We fantasize of the day when we make the last mortgage payment, but hopefully we'll enjoy all the income labor between then and now too.
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