From Homeowner to Van Life: A Transformation Story

In this engaging conversation, Mel Klein shares her journey from traditional homeownership to a nomadic lifestyle, emphasizing the importance of intentional living, space management, and pursuing one's passions. She discusses the challenges and rewards of living on the road, the various career pivots she and her partner have made, and offers valuable advice for those looking to embrace a similar lifestyle. Mel highlights the significance of starting small, being adaptable, and focusing on what truly matters in life.

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https://www.youtube.com/@abeandmel

Instagram @abe.and.mel

Facebook @abeandmel

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Go to thetinyhouseadviser.com

Transcript

Laura Lynch, CFP® (00:39)
Well, Mel Klein, welcome to Less House More Moola podcast. I am so thrilled for us to be able to talk about your story. Goodness knows you talked to me about my story enough when you filmed with us for tiny home tours. So thanks for joining me.

Mel (00:56)
Yeah, thanks for having me. It was fun to dive into your story and hear everything about your tiny home, but now we sort of flipped roles and now we're about to, you get to drill me with some questions.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (01:06)
Yeah, yeah, good. And less camera angles.

Mel (01:11)
Yes, we got just we're talking face to face well through the camera whereas I had you know all the mics and cameras and this and that and b-roll and yeah, I think

Laura Lynch, CFP® (01:16)
you

Yeah, so

interesting. And I definitely want to get into your career transition and kind of get the backstory a little bit on that. But while you're sitting there in front of your beautiful ⁓ green ⁓ rig, tell us about yourself and your rig.

Mel (01:35)
Hehehe.

Yes, yep, this is our home right here. It does not quite look like what you would call your standard and normal home to most people, but I consider this normal. ⁓ This is our green expedition truck that we built out and this is our third home on wheels. We've been traveling for the past five years, first in a couple vans and then now in the truck. And I would say out of all of them, the truck is the most comfortable.

with how we have the layout and living situation inside. So we've been traveling for a while now and we're able to start picked up some work on the road and found different income avenues to be able to continue traveling because originally it was just going to be a one year, let's try something new, try a new adventure. And it slowly became into a whole lifestyle for us.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (02:38)
Yeah. So what are the key things that you really like about your current setup as opposed to the vans that you were in before?

Mel (02:45)
I feel each has its pros and cons. The vans had great gas mileage. This one, let's not talk about the gas mileage. It's really bad, but we say it makes up for how comfortable it is compared to how gas mileage because ⁓ in here we have a little spot for like a pop-up desk where we can work inside, but a lot of times we've been working outside just because it's been so beautiful.

We have a couch now in this rig versus our other one. We just had like a foam bench and that's not comfortable after a while Larger fridge in this one, which makes a world of a difference Especially if you're someone who buys gallon of milk Our little fridge we had in our van you put a gallon of milk in there and then you have no room for a head of lettuce So what do you want a gallon of milk or head of lettuce? No more making those choices anymore We can buy all the fresh produce and milk and Abe can even get his gallon of chocolate milk in there, too. So

Laura Lynch, CFP® (03:42)
Hahaha.

Mel (03:43)
Life is definitely easier in a rig that fits more towards your lifestyle as well. You know, maybe someone doesn't typically buy a gallon of the milk in the smaller fridge and smaller rig can work for them. So it's comfortable in that way. have a shower that's set up all the time so we don't have to like set up a shower. So it's just the different tweaks and things we did over the years of living on the road. What can make it, life even easier?

and the less you have to set up the easier it is. So it's a lot more, I would say, comfortable on what's working for us now versus before.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (04:22)
Yeah, you're designing your life around your priorities. Chocolate milk.

Mel (04:26)
That's right

and well the other thing too is we have two motorcycles in the back under our bed and we try to make that fit in the van and it didn't so that was a big priority for me so yeah you sort of build around what's important to you and you go from there because you know some other people it's more important to have XYZ in their rig so they build it that way but that wouldn't work for us so we build it this way so I think that's the beauty of like tiny homes and custom homes is

You're very intentional with your space. Whereas when you're in a bigger home, it's just like, whatever, throw this there, that there. And you don't really truly think about your space or how much space you're taking. Whereas in your tiny home, this is like a hundred and, like a hundred and twelve, hundred and twenty square feet. Like everything has to have a reason to be there. And it can't just be like one reason. It has to be multi-purpose to make things work. Like our stairs going up into our bed is our shoe storage. So.

You're very much more intentional with the space, with the things around you when you are living tiny and in 120 square feet.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (05:35)
Yeah.

Space to me seems a little bit like time in that regard that you know how if you leave open space, you will fill it up, right? With, with whatever, you know, for some of us it's work, right? If we give ourselves too much free time that's not structured with, I'm going to, you know, go hike right now. It's on my calendar. I'm going to go do it. I will just work. Right. And space is like that too, right? It seems like the more space you have, the more you'll

Mel (05:46)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (06:06)
just fill it up. And so it really by constraining yourself, you have to be extraordinarily efficient. ⁓ And that's kind of an interesting, like just human practice of around, you know, kind of keeping yourself within certain constraints in order to have the richness of life that you want in terms of if I don't need, you know, if I don't have a fourth bedroom that I need to dust, what is it that I'm going to do with that time and that space?

Mel (06:08)
Mm-hmm.

Exactly.

Yeah, and it's sort going along with what you were saying too about priorities is sometimes we don't realize, I guess it's not necessarily priorities, but we don't realize what our time is being used on. We haven't mowed a lawn in five years, minus the fact that we, you know, when we're at home, we help our parents out with that, but we haven't mowed a lawn in five years. So now we have how many hours during the summer now to do something more that we want to use our time with. So it's

being very, like I say, being very intentional with your space, but being very intentional with your time, focusing on what matters most in your life.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (07:11)
Yeah. And you came to this realization after actually owning a very traditional type home, right?

Mel (07:21)
Yes, so we had in Michigan is where we were living before we hit the road and we had actually a lot of people would sort of considered a tiny home, but we didn't at the time, but it was only 900 square feet. ⁓ It had no garage, but 900 square feet had you walked in and it was pretty open. We had a living room, dining room, kitchen, and then down the hall was three bedrooms. ⁓

one and a half bathrooms, we had a little basement. So yeah, I would say what others consider the traditional lifestyle, we were living that traditional lifestyle in a regular home for a while. We owned it for, let's see, 17 to 21, so it was five years. And...

After a while, it just felt like we were sort of a bit in a rut and don't know if you wanna, if that's the direction you wanna go towards next on why we no longer live there and why we no longer have it.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (08:19)
Yeah, tell me about what home about what about homeownership was not working for you.

Mel (08:25)
So I would not necessarily say home ownership was not working for us. ⁓ I would say it's more where we were at and I'm not necessarily saying location, just sort of time in life too. We all know 2020 job layoffs, all that type of thing. It was affected by that ⁓ as well. But I think before that even happened in like

2016 2017 2018 I was seeing people who were traveling in their RVs across America and also people who were doing Aaron internationally and I was telling Abe like hey that would be really cool to Do and see so many things and he was more towards like the international side. Yeah Like wanting to travel more internationally than all around the United States, but he was still pretty Not quite fully convinced that we should do that so after

quite a few years of convincing him and then once he was laid off he did pick up another job and then it got to be where I didn't see him ever because his schedule and my schedules didn't quite line up correctly. The only time we saw each other was when both of our eyes were closed sleeping because I was already in bed at like eight o'clock at night because I was out of the house by five in the morning.

and then he wasn't home till sometime 9, 10, 11 at night and he wasn't up till 9 in the morning. So then there was this four day period I specifically remember, I didn't see him at all. We both lived in the same house, but because of our schedules, the only time we saw each other was our eyes closed and sleeping. So then I was like, this is enough. Like, just quit. Like we need to do something else. ⁓ And his work was, he was delivering packages for UPS and it was just getting to be

too much, too many hours, and then it was coming right around the holiday season and they were working him way too, it was too much. So I talked to him about what I was thinking and he was telling me how he was feeling and everything. We just felt like, is the time for him to at least quit, then we need to figure out what I should do, whether I should quit or he should find something else right now.

I think during that time we just really had to evaluate everything. Like, what do we want our next steps in life to be? What do we want to do next? Because we had gotten a house and ⁓ we had kids for, we had seven foster kids over a four year period. So we sort of say we're like empty nesters now. We had the house, we had kids, we're like retirees now, right? We've done all the, checked all the boxes of what you normally do for the American lifestyle traditionally.

I say traditionally because I think normal is different to everybody. we sort of, did all those things. So I was like, well, what's next? Should he be getting another job? What should I do? So after talking for a while, we realized, like, I guess now's the time. Let's see what happens. Let's see what's next. What's the worst that can happen? Would I be able to come back to my job? I was working at a bank at the time. Would I be able to come back to my job at the bank? If I can't, is that...

Can I find something different? You know so you just sort of start to evaluate all best and worst case scenarios of what's the worst could happen? You know and so then after we realized like I was sort of getting to a point and at the bank where I was sort of I was I was happy and I really liked it But it wasn't quite sure if I fully want to do that forever So we're like if that's my answer then

Why not let's try something new and that served then when we did take the leap.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (12:14)
Did you all feel like scared? Did you feel like it was a big risk? Did you feel some sort of backstop? you know, if this doesn't work, we can always, you know, go hang with family or, know, kind of how did you feel about the level of risk you were taking?

Mel (12:34)
think Abe felt it more than I did. I was, I had seen all these people online doing it where he only heard and saw what I sort of showed him. ⁓ so I think he more, I had more of big ideas, let's go do this. And he even more like, whatever that was, phrase, like bring, brought me in of what's reality. but I think the most reservation was sort of.

I don't really know, because we just had this plan to do it for a year. So I think, I don't think we were really scared because we had this plan to do it for a year and then we would find where we want to live and then we would settle down and get jobs there, et cetera, et cetera. So I don't think there was too much necessarily being scared about it. I think it was just more like the feeling of like, let's try and let's go and see what happens.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (13:28)
Yeah, and you had and you sold your house. So you had a little bit of runway there financially, right?

Mel (13:33)
Yes, so ⁓ we sold our house. We also had a triplex that we had for a rental that we were renting out. And ⁓ I was just actually talking to him about this the other day of like, should we have sold it? We could have been living off of more of that income while on the road. But our triplex needed all new siding. was like a 1905 house. And I was like, I don't really want to deal with that. It's a lot of money. We just got it a couple of years prior. So we ended up selling.

the triplex and using that money to sort of live off of for our year of travel and then we sold our home and the profit from that we used to buy our first van. ⁓ But our first van was just a partially converted one because it's all we could afford at the time. So we then put some sweat equity into building it out and making it work for what, you know, life on the road type of thing.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (14:31)
And were you able when you went from one van to the other and then from the second van to your truck, were you able to sort of break even on the we built out our van so we were able to sell it and buy a little bit of a different setup or whatever and and likewise with the truck was it kind of like you were able to build up that a little bit of value there?

Mel (14:55)
Yeah, so since we put all a lot of the work into we put all the work into the first van the second van We built out since we did all that work We were then able to use sweat equity and be able to sell that in order to afford the next vehicle So it was sort of like a stepping stepping stone into each each rig Like we wouldn't have been able to afford the transit if we didn't build out the pro master rest of the pro master ourself so it was

doing the hard work yourself versus having to hire out or you know, move in ready if you want to call out for a vehicle.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (15:32)
And I think a lot of people do that. ⁓

that are in van life or, you know, digital nomad in a vehicle, they do start with one thing that doesn't fit them perfectly. And so they ⁓ upgrade or make changes. And so it's good to know that when you do that, that you can potentially use it as a bridge that you're not losing the value necessarily on the first purchase and that you don't have to make up for it in the next purchase. If you're doing some work yourself and improving, you know, each rig as you go.

Mel (15:39)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's one of those things of like just get started. It doesn't have to be perfect, but build it out and work it out and then use it as a stepping stone for your next. You don't have to be in your dream right now because there's no way something like this, you know, I wouldn't be able to have our dream the first step along the way. That took four years to get to. So, and it's, it's sort of the same too in the home. Like we didn't have this grand, beautiful dream home. I don't really know what my dream home was at the time.

but it was a rental prior to us purchasing it and it was, it needed some TLC, it was a little rough around the edges, we sort of fixed it while living in it. But we were able to use that to then buy the next dream, which was our van, and then use that property to buy the next dream. So I think it's sort of one of those things like you don't have to have your dream right now, you just have to get started.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (16:53)
Yeah, what a good message. ⁓

Mel (16:55)
Mm-hmm.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (16:55)
That's

definitely the story of our real estate, you know, like home journey in terms of buying a house in foreclosure and fixing it up and then buying another, you know, sort of deferred maintenance as they call it property and fixing that up. And you can just build a lot of, a lot of sweat equity there. And sometimes I even debate how much the market, the housing market affected our gains versus how much work that we put into each one of those properties.

Mel (17:15)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (17:25)
So yeah, very interesting and good to see that that can be done on wheels too.

Mel (17:30)
Yes, yeah that is one thing that isn't talked about too much but we have been able to do that not only just a stationary home but a home on wheels been able to like get to those the next stepping stone and dreams. But I will say to the ⁓ what you were saying about the hard work like was it worth it it's like there are a lot of times where you're sitting there like why why are we doing this this is I'm not someone who builds out like this what are what am I doing this for but

I think the skills we learned have been able to help us fix the things within our build as well if like something's not quite working correctly or you want to make an upgrade. So it's one of those like things you got to toss up like, okay, that was a pain in the butt. I did not like that, but I know a lot about our electrical system now and I actually find it interesting. So it's like one of those things you have to sort of go through to then benefit from later.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (18:25)
Yeah.

I have this theory that we don't like anything that we haven't done before, right? That we just kind of have like this resistance to, if you don't understand anything about plumbing, you are going to not like it. And then the more that you feel some capability around it, you might start to actually like it a little bit, but you won't know until you're a little bit good at it. And so, ⁓ this is another area that makes you resilient too, in terms of your career and the opportunities that show up in front of you.

Mel (18:30)
there you go.

Mm-hmm.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (18:56)
that should you all, you know, come to a place where you needed to do some other kind of work, then you've got another set of skills that you've got hidden in your back pocket.

Mel (19:01)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yes, absolutely. Now, I've talking about plumbing though. think we'll stay away from that one. Anytime you can't find that darn water leak.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (19:16)
There's always a water leak the first time. ⁓ So let's talk about your career pivots a little bit. So you were working at a bank and it was delivering for UPS and then now you're doing something completely different. Is this in alignment with like a hobby that you had or an interest? Like how did you make that transition?

Mel (19:19)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, so for me actually it's not a pivot, it's a circle back around. I went to school for video production and I've had a camera in my hand since I was, I think when I was 14 I saw this other girl have a camera at this conference I was at and I was like, I wanna do that. And ever since then I've had a camera in my hand. I used to film weddings, I did real estate, photography and videography. And so I think it was more just, I pivoted in my career for a little bit.

why we're living in Michigan, but I came back around to what I truly love to do and am passionate about, which is having a camera in my hand, filming, photographing, anything to do with that. I absolutely love. But for Abe, yeah, it is a bit of a career change. He was at the law office that he got laid off in 2020 and then did UPS and now he's doing multimedia and editing and social media. So it is a bit of a pivot career for him, but I would say he is

He's a very fast learner, so he has picked it up really quickly. So that's been fun. And he knows a lot about DaVinci now, which is what I use to edit. So it's sort of fun to see him learn that stuff, which is what I like to do as well.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (20:49)
Yeah, so cool. And it's so interesting that there are so many, seems like these nomadic jobs that are in this space, because a lot of the, I mean, this is just my outsider perspective, maybe, but it seems like a lot of the documentary filmmaking and social media, it requires you to be in different places. You can't, you know, kind of be on a set like, you know, film used to be. ⁓ So it seems to be enabling the nomadic lifestyle, enables

Mel (21:10)
Mm-hmm.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (21:19)
you to stay in this career path. Would you say that's true?

Mel (21:23)
Yeah, absolutely. I think this day and age is very different from even just five, 10 years ago. A lot of people that I am filming for Tiny Home Tours, a lot of them are working remotely as well. And so, and it's not just like, they do something for social media. No, it's very, very different. So many different types of fields and careers people can do from the road. I think growing up, you're told like,

to do this, this, this, this. And it includes get a job, you know, a stable job, and here's sort of your list of jobs. But nowadays it's so, there's like a million roads that you can go any direction that fits what you might want to head towards. And you don't necessarily have to have something that's remote to be able to travel and be in a bunch of different places.

Numerous other types of jobs and things like work camping jobs where you can work at different campgrounds across the country There's small things like you can there's certain businesses that when they're opening their shop They just hire someone for like 60 days to set up the shelving and get all that done so you could literally Go work at this place for 60 days and you work a lot of hours and you make pretty decent money And then you can go travel for two months and then find another shop that's opening so there's

So many different things the longer we're out here, the more we're hearing like how many different ways there actually is to make an income. And it doesn't have to include being in your 1200 square foot home in the city and getting a job at XYZ. That's, that's, it's called standard jobs. So it's this day and age has made it that there's so many more opportunities than I feel like there were.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (23:12)
And so you're hearing a lot of these stories as you're out there and encountering other people. And then obviously through your work, through tiny home tours, would you say that there's any one place like for a listener who's like, gosh, I want that lifestyle. have no idea how it would make money. Is there a Reddit thread or like a place where people could go and just read through all the different ways that people are making money on the road?

Mel (23:20)
Mm-hmm.

Yes, so I mean one would be Watching videos of other people living the lifestyle you are living grant a lot of people who make those videos themselves are probably Saying social media or something like that ⁓ But there's a lot of people who start giving you information on how they're making money on the road like that But there are Facebook groups one's called like work campers and others called like looking for work campers and

There's there's there's a few so definitely search I can't remember the names of the other ones But definitely search Facebook and find those groups and they'll tell you there's constantly people asking like how do I make money on there? How do I do what you guys are doing that type of thing and there will be people that just start lists listing them all

Laura Lynch, CFP® (24:21)
interesting and then of course your channel that you work on tiny home tours every one of those folks is not I mean maybe some of them are social media influencers but most of them are just you know regular people that you all are filming that have a variety of different careers right

Mel (24:25)
Mm-hmm.

Yes, so I would say more recently who we've been filming are not ⁓ social media influencers. I would say it's more people that ⁓ are working other jobs that don't involve social media. And it can range from anything and everything from brick and mortar place. can range from ⁓ someone I filmed a couple days ago does customer service.

online for I believe it was an auto company, just from her computer from the road. So it's, it's sort of sky's the limits. And I feel like all the people that I've been talking to is just ask your employer too. And if you're somewhere right now where you're at, you know, maybe being a cashier at the store doesn't quite work. You can ask them, Hey, can I remotely be a cashier? Like, you know, that doesn't work. Or can I remotely do plumbing from the road? Okay. That doesn't work. But you know, some of these other jobs,

It's like just ask, you hey, can I do X amount of days from the road or from home or, you know, or can we just move it to a remote position? And I've learned a lot of people have started to do that and companies, if you're a good worker, companies don't want to lose you. And so they'll do whatever it takes to keep you. Cause some people have made the decision like I want to start traveling. I want to go this direction in life, but this career path currently isn't working for me to chase my goals.

So I think the companies are realizing, ⁓ this person, they're ready to go that path and it doesn't necessarily include me, but I don't wanna lose them. So they're like, okay, let's do remotely. You can go part-time, but I still need you on the team, but at least have good internet while you're traveling. And then they make it work. So I think just asking really gets you pretty far too.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (26:25)
And as you said, even just starting out, Hey, we can take, we can be on the road for half the week and I can work remotely half the week. And then I have to be back, in person for half the week that allows you to, slowly ease in and try it out and also continue your employment. And sometimes we have, or at least I do sometimes I have this kind of, all or nothing mindset, right. But the, but we can't let perfect.

Mel (26:48)
Mm-hmm.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (26:52)
to get in the way of good. Right. And so sometimes you gotta, say, Hey, they'll let me, work remotely two days a week. That means for four days, we can be, at a local, national forest or whatever, you know, whatever it is. And that for the rest of the week, we got to be back, in person, but who knows where that goes from there. And maybe once I build that trust with them, then we, if it goes to three days or, you know, five days. And so, we can't be all or nothing. We have to just make.

Mel (27:05)
Exactly.

Mm-hmm.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (27:19)
progress towards our goals or our vision a little bit at a time. And then,

There are folks, I think that also then when they have to be back in person, right? Maybe they, can't afford both to have, be out on the road with the, fuel costs and the parking costs at the, local state park and manage the, the regular housing costs too. So then you got to kind of figure out where are you going to, if you're going to go full time in your, your van or your, your over land vehicle as you all have, ⁓ where can we park?

park

that's close to the work. just all kinds of, it's a puzzle, right? Putting the pieces together, but definitely a lot of options there. So you have been on the road since 2021. Yep.

Mel (28:01)
Absolutely.

Mm hmm. Yep. Early

2021.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (28:13)
So what is your best piece of advice ⁓ that for folks other than what we have just talked about, which was really great advice, but what's your best piece of advice for those that are wanting to make a lifestyle like yours?

Mel (28:28)
It's sort of like I was saying earlier about just start. You know, we didn't have everything figured out. We just knew we needed and wanted a change than what were, what life was at that moment. And it was one of those things we didn't have a lot of money to have, to create that dream right now.

as well. So it was one those things like just start, find something that will work for you now, build onto it to have something work for you later, and just keep taking those small steps towards the dream. just doesn't have to be like, I'm going to take, boom, I'm to that dream right now. No, it's a process and it takes time too. We going back to the house, we wanted a house, but we didn't want to be

stupid about it. We didn't want to just get a massive loan and and not be able to have money for a down payment and have to do something else. Like you just have to be smart about your decision. So it was probably four or five years we wanted to save X amount of dollars to then put for the down payment to get the house. So it was just like working hard and staying focused during those like four years.

then get the house and then the next thing I was like I want to travel so it was from 2017 all the way to 2021 it wasn't like hey I want to travel next month we start traveling so it's one of those things like stuff is gonna take time but if you stay focused on what you want and maybe if that's life on the road then you have to start creating that path to get towards there and I think it sounds cliche but very it's very important with what you spend

your time on, like you were saying earlier, time is very, you have to be very intentional with it. And I think, and like I said, as a cliche as sounds, social media and just doom scrolling or doing other things that aren't aligned with your goals really take away from what you truly want to do and what you think is going to make you happy in the future. And so sometimes it's current.

you have to sacrifice maybe extra hours of this or that extra hours to work towards paying for your dream essentially. So all that to say pretty much is use your time wisely and know it probably will take a while to get to that dream. It's a dream for reason. It's not a reality right now. It's a dream to work towards.

When I was at the bank during my lunch breaks, I would go over to this restaurant called Fazzoli's, a little Italian fast food restaurant, and I would bring my iPad there. And during my hour lunch, it was like a two minute walk from the bank. I would go over there and I'd get my iPad out and start working on what path do I need to take to get towards there. And so was trying to use my time as wisely as possible to figure out what I needed to do. So it's like,

I didn't just like, I wanna do that and go do it. I had to have a plan. I had to have the small steps written out and I had to start working towards it. So just understand that it's gonna take time and it's okay if your dream does pivot as well.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (31:45)
I adjust.

I want to just take what you said and just publish it everywhere because you are so right that everything that's big and anything that's worth doing is hard. And it does take a lot of intentionality. ⁓ as you know, ⁓ it took us 30 months to get ourselves into our tiny house full time. And it involved a two year calendar on the wall with sticky notes, with three things every month that had to be accomplished and two businesses had to change.

Like there was just a lot of moving pieces and I had it all like listed out, like check, check, check. And that can be so fulfilling when you're checking those small boxes, keeps you motivated to move forward. But it's, you know, very much about intentionality and like architecting your life. And so I just wish a lot of people could hear your story because sometimes we, you know, look on social media and we think, like you said, people just one day wake up and say, I'm just going

Mel (32:28)
Mm-hmm.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (32:47)
and travel full time and you know, I'm a, you know, multimillionaire so it's no big deal. But the reality is, is that the most of us just have to be work really hard in order to get what we want.

Mel (32:58)
Yeah, and the other thing is you don't have to, like I was saying, you don't have to have it all set and ready right now. And you don't have to make as, like, for example, for on the road, you don't have to make as much money as you were making when you were in, say, a 1200 square foot stationary house working the job at the bank. We had our mortgage we had to pay. We had electric bill. We had...

the gas bill, the water bill, and we had house insurance and you know, all those things start to add up and I feel expenses on the road are different and you can also make them less. So it's like, we didn't have to be like, okay, we made this much money at the bank and at the law office, we need to make this much money as well. Like it doesn't have to be equal like that. I always say, make a little more than you spend. I definitely recommend that.

because you don't want to go in debt in the opposite, but you don't have to be equal to what you were making to live the lifestyle of your dreams. I still think it's smart to maybe spending less so you have that buffer for emergencies, but also for retirement. It's something we're still young, but we still need to think of our future. So we sort of watch our expenses and what we spend.

but we don't make as much as we did, but we have more time together. We have more time doing the things we want to do. And there are sacrifices we make to living this particular lifestyle, ⁓ but it's all aligned with what makes us happy, what we wanna do with this life that we get here. So it's very important to understand that

If you're wanting to start life on the road, you don't have to make the same amount of money that you had made before.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (34:55)
Good, good advice. I think a lot of people are trying to figure out, you know, what that is, you know, what is that amount of money that I need to make in order to live on the road. And it is important, of course, to be making a little bit more so you can have that emergency fund and so you can save for your future. So all very sage advice, pretty much the poster child for my financial planning business. So

Mel (35:03)
Mm-hmm.

There you go. Yeah, I think it's important to go for it and dive towards your dreams and what you want to do and take those steps, but I think it's very important to also be smart and make sure it makes sense because yeah, we have that chunk of money. We're like, okay, we're going to spend one year life on the road, exploring and seeing as much as we can. And we have this chunk of money that we made from

our rental property to go and do that. But five days into life on the road, our engine and our van blew and we were stranded for 16 days and it was a $9,000 repair to put in a new engine. So there went that $9,000 that we expected to live on for the first six months. So I think it's very important that we had a backup, you know, emergency fund or we knew, okay, maybe we won't be able to travel as long. So what are we going to pivot and do next?

So think it's very smart. Like, yeah, just dive in and just start, but you also need to be smart in the decisions.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (36:27)
Mel, thank you so much for sharing your story, your experience, your best tips, all of your ideas. Certainly you are just killing it at this thing. I'm curious if you have some sort of, you know, forward look, like what's next for you? Are you all continuing on the road for a long time? Do you have something new that you're working on?

Mel (36:54)
I would say we're not quite sure. ⁓ We have, so this whole travel life was like one year and find where you want to settle down type of thing. And after like a month or three months, we're like, no, we're going to do this indefinitely. But after here now into year five, it's sort of one of those things like maybe we should get some land and park the truck on it for like the winter or something. ⁓ So I think maybe something like that would be next for us, but I don't see us stopping travel.

In the most beautiful months during the spring during the fall even summer still chasing those places that we absolutely love to be like here in the Pacific Northwest where it's just absolutely gorgeous so What is next is just continuing to? Find happiness and enjoy the happiness and the everyday of like hey, we made it to our dream Figure out what is like you made it to your dream. So what's your next dream? What's the next thing you want to pursue?

A lot of my spare time recently outside of hiking, traveling and whatnot is cinematic filmmaking and storytelling. So I dive a ton into just like learning how to become a better filmmaker. Just is something that interests me. So I think just using your time towards what you want to do next is important. And I think that's what's next is just continuing to

learn more and more in the things that we love to do. So I don't know if that really answers your question, but I think we're to the point where just we're enjoying life. We got to where our big dream was at. So it's sort of just like enjoy it now.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (38:34)
Yeah, that's so good. Because sometimes we're really pressured to more is more, you know, growth, what's the next thing and yet at the same time, like, there is a little bit of rebellion and just saying, Hey, I'm, I'm doing it. And, and I'm, I'm happy here and I don't need, you know, the next thing because I already did that work.

Mel (38:43)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah, and I think it sort of goes back to like, What you do now affects what you're going to be doing in five years, but I sort of look at it also in reverse. Five years ago, what would myself say to me now? And it's like,

would she believe like we made it and we're doing it I think it's okay to be ⁓ Not prideful but be very happy that you did get to where you want to be I think it's very important to focus on like hey look back You know Here's everything all the steps we did and when we got to I think it's okay to be happy and be excited for yourself about that, too

Laura Lynch, CFP® (39:39)
I agree. ⁓

So if people want to follow your filmmaking and the work that you're doing, where did they track you down?

Mel (39:46)
Currently we are Abe and Mel on social media if you guys want to contact us talk with us My cinematic filmmaking I have posted some on our YouTube channel, but I actually have another YouTube channel I am going to be starting which is unnamed currently, but I'm doing a whole new Storytelling I'm learning so much and I just want to put it out on a new fresh platform

sort of separate from the style we have been doing. So that is TBD. But yeah, follow us along on Abe and Mel on Facebook, Instagram, and you will see when that will come out.

Laura Lynch, CFP® (40:24)
But Mel, thank you so much for your time.

Mel (40:27)
Yep, thank you. I'd be happy to answer any questions that people might have to be able to pursue this lifestyle.