A Sydney couple is ditching their $700-a-week rent to build a new life in a van

When their $700-a-week Erskineville rental went up for sale, Sydney couple Sam Savage and Jess Jacobs didn’t look for another rental – they hit the road, built a house on wheels and came back with a plan to buy land and build box houses in Western Australia.

Savage, 33, an English mason who moved to Australia a decade ago, told Yahoo Finance that the vanlife idea went from a “bucket list” to a reality after the landlord decided to sell.

“We’ve talked about it before and we always thought it would be a bucket list item, but we never thought we could do it,” she said.

Faced with rising rental costs, the two “bit the bullet”.

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They bought a $20,000 bus and turned it into a mobile home, moving into a small studio in Alexandria for $500 a week while they worked in construction.

The renovation cost $30,000 and to finance it, they used savings and investments.

Savage used Raiz’s micro-investment feature “rollover” to automatically invest spare change, then compounded his contributions when he started saving seriously – “at least $50 a week or whatever spare change” he had.

By the end of the year, he had saved about $12,000.

The couple embark on the journey of a lifetime

In February, they embarked on a 10-month tour of the country.

They spent a combined $32,000 on the trip, mostly from savings.

Savage got rock painting jobs along the way and Jacobs, a personal trainer, kept a few online clients.

The couple bought the bus for $20,000 and spent $30,000 on repairs. Source: Provided/Yahoo News

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“We were selling our scotch fillet steaks for ground beef. We were really careful about what we bought. We were trying to save as much money as possible,” he said.

Looking beyond ‘crazy’ Sydney to buy cheap land

Back in Sydney in December, the couple bought their first home – but not in Sydney, where Jacobs is from.

“It’s just crazy. The amount of money you have to have, and then you pay. That’s it, it’s game over, you’re stuck,” Savage said.

“He’s locked in for 30 years, and Jess and I don’t want that. We want more freedom and we want to build a passive income.”

On their travels they found Esperance in WA and now want to buy there, building a bowl style home.

They are now selling the bus to buy a property in WA. Source: Provided/Yahoo News

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“When we looked at the land, we realized that it was actually very affordable. That’s what’s going to work next,” Savage said, with plans to go up to $200,000.

Ideally, he would buy two plots of land and build two box houses – turn one into an Airbnb and sell the other.

To help fund the project, they have listed the bus for sale and hope to get between $80,000 and $90,000 for it.