Dan,
I sold my home and property of 28 years, in the middle of my current (and second S-7, 6 th plane total) build of my now flying S-7S. 10 days after listing, it sold, and 10 days after that I had to move out. I bundled up the parts, and hung it from a neighbors barn roof. Then I moved onto 40 acres of raw ground a mile or so away, and hauled water from the creek and town, crapped outside, and gradually over the next few months got the well in, the septic system, the shop/hangar foundation, and then finished it all (3,000 sq. ft. insulated, finished out, full bath, not just a tin box). Then I snapped lines on the floor of the hangar, the size of the finished plane, and I used some of the concrete form work material to rough in a small apartment in the hangar, VERY small, but better then the 35 year old borrowed travel trailer I was camping out in. With the upstairs shop (and full bath with laundry room, hog heaven after roughing it) finished I dove right back in and knocked out the plane in the next 3 or 4 months, test flew it, landed it back at what was now home, and for the first time put it in the hangar. I subbed out the waste plumbing and the electrical, everything else I did myself with very occasional help (and with the help of my radio remote controlled crane).
The other big help was the money was there to keep going, from selling the previous property, no lag time while making more!
THEN, I started on the house, got it all done in 2 or 3 months, and tore out the temp hangar apartment along the way. So about 1.5 years after moving mid build onto this raw ground I had everything built, including the plane, oh yeah, I was working (crane work) 20 or 30 hours a week during this whole time, plus snowboarding in the winter. I honestly don't know how I did it, not until it was all done and enough people exclaimed as to how much happened so quick, did I realize I had indeed kicked it's ass and made it happen, all because I DIDN'T HAVE ANYTHING TO FLY! That was the motivation, after the plane was flying, and I was still somewhat roughing it in the hangar temp. apt., I didn't care, as I was back in the air, all else was secondary. I would have never worked that hard, so long term, if I had bought "something to fly in the meantime".
Since then, with nothing else needed built, I've been flying around 200 hours a year, and life is back to being a lot of fun, which is of course the payoff.
