A homestead is a set of budgets
A household budget tracks money coming in and going out. A homestead has the same problem, but with more than money.
A budget, in this course, is any resource you have to balance: what comes in, what goes out, and what you store in between. If more goes out than comes in for long enough, the store runs empty.
There are five budgets, plus a sixth that people tend to forget.
The five budgets
- Energy: electricity for lights, appliances, pumps and tools. Measured in kilowatt-hours (kWh). In: solar, the grid, a generator. Stored in: batteries.
- Water: for drinking, cooking, washing and growing. Measured in gallons (or liters). In: a well, rain, a town supply. Stored in: tanks.
- Heat: keeping the home warm enough in winter and cool enough in summer. Measured in BTU (British thermal units) or kWh. In: the sun, a stove, a heat pump. Stored in: the building itself and the fuel pile.
- Food: what you grow, raise and store. Measured in calories and by weight. In: the garden and animals. Stored in: the pantry and cellar.
- Money: what you spend to build and run it all. Measured in dollars, upfront and per year.
Text description
A diagram with the homestead in the center and five budgets around it: energy, measured in kilowatt-hours per day; water, in gallons per day; heat, in BTU or kilowatt-hours per season; food, in pounds and calories; and money and time, in dollars and hours. Arrows show how they connect: energy pumps and treats water, energy can make heat with a heat pump, water grows food through irrigation, and food you grow saves or earns money. Money and time pay for and run all of the others.
The sixth budget: time
Time is the budget that breaks most homesteads. It is measured in hours per week, and it changes with the season.
- Spring planting, summer watering and fall harvest can take many hours a week.
- Firewood is cut, split, stacked and dried months before you burn it.
- Tanks, filters, panels and batteries need regular checks.
Every system you add saves money or adds independence, and costs time. If you also work a job, time is often the tightest budget of all.
Some rough starting numbers
These are US averages. Your own numbers will differ, and a homestead often aims well below them.
- Energy: an average US home uses roughly 900 kWh of electricity a month (EIA, 2022). State averages run from about 500 to over 1,200 kWh. Space heating is the largest single use of energy in US homes. It was about 42 percent in 2020, with all fuels counted (EIA).
- Water: at home, people in the US use very roughly 80 to 100 gallons (about 300 to 380 L) per person per day (USGS, EPA). Careful households use much less.
- Food: an adult needs very roughly 1,600 to 3,000 calories a day (Dietary Guidelines).
These are rough national figures, not targets. Later tracks show how to work out your own.
Which budget is it?
Which budget does each number belong to?
- The well pump runs for 20 minutes a day
- The house loses heat faster on windy nights
- A battery bank costs several thousand dollars
- Four cords of firewood for the winter
- The fridge uses 1.2 kWh a day
- A year of potatoes, onions and winter squash
- Ten hours a week weeding and watering in July
- A 2,500 gallon rain tank
Budgets are connected
Most choices move more than one budget at once. That is why the course treats the homestead as one system.
- A bigger garden adds food, and uses more water and more time.
- A well pump makes water, and uses energy.
- More insulation lowers the heat budget, and costs money once.
- A wood stove saves energy and money, and uses a lot of time.
The hard month
Each budget has a hard month: the stretch of the year when it is closest to running out.
- Energy is often hardest in December and January, with short days and long nights.
- Water is often hardest in late summer, when rain is low and the garden is thirsty.
- Heat is hardest in the coldest weeks.
- Food stores are often lowest in late winter and early spring, before the first harvest.
- Time is often hardest in spring and fall.
When several hard months land at once, plan for that overlap first.
Text description
A year chart with a row for each of five budgets and a column for each month. Energy is hardest in December and January, with short days. Heat is hardest in the coldest weeks, from late December into February. Water is hardest in late summer, August into early September, when rain is low and the garden is thirsty. Food stores are lowest from February to early April, before the first harvest. Time is tightest in spring, April and May, and in fall, mid September to mid October. A dashed box marks January, where energy and heat overlap, labeled: overlap, plan for this first. A note says this is a common pattern in a cold US climate, and yours may differ.
Check
You double the size of your vegetable garden. Which budgets does that change?
Summary
- A homestead balances five budgets: energy, water, heat, food and money.
- Time is the sixth budget, and often the tightest.
- Each budget has a unit: kWh, gallons, BTU, calories, dollars and hours.
- Most choices move several budgets at once.
- Plan for each budget’s hard month, not the average.
Next, you will see why your climate zone changes the answer for almost every budget.
Go deeper: stocks and flows
Engineers call a store a stock and what moves in or out a flow. A rain tank is a stock; rain and use are flows. A battery is a stock; solar and loads are flows. A stock buys you time when flows do not match. Bigger stocks, like a larger tank or battery, cost more but carry you through longer mismatches. Smaller outflows, like using less, often do the same job for less money. This idea runs through every track of the course and the Homestead Lab.