<story><title>My failed attempt at using a closet as an office</title><url>http://blog.pamelafox.org/2023/12/my-failed-attempt-at-using-closet-as.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ryandrake</author><text>When I made the decision to go fully remote, the first obvious step was to move out of the Bay Area. One of my hard requirements was property with a &lt;i&gt;separate physical building&lt;/i&gt; for a home office. This requirement &lt;i&gt;vastly&lt;/i&gt; reduced the set of viable homes to choose from, vastly constrained the neighborhood choice to more rural areas, and somewhat increased the cost. But after more than a year of working this way, I have to say it was well worth it. I wouldn&amp;#x27;t want to go back to work-from-spare-bedroom or work-from-closet. If you can manage it financially and you can culturally manage to live in a more rural area, you&amp;#x27;ll won&amp;#x27;t want to go back, either.&lt;p&gt;First, and obviously, it&amp;#x27;s quiet. No more kids playing in the house chaos. It&amp;#x27;s private, and can be locked separately, so I can work on my company&amp;#x27;s confidential stuff. Economical to heat and cool, since it is a very small space. You also get that intangible &amp;quot;separation&amp;quot; of your work life from your home life that your commute used to give you--hard to explain. A brief walk outside to and from the office allows me to reset into work-mode or home-mode. Highly recommended if you can swing it!</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>dotancohen</author><text>&lt;p&gt;&lt;pre&gt;&lt;code&gt;  &amp;gt; You also get that intangible &amp;quot;separation&amp;quot; of your work life from your home life that your commute used to give you--hard to explain. A brief walk outside to and from the office allows me to reset into work-mode or home-mode.
&lt;/code&gt;&lt;/pre&gt;
A lifehack that I learned here on HN when I was working from home was to actually leave the door, then walk right back in and work. If I needed to do any housework, I would again leave through the door, and return &amp;quot;home&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;This reduced all temptations to mix work and home life. It also made it clear to the other people in the house that daddy is now serious, and that even just a simple &amp;quot;hi, how are you&amp;quot; would require me to get up, leave, and return to answer. And then leave and return to go back to work. The social friction was important.</text></comment>
<story><title>My failed attempt at using a closet as an office</title><url>http://blog.pamelafox.org/2023/12/my-failed-attempt-at-using-closet-as.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ryandrake</author><text>When I made the decision to go fully remote, the first obvious step was to move out of the Bay Area. One of my hard requirements was property with a &lt;i&gt;separate physical building&lt;/i&gt; for a home office. This requirement &lt;i&gt;vastly&lt;/i&gt; reduced the set of viable homes to choose from, vastly constrained the neighborhood choice to more rural areas, and somewhat increased the cost. But after more than a year of working this way, I have to say it was well worth it. I wouldn&amp;#x27;t want to go back to work-from-spare-bedroom or work-from-closet. If you can manage it financially and you can culturally manage to live in a more rural area, you&amp;#x27;ll won&amp;#x27;t want to go back, either.&lt;p&gt;First, and obviously, it&amp;#x27;s quiet. No more kids playing in the house chaos. It&amp;#x27;s private, and can be locked separately, so I can work on my company&amp;#x27;s confidential stuff. Economical to heat and cool, since it is a very small space. You also get that intangible &amp;quot;separation&amp;quot; of your work life from your home life that your commute used to give you--hard to explain. A brief walk outside to and from the office allows me to reset into work-mode or home-mode. Highly recommended if you can swing it!</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>vondur</author><text>Luckily, I convinced my wife to let me purchase her a pre-fabricated building for an office in February of 2020. We already had an existing concrete slab (12&amp;quot; x 12&amp;quot;) where I had a 12&amp;quot; x 10&amp;quot; building put in. It took the work crew about 4 hours to build it. Later I had electrical installed and drywall an insulation put in. She really likes the space.</text></comment>