Early Retirement Extreme Forums

I live in a rural town. Like some (many?) rural towns, people here are largely self reliant, doing their own mechanical, carpentry, electrical, you name it. To do that requires an array of tools. Like most Americans, people here have ended up each getting their own tool. It seems to me that it would be much more cost efficient and a wiser use of resources to share certain tools that aren't used as frequently. Things like an axe or splitting maul aren't necessarily tools to be shared as they are used frequently. But on the other hand, I don't understand the logic of everyone owning their own set of power tools or a ladder (i.e. things that aren't used frequently).

Now that being said, how does one go about setting up a shared tool/resource program? The initial issue I see is that some may think others (like myself) may be just trying to leech off other resources instead of purchasing their own. Or is it better to keep it informal and just build up/use social capital on the occasions whenever I need a rarer tool/resources?

Thoughts?

Note: This is a community of <50 people.

If you're setting yourself up as the resident minimalist (as it sounds like from the peer pressure thread), you're going to have a hard time setting something like this up without looking like you're just trying to borrow everyone's stuff so you don't have to buy anything yourself. You might have to decide how important things like this are to you and how involved you want to be in the community. If you want to be involved enough to start things like this, you might have to compromise a little and make some outward adjustments to appear more like everyone else to fit in better.

I'm not saying you have to buy a vehicle necessarily. Find other ways to join the tribe that make you look like you're contributing to the community.