(gentle violin music) - So living in Jackson, the housing cost has ballooned because there's national forest land, there's wilderness, and there's national park land, and then there's this small develop-able town of Jackson.

At first, it was the millionaires that moved here and built their second homes, and now it seems that the billionaires are kicking out the millionaires.

(gentle violin music) All right, my name is Sven Taow, I am originally from Idaho, I moved here 12 years ago with the misinformation that I would be making lots of money if I moved here.

If you just come here, and you plunk down your 1,100 a month for housing and pay your first-month, last-month deposits, you're going to have to have two or three regular jobs to be able to live here, a lot of people do it.

Jackson's kind of unique, there's a lot of rich people, but also a lot of poor people, but the poverty here is a lot different than other places.

People here are generally poor by choice, they're living frugally, but they're living here to pursue their passions, they are possibly uninsured or making nine bucks an hour, but are spending it all on the gear at the gear store that they work at, but there's also people like me who have also constantly avoided the housing situation by finding some different housing situation.

One summer, somebody actually let me live in their basement for free, one summer, I lived in a van, one summer, I camped, this summer, I renovated an old tack shed.

So my wife was a river guide for Dave Hansen Whitewater.

He has this old tack shed right next to their new tack building that has been in disuse for maybe 20 years.

I asked him if I was to turn the tack shed into an apartment, if I could live in it.

And he didn't see any problem with it, and that's what it takes to be a Wyomingite.

All right, I'm going to take you on a quick tour of our tack shack.

Starting over on this side, we have our art gallery, we have our dining room, our dining chairs, and our computer room.

(light piano music) Okay, moving on over here, we have our library, our media entertainment center, and our coat closet.

Our kitchen, our walk-in pantry... Moving over here, we have our kitchen island, ample storage, this is our junk drawer, and we have running water.

(light piano music) And last but not least, we have our walk-in closet, (light piano music) and our California King bed.

(music ends) Now that I have a master's degree in parks and recreation tourism, I'm hopeful that I can find an actual year-round full-time job here.

Currently, I own a photography company.

We operate for five months during the summer months.

I operate with my good friend Dusty.

We work at a horseback ranch where we take pictures of the people that go on horseback rides, and take a bunch of photos, family photos, and give them an option of buying a package of photos.

Most people come here because they are pursuing outdoor activities, I came here to make money, but then found that I loved climbing up the Tetons.

From 2000 until now, I've been up 34 of the Teton peaks, and there's still about 20 to go, but I'm making a goal to summit them all.

(wind rushing) I love living in Wyoming, it's not the easiest place to live, but I've seemed to make it work out so far.

Wyoming's also unique because it really is one of the last frontier states.

You'll run into old ranchers who've lived the same way and have been doing the same things for the past 140 years since they settled here in the 1890s, 1880s.

Wyoming helped me slow down, and helped me realize that life is for living and enjoying.

Ever since I've moved here, for my first time, I've been trying to live my passions, and so I'm trying to stay here.

(slow violin music)