I built a SaaS starter kit that runs on a $5 VPS because I got tired of the "Vercel Tax"
Most SaaS boilerplates today have a hidden flaw: They lock you into a stack of expensive managed services.
Between Vercel Pro ($20/mo), a managed database like Supabase ($25/mo), and an auth provider like Clerk, you are looking at a recurring burn rate of over $50/month before you have acquired a single paying customer.
For a bootstrapped founder, that kills your runway. It forces you to monetize immediately or shut down.
I decided to engineer a way out of this trap.
Introducing: The Boring SaaS Starter Kit
I spent the last few months architecting a production-ready stack designed to run entirely on a single $5/month VPS (Hetzner or DigitalOcean).
The goal was simple: Zero vendor lock-in. 100% ownership.
The Tech Stack:
Next.js 15 (Dockerized standalone build)
SQLite (Running in WAL-mode for zero-latency queries)
Litestream (Real-time streaming backups to S3, so data is never lost)
Better-Auth (Self-hosted authentication)
Why support this launch? If you believe that developers should own their infrastructure instead of renting it from VC-backed cloud monopolies, this project is for you. It enables you to host unlimited side projects on a single server for the price of a coffee.
I am launching on Product Hunt today
If you want to support the "Cloud Exit" movement, you can upvote me on
Happy to answer any questions about the architecture in the comments.
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