For location, you can find villages or monasteries in Europe, especially depopulating areas in Italy for brutally cheap (under $100k). If you have a bit more money, say $5-700k, you can buy an old factory or convent in France. Various tax advantages can be had with enough cleverness.

An endowment you can rustle up with sufficiently well connected people, especially if you aren't looking for that much money.

Grants I agree are a problem. Darpa as I recall doesn't necessarily require university connections, but I'm not sure if Europe has anything easy like that. Maybe you attach a startup incubator?

1)https://www.patrice-besse.co.uk/ads/historic-buildings-for-s... 2) https://www.patrice-besse.co.uk/ads/historic-buildings-relig...

EDIT: In terms of financing, how much money do you really need? If you are self sufficient in terms of owning the property, endowment income and growing vegetables and selling beer/yoghurt etc., is that not enough? Would the modern academic type be interested at all in essentially living in a commune/monastery where some amount of time is dedicated to cleaning/maintenance/carpentry/agriculture?

This is false. Not-for-profits which aren't universities apply for grants all the time. Different grants come with different restrictions, but the proposed scheme would certainly be above the bar for e.g. typical NSF science grants.

Universities are hard due to accreditation, but starting a not-for-profit is quick and easy.

It varies per grant. I work in medical research and this is the case where I live.

In the USA the NIH is 3-4x the budget of the NSF