Tiny Houses for the Masses

[Deleted]

Mar 11, 2016 17:33:34 GMT here to stay said:

Once I gave thought to building from plans made by a company that specializes in expandable designs. They supplied a series of plans that started with a small house that could be added to as finances allowed but end up still being a unified whole.

The local planning department pointed out that was not going to skirt minimum square footage limits because 'almost no one actually does the expansions.' But I still think that is a great idea if you can do it.

Do you have a link to that company? I would like to check them out.

[here to stay]

www.carolinahomeplans.net/buildinstages.html

Mar 29, 2016 21:14:40 GMT @shotgunluckey said:

Mar 11, 2016 17:33:34 GMT here to stay said:

Once I gave thought to building from plans made by a company that specializes in expandable designs. They supplied a series of plans that started with a small house that could be added to as finances allowed but end up still being a unified whole.

The local planning department pointed out that was not going to skirt minimum square footage limits because 'almost no one actually does the expansions.' But I still think that is a great idea if you can do it.

Do you have a link to that company? I would like to check them out.

I think this was it.

[Deleted]

Check out this youtube channel of a tiny house builder.
www.youtube.com/user/scottstew1/videos

I'm hoping to build a tiny house mainly because I don't have 100 thousand to throw around. I don't even have 50. If I can get the land I want, I'm gonna build a tiny tree house. Why a tree house you ask. Because the only land I can afford is in a flood plain.

[comfortablynumb]

I dont understand how you can run your life from such a tiny space unless you have a large storage building besides the house.

The only thing that these homes provide is portability (most of them) and you could have more room in a school bus or a large older RV.

You can pick up a pretty big older RV pretty cheap. If you dont intend on moving it much, there ya go.

[Deleted]

comfortablynumb,I don't have the skills or strength to fix up anything. It has to be built and ready to go for me. Rv's and travel trailers are notorious for their flimsy building. Walls with 2x2's no thanks. Not in tornado alley! I wish I could build tiny underground.

Part of tiny living is letting go of all the junk and extra stuff that you don't NEED. I could, if I had to, fit everything I need in a van.

[comfortablynumb]

A tiny house seem to be fine if you want a place to sleep and eat. Where do you put all your clothes tools ect not to mention all the stuff in the pantry? My kitchen is about 8x10 with a pantry that is 4x10 or so.... and its still cramped.

I'm trying to grasp what it is a person does all day if something the size of a horse stall is all the house they require?

You might as well live in an econo apartment.

Hey, with the RV you can drive away from the tornado. LOL

[bluemingidiot]

Tiny house -- $50K; plus 20' x 20' garage/shed/shop $5.5K; 5 acres $15 to $25K; Water well/casing/pump/lines $5K;  Septic system $4.5K.  For $90K or less, you own your place and are living the dream.  The dream is still not doable for everyone, but is available to a lot more people.
 
20 ft. x 20 ft. x 10 ft. Garage
from Home Depot

VersaTube · Garages · 20' x 20'

The VersaTube 20 ft. x 20 ft. x 10 ft. steel building can be used as a garage, workshop, or storage building with an adequate 400 sq. ft. of space. Pre-engineered for DIY ...

See more details at Home Depot »

$5,095.00

+$420.34 tax. Free shipping

Home Depot

[comfortablynumb]

50k for a tiny house?
50K?

Ermagurd. I need to get into the tiny house building racket.

[bluemingidiot]

Build a bigger tiny house for less than $50,000 and the world will beat a path to your door.

[Rustaholic]

Apr 14, 2016 4:24:03 GMT bluemingidiot said:

Build a bigger tiny house for less than $50,000 and the world will beat a path to your door.

    I am confidant that I could convert our 24' travel trailer into a tiny house for less than $10,000.

I would even have a shed on the back of it for tool storage. If I added another $1200 to that I should be able to make it self powered electrically with a bank of batteries and a lawn mower engine coupled to an automobile alternator to charge the batteries and the engine running only on HHO.
           

[bluemingidiot]

Go for it!

[comfortablynumb]

Supersized tiny houses.
Not normal sized houses, nobody will by those.
Supersized tiny.

I'm gonna be rich.

[bluemingidiot]

Do you think 'super-size" is better than "obese?"

[kawaiitimes]

Here is a great blog post thst deals with the question of how someone can possibly live in a tiny space.

www.gregkroleski.com/2015/11/03/life-in-a-studio-apartment-with-my-wife-and-two-sons/

As an aside, the tiny house we plan to build has a 161sqft main floor, and two 70sqft lofts. So our family of three will occupy about 300sqft of space.

[bluemingidiot]

That definitely sounds "obese."

[kawaiitimes]

Apr 16, 2016 13:53:42 GMT bluemingidiot said:

That definitely sounds "obese."

It is a pretty big waistline a far as tiny living goes. If I were single, I could probably live very comfortably in a 100sqft model. But we are determined to have some separate living areas so we can at least have the illusion of getting away from one another.

[jassytoo]

Storage would be a problem for me. I don't mind a small living space and we don't have a lot of clutter but we do have an extensive pantry and homestead equipment etc. I would need a large storage building as well which would probably cancel out the low cost of the house.

[here to stay]

I'm not so convinced that a really tiny house on whatever land you can afford is reality for many. In terms of thinking for the maases, although there certainly are individuals who could do it comfortably.

But if you edit out the land issues, which in many places are limiting factors, then we already have plenty of "tiny houses." They're called apartments. Or even micro apartments. That is the housing for the masses.

I think what we're discussing is housing for the select few who make that a life choice.

I lived in Japan where tiny is endemic. Yet the there homes are full, every spare inch, of stuff for most people. Most people live in a small area in the center of surrounding bookcases and cabinets full of stuff. The houses are very close, even in places with lots of agricultural land around them.

Somehow, although were are not there yet, land is the limitation. Not construction.

[mollymckee]

I have seen some tiny houses where it sounds like the owners are planning to use it like a camper, traveling around the country. I was under the impression that the wheels or trailer where for moving the tiny house to where you wanted it, not for a continual or even often moving. They don't look very aerodynamic to me, I would think if you were going to be moving around, a camper would make more sense? Am I confused, or are these new owners? It also seems to me that since the tiny houses have become popular they are often priced based on what the market will bare, not what the costs of building should dictate.

[motdaugrnds]

Well, a "tiny" house (say 25' x 25') would be just fine for me as long as it was actually well constructed and had a basement under it. Much of the time I'm working; and if it isn't work outside on the 6-acre homestead, it will be inside either cooking or sewing. My entertainment area is used only when the weather is bad; and it has a nice lounge chair in it should I want to take a nap. I really don't like to be around most people; so I don't need any space specifically for entertaining. (I'm pretty much a recluse preferring 4-legged animals to 2-legged ones.) I would already have had a tiny house built but this county's Building Department demands the materials used be of a certain grade, nothing like the "damaged" wood I used for all my out buildings, which people still stop up on the state road to look at.

So many small structures are so poorly constructed, a strong wind would blow them away!  I might as well stay in this old 1972 trailer.....

[kawaiitimes]

Apr 16, 2016 17:14:57 GMT mollymckee said:

I have seen some tiny houses where it sounds like the owners are planning to use it like a camper, traveling around the country. I was under the impression that the wheels or trailer where for moving the tiny house to where you wanted it, not for a continual or even often moving. They don't look very aerodynamic to me, I would think if you were going to be moving around, a camper would make more sense? Am I confused, or are these new owners? It also seems to me that since the tiny houses have become popular they are often priced based on what the market will bare, not what the costs of building should dictate.

There are tiny house owners who travel. The benefit of a tiny house over an rv is that tiny houses are insullated much more similarly to stick built houses and so can be used comfortably for all 4 seasons. Plus, tiny houses can be made to feel much more like a home than an RV can which makes having a "mobile house" more appealing to young professionsals who travel as a part of their jobs. Those who do move their homes frequently may move every few months... Not likely to be moving every couple of weeks like an rv might.

We actually looked at custom building an RV to suit our needs initially, but at the cost of a custom RV that would only be comfortable 3 seasons of the year, we can build a tiny house that is much more durable comfortable and is actually built for full time living.

[kawaiitimes]

Apr 16, 2016 17:00:17 GMT here to stay said:

I'm not so convinced that a really tiny house on whatever land you can afford is reality for many. In terms of thinking for the maases, although there certainly are individuals who could do it comfortably.

But if you edit out the land issues, which in many places are limiting factors, then we already have plenty of "tiny houses." They're called apartments. Or even micro apartments. That is the housing for the masses.

I think what we're discussing is housing for the select few who make that a life choice.

I lived in Japan where tiny is endemic. Yet the there homes are full, every spare inch, of stuff for most people. Most people live in a small area in the center of surrounding bookcases and cabinets full of stuff. The houses are very close, even in places with lots of agricultural land around them.

Somehow, although were are not there yet, land is the limitation. Not construction.

You are right that tiny/micro living isn't new, and if this were a city based forum instead of a country based forum the debate would likely be about micro apartments, split studios and the like. Tiny living, whatever the landscape, isn't for everyone. 

[willowgirl]

Apr 16, 2016 2:58:58 GMT bluemingidiot said:

Do you think 'super-size" is better than "obese?"

I prefer to be called "a victim of the fork," thank you.

[willowgirl]

Apr 14, 2016 4:24:03 GMT bluemingidiot said:

Build a bigger tiny house for less than $50,000 and the world will beat a path to your door.

Well, he just built a 16x18 ft. combination woodshed/greenhouse, using mostly salvaged materials, for less than $500. Of course, it has a dirt floor and the walls aren't finished inside. I'm not sure how much it would cost to make a structure like that habitable, but probably not $49,500.

[bluemingidiot]

Materials are one thing, labor is another, finishing touch something else. You could in theory defend yourself in court quite cheaply. The reason a lawyer charges so much is that he is supposed to know what he is doing. Likewise, baking and offering to sell a couple layers of flour mixed with other ingredients is not going to attract a parent looking to buy a birthday cake for a 5 year old's party.

But again, build a supersized, transportable, tiny house with all the bells and whistles for less than $49K and I bet the world will beat a path to your door.

[mollymckee]

I would think you would need a serious car or truck to pull (an stop) a tiny house loaded with all your possessions. Does anyone know how heavy they are?

[comfortablynumb]

The materials to make a tiny house on a trailer base so it is transportable is grossly inflated and also, the ones I have seen are built with useless waste like tongue and groove 1" thick cedar walls and other ridiculous expenses.

Small and super energy efficient does not cost 50k. The pointless grade of the materials they use do push it up there.

The idea of tiny house is a marketing thing. Mobile/modular houses you can buy second hand or repo are built with 6" walls and high R insulation all around. It would take very little to heat and cool a modern well built modular home.

Now, take the construction method and design of one and scale it down 50%. A 12x60 footprint is 720 sq foot. Comsider that you dont actually heat or cool the entire 720 at any one time.

Willow has a "tinyhouse" shell at the top of her driveway she bought for 3K installed. I could finish it ready to move into, heat water insulation ect ect. and throw in a solar roof. The end total would come no where near 50k.

Portability is an added expense. DO you really need portability? Probably not. Transporting one of these multi ton creations isnt as simple as it looks. The stress of being moved will created problems, the more you move it the more issues will pop up.

The point that an RV is not easy to heat made me ask.... if you have autonomous RV capability.... drive it somewhere warm. You wont have the flexibility of the RV with a tiny house on wheels as you think you will.

If you are going to buy the land and build, why make it portable? ALand with a portable house will have far less property value than one with a standard permanent structure.

The only way I can see a "tiny house" being even remotely logical and useful is if it is at least 20x20 with a full basement.

For me anyway. If all you plan on doing is sleeping there and making breakfast then going out to work all day and live that style well sure... all you need is a nice hotel room sized house. Our heated and cooled living space is only about 500-600sqft, but useable under roof total is more like 3K sqft. couting all the places that are roofed structure.

And they are full... and not of junk. lol

[comfortablynumb]

Apr 20, 2016 20:55:15 GMT mollymckee said:

I would think you would need a serious car or truck to pull (an stop) a tiny house loaded with all your possessions. Does anyone know how heavy they are?

Moving a 10 or 12 ft wide trailer is no simple task. One made that heavy would require some serious truckage.

[comfortablynumb]

Here ya go, for 29k, this beats any tiny house hands down and you have 20k left to buy a truck to pull it.

pittsburgh.craigslist.org/rvs/5507439532.html

Just as nice can be had for half this price. or 1/3.

pittsburgh.craigslist.org/rvs/5549017876.html

[bluemingidiot]

Apr 20, 2016 20:55:15 GMT mollymckee said:

I would think you would need a serious car or truck to pull (an stop) a tiny house loaded with all your possessions. Does anyone know how heavy they are?

Does anyone know how heavy travel trailers are loaded with all your possessions?