“LOUISVILLE, Colo. — For many Americans who bought more home than they could really afford in the giddy days before the crash, the big-house dream has become a nightmare in the ashes of foreclosure and regret.
So after all that, how does 84 square feet sound?
Glenn Grassi, in building his prototype one-room microhome — 7 by 12 feet stem-to-stern, including a wood-burning stove, an antique parlor chair that also serves as a seat for the compost toilet beneath it, and a shower under the bed — is hoping it sounds, well, like shelter in the old-fashioned practical sense.…”
NYTimes story by Kirk Johnson Published: December 2, 2011
Photo: Matthew Staver for The New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/03/us/at-84-square-feet-home-takes-tiny-house-movement-tinier.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=tiny%20homes&st=cse
“What’s green, affordable and rolls on wheels? The ‘Molecule House,’ built by Jason Dietz and his father Michael in Felton (Calif.).
I was sitting at the Scotts Valley Car Wash this summer when I looked over at the mobile home lot and saw the cutest cottage beckoning me over. At around $48,000, it offers a kitchen, living room, bathroom, and two loft bedrooms which can accommodate queen beds.
‘These little houses are all built ‘green,’ Dietz said. ‘We use as many non-toxic components as we can, so on the outside all the wood is sealed with vegetable oil, not harsh chemicals, and the inside is painted with all zero VOC milk paints.’ Dietz sources all his construction materials from Santa Cruz County, including the redwood lap siding from Big Creek Lumber’
“It’s a 2×4 construction built like a regular house, with copper wiring and double paned windows. The real wood will stand the test of time and there is no formaldehyde or off-gassing like you would get in a manufactured home.’…”
by Kent Griswold, tinyhouseblog, November 29th, 2011
“We weren’t looking to buy a boat, we definitely weren’t looking to buy a tugboat, we were just looking. We have a home in Port Townsend, Washington but the commute into the city for work was too much to do everyday, so at the time we were renting a house in Ballard (a neighborhood of Seattle). It was a nice house in a great neighborhood, but we really weren’t keen on being renters. When we saw the tug on craigslist we were just curious, but once we looked at the boat we realized we could stop being renters and have a place of our own in Seattle. A place on the water with a million dollar view.…”
https://tinyhouseblog.com/floating-homes/tugboat-tiny-house/
“Over Thanksgiving break, I enjoyed reading about this small, energy-efficient home in North Carolina built using the Harbinger plan offered by the Tumbleweed Tiny House Company. Built to International Building Code requirements, the plan includes a loft, home office, kitchen, bathroom, living room, and deck — tightly placed in less than 500 square feet! Details are hard to come by, but Tumbleweed sells this plan for $695 and estimates that it costs about $33,000 in materials to build.…”
https://www.jetsongreen.com/2011/11/harbinger-tiny-house-north-carolina.html
“Smith and Mueller set out to find what makes a home feel like home in their upcoming documentary, ‘TINY.’ They state houses have doubled in size since 1970, yet people don’t necessarily feel more at home in them. Thus, in their search, they’ve honed in on the folks of the tiny house movement.
Their findings were clear: “It is very rarely the size of a house that makes it feel like a home, so much as the relationships we fill them with.”
‘So far we have found that for most people, home is more about the people they live with or near rather than the physical structure itself,’ they said, noting that while many still enjoy the aesthetics of their small homes, people tended to place more emphasis on the world outside—their communities, or the land they live on.
There was a general agreement among people they met along the way that ‘…living small has shaped their lives for the better.'”
Published on November 27, 2011, by Joshua Philipp
https://techzwn.com/2011/11/tiny-homes-are-where-the-heart-is/
Derek “Deek” Diedricksen: Micro-Architect & Tiny House “Mad Scientist” from TINY on Vimeo.
“Derek “Deek” Diedriksen is a tough guy to pin down.
His love of tiny architecture is first on a long list of creative pursuits—including radio DJ, comic book artist, musician (currently heading a Rage Against the Machine tribute band), blogger, author and full-time dad.
His blog, Relaxshacks.com, and his book, “Simple Shacks, Humble Homes” is devoted to micro-architecture and living in small spaces, but the structures he builds aren’t necessarily meant for living in full time. Closer to forts or pods, his “Hundred-dollar-homeless huts” and greenhouse-office-shelters are inspired by the salvaged materials that Deek finds in local dumps, thrift stores and second-hand building lots. A sort of D.I.Y. mad scientist, he’s been featured in the New York Times, NPR, Readymade and Make Magazine.…”
https://www.elephantjournal.com/2011/11/tiny-house-mad-scientist/
“Personalized postcards became a fad in the early 20th century; you could get any photo printed on photo paper stock and send it in the mail. The following are postcards of homesteaders in front of their new residences in South Dakota, North Dakota, and Montana, taken between 1907 to 1920. The subjects are dressed in their finest garments; they sent the cards to family members in other parts of the country to show off their new lives.
Credit: Collection of Michael Williams/courtesy Michael Williams.”
https://www.slate.com/slideshows/arts/homestead-postcards.html#all
Stacy “…felt like it was time to draw a line in the sand and make some important decisions about her future and her security. She went on Craigslist, found a room available in an apartment close to her work where she could walk, and split living expenses with her roommates. She sold her car, bought a bicycle and cut her expenses down as much as possible. She paid down her remaining student loans and credit card bills. Once those were paid off she began looking at her long-term housing options that would allow her to live life without being married to a job. A friend told her about a really cool website called Tiny House Blog that features lots of cool, inexpensive homes and ideas about living simple. She decided this was the approach she wanted to take. Now that her debt was eliminated from cutting her lifestyle back, she could throw more money at her savings to purchase a tiny house. Sure enough, faster forward a couple years and she was fired from her job. Her company was feeling the cutbacks from the recession and was forced to let her go. Stacy felt she had saved enough money to look for a tiny house to purchase. She went online and found one exactly right for her. She purchased it, parked it in a friend’s back yard, found a part-time job at a local market and was good to go. Even though her job was only part-time, she still managed to set money aside each month because of her extremely low monthly expenses. Now she worked less and saved more. She did this by realizing that her housing was her biggest expense, creating a plan, taking action and sticking with it.…
https://tinyhouselistings.com/tiny-houses-the-ultimate-recession-proofer/
“LOUISVILLE, Colo. — For many Americans who bought more home than they could really afford in the giddy days before the crash, the big-house dream has become a nightmare in the ashes of foreclosure and regret.
