I've Seen My Future

Well my most probable possible future anyway... (You never really know what your life is going to look like day to day) and it looks like this.

^{okay maybe not that smallsource}

I’m talking about tiny houses!

I was browsing the interwebs the other day and I came across a rather interesting video about an assistance program for the homeless in Colorado. It explained how they had made a wee little ‘village’ with about 30 shelters. These transitional housing shelters included one communal living area, a bath house, an office and the rest were very small (around 8x8 - 8x10 feet) one room “houses”. They have no utilities, no plumbing, no electric, only four walls and and a little window. This is fantastic I thought as I watched the formerly homeless occupants tell their stories and explain just how much these little shelters meant to them. You can learn more about this project here.

As the video went on they showed how they were expanding on this concept by building a village of studio houses. I call them studio houses because they seemed to be along the lines of studio apartments, everything save the bathroom in one sectioned off area. They have everything a normal house has as far as plumbing, electric, bathroom, kitchen… just… smaller.

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At this point I thought to myself You know what… I could live in one of those. It’s just my daughter and I, and as of yet I’ve no reason to believe that will change any time soon. I’m a bit of a minimalist to begin with, really the bulk of my possessions is my book collection. I try to keep her toys to a minimum; she was quite happy with the toys she had that fit in her 8x8 room in our last residence, a 500 square foot apartment that we were very comfortable in with another adult and three cats.

I could, of course shove us into another small apartment for $600 a month in the city and I will probably wind up doing so for a little while but that is not a long term solution for me. I hate the city. Say it again…

I hate the city.

And as discussed in my last post, I want to homestead. So… Spend the next twenty years renting on land I have no control over while saving to buy a conventional house the conventional way OR spend five years saving and planning to buy an acre or two of land and build a tiny house on it.

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Hard choice, no? Haha no. I have sense done some research and found that the average cost to build a tiny house is right around $25,000 - $30,000, and the current average cost of land in my area is around $3,000 per acre, bit more in residential areas.

So say I allow myself up tp $8,000 for an acre or two of land and $22,000 to build my tiny house using reclaimed materials that I have a few years to gather for a total budget of $30,000. If I could save $500 a month I’d have it. Keeping within reason, we’ll say I save up $10,000 in five years… five years is plenty of time to get my credit pin straight and take out a $20,000 loan. It’s perfectly doable!

Let’s break down the costs. I found a nice blog post that breaks down this writers cost of building her brand new tiny home like so

^{If you would like to follow her click here links you'll have to visit thesource}

Now, of course these expenses are extremely relative, but it did give me a nice reference to come up with a budget of my own.

You may think I’m missing a really important thing; labor, but trust me I’m not. I know contractors, construction workers, tradesmen, and general handymen for just about anything you can think of that would be more than willing to help me out if I cover cost and provide the beer for anything that I can’t do myself. Which honestly, isn’t much… especially with the help of my Dad’s wife, and I know she’d be more than willing to help. My other Dad’s is a construction worker, I have general contractor friends, a couple of electrician friends, family that own landscaping, and concrete businesses. I don’t think I have a plumber but I can guarantee one of my people do.

This is also estimated costs. If I give myself five years to gather reclaimed materials and search for good quality used appliances that fit my specifications, and grab minor supplies on sale I’d likely be able to reduce the listed cost even more. I would like to have them reduced to around $25,000 so that I have a little wiggle room for the unexpected costs that inevitably pop up, and hey, if I can get it down to $25,000 and not have that $5,000 in unforeseen expenses I can build my coup and start a flock right away. Yes. Tiny house is the way to go for me, combined with my homesteading project.

Accio Tiny Homestead. ;)

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If you do happen to see anything important you feel I'm missing help a gal out and let me know ;)