Here's a snip from the online article. Hey, look, there's Laura LaVoie's house! I've visited that lil house!
Several weeks ago I was interviewed by Lauren Modery of Good Magazine for a piece on the true costs of building or buying and dwelling in a tiny house. Lauren also interviewed several of my friends and colleagues in the tiny house world, including Alek Lisefski and Laura LaVoie.
While I take issue with a couple of her statements (namely that tiny houses on foundations are Accessory Dwelling Units - possibly but not necessarily - and that going off-grid is more environmentally-friendly than connecting to city utilities - it depends on lots of factors but often there are efficiencies with being part of a city system that make grid-tying MORE environmentally-friendly than being off-grid!) overall I give Lauren's article a big thumbs up. She did a great job identifying the material costs, time costs, labor costs, and parking costs, many of which are glossed over when the media gets captivated by tiny homes. She pulled this snippet from our conversation about the non-financial benefits of a DIY tiny house:
“There were, of course, dozens of other nonfinancial benefits,” [Lina] told me, “like living in a sculpture I made myself, knowing I’d always have a roof over my head, having a house that perfectly suited my needs, having my own four wall and knowing I wasn’t throwing my money away on rent.”
To read the full article click on the button below or right here: Price Check: What It Costs To Live Small: Tiny houses can come with not-so-tiny costs by Lauren Modery
It was an interesting opportunity for me to reflect on how well my tiny houses have served me financially.I already knew that neither of my tiny houses were as cheap as some of the ones out there. I admire folks who are scrappy and ingenuitive and figure out how to get their little houses built super affordably. On the other hand, I think it makes sense for those of us to have the means to invest in making our homes durable, sustainable, and comfortable. Both times I built tiny homes for myself I used Structural Insulated Panels (SIPs) and new tiny house specific trailers as well as high quality windows. The second tiny is about twice as big as the first and cost about twice as much. I didn't do as much salvage for the second one as I did for the first but it's also more straightforward in some ways.
Through the course of my correspondence with Lauren it also became clear to me that since I only lived in my first tiny house for a couple of years it certainly didn't have a chance to "pay for itself" while I was living in it. However, I'm now able to rent it to a friend so it will eventually pencil out. Meanwhile, designing, building, and now living in T42 with my sweetie has been absolutely worth it!