All about Tiny Houses

For the past few years I have become more and more obsessed with alternative house building techniques. I know I want to own a home and land but without all the debt. I do not want nor need a McMansion, I do fine with living in tiny spaces. For a summer a few years back me and my buddy Mike built two 10×10 sheds and I lived in them. I was perfectly comfortable and had everything I needed. One of the most interesting alternative houses is the Tiny house. They are built using traditional hose techniques, framing etc just much smaller. One the inside they have been optimized for getting the maximum  usage out of the tiny space. Today I’m going to talk all about tiny homes and share my love of them with you.

History

Tiny houses are not so much an aberration as they are a return to normal. Only in America and only recently have huge houses become the normal. Throughout history houses have been historically smaller. In the 1950’s the average house size was 983 square feet compared to the modern average of 2,349 sq. ft. That mean that houses have more than doubled since then with family sizes getting smaller. Less people now need more space to live in. Best as I can tell the modern return to smaller houses began in 1997 with the Publication of the  The Not So Big House by Sarah Susanka. Since then I would contribute the major push of the movement to Jay Schaffer and the Tumbleweed Tiny House guys. With workshops, plans and the ability to buy already built tiny homes the movement is set to explode.

Resources

YouTube has a great many videos showing off beautiful tiny homes. It does not have many videos showing how to build one. Recently  I found a great series by a guy named Kevin Coy that showed step by step how he built one. You can check out Kevin’s YouTube channel here. The Tumbleweed Tiny House Blog has plans for sale on their site.I even found a site that has them listed for sale and rent. Tiny House Listings even had several houses in my area.

I would love to come visit with a local tiny house and shoot video if anyone has a tiny house or other alternative hose in the Tennessee area or close by state drop me a line James@survivalpunk.com.

Do you have an alternative house? A tiny House? Do you want one? Let me know in the comments!