Tiny home development

[Danny Day]

Has anyone taken interest in "Tiny Homes", less than 500 sq ft homes.

I've been reading up on these, and it looks like people are building them ground up for less than $15k. Some people are claiming to live here for 10-15 years happily.

In my opinion, it seems like this could be an up and coming trend in real estate.

There are certain areas where property values are very high, and people choose to live in tiny home.

Has anyone considered developing a community of 25-50 tiny homes? Based on my calculations, you could fit 50 tiny homes at 500 sq ft each on a 1 acre plot, with enough room for landscape, sidewalks, etc.

These are the guys who started it all (I believe): http://www.tumbleweedhouses.com/

Opinions?

:cool:

Danny

[Bill Bockwoldt]

I live just up the road from the Tiny Homes office and demonstration area where they have several models. These were done by Jay Shafer who has http://www.fourlightshouses.com/ and http://www.tumbleweedhouses.com/.

This is what we learned on our last visit checking out their models:

1. In Sonoma county (Northern CA), these are considered RV's and can not have permanent utility connections - with the exception of as an assisted living unit where home healthcare workers may visit (so you could put one in your backyard for Grandma if you were taking care of her there and leave the utilities permanently connected). If someone reports you, they will come out and verify you have disconnected the utilities and then come at random intervals to check on you. The office manager told us they have exhausted the market for people who will set up technically "illegal" housing in their back yard.

2. Regulation can be local/county/state specific but generally in CA RV's can't become stationary, and tiny homes are classified as RVs (at least in CA). The minimum sq. ft. for a permanent structure (e.g. granny unit) is 640 sq. ft. in our county. They continue to petition the State of CA to try to get tiny homes reclassified, and no local politician wants to remove the ordinance banning stationary RVs (we all know where that might lead).

3. They said Jay Shafer has sold the Tiny House business to Champion Homes (large producer of manufactured homes) and he now focuses on designing/building structures around 800 sq. ft. (supplied by Champion) because they are considered manufactured homes (e.g. fancier mobile homes). We toured an 840 sq. ft. 2br/1ba home that cost $60k (base) and came in at around $90k as constructed. It had stainless appliances/tile/concrete countertops and was mostly bare wood (aesthetic) or sheetrock, and had a minimalist/vacation home feel to it. It also had a nice front deck bolted on (we were considering something like that for a vacation home on a bare lot near the coast). You can custom-order them with whatever features/configuration/materials you can think up and they prepare a custom quote. The permits run about $9k where we live, and they will level the ground and bring utilities from the lot line to the structure for $15k. The price of the home includes delivery/assembly.

The overwhelming concern, as pointed out by many in this thread, is zoning and costs in your area. They don't make sense in the town where we live, but if you can build them yourself and have raw/cheap land with access to utilities then they might be more interesting as an investment.