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Small World: The Tiny House Trend

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Re: Small World: The Tiny House Trend

#251

Post by ams6110 »

fouc wrote: post #180
Kaivo wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly this! We got rid of out dinning table because we were always eating in front of the TV or the PC. We got rid of the couch because we were always watching TV from bed. We didn't see the point in keeping these only to very rarely have people come over. We can meet outside or they can deal with the no table no couch setup, I won't live in a more crowded space for them.

Honestly I find it strange for some people to have TVs in their bedroom. I think it's nice to have some separation of concerns. I think sleep quality is better when the bedroom is mainly for sleep. Have you thought about moving the TV out of the bedroom?

When I was a kid most people in my neighborhood didn't have a TV in their living room either. It would have been too casual. The TV was in a "den" or "family room" and the living room was the formal room where the adults would gather and kids weren't allowed in it.

I would joke with my parents "why is it called a living room when we can't live in it"

For context, TV at that time meant a handful of channels received over the air, and a "big" screen was 19 inches.

Re: Small World: The Tiny House Trend

#252

Post by ghaff »

benj111 wrote: post #168
jerf wrote: post #27

Tiny house retention seems to be fairly poor. Search a bit for "give up tiny house" or something and you'll get a lot of people giving up the lifestyle, and it seems hard to come by people who have been doing it for a long time. Not impossible, because nothing is impossible, but not easy. It makes journalists swoon, but I don't see it as something that has a lot of future to it. Seems like something that sounds a lot…

I get the impression that most tiny are in rural locations (certainly judging by the photos), in that kind of area there isn't the density to support the things you might want to offload, ie coffee shops for meeting people, laundrettes, restaurants etc. In a city to you could cope much more easily with less space. I also suspect tiny homes probably are a bit too tiny. I'm not sure if the extreme tinyness in a politic…

Whether tiny homes or pod apartments, the dimensions seem to be squeezed to the point where it would be an uncomfortable squeeze for most people yet it's probably well within the range of diminishing returns of actually saving money.

The details will vary of course but so many of the discussions seem to be around whether you "can" live this way, not whether you want to, especially long-term.

I say this as someone who lives in a fairly modest-sized house but enjoys not feeling I have to squeeze every square foot out of my space.

Re: Small World: The Tiny House Trend

#253

Post by JKCalhoun »

crankylinuxuser wrote: post #175
Bjorkbat wrote: post #142

I really wish there was more diversity in offerings when it came to manufactured/trailer homes. To clarify, I'm not talking about RVs. I like tiny houses, but really only in the sense that I'm fascinated by unusually small things. Otherwise I think they're actually kind of ridiculous if your motives are to downsize and not pay $300,000+ on a house Trailer homes are pretty incredible when you think about it. They're t…

Exactly! That's what I've been saying all along. The "Tiny Home" trend is "I make way too much but want to show my opulence with virtue signalling of "I'm rich enough to build dinky" Versus a trailer. I live in a trailer with my wife in Indiana. It is portable. Its a bit smaller than what we want, but we own the trailer out right. Our total utilities (land rental, electricity, internet, water, sewer, trash) is $500/m…

> The "Tiny Home" trend is "I make way too much but want to show my opulence with virtue signalling of "I'm rich enough to build dinky"

Or, "Trailer homes are fine but I want something more stylish than a box."

Re: Small World: The Tiny House Trend

#254

Post by chillacy »

ryandrake wrote: post #223
icebraining wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious, I'd say many of us younger folks see it in reverse: our parents got roped in the propaganda of "consume now and pay later, you'll certainly be earning more", and then the lie was exposed, and they're left unemployable and with a crippling mortgage. Under this perspective, by giving up on superfluous crap, we're just keeping our eyes wide open, because we're fully aware that we'll get fucked sooner or later.…

Yea, there are pros and cons to bigger and smaller homes. It’s just that the marketing of the Tiny House “Movement” and the constant pushing for us to be happy with small apartments instead of houses reminds me of Huxley. “Alpha children wear grey. They work much harder than we do, because they're so frightfully clever. I'm awfully glad I'm a Beta, because I don't work so hard.”

I don't see that kind of sentiment in people I know who like tiny houses. If anything it's the opposite: they work a lot harder to save up to buy a tiny house (it's like 200k) vs continuing to rent. It's also harder to go against the grain than it is to flow with what society tells you to do.

Re: Small World: The Tiny House Trend

#255

Post by mruts »

boxcardavin wrote: post #122

I've lived in a ~250sqft 1940's era wood train car for the past 9 years, with my wife and now a newborn. It is doable if you enjoy the constraints and how it affects your decision making. I live about 5 miles from Seattle in a very rich neighborhood (a few blocks from the Paul Allen estate) on a large piece of land that is set aside as a reserve, while most of my neighbors have 5000sqft houses. As long as you have am…

I'm guessing eccentric/eclectic and rich. Poor people don't make their lives harder than it already is. Also poor people don't live a few blocks from Paul Allen's estate.

Re: Small World: The Tiny House Trend

#256

Post by hoaw »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #230
Bjorkbat wrote: post #142

I really wish there was more diversity in offerings when it came to manufactured/trailer homes. To clarify, I'm not talking about RVs. I like tiny houses, but really only in the sense that I'm fascinated by unusually small things. Otherwise I think they're actually kind of ridiculous if your motives are to downsize and not pay $300,000+ on a house Trailer homes are pretty incredible when you think about it. They're t…

On one end of the spectrum is Blu Homes ( https://www.bluhomes.com/ ) which builds pre-fabricated homes that aren't quite so boxy as mobile homes. We looked at investing in them when they started up and perhaps getting one of their smaller units for a piece of land up in the Sierra foothills[1]. Shipping container homes are also a sort of niche thing at the moment. Realistically though it isn't the walls that cost th…

I think there are a number of companies building modular homes. IKEA has a join venture with a construction company for example [0]. Just that construction isn't generally the problem. We know how to build relatively cheaply.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0dbRKACktA [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgu7ZK894gs

Re: Small World: The Tiny House Trend

#258

Post by losvedir »

crankylinuxuser wrote: post #175
Bjorkbat wrote: post #142

I really wish there was more diversity in offerings when it came to manufactured/trailer homes. To clarify, I'm not talking about RVs. I like tiny houses, but really only in the sense that I'm fascinated by unusually small things. Otherwise I think they're actually kind of ridiculous if your motives are to downsize and not pay $300,000+ on a house Trailer homes are pretty incredible when you think about it. They're t…

Exactly! That's what I've been saying all along. The "Tiny Home" trend is "I make way too much but want to show my opulence with virtue signalling of "I'm rich enough to build dinky" Versus a trailer. I live in a trailer with my wife in Indiana. It is portable. Its a bit smaller than what we want, but we own the trailer out right. Our total utilities (land rental, electricity, internet, water, sewer, trash) is $500/m…

Where in Indiana? $500/mo strikes me as a little on the higher side. In my town in Indiana (Whiting), you could rent an apartment for roughly that price, although I guess it depends on the size. And you can buy a house for What are the advantages of a trailer vs. a small (not "tiny") home?

Re: Small World: The Tiny House Trend

#259

Post by Vinnl »

driverdan wrote: post #89

I've been living in a shuttle bus I converted for about 20 months. I built it to be like a high end RV, with everything you'd expect in an RV but with lithium batteries and a solar array. I did it for two reasons, so I could own a home with minimal expenses and so I could take my home and dog when I travel. My cost of living is significantly lower than living in conventional housing. I estimate I've spent around $50k…

Can you get letters delivered? What address does the government think you live at? (If that's required for them to know where you're from.)

Re: Small World: The Tiny House Trend

#260

Post by falcolas »

war1025 wrote: post #119
wenc wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Upbringing and personality has something to do with it too. Folks who grew up in the country with wide open spaces feel claustrophobic in small spaces. City people are happy with 400-600 sqft/person. It's an exercise in minimalism and frugality.

What I think the biggest part of it might be, really, is the size of furniture and other "things" people think they need. If you tried to fit two couches and three chairs into our living room like my parents have, it wouldn't work. We also don't have a "kitchen table" and a "dining room table" like my parents do. Yes, we'd probably have a hard time hosting 30 people for a holiday, but that seems like an odd standard…

> but that seems like an odd standard to base your home purchase around

My wife and I made several house (and furniture) purchase decisions based off this. Big families like to have big parties in family settings - it's an important feature of the house for us.

We've made do in ~300 square feet in the past, and just didn't enjoy the compromises on comfort and the constant extra effort to keep the space livable.

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