Dee Williams discussing parking at a recent PAD Tiny House Workshop.

Have you labored over the design of your dream tiny house for years, but still have no idea where you’ll park?  What will the place you call home look like, and who will be part of it? Do you want peace, quiet, and country views that stretch for miles, or to be nestled into your best friend’s back yard?  And once you do decide where you want to be, will you live in fear of being asked to move because it violates the zoning laws in your area?

There is no one right answer to any of these questions.  Parking is always a rich subject at our tiny house weekend workshops, where there are always common questions, and utterly unique options.  We recommend recognizing the different obstacles and opportunities for parking, being thoughtful about what home means to you…and ideally, doing these things before you actually move in.

Step One: What Do You Want?

First, we recommend writing down exactly what your ideal home location would be.  At this stage, it’s just an exercise to figure out what you want, but you can also re-use a lot of this material when you start shopping for a host property.  Try and cover practical questions, as well as the touchy-feely stuff:

• Are you bound to one geographical area for work, family and community, or do you intend to move somewhere new?

• Do you want to park on an isolated property, or in a space that belongs to someone else?

• If you’re parking on someone else’s land, what level of social interaction do you want?  Will you be automatically invited to one another’s barbeques, or do you want to just carry on separate lives in a shared space?  Will you feel free to throw out a picnic blanket in the yard on a sunny day, or will you feel like you’re invading “their space”?

• What types of practical “big house” support are you hoping for?  Utility hookups like water and electrical are common, but also consider things like internet connections, laundry, and receiving mail.  Parking on someone’s property is not unlike a landlord/tenant arrangement, so think through how to fairly share the costs a tiny house still incurs after you’ve built one.

• Will local laws be an obstacle to parking in the area you plan to?  If so, who can you speak with to try and work something out?

Some of these questions can create conflicts.  It might be easier to park a tiny house in a rural area from a legal standpoint, but rural areas present other challenges, like social isolation and lengthy commutes to urban jobs.  It’s not necessary to have perfect answers to all these questions, just be thoughtful about them, and then move on to…

Step Two: What’s Actually Available?

Tammy and Logan from Rowdy Kittens, in one of their many home locations.

Once armed with your hazy vision of a dream parking situation, start getting the word out about what you’re looking for to anyone who might be able to provide something like it.  Tammy and Logan from the Rowdy Kittens blog have a great audio clip describing their process of looking for parking leads.  Listen to it here.  They shopped for a parking spot for their house (which was designed by PAD a few years back) by personally emailing friends and acquaintances in their area with a flyer they’d made on what they were seeking in a parking spot.  This is where you can take those questions you answered for yourself in Step One, edit them down into the basics, and use them to start some conversations.  Tammy and Logan also explored using a realtor to shop for parking options in a new location where their social network wasn’t as strong.

If someone responds to your description with interest,  sit down and have a detailed conversation with the property owners about everyone’s expectations.  Really talk through the whole situation, almost as though you would be both roommates and tenants.  Do this even if you are already friends with the potential host.  Maybe especially if you are already friends with the potential host.

• What do you need to know about one another to know if this is a good match?  Do they entertain large groups of people in the yard constantly?  Do you?  Is your or their free time spent reading quietly, or practicing the bagpipes?

• How will you share utility costs?  What will you pay for land rental costs?

• How will you address conflict if it arises?  And the arrangement isn’t working for you or them, how much notice will you need (or will they give) for you to find a different space and move to it?

Home Is What You Make It

We can talk parking options, dreams and realities until we’re blue in the face, because it’s going to be different for everyone.  And for tiny houses, it also isn’t permanent, so you may address these questions again and again.  Tammy and Logan just moved for the sixth time.  When PAD collaborator Lina Menard moved last year, it actually gave her a new appreciation for how setting, landscape and lighting can make the same house feel like a totally new space.

Many people who are interested in tiny house living feel that their life occurs out in the world, not just inside their house, and where you park is the gateway to that world.  Approach parking by being thoughtful about what you want, being proactive about finding it, and clearly communicating with whoever is hosting you.  If you do that, you’ll be happy to step outside your door each morning, and that’s what everybody wants.

A couple of recent interviews with Dee Williams and Joan Grimm from PAD provide a good, quick, tiny house 101 you can share with the skeptical folks in your life.  They fill out some of the perspective on what a tiny house is, what they feel like from the inside, and most importantly, why people want to live in them or host them on their land.

Dee Williams of Portland Alternative Dwellings

This interview in About Face Magazine cuts right to the motivations for building a tiny house that anyone can relate to, including creating more time for friends and family and having your heating bills shrink from $300 to $8.  “I don’t know of anybody who wants to feel like they’re living a spartan life.”  Dee tells About Face.  “You want to participate in your life and you don’t want where you live to be a place that limits that.”  (Click here to read the rest of the interview.)

In this recent video KATU news in Portland made with Joan and Dee for Earth Day, Dee covers some of the nuts and bolts of tiny houses, and their environmentally-friendly attributes.  She also addresses the common assumption that although a tiny house could be “as big as an 8 by 10 area rug…most of the time when people step into a house like this, they’re surprised at how big it feels.”

Joan, meanwhile, speaks from the perspective of a tiny house host.  Joan chose to let a good friend park her tiny house in her family’s backyard to build a stronger social community, even when she’s just lounging around at home.  This tiny house completes the trio that makes up “Pod 49”, the nickname for the unofficial residential community of Joan’s big house, her close friend and neighbor’s big house, and the tiny house on wheels in their conjoined backyards.

If you feel like these pieces help articulate some of your motivations for tiny house living, consider sharing them with those in your life who still don’t quite get it.  The first time someone hears about a tiny house, it’s natural to think of it as a novelty, but try and help them see the opportunities that you see.  Tiny house living isn’t about what you give up or what you lack, it’s about saving your time, energy and money for the things that are really important to you.

“The folks who attend tiny house workshops are wonderful people. They’re collaborative and intentional. They’re open-minded and open-hearted. They tackle big questions about needs and wants. They carefully consider what makes a place feel like home. I’ve come to expect that of tiny house lovers.

What was really special about this workshop was that the momentum of the Tiny House Movement was palpable. In June of last year I assisted with the Portland Tumbleweed Tiny House Workshop led by Dee Williams of Portland Alternative Dwellings. That was just 10 months ago. At the time a handful of the 50 people in the room planned to build a tiny house over the summer. This year 16 of the 29 participants said they’re considering building this summer!”Click to read the full post: Tiny House Movement Gains Momentum →

If the workshop sounds like something you want to be a part of next time, stay tuned to PAD’s Facebook page and email list!  The details for PAD’s next Tiny House Design Workshop are coming soon.

This past weekend, Dee Williams and the PAD crew held the Casa Pequena Tiny House Building Workshop at the Casa Verde Earth Day Festival in McMinnville, Oregon.  Workshop participants got hands-on experience building and expert instruction on the construction issues specific to tiny houses, and festival-goers were introduced to the tiny house world as a practical way to reduce their environmental footprints and living expenses.  The now-framed tiny house, “Casa Pequena”, will be completed in a series of follow-up workshops on specific subjects like electricity and plumbing, and the design itself will be available for sale at the Shelter Wise website.  Join PAD’s email list or like us on Facebook for updates on these opportunities, and read on for Dee Williams’ rundown of the workshop!

Over the years I’ve built go-carts, chicken coops, backyard saunas, lumpy cat-scratch towers and tiny houses. Building is one of my favorite things to do in the world, but last weekend’s Casa Pequena Tiny House Building Workshop stood out as one of the coolest builds I’ve ever been a part of.

Derin Williams of Shelter Wise masterminded the event with the goal of building a complete tiny house exterior in just two days. Derin designed the house, dubbed Casa Pequena, and prepared the construction materials to give our workshop participants an action-packed experience that used their time efficiently. Lina Menard of Niche Consulting helped us out as well, and you should click over to her great blog This is the Little Life to hear her Casa Pequena experience too!  The rest of the team was our fantastic workshop participants, who came together from as far as Utah and California to get their hands dirty building tiny.

To begin, participants built the floor into a twelve-foot trailer, cut and fastened the walls together and raised them up. By the end of day one, everyone in the class had a chance to fire up drills, chops saws, the table saw and more – and they enjoyed it!. As one student put it: “I didn’t expect to have so much fun. Plus I learned how much I already knew, and what I need to work on before I start building my own little house.”

I didn’t expect to have so much fun. Plus I learned how much I already knew, and what I need to work on before I start building my own little house.

On day two of the workshop, we finished out the walls and worked as a team to lift the roof into place. After securing the roof properly, we rolled the tiny house into the center of the Casa Verde Fair so fair visitors could see what we were up to and maybe take some inspiration from the tiny take on eco-friendly living. Over fiddle music and preparations for the annual chicken tractor race (What’s a chicken tractor race, you ask? Click to find out!), we continued building. Workshop participants learned how to install windows and wrap the house to keep it moisture-proof, how to install shear panels, and how to configure the house to address wind shears and earthquake-like highway travel.

By five-o’clock Saturday afternoon, we had a road-ready tiny house and were laughing about the crazy-awesome time we’d all had. Everyone learned something new, had fun and made new contacts to support their upcoming building project. Everyone left with a shared feeling of accomplishment, but also the readiness to move forward on their own individual tiny house plans.

Many thanks to the students, Derin, Lina, DK (Derin’s pop), and Joan from PAD and Andra from Shelter Wise for making this event happen. I loved every minute of it – even the part where I went home with indestructible glue all over my hands that made a lady at work ask if I wanted to use her hand sanitizer… twice.

Viva la teeeeny tiny!
Dee

Tiny House Trailer from Iron Eagle. Photo via: Kate Goodnight of Najhaus.com

At PAD, we get a lot of questions about trailers – the foundation of a little house.  Whether you’re planning to buy a new or used trailer, consider the following.  The first time you pull your tiny house out of the driveway, you’ll be glad you did!

• Depending on its size, your little house will likely weigh between 4,000 and 6,000 pounds.  We typically recommend that you get a tandem axle utility trailer with axles that can handle 3,500 lbs each, or 7,000 lbs overall.

• The trailer is typically 8½-feet wide if you measure to the outside of the fenders over the wheels.  The top deck sits about two feet off the ground, and the overall length varies (usually between 10 and 22-feet).

• To be street-legal, the trailer needs lights, brakes and a license plate. It will be registered through the Department of Motor Vehicles using the Certificate of Manufacture that should come with the trailer.

• You should be able to haul an empty trailer with a light-weight truck, but once your trailer is fully loaded with your cute little house, you’ll need a macho, two-ton truck to pull it.  The truck will need to have a tow package that at least includes the connection for lights and brakes.

• The tires need to be rated to handle the load, they can’t just be average car tires.  Remember, your little house could weigh between two and three tons!

For more information about configuring the trailer so the little house can be easily bolted to it, check out our book Go House Go.  Kate Goodnight, a PAD workshop graduate, also recently wrote this great blog post about picking up her trailer in Portland from Iron Eagle Trailers.  It’s an awesome read and includes all sorts of helpful information about weight distribution and taking the big plunge into trailer ownership.

If you have really specific questions you don’t see covered, or if all these details are making your head spin, consider taking our 2-day Tiny House Design Workshop. The workshop covers tiny house design from top to bottom, talks trailer specifics in-depth, and lets participants just like you ask our experts exactly what they want to know.

Every workshop participant will receive personal attention and instruction from our tiny house construction experts: Dee Williams of PAD, Derin Williams of Shelter Wise, LLC, and Lina Menard of Niche Consulting. Whether you’ve never used a power tool, or you’re a seasoned builder looking for tiny house building experience, this weekend workshop will provide you the experience and community you need to take the next step toward tiny.

La Casa Pequena Tiny House Building Workshop will be April 19-20th, 2013, held during Cellar Ridge Construction’s annual La Casa Verde Earth Day Festival in McMinnville, Oregon.

To sign up, visit our workshop page.

Don’t delay! This is going to be epic!

Lina Menard, center, leading a discussion on tiny house sites and community.

We had a blast at our recent February Tiny House Design Workshop!  While we gather our thoughts about the weekend and comb through the feedback we got from our great crop of enthusiastic participants, please enjoy this guest post from Lina Menard on her wrap up of the weekend.  Lina is a PAD partner, tiny space dweller and designer, and blogs regularly at This Is The Little Life.  If you like what you read, click over to her blog to read more about Lina, or sign up for PAD’s next Tiny House Design Workshop in April!

Tiny House Workshop Weekend:

It was a pleasure to be part of the Portland Alternative Dwellings Tiny House Workshop this weekend, along with Derin of UrbaNest, Brittany of Bayside Bungalow, and Chris and Melissa Tack of Tiny Tack House. Tiny house enthusiasts from around Oregon and Washington joined us at the Historic Kenton Firehouse for the workshop. A few workshop participants even traveled internationally from Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada! Thanks for dedicating your weekend to tiny houses everyone. We’re so glad you did!

Touring and comparing notes on the POD 49 tiny house

The two-day workshop covered everything from framing and tie-downs for mobile structures to the “sticky wickets” of how wee structures are addressed by code. We were lucky to have so many experienced tiny house designers, builders, and dwellers present to share different approaches. Dee Williams led most of the workshop sessions and asked us to chime in throughout. In one session Derin used a life-size model to demonstrate his super energy-efficient building strategies. In another session Brittany shared information about her graywater system and humanure composting system.

Chris and Melissa described their kitchen layout, appliance selection, and how the two of them share the small space they designed for themselves. I addressed regulatory considerations, moving a tiny house down the road, zoning and building, and creating tiny house community. On the second day we wrapped up with a visit to Pod 49 to tour a tiny house.

It was a treat to meet more tiny house enthusiasts and to learn about everyone’s ideas and hopes. It’s so fun to see the tiny house community grow!

Lina Menard blogs regularly about tiny houses and more at This Is The Little Life.

We are thrilled to have a stellar line up of speakers including, of course, Dee Williams, also Derin Williams of Urban Nest NW, Lina Menard author of This is the Little Life and owner of Niche Consulting along with several tiny housers Chris and Melissa Tack of  Tiny Tack House fame and Brittany Yunker who owns the Bayside Bungalow

Our workshops drill down into the details you need to know to save time and money and do it right the first time. If you are building your own tiny house—you are going to be much happier if you take your advice from other tiny house dwellers. This sets us apart for anyone else offering workshops!

We are also very fun and like to laugh and learn at the same time! Sign up today!! Click on workshops tab on our website to find out what we’ll be covering over the two days. Hope you see you there.

February Workshop Registation

My husband and I think we’ve found a way to pay off our mortgage early, without taking on an extra job or working nights. We’ve decided to construct a rental unit—a “mother-in-law suite”—within our home. If it pans out as we hope, the rental income will let us pay off our loan 10 years early. And who knows: it could give us a chance to live closer to family as we, or they, get on in years.

Jason and I are not alone; lots of folks across Cascadia and beyond are experimenting with adding a second (or third) dwelling to an existing single-family home. And in perhaps the most interesting development, more and more people are choosing to buck the “bigger is better” trend in North American housing. They’re taking small spaces—back yards, side lots, or freestanding garages—and using them to build tiny houses.

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