Small Homes

Tiny Homes Get All the Attention, but Small Homes Are What America Needs Now As the Crisis in Housing Gets Worse

The climate for building is so different in this country now than it was in the ‘60s and ‘70s. It’s hard to believe that there was a time when people of moderate means could build their own homes — like in the ‘60s and ‘70s.

You didn’t need a ton of money to survive the year it might take to build your house.

Now, everything is ridiculous:

• Materials costs have skyrocketed.

• Bureaucrats have pushed fees into the stratosphere.

• Just plain living is so expensive.

And although I’ve generally been telling people that fixing up an old house in a city or a town is a good way to create a home nowadays, there are still people out there who want to build a house from scratch on a piece of land.

And to you, brave souls in this day and age, here’s some advice.

I wrote the following after the devastating Santa Rosa fire of 2018, addressed to homeowners who were rebuilding. I told them that if they would be doing design and construction themselves, here were some tips. If not, they could discuss these random ideas with architects and/or builders they’d be working with.

Saltbox design. Drawings by Bob Easton, Shelter II

Here’s what I wrote then; the principles are the same for anyone building a home now. All illustrations from Shelter II.

A lot has been learned about building homes in the last two or three decades. You may be able to take advantage of building materials and techniques that weren’t available when these homes were built. Here’s a chance to do things better, to learn from experience, to create a home built from sustainable materials that will save energy, that will be better for you and the planet.

Please note: These are just random ideas for your consideration. This isn’t a checklist, where you try to incorporate each suggestion in your plans. The purpose here is to stimulate thinking. Maybe you’ll find two or three ideas that will work for you.

• Consider putting a tiny home on the site for a temporary place to live. For example: a Tuff Shed — you prepare the foundation/floor, and they erect the building in one day. You then finish the interior: www.tuffshed.com. Look up pre-fab manufacturers in your county. 

• If you build a tiny (or small) house first, it can later be a guest house, studio, or enlarged to be a “granny flat.”

• Consider some sort of pre-fab kit to get the house framed up quickly and ready for services and finishing. For example, some friends in Carpinteria had the shell of their house steel-framed by local barn builders; the fire-resistant shell went up in a few days. Then they completed the house themselves.

• Consider the orientation of your property. Windows facing south will allow for solar heating. Deciduous trees can be planted so there is shade in the summer, sun in the winter (when trees are bare). What direction do the winds/storms come from? Where does the sun rise and set at various times of the year?

• Consider having a large-enough section of the roof sloping and facing direct south for maximization of solar panels (which can be added years later).

• Have the home built in two stages. Get the kitchen, bathroom, living, and sleeping areas done first, with plans to add on later, so you can live there ASAP.

• Even if you hire a builder, do some of the work yourself. I built most of a house in the ’60s by working on weekends, after work, and holidays. You can save a lot of money by doing some of the simple stuff.

Stud frame construction

Straw bale, cob, timber frame, and other natural materials each have their benefits, but the stud wall system, with insulation, wiring, and plumbing within the walls is by far the quickest way to build. (According to the National Association of Home Buiders, in 2023, 92% of all the home building in the USA was wood frame construction.)

Rectangular design

Gable roof with loft

Stick with rectangles. If you get into building curves, or polygons (e.g., hexagonal, octagonal) you’ll end up spending a lot more time and money.

• Use Class A roofing materials, which are “…effective against severe fire test exposures.”

• Consider Hardie board fiber cement siding for exterior walls. It’s a cement fiber product that looks like wood, but will not rot, and is fire-resistant, insect-resistant, impact-resistant, and moisture-resistant. Or corrugated roofing for siding.

• Use some kind of non-toxic insulation (not available when I built), such as wool, denim, and cellulose made from recycled paper products. Research it. “Roxul” seems to be a good non-toxic, non-water–absorbing, non-rodent- and non-insect–supporting type of batt insulation; made from natural fibers.

  

How can you waste less in/with your new home?

• Have a central core, including kitchen/ bathroom back-to-back (for plumbing simplicity).

• Consider wearing layers of winter warmth rather than keeping the entire house at 70 degrees. We wear 4-5 layers of cotton, wool, and down in the winter; it feels good and lessens energy consumption for heating. 

• Locate the hot water heater in a central core area, including a wood (or gas) stove for space heating, with a coil for heating water in winter, plus a solar-heated water panel on the roof for summer hot water.

• Consider a small 5-gallon hot water heater under the kitchen sink. We have one, and it provides almost instant hot water, with no waiting, and doesn’t use much electricity.

  

  Kitchen/Garden relation to each other

• Consider facing your kitchen south. I’d get the kitchen floor as low as possible (concrete slab with stringers, plywood, then linoleum). (Don’t have a wooden floor in kitchen if you really cook; linoleum is easy to clean.) The reason for the low floor is so that you easily step out to an outdoor cooking/eating area with a roof (maybe double-wall polycarbonate), right outside the kitchen. Weber barbecue, table, sink. This is cheap square footage, and you can do a lot of cooking, eating, and socializing outdoors in warmer weather. 

• Vegetable garden easily accessible to the kitchen

• Don’t install a kitchen sink garbage disposal unit. It’s a bad practice to grind up food, especially if it’s going to a septic tank. Rather, compost kitchen scraps using a composting tumbler.

• Consider washing dishes by hand. Here’s a video of my technique, which includes dumping water in vegetable garden: shltr.net/dishwashing

• Have a window at the kitchen sink, so you can look outside while doing dishes.

  

  Shed roof, the simplest of all roofs

• Install a Blue Star range (made in America) if you are serious about cooking. The one we have has no digital controls. It cost $3100 (in 2014) and is one of the best things we’ve ever bought.

• Consider getting a tank to collect rain water off the roof.

• Set up valves to divert greywater for wash basin, bath, and shower.

• If you are interested in gardening, in providing some of your own food, consider where a vegetable garden might best be located.

• Plant some fruit and/or shade trees. (If I was starting over again, I’d plant half a dozen olive trees.)

• Avoid architectural cleverness. Watch out for architects trying to make a statement. Quite often, tried and true designs produce economical, practical homes. The wheel needn’t be reinvented.

Shallow gable roof

Tiny homes (under 400 sq. ft.) have gotten all the press, but small homes (400-1200 sq. ft.) are the most practical size for today’s shelter needs.

If you’ve read this far, I want to recommend two of our books:

• Shelter II: its main theme is building a stud frame house. All the drawings here , by Bob Easton, are from that book.

• Small Homes: Simple Shelter : I’m really proud of this book. There are 120 affordable small home designs. Practical, simple, natural materials.

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Here is some advice from my long-time friend Michael Gaspers, a seasoned and sensible and practical builder:

Based on my long experience as a carpenter, builder, contractor, I'd like to offer a couple of ideas on the subject: With regard to framing, beginners will find roof framing the most challenging. These days carpenters/builders don't frame roofs anymore. Whether it it's just rafters or trusses, it's faster, simpler, not expensive, to give your plans to a truss maker. (they're everywhere). The trusses will arrive at your site when your walls are framed and sheathed (braced) on a flat bed truck and be set on the walls — no lifting by hand. In a day two or 3 carpenters will erect the trusses in place, and blocked, (the package will include frieze blocks drilled for venting). and immediately proceed to roof sheathing and ready for roofing.

About roofing materials: I have roofed with asphalt shingles, wood shingles and shakes, concrete shingles, etc.. My current house which I have lived in for 20 years, has a steel roof. Steel roof materials are not expensive, come in many styles, colors, light weight (think earthquakes), and last 50 years or more. Give your plans to the supplier and your panels will be precut to your specs. Easy for beginners to install: Lots of screws. I prefer the standing seam style which is traditional and has no exposed fasteners.

Hardie board is great stuff. I like stucco, would not recommend beginners try it. Takes training, practice, skill, and hard work.

Some other time I'll talk about passive solar heating. My house is at almost 5000 feet in the high desert — actually on the edge of the Great Basin. Snow and sub freezing temps in the winter. Most houses here using wood as a primary heat source use 5 to 10 cords of wood per year. My house uses about ONE CORD. Very comfortable all winter.