How to Start Living in a Tiny House!

Ooh, so you've come over to the small side where houses are compact, bills are low and the lifestyle is good. BUT, you haven't a clue where to start! Over the past year, we've listened to people from all walks of life who are wanting to go tiny so I'd say we’ve learnt a thing or two about the biggest hurdles, and equally, the major worries that repeat themselves. So, before you run away in fear or get too excited that your dreams can come true, I wanted to write an honest overview of how people are living tiny and how you may be able too!

What are the main hurdles to living in a Tiny House?

To live tiny, the BIG 3 hurdles that come up during almost every conversation are - affording the tiny home without a loan, planning permission for the land and how easy is it live off-grid. Each one has it difficulties but is doable for many. As per usual, the answer may not suit everyone leaving some of you unable to live the dream until new laws and financing come to market.

Hurdle Number 1 - Affording a Tiny House With or Without a Loan

Some tiny house enthusiasts are downsizing. Some have savings and a family loan to cover their home, and others, don’t have the luxury of either.

While a tiny house is a fraction of the price of a standard brick home, it can be difficult to purchase if you don’t have some help or savings. All tiny house builders require the whole sum to be able to build the home so this means a loan or another source of financing is needed to fund this lifestyle.

Option 1 - Taking out a loan

Two people would need to apply for 2x personal loans as a couple or an unsecured loan for the full amount which you would both payback together. To get this loan, some companies may require an asset to secure the loan such as a car, house or something of high value. However, there are loans out there that will offer you the full sum but at a higher interest rate.

To add to this, the loan itself is usually 5-10 years long, so the repayments are high until it is paid off. The good news is that once paid, you’ll own a home without a mortgage looming overhead, Yipee! Since the house is the costly item, we would recommend placing it onto low-cost rented land. Most of our customers have been lucky enough to seek help in their local community with a friend of a friend offering up a little space for a small fee. Reaching out to farmers or landowners is also a good shout. You'd be surprised at how many landowners could do with the extra monthly income. Then, once the home is paid off, you can save up for your own land as this doesn't rapidly go up in price as houses do. Before you know it, you'll be landowners with your house paid in full! 

If this isn’t an option for yourself, there are still other methods such as community support or having your very own camping site, keep reading!!

Option 2 - Get support and work within a team.

We tend to forget that the tiny house lifestyle is a movement and one that is filled with enthusiasts! If you can’t afford your own, working with a group or community could be what you need, find those who have the same passion to live tiny. We highly recommend you hit up every social media group out there to join those who are building their own or are arranging groups themselves. This means someone can do the hard work for you! The only downside to this, that’s if you want to call it a downside as I’d call it an adventure, is that you will more than likely have to move away from home. Most communities are in rural locations and you’ll have to seek online jobs or work within your local area to bring in income, which might mean quitting your current job.

Hurdle Number 2 - Is Planning Permission Needed for the Tiny Home?

First, you need to decide whether you even need planning permission. In simple terms; a tiny homes - be it on wheels or not, will likely fall under the caravan act or ‘temporary building’ area of planning. You likely won’t even need planning permission for your home, but if you do, check out some of the potential things that might happen during the planning permission route.

Remember, Tiny houses are an ‘alien’ lifeform to some councils, mostly due to the name and others due to it’s size. You’ll often receive ‘so it’s a caravan?’, ‘what’s a tiny house?, can you elaborate?’ followed by a firm no since they don’t understand you if you don’t explain properly.

Option 3 - Avoid the words ‘tiny house’. By changing what you are saying to words such as a ‘modular home’, ‘mobile home’, ‘compact house’, are a few ways to explain what your home looks like. These words are more familiar and more often will help you with approval on your application. Further note, it is key to understand that a human, who possibly woke up on the wrong side of the bed, maybe the person looking into your application, so it is vital to make it as easy and clear as possible for them to understand.

Option 4 - Should this not work, you’ll need to learn what the main issue is. In some cases, it may be a feature such as the exterior finish needs to fit in with the local surroundings or the house needs to be finished in a particular material. If this isn’t the case, then another common reason is the height with some limiting the size to 3.05m tall internally. Options such as the Betula/Darwen or the XL Tyne / Eden will all work within this size range.

Option 5 - If the planning officer explains that your home is too tall for the land as a ‘caravan’, you can potentially dig down to make it fit the environment! This, of course, comes with a fee unless you have some very strong friends to help you dig a gigantic hole or you rent your own mini-digger for the day! You would more than likely need to remove the home from it wheels to reduce 60cm, and instead to place it onto JackPads. For example, the Nomad 2 Bed Tiny House is 3.6m tall without its wheels.

Option 6 - On the flip side, some councils will request a bigger home that meets minimum space standards. The XL range of Tiny Homes; the Tyne & Eden, can most certainly cover this.

Option 7 - If you don’t wish to have something so big, you could change the use of your land to set up a business that requires a management building. Quick businesses such as campsites and animal petting sites are the easiest to maintain and make sufficient income along with a valid reason for you to live on the site at all times.

Option 8 - Community Land-Based Trust

Well, that’s a mouthful, so what is it? A Community Land-Based Trust is a method of holding a plot of land in a ‘trust’ that is not owned by one individual, but rather collectively, for community dwellers. To do this, you’ll need to start or find a community, but first, you may want to sit down and make a loose plan of what you are looking for. To start, you’ll need to show your community , what houses you’re looking at building, who can join the community and how the ‘rules’ will be set up to live with one another. Check out other ‘co-housing’ or ‘eco-villages’ to see how they operate.

When you’re ready to launch your site, you can select a Tiny House, such as the ‘Endura’ to be used for your home, or even a number of our smaller models such as the Nomad. You’ll need to ensure that once you put in planning permission, you show that the homes are either ‘permanent’ or ‘temporary’. We also suggest you highlight the eco-friendly materials, minimal co2 emissions in using the homes and that they are a ‘light touch’ on the ground.

Option 9 - Create a new community using the ‘One Planet Development Route in Wales’

Wales has been very forward-thinking in its route to creating unique, zero-carbon developments, through the One Planet Development. It’s a way for you to live on the land, live minimally and eco-friendly, either on your own or with a community. You could set up on the land, farm it, place your low-impact tiny homes on the land, and take, for example, set up a small pen of llamas for petting. Why do all this? The ODP route says that in 3-5 years, you must be self-sufficient on the land, and be carbon neutral. So you’ll need to create a business plan, to make an income from the land and show how your homes will generate less carbon over the lifetime

Once a business plan has been made, a community has been gathered and a good plot of land has been sourced, you can then get to work on getting approval for a loan and also planning for your site with the ODP application being submitted. And yes, I’m aware that this sounds like a lot of hard work to live tiny, but do remind yourself that it’s easier in numbers and if everyone is pitching in to make this work then there is little to fear.

That leaves us with the last hurdle..

Hurdle Number 3 - How to live off-grid in a Tiny Home?

‘Where does my poop go?’, ‘Can I live off rainwater'?’, ‘how often can I run a washing machine?’ are the most frequently asked questions when ponder the thought of off-grid living. The poo question is our favourite because, let’s face it, we’re Brits and we don’t like to talk about what comes out the other end. Lucky for you, we’re very comfortable having this conversation as we’ve had it time and time again. As there is more than one solution to each of these questions, we’ve attached the in-depth article to each question for a bit of light reading!

Where do I get my water from? - Click here for the article

Where does my poop go? - Click here for the article

How much solar do I need? - Click here for the article

That’s it from us this week, if you have any questions regarding our builds, how to live off-grid or need support with planning permission or simply want to know more about us, feel free to contact me anytime - leanne@thetinyhousing.co

P.S A sneak peak ahead of what we are talking about! Our next article is going to be about Glamping sites and how to set one up. The following article is going to be about self-builds and how you can build your own with the help of some local builders!