Proud Tiny House Owner:

How I bought Villa Villekulla - with a Bird.

January 10, 2019

Tiny living, new keys, beginning of a life in a tiny home — Welcome to my new home - yeah!

The wind whistles through my coat and drizzle spreads across my face like a spider's web. I'm trudging down the gravel path to my new house. It's a few days before Christmas and I just signed all the contracts. My Tiny House. Finally. After so many considerations, dreams and calculations. The light brown wooden house is located on a small plot of 1722 ft². With parking space, garden and terrace. My own garden! I could grow tomatoes. Or salad. Or uranium. I grin and quietly sing "Mercedes Benz" by Janis Joplin while I almost throw away all my papers because of my endless euphoria. They nearly end up in the hedge of my neighbor.

On the 5th of January I pick up my keys from the previous owner. Although the house is in good condition, I have a large list of things I would like to change. Just for fun. I want to throw with paint, hang up two million pictures and put a paper hat on my head. But before all that becomes reality, I have a chaffinch on the fridge and a hard laughing fit. Read about my first steps as a Tiny Home owner.

What is a Tiny House?

Tiny Home, Living in a tiny home, lonelyroadlover, advice and quick tips — There it is!

A Tiny Home. What's that? Basically it means working wonders with small rooms. It is like an apartment with all amenities - kitchen, bedroom, living room and bathroom. In a very small house. No, not with an outhouse or hair washing with curd soap in the rain! But with proper connections to civilization. Hot water, electricity, internet. It is just that my house does not have 1600 ft², requires no loan and can - theoretically - even move with me.

That's what some Tiny House owners do. They put the house on a low-loading truck and move it around. But a Tiny House is not a motorhome and not a campervan! It is nothing you can simply take with you for a trip to the North Sea to smoke flowers in Amsterdam. It's a place to live. And normally it does not stay on wheels either, but is unloaded and placed on clean ground. Important fact: In Germany you usually can't register a Tiny House as your primary residence. Big laws for small houses.

If you go for transport, expect high costs. It's because such heavy load usually has to be registered and approved. With escort vehicles. Those annoying, orange-coloured vehicles which, flashing like a fairground, block the entire road by rushing along with 30 mph. Could be fun - but not for $2.500. The costs for transportation strongly depend on the length of the route and the number of countries or states you pass. Sometimes you need a separate permit for each state.

How much does a Tiny Home cost and where to get it?

Buying a tiny home, costs of a tiny home — With rain in my hair and a smile in my face

That smelled too much like paper war and an open fire of despair. My house is now simply located on a beautiful piece of land in the countryside on the Lower Rhine. Where the previous owners had it as well.

Yes, my Tiny Home - or mobile home - is a used vehicle-house.

I also could have tried to build my own house. Which would have led to stabbing myself with a spirit level out of frustration. I can sew on a button and hang up a picture. That's it.

However, if you have such a house built by a company, you will usually have to pay at least $25,000 to $35,000. Even for simple versions. With that amount of money I could pay more than ten low-loading trucks. And just for the fun of it, drive through the country and clog highways. Sometimes I think about strange things. For example, what it would be like to hear a congestion alert on the radio by knowing that I caused it.

But since I only throw my money down the drain for really awesome things, I decide to buy a used Tiny Home for about $17,000. In really good condition, completey furnished and with some parts of the interior newly renovated.

430 ft² and fully furnished

Tiny Home, living room, saving space, storage — The living room with couch and cupboards

There is a complete kitchen with stove and refrigerator, in which one could store sauerkraut for a whole army. A washing machine, a shed full of appliances with a lawn mower and an outdoor kitchen for barbecues on the terrace. A living room with a huge, comfortable couch, a brand new bedroom with king-size bed and hipster lamps and a bathroom with shower, toilet and cupboards. The floor is laid with modern wood. The living room, bedroom, kitchen, bathroom, hallway and anteroom are spread over about 430 ft². Not too tiny, that Tiny House, isn't it?

But only 7 feet high. I almost scratch the ceiling with my hairline with my gigantic 5,3 feet.

Me and the house - it was love at first sight. I feel that I belong here. Away from the city. Between farms, fields and woods. With early birds freaking out in the morning and stars falling from the sky at night. With summer nights where the crickets are louder than the street noise. Where the eagle owl calls like in a horror movie and I can run into the illuminated garden and shout "Hello?!" while someone slammes a spade on me.

Minimalism, consumption and the meaning of things

Minimalism, living without consumption, lonelyroadlover — That's all I need in my new Tiny Home

Speaking of birds. It's January 5th and I proudly hold up the keys of my new hut while I fight with a folding rule and almost kill it. My best friend Alex and I are decently dead because we've been transporting a bunch of boxes from A to B and C for seven hours now. Only very few stuff will go into my house. I have thrown away two huge garbage bags full of past and feel free and light. If I need one thing, then it's not much. Life hasn't been about things to me anymore for a long time. I don't give a shit about possession and consumption.

Since I moved out from my ex-boyfriend, I am living on 214 ft² in a shared flat for nealy three months and only have a closet, a bed and a table. I haven't missed much yet.

After we're finished, three big boxes, a light, a guitar, a historical radio and a few book-boxes are standing in my new house. Moving with a station wagon. Driving once to get everything - yeah!
As we're about to take a fun video for my love in the US, something shoots through the open door. We scream like little kids and I almost drop my cell phone.

A different kind of ornithology

Best friends, friendship — Tired after chasing the bird

"A BIRD!!" I yell with a manic-panic laughter. Unbelievable! I've had the keys for a few minutes and the first thing that happens is a bird in the cabin! The little animal flutters around wildly in the anteroom, while we hide away and I hectically close the door to the living area.

"What are we going to do now?" I shout breathlessly as the feathered will-o'-the-wisp lands on the six-foot-tall refrigerator.
"I don't know!" Alex replies, also close to gasping.

"I'll open the window." I say.
"I'll hold open the door" he says. "

"I'm going to fly around and mix up your plan" the bird thinks and puts on a flight show through the whole room - of course without even paying slight attention to the emergency exits that are wide open. Finally he stops by sitting on the frame of the open window.

I'm approaching. "A chaffinch," I state. I do birdwatching every now and then and so I know some of those dicky. After that biologically highly significant discovery, I look at the bird and the bird looks at me. "Why don't you just go out" I say a little desperate. Then he's moving back to the top of the fridge. Despite all the fun I'm afraid he's gonna get hurt.

The first challenge is done

Buying a tiny home in Germany — All papers signed

At some point we arm ourselves with a jacket and a big concert poster of Chris Isaak and try to show the bird the way out. Discreetly but clearly. Works perfectly... It flutters wildly, we scream, almost collide and realize that our hands are almost frozen. Because hot water and heater are not running yet. Why paying running costs for a place where I don't even live yet.

"I'm bleeding again!" I whine theatrically, looking at my thumb. "What do we do now?" asks my best friend slightly lethargic, after 15 minutes of unsuccessful bird-catching.

"I have to eat a fucking pizza now or I'm gonna die" I notice. Then I think about it again. "But first, we need to get that lost creature out of my house!"

At some point the little animal actually jumps from the window frame into the garden. I am screaming and closing two windows at the same time while Alex locks the door as if the nuclear world war was about to begin. Then we collapse, laughing out loudly, at the table.

By the way: You can see a video of this action on my Facebook page.

Now I sit in my temporary apartment again and look at the sketches, which we drew of the rooms, highly professionally. So I can start planning with colors, wallpaper and decoration. I see that Alex has written "Scale 1:Infinity" at the bottom of the page and have to grin again.
I will go to the home improvement store soon. To buy drills, chain saws and raking devices. Little exaggeration. Paint, painter's fleece and a brush may be enough for now. Welcome to my new life as a Tiny House owner. With bird.

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Kommentare: 1

#1
Pat (Freitag, 18 Januar 2019 19:38)

And so the adventure begins :D