Why Tiny Houses?
An old friend asked me a question privately on Facebook.
“I have seen you post a lot of things lately. What is the deal with the small houses pursuit? Is this a hobby or part time job or are you just trying to promote a different way of living? what’s the story?”
I sent him this answer (slightly edited) and thought it made sense to post it here. I suspect there are a few people wondering if I’ve gone completely insane.
I connected my twitter and facebook accounts so now all my tweets now show up on my facebook page. I guess tiny houses are a hobby but they have provided a real eye-opener to the benefits of living more simply.
Up until six years ago I/we had always lived happily in smaller spaces. But when Julia and I moved to Sacramento we bought an 1,800 square foot 3 bedroom post-modern house.
When the housing market collapsed I got an abrupt wake up call. So in classic artist style I’m exploring by making stuff… a free tiny house… and a nine square foot house (next).
Ironically blogging about all this has already gotten my story written up in the NY Times and has generated a lot of traffic to my blogs. But more importantly I’ve been having a ball drawing and exploring tiny house design.
Slowly this stuff is becoming more than an artist’s exploration. I have even had a couple publishers ask if I’d be interested in submitting book proposals… so who knows… I might just turn these lemons into lemonade and get out of my debt-trap by writing about it. Maybe that’s a day-dream… maybe not. The most important part is that it’s been good therapy and fun.
The biggest lesson I’ve learned is:
The true value of a home should be measured by the happiness and security it brings instead of its size and cost.
Don’t wait to hear the D-word
I saw this CBS video the other day that focused on Obama and the economy. One of the things he said strait-out was that he’s working to avoid total economic collapse and a depression. This is not news of course but to hear him dance around the d-word was a bit of an eye opener. It’s one thing to hear our media talk about it and another to hear him say it.
I hope the work he’s are doing today will actually help us avoid more trouble. But I’d argue that we the people shouldn’t wait for the official announcement of a full-blown depression or our own personal financial demise. We should change our lifestyles today, live frugally, and prepare ourselves for the possibility of harder times. Here are some things you can do right now to prepare:
- Always work to improve your personal health.
- Buy bulk dry food (beans, rice, grains) and always have a reserve.
- Learn to cook creatively with beans and rice.
- Learn to bake from scratch.
- Switch from coffee to tea, it’s so much cheaper.
- Plant a victory garden.
- Raise chickens, if your community permits them.
- Downsize everything you can.
- Sell possession you don’t use or need via craigslist, garage sales, and ebay.
- Create additional revenue streams by monetizing hobbies, blogging, etc.
- Prepare a worse case scenario plan (job loss, homelessness, etc).
- Build a tiny house on wheels.
For optimism’s sake lets say we’re not headed for the second great depression. In any event this advice is good advice. By preparing for the possibility of a depression today the worst result is that you’ll be better positioned for the future.
“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change that survives.” – Charles Darwin
The story behind my blogging success – and little known secrets
A few months ago I started a blog on my growing obsession with tiny houses called Tiny House Design which has quickly become my busiest website. I think I’ve stumbled on some little little discussed secrets to successful blog marketing. But first let me show you the traffic evidence because it will help explain how I’m driving traffic up.
The Evidence
This chart from my Google Analytics account shows the traffic spikes over the last two months. As you can see there are three distinct traffic spikes that resulted in a slightly higher base traffic after each spike. The first little spike was the day an article was published about me in the New York Times. The next spike was a short national television spot on the tiny house movement. The third, tallest spike, was a CNN television story on two leaders in the tiny house community, Jay Shafer and Bill Kastrinos.
This next chart is from Google Trends and shows how my top keywords have been performing for the last twelve months. As you can see there is a direct correlation since most traffic comes from search engines.
This next chart shows my bounce rate dropping off significantly which means that something has either changed on my blog or the people searching for this content are really getting interested in it and are sticking around on the blog much longer.
This last chart shows average page views by visitor. It’s not surprising that it looks like the inverse of the bounce rate. But still interesting so see the correlation.
Little Known Secrets
First I am not doing all the normal marketing tricks pro-bloggers tell you to do. I’ve simply optimized my blogs and done a little bit of networking. I have however stumbled on some simple things that are driving my traffic higher and higher everyday. Here they are:
- Do something that really matters, then blog on it. Make blogging secondary and the quality of your content will actually improve because you will be making the story not just reporting on it.
- Choose a topic you’re passionate about and that’s growing in interest. The collapse of the housing market is actually fueling more interest in downsizing. It’s exactly what drove me to tiny houses in the first place. People from all around America are re-thinking how they live and the true value of a home.
- Real stories want to be told. The main stream media wants to tell your story if its real and timely. Reporters are combing the web for stories to tell. News agencies and television shows make their money by telling compelling stories.
- Use your real name. I’m also working on writing a couple books and figured it would pay in the long run to have my real name out there. Real people, with real stories, have real names. Use yours.
- Make real friends and connections. Get to know the people in your online and offline community. You are stronger together.
Warnings
- Avoid publicity stunts. The main stream media wants to report real stories. Be honest and real or everyone will see right through you.
- Don’t waste time with tricks. No real traffic comes from search engine optimization tricks. Spend less time commenting on other people’s blogs and more time doing something people value and writing about it. If you can video tape and photograph it even better.
Conclusion
As you can see this is just the beginning of something good. Ironically as the economy worsens the interest in downsizing increases. So I suspect my blogs on tiny houses will get the biggest boost in traffic during the upcoming lean years. In any event I think my strategy is sound and proving to be successful. I hope you fiud it useful.
Here’s a recap:
- Be real
- Do something real
- Do something your passionate about
- Write about it
- Video tape it
- Photograph it
- …and ideally pick something more people are moving toward.
Now take a look at my tiny house blogs/forum:
Katie & Daddy Score More Pallets
Katie and I did a quick pallet run this morning before work and picked up a good load of pallets for the tiny free house. Here’s Katie patiently waiting for her crazy daddy.
My Tiny House is in the New York Times!
This is a pretty cool day for me; I’ve never been in the New York Times before. A few months ago I started a little project, actually a tiny free house project, in an attempt to better understand my own values. I had also been admiring the people behind the tiny house movement for the freedom they have achieved. I wanted to built a tiny house too but do it with a different spin. My first tiny house would be free and made from reclaimed and recycled stuff. In fact I’m building it from mostly trashed wood pallets. You can follow my progress on my Tiny Free House blog.
If you’re interested in tiny house design I’ve got a blog on that too, tinyhousedesign.com. But by all means read the article in the New York Times. Photo credit, New York Times.
The New York Times Wants To Talk To Me?
Since last summer, as the value in my house evaporated, I’ve been spending a lot of time noodling over issues like the real value of our homes. I’ve come to a simple conclusion, which should be fairly obvious and should go without saying, the value of our house is completely market driven. In other words the price of a house is completely dependent on what someone else is willing to pay for it. Normally I would choose to avoid a word like completely but in this case I think it’s 100% accurate.
According to Zillow.com my house is worth 35% less than about a year ago. Yeah YIKES! The house didn’t change. The number of rooms and square feet have stayed the same. Mortgage rates are about the same. The only thing that changed was the demand for homes in my area. Anyway as you can imagine this little fact got me thinking about the true value of a home.
At this point I’m certain that the true value of a home should be measured in security and usefulness, not square feet, number of bedrooms and bathrooms. Yeah sure a home has to be big enough to meet the needs of the people living there but avoiding a big mortgage (or any mortgage) seems like it should higher on our list of priorities. But I digress…
Recently two movements came into my awareness, mostly thanks to my wife Julia and Oprah. Julia doesn’t watch Oprah very much anymore with Katie’s nap time often overlapping with Oprah but on two occasions she called me into the living room, (I work from home 100% of the time for a giant bank), to show me a story on tiny houses and a separate story on freegans.
More recently, after much baking in my brain, I become a bit obsessed with building two tiny houses, NINE TINY FEET and TINY FREE HOUSE. I’ve started blogs on both to capture the progress and help drive me along. Both house projects are inspired by Henry David Thoreau’s cabin at Walden Pond, freegans, the tiny house movement, and the evaporation of my home’s equity.
NINE TINY FEET is all about building the smallest house possible while still being useful and meeting the requirements of one person. I’ll keep the budget low on this one but I expect to spend a little money.
TINY FREE HOUSE is about building a free house with reclaimed building materials and wood from old discarded pallets. For the few items I’ll need to buy (screws, nails, hinges, etc), I’ll make the money to buy them by selling free stuff I find on craigslist.
The other day a reporter, (Steven Kurtz), from the New York Times contacted me interested in doing a story on the TINY FREE HOUSE. I’m guessing I’m not alone in my ponderings and maybe not as crazy as I might appear. OR… I am as crazy as I appear and the New York Times thinks people will enjoy reading about a crazy guy. In any event I’m crazy enough not to really care [LOL]. I’m happy to share my story, point of view, and projects with them.Maybe someone will get something valuable out the story.
I’ll post updates here about my continuing conversations with the Times and if anything comes from them. I’d also love to hear any feedback, stories, or ideas you might have about my tiny house projects, the economy, home values, etc. Comments?
