What started out as a bet ended up a home
It takes three steps to walk from the front door to the back door.
It’s narrow and takes ‘‘not long, not long at all’’ to vacuum, sits on the back of a trailer, and Everett Norris, 24, calls it home.
There are just a few tiny houses in Hamilton, Norris says. He built his own for $40,000 but it could have been cheaper had he not made it energy-efficient.
‘‘This is the part where you say it’s not as tiny as you thought,’’ Norris adds.
For someone used to living in an average Kiwi home, it’s downright claustrophobic. But for Norris, it’s a step up. ‘‘I actually upsized because prior to this I was living in a single room so this is a huge improvement,’’ he says. ‘‘This is way bigger in terms of personal space.
‘‘I wouldn’t know how to compare to a really big house.’’
Norris built his house in the first year of his building apprenticeship and after a bet. He is organising a workshop in January to teach others to do the same.
‘‘It’s the sort of bet you make as a teenager – as a joke – that I never forgot about,’’ he says.
‘‘It ended up becoming a goal and the goal was to own my own house, debt free, before I turned 22. When I was 19, it started to look more possible.’’
It was about that time that he hitchhiked from Melbourne to Perth, building straw bale houses as he went.
He came back to New Zealand, bought a rundown home with his siblings, which they renovated, and are now renting.
‘‘I got the trailer just before I turned 21 but I failed my own goal,’’ he said. ‘‘I was 22 when I finished my house. It could be worse.’’
Norris, who has no children, said some people are happy to raise families in the cramped conditions but he’d need more space.
‘‘What I always thought would be a cool idea is you build your little house and then every kid, you just build another tiny house. I just thought it would be really cool if when they get to 16, you say: ‘All right. You’re building your own tiny house.’
‘‘Teach them to build it and by the time they’re 18, they have their own house and they know how to build. I think I’ve done my responsibility as a father, at that point, if I’ve done that.’’
His house fits within New Zealand Transport Agency’s light trailer classification. He is on council water supply but has a composting black and grey water system.
And while tiny houses were once the preserve of environmentally conscious and ‘‘alternative’’ types, Norris reckons the movement is becoming more widespread.
It’s about need. ‘‘We’re all just looking for another option,’’ he says. ‘‘There is this old ideal where you get a job, save up, buy a house, have a mortgage – the standard way – and for a lot of people it is not working out or making much sense.’’
The Tiny House Workshop starts on
January 5, 2019.