Tiny House Blog

by Steven Kuchinsky

I am part of a team of people from Monmouth University building a program known as THRIVE (Towns for Healing and Rehabilitation in Interactive Village Ecologies.)

We are working to create an alternative for about 80 homeless people living in tents (Tent City, Lakewood). Unfortunately, they must soon leave and will only have a homeless shelter to go to for one year and then they are on their own with no facilities available.

We want to create a sustainable community where these people together can build micro-homes and learn to live in a holistic life style.

We want to partner with whatever appropriate, likeminded caring people/groups will support this endeavor, such as Habitat for Humanity, various school programs that initiate sustainable farming, Home Depot which teaches home maintenance, and finally proponents of tiny homes that would like to make a difference in the lives of these people.

What better way to empower homeless people than to give them the opportunity to build their own homes and build their own community!

To what extent would you like to be a part of this ranging from simple suggestions, sharing contacts, ongoing communication, educating, etc.?

Here is a website about Tent City, and here also is a slide show (video) that I created. As idyllic as it may look, it is very difficult in the winter and they will not be permitted to live in these tents much longer.
(The pile of wood chips shown in the slide show were placed there by the town to make it more difficult for people to donate food to the homeless people. The county has since enforced removal.)

by Jaclyn Nicholson

Have you ever considered the difference between acting green and buying green? A lot of energy is wasted in homes on showering, lighting, cooling, using the bathroom and doing laundry.

So, in order to preserve, you can change how you do things or you can purchase energy-efficient appliances.

For example, you can keep the light on in your room for just 49 minutes or you can get an energy efficient LED bulb, and keep your light on for 6 hours and use the same amount of energy. Which do you prefer? Weigh the differences here.

Source: eLocal.com

If you love houseboats or floating homes, you may want to make a walking tour of the famous Sausalito Floating Homes part of your next trip to the San Francisco Bay area. I thought I would profile these particular floating homes because the community is maintained by homeowners and individuals rather than city officials. This makes this waterside neighborhood unique in that the designs of these homes, that are docked in Richardson Bay, are up to the owners.

M Skaffari/Flickr

The famous Sausalito floating homes community has a history that stretches over a century. During the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s improvised floating homes made from scrap wood, old tugboats, elegant ships and even old Pullman cars were built by professional artists, and since the dock areas were so small, most of the floating homes stayed small. Some of these homes are now offered as vacation rentals and there are usually a few for sale. Some of the homes have names including the Taj Mahal, the Train Wreck and the Pirate. Continue Reading »