Empty nesters, greens and first-time buyers are finding tiny houses a good fit

If Dee Williams had the arms of an orangutan, she could touch every corner of her home without leaving her one-burner kitchen. As it is, she comes close.

Photos: Small houses

With only 84 square feet of living space, Williams is an expert at living large in a do-it-yourself home the size of a garden shed.

She built her 7-by-12-foot Tumbleweed Tiny House for $10,000, including solar panels, trailer, eco-friendly denim insulation and high-performance wood windows. It brims with dollhouse charm. Her overhead: $6 a month to run the propane heater.

"I hadn't ever taken a project from blueprint to real life," said Williams, 45, whose tiny frame and intrepid spirit are a good fit for the Tumbleweed. "It's, like, a really cool, empowering thing."

Williams, a hazardous-waste inspector at the Department of Ecology in Olympia, is an extreme example of the "small-house movement," which seeks to counter the McMansionization of America with an ethos of sustainability.

Though few people aim quite so small, the benefits of "rightsizing" are resonating with empty nesters, cash-strapped first-time buyers and green-minded consumers who want to use resources efficiently.

"I think people are being realistic about what they need," said Prudential Northwest Realty agent Debbie Rutledge, 37, of Seattle, "and part of that has to do with being socially responsible."

Rutledge lives in a 600-square-foot Alki Beach home she bought five years ago. Affordability was a draw -- she paid $260,000 and pumped $30,000 into a remodel -- and she figures it's about all the house she can handle.

Williams began building her tiny Tumbleweed in July 2004 after a trip to Guatemala opened her eyes to global poverty and unequal distribution of wealth.

She and her micro-home reside in the Olympia backyard of a family of four who are longtime friends. Williams has become close to the kids and helps care for her friends' elderly aunt, who has her own home on the double lot.

"It's humbling," said Williams, who wrestles with an awareness that few of her agemates are "poaching in someone's backyard."

Friendship and a mutual respect for privacy make it work, said Annie McManus, who lives with her family in the 980-square-foot main house. "There's something very nourishing about living in our compound."

Even by micro-home standards, Williams' residence is barebones. She eliminated the shower -- all the plumbing, in fact -- because she didn't want to deal with a water tank.

She showers at work or at McManus' house and cooks with bottled water. Her odor-free, composting toilet doesn't need water. And she uses an outdoor ice chest for "essentials" such as beer and half-and-half. (She had planned for an under-counter fridge but mismeasured the hole.)

Though it sounds Spartan, Williams' tiny home glows with charm, from the stained-glass window on the front porch to pine paneling in the living area. The front door was a Dumpster find. The loft's hefty cedar beams were salvaged from a house fire. And the gleaming kitchen countertop was crafted from a pair of garage-sale pocket doors she bought for $5.

Williams' house has even become a field-trip magnet. Last year it accommodated 64 fourth-graders at once, including 18 in the loft. But the downside of small-house living quickly surfaced.

"Somebody farted," Williams said, "and then it was like rats leaving a ship. They emptied out so fast!"

While teensy homes win cool points, "small" is more a state of mind than a specific square footage, says the Small House Society, founded in 2002 as a voice for the small-house movement.

"It's not to say everybody needs to live in a 10-by-7-foot house," said Gregory Paul Johnson of Iowa, one of four co-founders (Tumbleweed owner Jay Shafer of California is another). "It's not so much about being small, it's about better utilization of space."

That's the thinking behind Monica and Sam Guckenheimer's brand-new Place House, an architecturally designed, green-built prefab in Kirkland. At 2,000-plus square feet, it's the largest model offered -- but only half the size of their previous home. Earlier, they lived in a 5,500-square-foot farmhouse in Massachusetts.

Monica Guckenheimer said large homes encourage overconsumption, and they've found that their three kids -- ages 10 through 12 -- gravitate to wherever their parents are, anyway.

"My children always want to be close to us," she said, as the Place House neared completion, "and we don't use a third of the house we have now."

Heather Johnston, director of design and a founding principal at Place Architects in Seattle, said the firm has gotten "tons and tons of inquiry" about its 935-square-foot prefab model -- the smallest it offers (base price $295,000) -- but high land costs are a deal-killer for people seeking an affordable first home.

Even so, she said, "I do think -- I'm sure of it -- that there is a bounce-back in the market toward more compact and lower-impact homes."

For Tiffany Larsen of Seattle, compact means 650 square feet, the size of her vintage, Columbia City home. Carving out creative storage space has been her biggest challenge. She joined the Small House Society in search of livability tips and now is a happy camper.

"At the time I bought it, it was what I could afford," said Larsen, 33, who paid $120,000 for the vintage home in 2002. "But it's turned out to be perfect, because it's cheaper to heat, cheaper to maintain."

Likewise, Allison Arth, 27, an editor and publisher who works for the Seattle Symphony, is already mourning the day -- far in the future, she hopes -- when she and her husband outgrow their 509-square-foot home in the Central District.

Built in 1916, it's one of 10 Pine Street Cottages, a pocket community with a birch-shaded courtyard. Initially just 400 square feet, it gained a sleeping loft in a 1992 remodel. Fifties-style decor, including a kidney-shaped sofa and a hand-me-down Formica table, adds period charm.

Arth recently launched a blog to share ideas and musings about small-home living.

"It's just a very cozy way to live," said Arth, whose husband, 25-year-old Bo Kinney, is in library school. "Bo and I aren't separated by tons of space and rooms that are left empty."

One drawback is a lack of sound barriers in her open-plan home. If one wants to read and the other wants to watch a DVD, she said, "that can be a little taxing."

With storage at a premium, they've had to cull their belongings and get creative. For example, they have a combination washer-dryer. It saves space but not time; a single load takes four hours because it dries by condensation.

That's OK. With only one closet, they don't have much laundry, anyway.

WORKSHOP

Jay Shafer of the Tumbleweed Tiny House Co. will travel to Seattle in his 100-square-foot micro-house to conduct design-and-build workshops July 12-13. Sessions, to be held at 21 S. Nevada St., are priced separately -- $275 and $375, or both for $500. Bring a friend for an additional $125 per workshop. Details and registration at tumbleweedhouses.com.

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