Mom + DaugHter Tiny HouSe - Might Be NiCest Tiny HoMe Ever!

Hey guys, welcome back to my channel where I take you on tours of tiny homes and showcase people living alternatively. Today's tour is of a gorgeous tiny home built for a solo mom who is redefining her version of the American dream home. So we're going to meet Jen, learn why she downsized, and hear about how much she loves her new tiny house lifestyle. The end product was better than any picture I gave them, hands down. You see when Jen downsized, she was able to sell her large home and use the money to put in a few high-end luxury items that you seldom see in tiny home builds. If you like these kind of videos, make sure that you subscribe and hit that bell so that you get a notification every time I post a new video. But right now let's check out this mom's amazing tiny home. Hi everybody, I'm Jen and I'm so excited to show you Trailhead Tiny, my not-so-tiny mansion. I was living the American dream. I was married. I had two kids, 3,000 square foot house. I got a divorce three years ago and the question comes into play, how do I afford a home on a single income? I knew about tiny houses. Definitely there's a draw there to simplify your life. I could do that. My kids are going to be gone soon and I could follow them anywhere they go. I thought, well, I'm going to have money from the sale of the house. I might not even have a mortgage if I find the right kind of fit for me. We found this guy on Craigslist and I got really excited about it. We started planning and I bought the shell and then a lot of time passed and nothing was happening because my builder was just a guy on Craigslist who I didn't vet in any way, shape or form. And then I realized I need to get the ball going here. So I started emailing other builders in the area. Mitch Craft Tiny Homes in Fort Collins totally saved me. Answered all my questions, had so many ideas for me, helped me figure out financing, even things that I didn't think to ask. He really helped me through. I signed a contract with them. He went to pick up the house. I gave them a ton of ideas. I made a visual thing for them to go by so they knew what the end product was going to be. The end product was better than any picture I gave them, hands down. My kids are actually going to be out of the house in a couple of years. They're teenagers graduating high school and my daughter was going to be the only one actually living with me. So really she was the one I had to win over. She and my son came to help move in. They actually hadn't seen any progress on the house so when they walked in the day it was delivered they were like, what? They did not realize how nice it was going to be. It's like any other house on a small scale and you get to customize it any way you want to, but your parents don't have to spend like 80 years paying it off. I was expecting to spend about $150,000. It was a couple months after the pandemic shut everything down. Things were delayed. Things cost more. It was another $20,000 which was a surprise, but I got my house. It's perfect. It was worth it all. I can't wait to show you all my favorite things on the inside. Come on in. Welcome everyone to the inside of my tiny house. Sometimes I call it a tiny kitchen on wheels. This is the whole reason I decided I could go tiny. If I could have my dream kitchen on a tiny scale, I was sold and it is by far my favorite part of this house. When people come in, the look on their face always makes me so happy because they say, first of all, this isn't what I thought you meant when you said you were going tiny. Second of all, your kitchen definitely has more storage than my kitchen. One of the things I love about the space is all of the windows and all of the natural light that floods this area. I rarely turn on a light until the sun goes down in this house. It's so well lit. The skylights above are solar powered. One cool thing I love to show off when people come over, I call it my party trick, is I have this nifty remote control and at the touch of a button, I can close my skylights. It's very Jetson. I love it. It's nice to cool off the space on a hot day. I actually love this circle shaped eating slash work area. Before the project went to Mitchcraft, I had actually hired an architect to help me plan the space and he came up with this round idea for me. I eat here. I work here. When people come over, we have happy hour here and we can all see each other. I work from home full time, so it was really important for me to have a space to put some office things like a printer, papers, my computer, electronic stuff. Both of these drawers slide out and there's even a hidden outlet right back there so I can print. I can do whatever I need to do. I can put my computer here, take it out when I'm and when I'm done, it slides back in and it's out of sight. This kitchen was originally supposed to have butcher block countertops, but towards the end of planning, I said, hey, what would the cost difference be if I went with quartz because that's kind of the look I'm really going for and he said, it's going to take so many man hours to craft the butcher block. It actually wouldn't be much more if you just went with quartz. I also have this great open shelving that my architect came up with. It feels like it really sets the mood for the farmhouse theme. I can set out all of my little, you know, my glassware and my friend actually calls it my bar because I do have my whiskey that I have to use when I'm crawling under two axles to attach my water hose. Moving on, I love this section here with my farmhouse sink. I will say though, this particular one is fire clay and if you drop something in it, the fire clay wins. So just know when you get like a real good sink, make sure you don't have any casualties. When I was planning this space, really I was waiting so long for it to be completed and I was excited and I was trying to visualize what a morning is going to be like waking up in my loft and I had this vision of like I'm going to come down my tiny stairs every morning and I'll have my coffee station set up here and I'll have my lovely little kitchen to wake up in and I do that every day. I love it. I do not have a green thumb at all, but my daughter loves plants. She's constantly bringing plants home and when we moved into this space, my land host came over with all of these vine plants that were 15 years old, no pressure for me to decorate my space with and I thought, oh my gosh, it really brings this space to life and my daughter started putting in these high places where she thought they looked so great. So she gets the job of walking across the countertop every few days to water it. It's kind of funny, but it does keep the space looking a little more colorful and gives it some life, so I like it. I do have an off-grid unique propane stove. It's run by a little battery down here and my propane tanks in the back and I actually only have to fill up those tanks like every three months or so. It goes a good long time. I'm 5'8", my daughter is 5'10", and my son is 6 feet, so when they come over to look for food, it's low. They basically are like sitting all the way down on the ground like little kids looking for food. It cracks me up every time. It gives me a chuckle, but really this is all I need for food in this space. It's worked out great for me. Storage stairs are where it's at. It's all hidden away. I had no idea what the configuration was going to be and this is what I have. It is the most functional pantry I've ever seen because I can get all the way to the back of my pantry. And if you ever thought you needed to go down to three pairs of shoes in a tiny house, I'm here to tell you, you do not have to do that. Voila. Welcome to the crown jewel of my tiny house, the bathroom, or as I like to call it, the tiny spa. An absolute must for me in this house was a soaker tub. As I went to research actual tubs and tried to find a small one, they were crazy expensive, but everyone has these cool trough tubs now and it fit my aesthetic and it's the best little soaker tub. And the first question I had was, is it going to retain heat? And the answer is yes, you're going to come out sweating. It's amazing. After a long day on the trail, I love this thing. This is my washer dryer combo, which I love, especially because it will go straight from wash to dry and I don't have to come back home or stop what I'm doing to switch the load. It's pretty great that way. And it actually faces across from where my clothes store, which often is a really handy way just to put things right where they go straight out of the dryer. Super efficient. I love my separate toilet. Like everybody says, there's no smell, but I still have poopery because it's funny. Come on up to my master loft and I'll show you what it looks like. I knew I wanted to have a king size bed in this space. It's super handy to have all of the space when visitors come, my daughter sleeps with me, they get her loft. There's all kinds of ways to reconfigure this when visitors come over. I'm on a journey by myself, but should I be in a relationship and have to cohabitate here? I wanted a king size bed. I want a little space up here. So that is why it's king size. I also have all these great cubbies bumping it up that extra little bit gave me the added top row that perfectly fit all of my trucker hats that I wear on the trail. I do love this skylight above my bed. The first night here, I felt like a little kid looking at the stars. I just sat there gazing out, but that's all magical until the sun comes blazing in at 5am in Colorado. So I was thinking about how am I going to do this? I do have an eye mask that I put on and I often give visitors eye masks when they come so they can sleep in. If you want to know how to cover your windows and match your bedroom, it just so happens that king size pillowcases fit the bill. All I did here was get for my windows, little curtain rings and tension rods and hung them up and they happened to be the perfect size. I was so thrilled with that. And this one actually also was the perfect size. All I did was get some little sticky hooks and it's a perfect solution. I'm not going to lie when I stood in this space, I felt like I forgot how small it was going to be and I kind of panicked and I didn't think anything would fit here. But it's amazing when you define the space how it suddenly works. So I had Mitch put this great fireplace in for me that was on the top of my wish list. It kicks out a lot of heat. It has some little vents here. If you feel like changing the color, if you're into that, hey, it does that too. If you feel like changing the color of the rocks, it's a disco fireplace. My kids get a kick out of it. It's a little cheesy. It doesn't matter. It's a fun conversation piece and it makes me smile. Anything in my house that makes me smile, I love. I have a 50 inch TV that can swivel out so that I can watch something, watch the news while I'm cooking or making my coffee in the morning. He put these little shelves in for me. So I have book storage and have a little knickknacks that are off the floor. And I have so much space in here that I actually can roll out a yoga mat. I can do my feet up trainer. I can do any of my on-demand workouts in here. It also meant I got an actual sofa, a nice sofa, and it has a foot rest. Also, I have a hanging chair because I keep seeing them in tiny houses and it's such a great way to add an extra space when people come over. And it's one of my favorite spots in the house at the end of the day or between meetings. I like to sit with coffee or a glass of wine and hang out. I was really happy that it actually fit right in the space between my storage stairs and my sofa. So it's completely out of the way when I don't need it. The storage stairs leading to my daughter's loft are super handy. I've got room for sunglasses and keys. This is a coat closet. It could also be a regular closet. And my daughter loves that when she comes back and forth between my house and her dad's, she can like take all of her clothes and put them in these and not have to carry her heavy bag up and down the stairs. And this is Spider and this is Skelly. And Skelly has fallen on us twice today and we're, we're getting in the spirit with this one. Welcome to my daughter's loft, which she decorated herself. Her number one requirement when I asked was to make sure she had space to put plants up above the cubbies and the wall divider. So she's got all kinds of little plants up there that she's managed to keep alive so far. She keeps a few clothes and personal items in there. And she even put a rug up here to make it feel a little homey. She's got her own artwork and things. She stays up here most of the time when she's here, she's like on her bed organizing things. She loves the space. This is the outside of my not so tiny mansion. It's very modern farmhouse inspired. I had seen this crazy good Chevron that they did on another build. And I thought, what if we put that around my French doors, this section of the house just brings it to life. And it would be so boring without it really. The trailhead comes in at 34 by 10 feet wide with two pop out lofts that make it 36 for the extra one foot on each side. She has a total of 18 windows if you include the French doors and four skylights across the top, two of which will open all the way to the roof for access. So because she's a big house, she is on a triple axle trailer. Fun fact, right here is where the water hooks up to my sink, which is right here. And in the winter when my water froze on entry, I had to crawl under the house right there and shimmy under two axles to hook it up myself. And I've never felt so powerful in my abilities as a homeowner. Um, yeah, not so fun, but I could do it myself. And my tip to you is don't hook up your water behind your wheel. A house this big also has big storage on both sides of my house. I have the same amount of large storage. I have room for all my toys. What more could you want? You can survive on one income. No matter how much that income is, you get to define your lifestyle. Now I'm at a place where I don't have to compromise. I can put my foot down on things that matter, and I don't have to be in a relationship to afford it. I decided I'm at a place where I've gotten married and had kids and had dogs and had the American dream. That didn't actually work out. It can be whatever I want it to be. This is what it looks like. Your house can be a school bus. Your house can be a tiny house. Your house can be a van. And that does not mean, oh, you're cramped up inside this little crazy thing because your life is not inside your house. Your life is going places. Your life is experiencing new things and people and seeing things. You can't do that when you're anchored to a mortgage. When it works for you, you're going to be happier and you're going to live your best life like you get one shot. Thanks for watching this week's video. Make sure to like, share, and subscribe, and I will see you soon with another tiny house, unique home, or alternative lifestyle video.