Rising housing costs make it feel nearly impossible to own — or even rent — a home these days.
When COVID-19 left Julius unemployed, he found himself inspired by YouTube videos of tiny homes, and decided to use all of his resources to build a home that was both affordable and sustainable.
While the Australian had no prior building experience, now his beautiful tiny home has been featured by Living Big in a Tiny House, and he’s sharing how he created the home of his dreams for just the cost of two years’ rent.
“It, I guess, just sort of evolved naturally,” Julius said in a tour of his home. “I didn't have a whole lot of money, so it was just about sort of finding things along the way and watching lots of YouTube videos of how to do stuff. With little experience building, you can't get it to look perfect, so I just embrace that look.”
Julius and his partner affectionately refer to the house as “hodgepodge,” since it was constructed with repurposed materials from companies throwing them away or houses being demolished.
The external cladding of the home is a combination of different Native Australian hardwoods from an architectural firm, and the windows were purchased secondhand through Facebook Marketplace.
The rear and side parts of the house are also patch-worked with incongruous pieces of corrugated metal, with different shapes and colors creating something of a mosaic.
The home itself sits on a double-axle trailer. It measures about 29.5 feet in length and 8.2 feet in width, and it stays parked on a piece of land owned by his parents in Victoria, Australia.
Opting for a tiny home was an easy decision for Julius, who said he’d always been drawn to “cozy spaces,” in addition to living a more minimalist lifestyle.
“I was drawn to have less and use less and live in a way that is alternative and slightly, you know, a little bit radical … to combat some of the things that are happening in the world and the direction that the world’s traveling in.”
He acknowledged that having the land from his parents was “a massive privilege,” but ultimately made it feasible for him to live in a way that was more focused on sustainability and less on consumption.
“If you're lucky enough to have that close family dynamic, it's actually the easiest form of community to lean into,” he added.
Julius said getting support from his friends, loved ones — and even strangers — was vital in bringing the home together, with people offering time or materials to complete the build. He even downloaded the building plans from generous tiny home builders online.
“I made some really good connections with people that repurposed materials from companies that were throwing them away, or houses that were being demolished,” Julius said.
“Once you form relationships with those people they can be really wonderful resources of advice and provide you stuff that you can use.”
The interior of his home is also filled with secondhand or reclaimed furniture pieces, like an old kitchen cabinet upcycled into a bathroom vanity.
Utilities are also designed with intention, including a simple water tank, solar panels, and a water runoff system that sends wastewater to be repurposed in the garden.
Julius describes every aspect of his home as “puzzle pieces” that came together “just one piece at a time, rather than thinking about an end product.”
The final product he has now, however, serves as a reminder that living sustainably and minimally does not mean things have to be boring.
“I think that is the best way to build, especially on a project like this where it is quite organic and you don't necessarily have to have the perfect vision for how it's all going to come out,” Julius said.
“So much of the design just gets dictated by what you find, and I think the result of that is a space that just ends up with so much more character than sort of a cold architectural design.”
Overall, Julius said he spent about $60,000 on the home, just about doubling his original budget. But in Victoria, he added, that equates to about two years of rent.
And this tiny home? It’s all his.
“I think, probably for commercial interests, there’s been this sort of wall of mystery that’s been built around building and constructing your own home, as if it's something that's really hard, and as if it's something you shouldn't accomplish,” Julius said.
“And it's not until you actually pick up a hammer and just give it a go that you realize, ‘Oh, I can actually do this.’”
Header image courtesy of Living Big In A Tiny House/YouTube
