5 ms·
Ok if you like toy houses, but the points made are moot. This is just feel-good hippy shit that distracts from real progress. Already been done- called mobile
by KevinMS 17y ago
Ok if you like toy houses, but the points made are moot. This is just feel-good hippy shit that distracts from real progress.
Already been done- called mobile home, trailer parks, etc.
Next time you dry past a mobile home park in a relatively affluent region of the country, the cars parked there are not rusting and up on blocks, they can be pretty nice, the people there are not poor. People are often living there because its cheap and efficient, or a second home for work reasons.
Cost - its the land that costs. As they say, a house is a wooden box that sits out in the rain and rots.
If you want efficient housing a medium sized earth sheltered house is simply the best you can get. But you'll never get a loan for it. You can actually heat one of those in the winter with a few people and a few candles. Its because the 'outside' is always a constant temperature, about 50 degrees F.
Theres no reason to think that one of those toy homes would be much less efficient than, say, if you scaled it 2x. The the shape and construction that would really matter.
- tome 17y agoWhy would you never get a loan for it?
- KevinMS 17y agonormally you couldn't get a loan because banks would be worried about the resale value of a "underground" house. But maybe recently you could have because they were just giving loans to anybody. But now you probably wouldn't have a chance. You'd have to build it with cash, and they cost about 20% more than a conventional house, last I checked.
- jws 17y agoIf your construction cost is significantly greater than your resale value, and you intend to borrow a large portion of this cost, then there is not enough collateral for the lender to recover their investment. A house which you will treasure, but is considered undesirable by the masses will be a problem.
- chrischen 17y agoLet's not forget tiny apartments. Not only space efficient but land efficient too (they stack up).
- KevinMS 17y agoand very energy efficient too with all the common walls rather than outside air.
- kirstendirksen 17y agoI'd agree that Jay does a good job of presentation, but I also think the points of living smaller and with less stuff are important. Just read a report that personal spending is 70% of GDP in the US. So given that smaller homes make it tough to buy more it should help cut consumption. We've done a story on living in an RV where the owner talks about how living small cuts down on energy consumption: http://faircompanies.com/videos/view/living-small-when-home-is-a-150-square-foot-rv/ http://faircompanies.com/videos/view/living-small-when-home-...
- HeyLaughingBoy 17y agoAnd what, exactly, is wrong with buying more? Why shouldn't people consume? I've never been much of a consumer, to be honest. Far too cheap for that! But I'm still waiting for someone to explain to me just why consumption is such a problem.
- sleepingbot 17y agoJust start here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overconsumption http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overconsumption. I didn't understand kirstendirksen was actually blaming consumption as is. Overconsumption, owning "stuff", more is better, bigger is better, double is better, etc., is a relatively new social push. Difficult to be really concise and short here. We all are here in a conversation that needs "information", "facts", "decisions", etc. My advice is don't be opinionated before the fact, avoid being defensive when possible, don't stay with asumptions. Asumptions are not facts. "Consumption" is not good or bad. Then, if you relate owning or buying or collecting stuff with things such as happiness, well.
- kirstendirksen 17y agoYou're right. I wasn't condemning all consumption, but overconsumption (what has made is so that if everyone in the world lived like Americans we'd need 5 planets to support us). In the past couple of years, I've started to think more about how most consumption means some sort of depletion of resources and most often they're resources we don't have enough of. I also learned the term "embodied energy" and started taking about what it takes just to make/transport stuff. Add to that thinking about CO2 emissions (also a relatively new concept for me.. past few years) and it all makes me want to try to do what I can to preserve the planet (and its resources) for kids/grandkids.
- nir 17y agoI wouldn't call it "feel-good hippy shit", exactly because of the trailer park example. Trailer parks have a bad reputation for low quality. His houses demonstrate a well designed, nice looking home in a small space. That's a novel idea to many, especially in the US.
- colanderman 17y agoYou, my friend, are a scientist, and not an artist.