the only reason i own my home outright at 45 is because: My wife died in 2011 and insurance payout covered the house. i could not buy my own home again. capitalism sucks.
this post was submitted on 05 Nov 2025
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I'm 44 and want a tiny home, but even they're getting up there in price. Apartment living is really disheartening.
It's not just tiny homes are getting up their in price; they are extremely affordable. The issue is you'll need to place it on a foundation and once you do, you'll be beholden to the same permits as a regular sized house which can add a tremendous expense. Sure, you can go the trailer/on wheels route, but that opens up to other issues such as home theft (literally) to cities outright not allowing it on your lot.
Also take into consideration that a lot of municipalities do not like tiny homes as it goes against the look of the town/city, to some even outright banning them to having exorbitant fees placed on them.
I've looked into tiny homes and to save money, I would have to move out to the rural areas where I am permitted to build them without being hassles by the city. Oh, and if your neighbor doesn't like your home, you can definitely expect frequent visits from the city inspectors to fuck your day over.
All I want is a tiny home, and a big front/backyard to garden/self-sustain my family.
It's not just the permits; it's the land itself. The vast majority of every metro area's land is zoned single-family with minimum lot sizes vastly larger than what a single tiny home would need, so you end up being forced to buy hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of land before you can even start to build on it, tiny house or otherwise.
Oh yeah you're well versed in the rules and regs. It's insane to me the push back tiny living gets from established systems, but it does attempt to fly in the face of the American way and capitalism.
You can buy a Tuff Shed for $20k with foundation installment, insulate it yourself, all for less than $27k. Toss in electrical, and water; you're looking at around $40k. Permits and such will probably add another $10-$15k. Overall, you're looking at $80k for a tiny home in a major city versus homes that go for more than $600k. Rurally in my county, I've seen homes go for $300k, so you're still saving a fuckton of money.
Tiny living absolutely goes against capitalism and our need to consume more than what we can handle to be further in debt by those who control the means.
I live in the Philly metro area and you see exactly 0 tiny homes around here. They are just not allowed by any municipality, anywhere. The closest I've found are at a sort of tiny home park in Lancaster, about an hour and a half away. And the owner of that development had to fight tooth and nail for years to get approval for it.
I refuse to believe that anyone is buying homes
It's extremely hard. I bought a house by myself last year, but I had the fortune(?) of living rent free in a van for 3 years while I saved as hard as I could. I was also working 2 jobs, 7 days a week, earning about $145k a year. And it's one of the cheapest houses in the area, a relatively small block. Now I only work 6 days a week. The value of my house has already gone up by 18%, in one year that I've been here. It's madness.
Absolutely none of what you just said makes any sense… However, I’m glad that you’re finally in a home.
Was that your van parked down by the river?
I found it easy, just took a long time. UK has got a fairly good minimum wage though, £12.21/hour now. Think it's a little better than when I was saving (adjusted for inflation) too.
2 of us, got a semidetached bungalow for £230k on the south coast.
Corporations are buying up homes to rent them out or tear them down to build small condos to rent out.
Land is limited in America and it'll get worse. Before covid I didnt buy a 5 acre lot for $4k because it was out in the desert + wife was unsure of job opportunities. The same lot today is going for $20k.
A few people are, but the market has dropped like a rock over the past year. Several housing markets are seeing massive drops as post-COVID demand dried up.
While this is true, job opportunities for remote markets are drying up. Those markets in rural areas went big because everyone was working remote, and you can do that from anywhere with an Internet connection. Now that everyone is being forced into RTOing, people are selling those nice little rural homes to move back into apartments in the city, or else trying to find business opportunities or something out in the country.
Only reason I was able to buy a home in my mid-40s was my wife picking up the phone to inquire about Habitat for Humanity. Make the fucking call!
Worst case is you spend an hour at the introductory meeting and figure it won't work for you. Can't imagine many reasons it wouldn't, just put in the application.
Be glad to answer questions, but be aware, the program varies a bit by region.
I bought the cheapest one bedroom apartment I could find, it's not bad but now I'm in decades of debt.
Same. My husband and I bought a small 2bdrm condo when we were 36. We will pay it off in 20 years, even though together we make 220k/year.
I was looking at one of these a few years ago, a decent 1BR unit for $125K. I thought that was reasonable until I learned that the condo fee was $960 per month and that the building had hit owners with special assessments for about $10K each year for the three years prior. Like, I'm supposed to pay almost $2000 a month just to live in an apartment that I already bought?
I just bought an actual 2BR house for $140K and the cost of my taxes plus homeowners insurance comes to $400 a month.
I was thinking that was cheap but that must be American dollars right
Yeah, USD.