Retired into Tiny House for Security & Freedom!

So what's better a tiny house on wheels or a traditional RV? There are a few big things that set them apart, but they both offer location flexibility. In today's episode, learn why Tina ditched her RV to retire in a tiny house. Hi, I'm Tina and this is my tiny house. I am in Silo Creek RV Resort. It's just north of Dallas. I've been living in my tiny house now for about nine months. It was built by Decathlon Tiny Homes. The dimensions are eight and a half wide by 32 foot long. I have really enjoyed being here at Silo Creek RV Resort. The owners are absolutely wonderful. It's got nice beautiful trees, so I feel like I live in a tree house part of the time. Looking out one of my windows, they have a wonderful pool. It's great. My lot rent here is $800 a month and that includes all of the utilities except the electric. I really feel fortunate that I am able to help do things around the RV campground in exchange for my site rent. It helps me out as a retired person and this is such a wonderful park. I take pride in making sure that everything is clean and looks good and people feel welcomed. So you probably noticed I have an unusual porch. Number one, I needed something that was easy access because as I get older, I know that I'm not going to be able to get up and downstairs really easily sometimes and so I contacted a company that sells pallets and decided how many I needed to have the height that I want and put it all together. It's wonderful because each pallet weighs about 25 pounds and I can move it myself whenever I decide to relocate. All right, let's take a look inside. Just follow me. All right, welcome to my home. I chose the Poseidon tiny home from Decathlon Tiny Homes. I have a total of right around 320 square feet. I chose this particular model because it has a downstairs bedroom. Well, let's start right here behind me. This is my living area. I really enjoy the fact that it's all white and bright. The ceilings are wonderful with the cedar. Smells good, number one. You know, one thing that I thought was important was being able to have good air circulation and so my light fixture is actually a little fan so that's awesome. So you just need to think about things like that. I did add a little fireplace to mine because I realized I missed a fireplace so I got the fireplace. All right, one thing you know that was really important to me in looking at living tiny is I love light. So I wanted lots of windows and April and Jerry were more than accommodating for that. If you look, my house actually backs up to a bunch of trees. I have birds out there that come and sing to me at the window and I really enjoy that. Sometimes I feel like I live in a tree house. So another thing that I really didn't consider whenever I was doing my tiny house and looking at the layout is are you having to really crane your neck back to look up at your TV or is it right in the right spot? So consequently, I had it moved down so that it would be a more comfortable range. Next, let's move into the kitchen area. It's kind of the middle section of the house here. Some things that were very, very important to me is I wanted a nice big sink. One thing that I was absolutely adamant about is I not have a trash can sitting out and so they were wonderful about actually building a cabinet so that I would have a space for my trash can. So that is absolutely awesome. You know, the most important thing to think about is how you cook, how much you want to cook, what type of cooking you do. I chose kind of a combination of things. I have a propane cooktop, two burner cooktop, which is absolutely perfect. It's just the perfect size for me. And then I went with the kind of a combination oven. It is a microwave air fryer convection oven. So I can actually bake cookies if I want to bake cookies or if I want to air fry something for a quick meal, then I have that as well. Lots and lots of storage space. They were awesome about using the space well. So I have really nice slide outs. Great big huge drawers for storage, for food storage and for bowls and pots and pans, that type of thing. So it's really nice. If you scoot over here to this side of the kitchen, I have my nice refrigerator, has the freezer on the bottom. It's absolutely great. I know I've had people say, how in the world do you get anything in there? But it's 10 cubic feet. It's perfect for me. I get plenty of things in the freezer. So it works out great. Obviously, I don't have everything that I had when I lived in a larger space. But I learned very quickly that I had a lot of things that I just didn't use very often, or that I had things that were multiple function that were better to use in my tiny home, as opposed to having something separate for every little task. What's compact, versatile, and on wheels? A tiny house, of course. Oh, and also, Vivor's collapsible folding wagon. From shopping to gardening, this bad boy has got your back. And when you don't need it, it quickly folds to a small size for easy storage. At just over 11 pounds, this lightweight folding wagon is surprisingly heavy duty. It's made of thick steel and high-strength iron with an impressive 225-pound load capacity. Man, this thing can hold a lot. It's perfect for carrying camping gear, gardening supplies, and enough water balloons for an epic battle in the park. This thing is made with durability in mind. With rust-proof pipes and wear-resistant fabric, it's designed for all terrains. Featuring five-inch PVC tires with 360-degree bearings. Smoothly navigate across uneven surfaces? No problemo. Ready to rock and roll in the garden or various outdoor adventures? Get your Vivor collapsible folding wagon today. See the link in the description below. Over on this side of the kitchen are the stairs that go up to the loft. Right now, I'm using it for storage. In the future, I'll have a little storage building, so I'll have it set up up there for when my grandkids come to visit this summer, and it'll be great. They'll think it's a hideout. I have looked at tiny houses for a while. I kind of like the whole idea of less is more. I like to be organized. I'm not a person who likes a lot of clutter or things just sitting around, and so living tiny makes you be organized. Also, I like the idea of being portable, being able to move from place to place. I am a single woman, recently retired, have been a nurse for 46 years, and ready to give that up. So I'm just starting to enjoy the retired life. I was a travel nurse for about five years. About six years ago, I had a relationship change and decided that was something I'd always wanted to do, and if I was going to, now was a great time. So I got an RV and took off, and I've just been just a lot of different places taking care of kids, doing pediatric nursing, also taking care of new mamas and babies and that kind of thing. So met some wonderful people, worked some great places. So I think the benefits of a tiny home over an RV, number one, utilities, if you have one that is well built. I mean, in the heat of July, August in Texas, my highest electric bill's been $50. And part of that is because of the quality, quality build. It is spray foam insulated so that it is really energy efficient. And again, just the feeling of stability. Like I know when Decathlon builds their tiny homes, they anchor them with hurricane ties to the trailer. And so even when it's windy and stuff, I don't feel a whole lot of wind. It doesn't shake. The shingles are high grade shingles. And so when it hails, it's just like being in a house or, you know, it rains. It's like being in a house as opposed to in an RV. I guess I just didn't feel quite as safe. I just feel like it'll last me for years and years and years as opposed to an RV having more issues. And I think the biggest thing about the difference between the RV and the tiny house is I chose quality over size because you can get RVs that have more square footage than what I've got here, but you have slides that slide out so you have a bit more room, but they leak or they're cold or they're too hot or that kind of thing. So I'm just happy with just the smaller square footage and the stability and the security that I feel from the tiny house. Next, we're going to head into the bathroom. And if you'll notice, the doors don't swing out. They are pocket doors and that's very important for your space. And as we go here into the bathroom, you'll see I have everything I absolutely need. It was very important to me that I have an area to do my laundry. So I have a stackable washer and dryer. That was, I believe, an upgrade with Decathlon, but I have used one of the single washer and dryers before that does everything and I just didn't care for that. And so I like the stackable much better. The other thing is, is I'm not a person who takes baths and I prefer a shower. And so I went with this gorgeous shower. It actually opens like this so that you have plenty of space to get in. I think it's like 36 by 36. So that's absolutely perfect. It works out well for me. The other thing that Jerry and April were really good about doing is I am a taller person and I didn't want a little bitty short potty. And so they were great about putting in a taller toilet for me. Moving on this way, you probably noticed in the kitchen that my countertops are all butcher block. I love, love, love this oblong sink. One thing to think about, and I had never thought about it in the past, is when you drop something in the sink and you have a bowl, it rolls down and you're racing to get it, keep it from falling into the drain. With this, it just kind of plunks down and you have a chance to save it before your earring or whatever it might be goes down the drain. So that's something I would think about and I had never thought about that before until I had this oblong sink. So that's a perfect thing. I have also had the opportunity to have a tankless hot water tank in the past and endless hot water. I would recommend that to everyone. It's so important. If you've ever lived in an RV and you had a little six gallon tank where you had to do the shower, where you got wet, soaped up, turned the water off, turned the water back on, got the soap off, then you would really, really appreciate the tankless hot water heater. So one thing that I really enjoy about my tiny house is the bathroom is in the middle between the living room, kitchen area, and the bedroom. That way when I have people over and they need to go to the restroom, they don't have to go into my bedroom. You know, there are days you just don't want to make your bed. So in the back of the house is my bedroom and once again, we have a pocket door to close that off should I want to close that off. But I feel like I have more than ample space in here. You know, one thing to really think about is, are you living by yourself? What else are you going to be doing? Because I started out with a queen-size bed and obviously in this space there was a little room to walk on either side, but then I had no room for a desk or, you know, much else other than a bed. So I did after a while decide, you know, it's just me. I'll eventually have space in the loft for people to sleep if they stay over. So I did trade out and get a twin-size bed. I love it now. I have my desk over here. Sometimes I'll come in here and open the window and sit here and read. I like to sew, so I'll put my sewing machine up there. It works out absolutely perfect. I also have a TV up here on the wall. Don't use it a whole lot because I'm out and about, but I do have that and the mini splits are awesome. So if that's an option that you have whenever you're building or purchasing a tiny home, the mini splits work wonderfully in the Texas heat. When it was cold, there's one here as well as one in the living room kitchen area. Another thing that I didn't even think about, but thank goodness my builder did, is the fact that when you have a home that's really well sealed and that type of thing, if you don't have some kind of good air exchange, that you'll have mold that grows, etc. I have never had to worry about that because they installed, this is called a lunos, and it basically is an air exchanger. And I don't know, you may have noticed in the living room on the opposite end of the house, there is another square just like this and it basically keeps the air flowing and moving through the house. I chose the downstairs bedroom because I knew I would have this into retirement and as I get older, going up steps is a little bit more difficult. And just with the length of the tiny house, the stairs are quite deep and so I knew that I wanted to have a downstairs bedroom. So at the end of my bed, I have my closets. There's one on either side and the one thing that I really appreciated about my builder is that they allowed me to customize some things. They had kind of a different plan for this area. I think they had some bi-fold doors or something like that and I knew that I wanted more closed, more cabinet style looking. I mean, this is my home. It's not a temporary RV or that type of thing. So they were awesome. I wanted drawer space as well as hang up space and they were awesome about changing that out. And in fact, now that they've done it, this is what they do in everybody's home. So it was great. You know, one thing that I love about having the tiny house is honestly, like I can sweep and mop and change the sheets and clean out the refrigerator and do all that kind of stuff and within a couple of hours, I'm like done because there's just not a lot of space. I don't have a lot of stuff just sitting around and so it makes that part of life really easy. You know, when I really first started looking at tiny living and that type of thing, some of it was, you know, kind of cost analysis. Looking at what the cost of, say, renting a house in the area or renting an apartment in the area, that kind of thing. One thing that I found out is that nothing is cheap in this area of the country, which I think a lot of people are experiencing just everywhere. But, you know, the Dallas-Fort Worth, Metroplex, the rent is crazy expensive and then you have all of your utilities on top of that. You have to consider what it's going to cost you to live and what your lifestyle is going to be like and payments you have. Basically, here I am in retirement now and I have my tiny house payment, you know, my cell phone bill, insurance kind of thing, things you have to know that you're going to have all the time, and a car payment and that's it. So that affords me to be able to travel and do the things I want to do and be able to afford it. This particular model, I think the price on it is like $89,000 something thousand and then you choose your upgrades, what you want. In the end, I paid $124,000, financed it through a company that they recommended. The process was very easy, you know, I had my down payment and that kind of thing. The build process went on. April and Jerry were wonderful about keeping me up to date. I went to Saxxy a couple of times, I'm sure I bothered the heck out of them, but they were real sweet to send videos and pictures and here's how things are going. The mortgage place was really good about keeping me up to date on paperwork and that type of thing. So the process really was not bad. It was a lot easier than homes I've purchased in the past, that's for sure. Until you actually live in a tiny house, you don't know how you're going to live in it. You know, there are things I'm like, darn, I wish I would have thought about that. But it's okay and I've made adjustments and I think it's very important for people to maybe go and rent a tiny house for more than just a vacation, because vacation is pretty different than being in it day to day and, you know, thinking about, okay, now I have to clean this toilet. Do I really want a composting toilet or do I just want to use a toilet bowl cleaner and clean it the easy way? So yeah, if you had the opportunity to go and, you know, live in one for say even six months or whatever, three months maybe even, I think it would give you a better perspective as to how much space you need and how you would actually live in Taking notes during your stay in a tiny Airbnb can really help you figure out what works best for you. Like we did at this cozy comfy gooseneck tiny home with a standing height bedroom. Check out this tour to get ideas.