In Nashville, Tennessee, six brightly-colored, 60-square-foot homes dot the property of Green Street Church of Christ. But their occupants aren’t fashionable trend-setters. They’re homeless folks who have found shelter in tiny houses.
In addition to four walls and a roof, the homes offer Murphy beds, laminate flooring, and a door that locks. Even better, they provide residents, some of whom used to live in tents, an address to put on job applications.
Green Street Church began allowing the homeless to pitch tents on its property several years ago, but ran into trouble with Nashville zoning ordinances. While that matter hasn’t yet been legally solved, a privacy fence has settled things down with the neighbors.
Having people move from tents to tiny houses, which are rent-free, should help even more.
“[Tents] aren’t really made to be lived in,” Caleb Pickering, a deacon at Green Street Church, told CT.
The homes were set up by a local nonprofit and the church keeps an eye on them.
“We have the right to go in and make sure they’re being taken care of,” Pickering said. “It’s trickier with tents. Tiny houses also present a better face to your neighbors.”
The tiny house movement sprouted in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, when 308-square-foot Katrina Cottages were developed as an alternative to FEMA housing. The popularity of the ecologically-friendly houses, which cost far less to build and maintain than a standard house, grew during the recent recession.
Last year, the American Tiny House Association was formed. At the same time, the structures made their television debut, with Tiny House Nation on A&E and Tiny House Hunters on HGTV.
The stylish look of the tiny houses makes it easier to gain support from neighbors who don’t normally work with the homeless.
“They don’t look like they’re slapped together,” Pickering said. “They look nice.”
Like tents, the houses are meant to be one step on the way to something better. One occupant at Green Street Church is working 40 hours a week at $8 an hour, trying to save up enough to get out on his own. Another is on disability and has a housing voucher, but is waiting for an approved place to live.
The tiny houses in Nashville resemble those in other areas of the country, including 100 micro-homes for the homeless planned by Mobile Loaves & Fishes ministry in Austin, Texas, and a village of tiny houses in Eugene, Oregon, developed by SquareOne Villages, a nonprofit with Christian ties.
SquareOne Villages is currently building its second village, Dan Bryant, pastor and executive director of SquareOne Villages, told CT. Slightly larger than the homes in the first village, the 150 to 250-square-foot structures will have a sleeping area, bathroom, and kitchenette.
They will also meet the 2015 international residential code requirements for a dwelling unit, which were recently changed to accommodate the tiny houses trend.
Bryant said that there are few affordable options in Eugene for those who want to get off the streets. “The waiting list for affordable housing in our community—with a single bedroom—is five years.”
Like Green Street Church, SquareOne has found that tiny houses for the homeless, which will rent for $250 to $350 a month, are much better received by neighbors than tent cities.
“The site we purchased was proposed for a tent city and got huge resistance,” Bryant said. “We had to overcome that resistance—this is not a tent city, but it’s meant for those who have transitioned out of homelessness or are rent-stressed and at risk of becoming homeless.”
Tiny houses are also cheap and easy to build.
“It costs about $170,000 for a traditionally built affordable housing unit,” Bryant said. “We’re building these [150 to 250-square-foot homes] for a per-unit cost of $34,000.”
Because they’re simple, tiny houses can be built with volunteer labor. In fact, high schools have volunteered to build and donate in Oregon and in Tennessee.
“We’re excited,” Bryant said. “When you have a little structure, you’re more stable and secure. You’re better insulated for winter. You have a place to keep your stuff.”
While tiny homes for the homeless are catching on, churches and charities are still feeling their way around them.
“I feel like this is a big experiment,” Pickering said. “We’re here doing what we feel like God is telling us to do. We’re taking it as it comes.”
