Road Trip 3: Living large by living tiny

I spent the first two weeks of August on an extended road trip. For two weeks, I had a nomadic lifestyle. Now, I have two weeks of going to medical appointments and then recovery. I don’t need to tell you which two weeks I prefer. I am finally getting a longstanding problem with the veins in my legs corrected. The process is somewhat more than I bargained for. The moral of that story is: if you are able, don’t put off getting medical things taken care of.

This third installment of my road trip commentaries is about staying in a tiny house. Maybe, like me, you have heard about them and are curious. Maybe you have watched TV shows about them. (I have not.) I learned that you can live large while living tiny.

The vision for this trip came about last spring. Two friends and I wanted to plan an escape from August heat. It is a popular time to go to North Carolina. I knew I needed to look for reservations in advance. A friend thought I would like Waynesville because of its amenities close to beautiful mountain scenery. I combined that recommendation with my curiosity about tiny houses. With just one Google search, I found Water 65, a tiny house resort right in Waynesville.

The property is in the historic Frog Level district, which got its nickname from lying in the lowlands downhill from Main Street and along the Richland Creek. There are historic buildings throughout the neighborhood. The Water 65 resort’s property is adjacent to the creek, which unfortunately suffered catastrophic flooding from Hurricane Helene in September 2024. The damage to the buildings housing shops and to their inventories was extensive. That part of the area has not yet recovered.

The grounds of Water65 were flooded, but the three tiny homes were spared. This little resort was created by a couple as their “pandemic project” in 2020-2021. They continue to take great pride in ownership. Each home is 420 square feet. These three homes are complemented by large covered porches with nice tables and overhead fans. Anyone staying on the ground floor has use of a propane-powered fire pit and a hot tub. These homes have full-sized kitchens and sleeping areas in a ground-floor bedroom and a loft. Two of us left the loft to our most agile companion. I took time to read a novel by the creek on a couple of afternoons.

The three of us felt we had everything we needed, and more, there. We chose to dine on locally grown produce and had our meals on the porch. We enjoyed hearing the rooster and chickens from across the creek.

Many tiny home communities are centered around leisure and nature activities and provide recreational facilities in common spaces. Some are reserved for residents' over- 55 guests. Still others are called “agrihoods” and are centered on a lifestyle of tending community gardens, caring for farm animals, and sustainable living. They often contain a mix of homes for rent or purchase.

Whatever one’s particular interests and needs are, there is a place for it. This type of community is growing in popularity. They offer affordable lifestyle options and a sense of community that people don’t find elsewhere. Sometimes, tiny homes are ADU’s (auxiliary dwelling units) and are located on property owned by family members. This is a way to offer elderly family members privacy and dignity in their living space or independence for single adults. One tiny home manufacturer summarizes the benefits of tiny home living as: lower cost of living, minimal maintenance, energy efficiency, flexibility and freedom, lifestyle simplification, community living, and investment potential.

I hear a lot of values clarification in these criteria. If you are at a point in your life where you can make choices, what guides those choices? The cost of housing is an important factor to consider. Those of us in the church business often say that a budget is a moral document. That is true for churches and for individuals and families and communities. We see many more homes being built in our area that are out of financial range for many, while the need for moderately priced and lower-priced housing is great. In addition, our government has left the task of caring for the unhoused to nonprofits. Cumbersome regulations discourage investors from thinking outside the box in neighborhood design.

Living large by living tiny is not for everyone. For some, it could be the answer to a need or desire long gone unmet.