Maybe it’s the Elon Musk influence again. One of Texas’ newest residents prefers living small. It’s been rumored that the billionaire is living in a 400-square-foot, foldable house in Boca Chica.
In this case, living small in Texas is likely not because of Musk’s actions. Apparently, we’re good at it.
Texas is one of the nation’s best states when it comes to tiny homes, according to a recent study by IPX1031. That’s right, one of the best. We’re ranked second behind Georgia.
The methodology is a bit complex: The study takes into account a tiny home cost, cost of living, median income, parkland coverage, annual average temperature as well as tiny home legality and regulations in every state. Each factor was weighted and ranked on a 25-point scale.
For Texas, the key data points are cost and income: An average tiny home in Texas costs $48,120 and the median income is $64,034.
IXP1031 is a national company that guides investment property transactions, so it churns a lot of this kind of data.
In the IXP1031 study, Hawaii’s tiny homes were the most expensive ($93,333) while Mississippi was the least expensive ($30,000).
Getting a tiny home is one of the extreme steps in downsizing. Instead of stepping down from the 2,500-square-foot Texas-style suburban homes and into something scalable, you’re stepping down as small as 400 square feet. In Texas, of course, some homeowners build bigger backyard sheds for their tools and lawnmowers.
It’s not hard to go tiny. Plenty of companies offer prefabricated tiny homes, including Boxable, a Las Vegas-startup that specializes in easy-to-construct housing modules. The kind that Musk is reportedly leasing costs $50,000.
Tiny home enthusiasts can also turn to:
- Home Depot, which has kit homes for as much as $61,590 for 1,298.3 square feet. Wal-Mart and Amazon also offer kits.
- The Spurce’s 5 Best Tiny Home Kits of 2021.
- Country Living’s list of 18 prefab tiny houses.
- Even Chip and Joanna Gaines converted an abandoned house into a shotgun tiny home space in Waco, probably with shiplap. The episode is on YouTube, but it’s only available for purchase.
- IKEA, which has a 187-square-foot dwelling that starts at $47,500. In a very unlike-IKEA move, the homes come prebuilt.
- If you really want to have some fun, an IKEA-branded Japanese show stars the Blåhaj shark toy whose mission is to find the smallest living spaces that it can.
As our home values rise — and you’re really comfortable living in a smaller space with someone — a tiny home could be a big solution.
