So many people ask me, “Deek, how the heck do you come across all your free building materials? I mean, how can you build so affordably? Wizardry? Black magic? A pact with some eight-armed, underworld demigod of refuse?”
Nope. It’s nothing so difficult, nor soul-sacrificing. Step one is just to think outside the box. Following are five simple tips that can save you a tidy sum. Keep in mind that none of these ideas are going to work for everyone stylistically, but they all work without sacrificing quality or strength in a build, and they help lessen that “Oh, crap; a tiny house (or shed or studio) is going to cost me x grand?!” gut punch.
Remember, every penny counts. . . . Speaking of which, you can tile a floor with pennies and epoxy, and it looks absolutely amazing!
1. Subfloor and flooring in one: Instead of the conventional approach of using junky, off-gassing oriented strandboard (OSB) for subflooring and topping it with a standard flooring material, you can use a high-quality, and nicer-looking, plywood instead. Yes, cabinet-grade birch or poplar, for example, costs more than OSB, which may seem counter to my own advice, but this subfloor is going to look so nice it can stay as is, without another layer of flooring (such as expensive tongue-and-groove hardwoods). This will not only save you money, but also time — which, they say, is money after all. A few quick coats of polyurethane will make this floor shine, and down the road, should it get beat or you tire of the look, just pick up where you left off and install that upper layer of flooring. Also, with only one layer of flooring, you’re freeing up 3⁄4 inch of interior height without affecting the overall height of the structure. This can be particularly helpful when you’re building a tiny home on a trailer and have to conform to Department of Transportation restrictions (no more than 13 feet 6 inches tall, total). Every inch or fraction thereof counts in so small a structure. Mark my words. And yes, if you want to save even more money, and are fine with a very rough and rustic look, you can use lower-grade AC fir plywood — it’s just as strong, and works rather well.
One thing we have come to understand about efficiency in a small space is this: everything needs more than one purpose. A bench can be much more than simple seating; it could also serve as extra sleeping and storage space. A wall-mounted table could function as a personal workspace during the day and a dinner table at night (and can be dropped down and out of the way when not in use). Use any small cracks behind or in between items for extra hiding space. For example, the space between your counter and fridge might just be enough to slide a folding chair into, giving you extra seating when needed. By having more than one function, things use up less space in already tight quarters, while at the same time utilizing that space more efficiently.
— Christopher and Malissa Tack, tiny-house builders/owners and bloggers at chrisandmalissa.com
2. Don’t overlook the small things. So you’re driving around doing errands and your spider- sense catches a few doors sitting on the side of the road. Upon second glance you quickly see that they’re lousy, cheap, hollow-core doors — not the kind that will do you any good in most cases. But, as you’re now a further-educated, savvy, uber-creative, and thrifty individual (all because you picked up this book!), you zoom in a little more and realize that these cruddy doors are bedecked with 3-inch door hinges, coat hooks, and all sorts of cabinetry pulls, lock sets, or slide bolts. Bam! In the span of 10 minutes, with a screwdriver from your Road Tools , you remove these items, thus saving them from a landfill and, better yet, from your future “to purchase” list. You can also sell what you don’t use if you end up acquiring a lot of hardware over time. Old, classic doorknobs are another thing to keep an eye out for, some being worth a decent chunk o’ change. I’ve seen prices around $80 for a single vintage knob. (See Here’s where I like to Look for more tips on salvaging.)
3. Furring strips for trim. If you’re content with a simple, less frilly look, you can use furring strips (the cheap 8-foot-long strapping boards you can buy for about $1.69 each at lumberyards) to make your own window, door, and/or wall trim rather easily. No, it won’t look like Victorian crown molding, and it won’t give your home any semblance of Taj Mahal grandeur, but I’ve used this method many times and always been pleased with the look — and even more pleased with the savings. I’ve never had a client complain, either. If you need to neaten up or thin down the stock, a quick trip through a table saw or planer will take care of things. A router table can do wonders too, by etching curves and layers into your stock. But I usually keep things on the simple side. In most cases, I just pick through the pile for the very best boards and use them as they are or with a nice coat of stain to bring out the wood grain. A time- and mess-saving tip: prepaint or stain these thin boards before you install them.
My assorted pile of lumber leftovers might not be organized, but it’s all in one area, which for me is really organized, and very helpful in times of need. The “scraps of scraps” often later go to my kids for their forts, or are painted and drawn on and sold as salvaged artwork online.
4. Save your scraps. This is a “finding what you already have” tip. Hear me out. Yes, a clean job site is important, but it’s still possible to maintain order while saving your scraps — just put them in a designated area to keep things less chaotic. I do understand that some of you out there are neat freaks and might obsess about immediately removing any waste and clutter from the building scene, but try to resist! Here’s why: You’re framing a wall and need just a piece of blocking or some angled knee braces, but you’re fresh out of lumber. Well, a trip to the lumber store for such a little piece (or three or four) is going to kill your momentum, cost you a bit extra, waste your time and energy, and just be an overall pain. But fear not! You most likely already have those very pieces you need right in that scrap pile — the one you’ve been dying to burn, donate to the kids’ fort fund, or throw away. So resist that urge to toss it all! At least for a little while. When this tip does in fact save you a tiny bit of what remains of your sanity, feel free to lavish any thank-you gifts upon me.
5. Secondhand windows and doors. There are some incredible character-loaded castoffs waiting for you out there on Craigslist, in Habitat for Humanity ReStores, at yard sales and architectural salvage yards, in newspaper classifieds, at transfer stations (a.k.a. the town dump), etc., not to mention those found through old-fashioned word of mouth. You may not get the exact size and quantity of doors or windows you were looking for, but if you’re able to remain flexible, you might end up with a unique look that’s even better than what you had inked out. On the other hand, if you’re patient, you’ll most likely find just what you need, without compromise.
Consider using the mathematical patterns that we find in nature to inspire functional yet organic designs that can be applied to storage, windows, doors, trim, and more. The golden ratio, fractals, and repeating geometric designs help give your space unity and peace. Tangrams and other simple shape-combination games can spark your imagination when you come up against designer’s block.
— Joe Coover, tiny-house dweller, blogger at LongStoryShortHouse.com
I often let the material dictate the build. I’m not saying that you should base the look of your home around a single unbelievable door, but I wouldn’t write off the idea completely. I found a free window a while back — a 4 x 8-foot sucker, just monstrous, 32 panes in all — and ever since then I’ve been madly sketching lanternlike tree houses, all based around the use of this single window. The window becomes a wall, the wall a focal point, and the rather unusual tree house is then loaded with light. You never know how an unexpected find might inspire you. Don’t be afraid to let the free junk lead you. If you’re willing to take the chance, you just might be thrilled with the result.
If your tiny house is on a permanent foundation, also consider building a separate storage area. Keep only the items you use daily inside your home, and keep seldom or seasonally used items in the extra storage area outside, which could be as simple as a tiny, unheated shed. Furthermore, the area beneath a tiny house trailer or any raised small structure is seldom seen as a place for usable storage. Get yourself lockable plastic bins to hold large or bulky items to slide in and out as needed. The tiny house overhead will help protect your bins from the elements.
—Steven Harrell, owner of TinyHouseListings.com
By now you’ve probably sensed a “subtle” theme that runs throughout my projects and designs: I like to build things with free junk. “Curbside culling” is a term I coined a while back, and it covers everything from yard-sale searching and word-of-mouth acquisitions to dumpster diving and back-lot browsing, all of which can make a microshelter much more affordable. In addition to the obvious environmental benefits, using recycled goods can make your structure stand out from the pack — in a very good way.
There are, however, some ins, outs, dos, and don’ts of the trade, and I’d like to cover a few of the more common, worthwhile goods you’re going to come across when cruising the streets. You don’t have to wake up early to race the trash crew for prime pickings, and you don’t have to combat fellow “seagulls” (junk hunters) with your fancy moves. Just keep your eyes peeled any time you’re on the road. Don’t worry, it’s not brain surgery; you’ll do just fine.
What are you waiting for? Get out there and start some creative harvesting — and enjoy the process, the savings, and the eventual results.
Here’s a quick list of tools that I often stash in my vehicle in case I need to do some quick dismantling on the roadside, at a transfer station, or in your garage at night! (Kidding . . . kidding . . .) These enable me to take things apart safely and to store them cleanly and securely for transport in my vehicle. If you have a truck or a trailer, you’ll be way ahead of the pack and able to haul just about anything you want, but even the smallest of cars will work for most found items (well, maybe not hot tubs, grand pianos, and fridges!).
These things are strewn everywhere. With increasing technological advances and insulation efficiency (R-value) standards, homeowners are ditching their old (perfectly good) windows at a darn rapid rate. For you and me, this is not a bad thing by any means. I can’t tell you the number of windows I’ve come across, grabbed, and later used in my own projects or just sold to pay for construction items I can’t find for free.
There are, however, a few things to be wary of when it comes to windows. Beyond avoiding cracked glass or broken frames (unless the window is amazing and could be fixed easily enough), you might want to pass on older windows. Not only are most “antique” windows single-paned, and therefore less efficient, but their glazing (the putty that holds the panes in) often needs work or replacing and can sometimes contain a percentage of asbestos. These windows are more likely to be covered with lead-based sealants and paints, too, both things you don’t want to be sprinkling on your breakfast cereal! Now, if the windows are perfectly intact, I’m not saying you can’t use them, as I’ve made use of plenty of them in sheds and shacks, but just be careful, especially if it’s an installation that will be in close proximity to kids, since lead exposure is dangerous for children.
That said, if you ever find any antique-looking stained-glass windows, or Gothic-arched church windows, grab them and hold on to them for dear life! They’re very valuable.
Create the appearance of length in your tiny home by utilizing light colors and thick horizontal lines, such as wide paneling. Also try to reduce complexity on your walls to create the illusion of open space.
— Guillaume Dutilh, tiny-house owner/builder, blogger at tinyhousegiantjourney.com
Just because your house is tiny doesn’t mean that everything in it has to be. Make beds, furniture, showerheads, and so on work for normal-sized folks and then build around them. Trim the open spaces between stuff.
— Hal Colombo, small-home dweller, Seattle tiny-guesthouse “innkeeper”
Logically, doors would be the next topic of consideration here, and they too are abundant. New, they can be incredibly expensive, so on any build I’ve done for a client, if I can incorporate a nice, vintage door that actually enhances the look of the structure while decreasing my cash outlay, you know darn well I’m gonna play that hand.
Vintage doors typically are built differently (often better) than most standard stock doors you’ll find out there today. Granted, you’ll see some amazing new doors with incredibly good R-values, but whether you use them will depend on the caliber, intent, and overall look of your project. For the budget-minded soul, just keep a lookout for replaced doors. Like windows, these are often just sitting curbside, waiting for a new home. At any given time, I seem to have about three or four in stock, which gives me the luxury of options when I’m faced with a need. When my stock gets too thick, I just sell a few.
You can also build your own board-and-batten doors, which is surprisingly easy. The sky’s the limit in terms of materials and design: multicolored boards, mixed lumber stock, inset windows or wine-bottle ends, carved designs — you can get as highfalutin and original as you want.
One key thing to remember is that most people are thrilled to see that you’re taking these items from their curb. Remind yourself of this if you are wary of approaching any prime pickings. In this more environmentally aware age, most citizens of Anytown, USA, or worldwide, will be happy to know that their items, which they might have felt guilty about tossing to begin with, are finding a new home. Some might even see you browsing or picking and then come out and offer you goods that they hadn’t yet had the time to haul out. This has happened to me time and time again.
Although small in the overall scheme of a building project, hardware seems to be the most overlooked realm of ever-present freebies out there. I really do mean ever-present. Most people will see a roadside pile of cheap doors and pass them up without a single synapse-fire of consideration. But true scrounger ’n’ savers are wiser than that. Take it from a guy who won’t have to buy hinges, hooks, knobs, or drawer pulls for a few decades. Now, you may be thinking this a waste of time and energy — all for items so very small — but aside from the motivation of saving perfectly good metalwork from the landfill, consider that hinges, for example, can run up to three or four dollars each. Now consider that the average home has several doors and swinging cabinet fronts, and you’ll start to get a feel for the bigger picture.
I once bought a small box full of old, rusty hinges for two dollars from a barn estate sale in my town. After using many of them, I sold the rest of the lot on eBay for almost $100. Vintage hardware is hard to come by, and it’s expensive at “salvage boutiques,” so be on the lookout for old doors being tossed. Smashed-up dressers often have nice hardware on them, as do kitchen cabinets, which are frequently updated and are loaded with metallic goodies. Learn to look beyond the initial face value of each item you come across — you’ll be amazed at what’s left behind.
Pallet wood can be hit-and-miss. Some of it is just so lousy that it’s not really worth the time to gently bust it apart into useable planks. On the other hand, some pallets are made with woods that may be common in a place like Brazil but are considered exotic and interesting to people like you and me. And shipping pallets, also known as forklift pallets, often are made of oak. Usually you can tell an oak pallet from pine (or other softwood) right off the bat when you try to lift it; oak is much heavier. It’s also expensive, so the effort of reclaiming oak from pallets can be very worthwhile.
Pallets are free at many locales, such as behind industrial park businesses, hardware stores, and any retailers of bulky, heavy items (woodstove shops, for instance). Often all you have to do is ask. You’ll need a truck or trailer to haul off more than one or two, though. Then there’s the disassembly. Some folks use pallet busters — long, crowbarlike tools with forked ends — to speed up the process. And you can find plenty of online tutorials (on YouTube and the like) showing several ways to get it done.
The most important thing to look out for is the grading or identifying stamp on a pallet. The pallets you want to use are stamped with a big old “HT,” indicating that the wood was heat-treated to kill any possibly invasive insects before it made its journey. The pallets you want to avoid carry an “MB” or "MT" stamp. This stands for methyl bromide, a fungicide; you wouldn’t want to spray this on your toast, so don’t use the wood for your new home. Regardless, even with clean-looking “HT” pallets, it's never a bad idea to brush, then spray them down before use, as who knows what used to sit atop them?
There are a ton of things you can use pallet wood for. There are more than a few books on the subject, as well as dedicated websites and instructional videos. Among the most common uses are flooring and wall cladding. While time-consuming, this gives any home a great, multicolored look — all with rustic, natural woods. I’ve also made quite a few Adirondack chairs and benches out of the stuff, as well as bookshelves, toolboxes, and garden planters. I’ve even used the thicker struts (often 2x4s or 2x3s) for actual framing, and I’ve gone so far as using whole pallets as mini “budget decks” or landings on my backwoods cabins.
Looking for a place to put a shelf? Think between the wall studs. Typical wall framing allows for a 141⁄2-inch shelf between the studs. Just make sure you only try this on interior walls. Doing this on exterior walls would compromise your insulation.
— Geoff Baker, founder and owner of Westcoast Outbuildings (Vancouver)
When thinking about maximizing space, look up! The average homeowner only uses about five feet of their available eight or more. Consider adding shelves up high on the wall. They can hold items that you rarely use and can be accessed by a step stool when needed.
— Andrew Odom, tiny-house dweller, podcast host, and blogger at TinyRevolution.us
Don’t forget that lingering out there in garages, sheds, and workshops ’round the world is a veritable treasure trove of nearly or completely free lumber that once was purchased by overzealous do-it-yourselfers who never realized their dreams of building a seven-level tree house, ark, or homemade time machine. This is why it’s important to be outgoing and vocal about your future projects, interests, and needs. By making it known that I’m always on the prowl for materials, I’ve had many people offer up unused lumber piles to me for nothing, on trade, or for a ridiculously small amount of cash. Craigslist is another place where homeowners and carpenters often offer up their overstock. Best of all, though, is the free garage-clean-out lumber I’ve found streetside. I won’t say that I stumble upon this situation all the time, but it isn’t as elusive as a Bigfoot sighting, flock of dodo birds, or albino rhino, either. Keep those eyes peeled.
However you come by it, salvaged lumber can give a build a custom look in addition to saving you loot. If you’re aiming for a distressed look or a certain patina, there’s no better way to achieve this than with wood that already has that genuine aura about it. And this is much easier than trying to reproduce the look of antique wood with new stock, expensive tools, too much time, and chemicals! If rough and vintage wood isn’t your thing, keep in mind that not all free wood is going to be paint-laden and worn. With a little looking, and word of mouth, you’ll probably find just what you need.
As a final tip, plan ahead and start to harbor materials early. A shed will do wonders to keep your materials safe and dry until they’re needed, but on the low end of the spectrum, even just storing them under a six-dollar tarp will be sufficient — at least for a bit. Add in a good dose of patience and persistence while hunting for all this stuff and, again, you’ll be just fine.
Install hooks under your kitchen cabinets for storing pots, pans, coffee cups, and any other things you use frequently. This keeps them easily accessible and out of the cabinets themselves. Hooks are also beneficial (and very affordable) on your closet walls and doors so you can vertically store bags, dog leashes, hats, cleaning supplies, and just about anything you can think of.
— Alex Pino, blogger at TinyHouseTalk.com, Tiny House Newsletter
You don’t have to be the luckiest lad or lass alive to come across good, useful, and nearly free materials. You don’t even have to be that bright or hardworking. Better yet, finding the future bones of your home or retreat can be fun. Since you never know what you’re going to stumble across, it’s almost like a treasure hunt. To make things easier for you, I’ve compiled a list of locales and avenues I’ve found to be fruitful in my years and years of architectural “picking.” I must warn you, though: even the most highly reviewed Salvageaholics Anonymous groups often fail to break the habit, once formed.
Since I don’t mind spreading the good word if it means keeping more things out of landfills, I will tell you that one of my best tactics, with a success rate over 50 percent, is to drop mailbox notes. No, not love letters, but rather “I love that crud of yours” letters. Seriously. If I happen to see huge fallen limbs as potential firewood, a downed line of fencing being heaped for removal, or a seemingly long-forgotten pile of metal roofing or tongue-and-groove siding, I grab a pen and pad I keep in my van and scrawl a little note that reads something like this:
Hey, I noticed you had a pile of ___________ in your backyard, and I’m working on a DIY project right now — on a very, very tight budget. If you’re ever looking to get rid of the stuff, I’ll haul it away for you and save you the hassle, or maybe even give you a few bucks for it [or case of beer, help with yard work . . .]. If interested, let me know. I’d really appreciate it, as my funds are limited and I could certainly put that stuff to very good use.
[Name and phone number]
You might also add:
“When I’m done with my project I’ll be sure to send you a photo of it, if you’d like!”
Of course, you’ll have to tailor the letter to the situation. You might not even want to suggest money because if they’re willing to get rid of their goods for nothing you’ve now shown your hand and put money in their minds. Use your own judgment, but always be sure to be polite and keep it short, sweet, and legible. This little method has worked for me many, many times and once yielded a nearly suspension-killing trailerload of 8-foot-long, true 1x8 planks. I’m smiling right now as I think about that find and how many projects that score has since gone into. People often tear down decks and pay someone for the demo work, so there’s another avenue you might want to stroll down— money and material, all from “junk.”
Another overlooked means to acquisition is to simply make it known that you’ll soon be undertaking a project and are looking for secondhand materials. “If your neighbors know, the junk will flow” is a goofy little saying I often share with students. You’ll be shocked to see how much useful material will be saved and offered to you — sometimes too much of it, so be warned.
No matter how well you plan out your storage, you might still be left with a “dead space” that you can’t make much functional use of. Typical offenders are spaces stuck between, under, behind, or on top of cabinets, drawers, or other built-in furniture. One way to put every inch to work is to install some James Bond secret compartments! While you might not be able to keep much inside your weird triangle space between your loft joist and your built-in closet, it will delight friends when you pop it open to get your extra batteries or personal documents . . . top-secret documents, of course! One pro tip is to use magnets or baby-proof cabinet latches to secure your secret door.
— Joe Coover, tiny-house dweller, blogger at LongStoryShortHouse.com
