Interview With Dee Williams

Thanks to a heads up from Logan over at Rowdy Kittens I was tipped off to this great video featuring Dee Williams.  Dee’s house is one of Jay’s first little house she built from reclaimed materials, she speaks about why she moved into the tiny house.  It is an interview from Peak Moments, which is a great video series, she asks some great questions and does a great job with the video.  One particular topic they touch on is the cultural expectations and consumerism.

 

8 Comments
  1. I’m not big on video over 5 minutes, but this one covered enough ground that it was definitely worth it, and is a great one to share as an introduction! Thanks for sharing it!

  2. (Talking about building code with respect to maintaining property value) “You don’t want to take money of the pocket of someone who is working very, very hard to pay a mortage.”

    That is a very profound thought, and I’m not sure yet how I feel about it. I’ve always taken a very negative view, mostly because the only home I’ve ever owned is currently upside done due to the mortgage crisis aka, someone else’s poor financial decision. But, how many would I truly hurt if I moved into a lot with a tiny house in my current neighborhood. There are many who are like me and struggling to maintain, so far successfully.

    • In listening to her discuss her inviting of the county inspectors and the reasons for why there is an infrastructure of codes in existence, I don’t believe it was so much about the potential of driving down neighboring values simply because there is a little house on the property, but that how a person lives there can. Irresponsible disposal of waste being the biggest concern it seemed – pollution of the land by black and grey water can certainly have a detrimental effect on the surrounding properties. How valuable can a piece of land be if it sits next to an unmanaged, illegal, festering cesspool? I think Dee handles herself, her abode, and her neighbors with responsibility and respect and serves as a good example for people who are thinking about a change of life.

  3. I love you, Dee!

  4. Questions for DEE: 1) What about a tiny home for a couple? Would the space have to be doubled to be comfortable? Would that mean it wouldn’t fit on a trailer or be towable? 2) What about cooking? You may eat out or cook at your friends’ homes but what about people who would need to cook every day in their tiny home? 3) What about storage/refrigeration for food? 4) What about showers? You may take them at your friends’ homes but that doesn’t work for someone who is truly living only in their tiny home. 5) What about zoning and bylaws for those that want to live in their tiny home 100% of the time?

    Being SELF-RELIANT means to rely only on yourself. How does this apply to living in someone’s backyard, using their shower/toilet, taking your water supply from them, and so on??

  5. Great interview!

    She is doing almost exactly what I am doing, except that I’m living in a yurt on my own land and in an area where notions like off-grid living and permaculture are not alien.

    I get my water from a stream and use gravity filters, all my electricity is solar, and I heat with a woodstove.

    Her reasons for doing so are very similar as well.

    • How do you handle your waste water?

      • I don’t have much. When I take a solar shower, it ends up on the ground…I only use pure olive oil soap with no additives. My dish water gets chucked onto my “driveway” and I use a biodegradable dishsoap for that…so very little issue there. I use less water in a day here than is in the flush of the average toilet.

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