When you’re getting ready to live in a tiny house or other kinds of small space you’ll probably end up wanting a futon.

This way when you have guests there’s somewhere for them to sit and/or sleep.

A futon is almost like having a sofa bed except that it’s less expensive and most of the time more comfortable.

In my friend Dan Louche’s first tiny house that he built for his mom, she used a futon as her couch during the day then converted it into a bed in the evening.

This allowed her living room to serve two functions with little effort since she didn’t want to be climbing up a sleeping loft to go to bed.

So here are what I consider to be the top 7 futons for tiny houses and other small spaces.

If you’re actually shopping for this right now, look carefully as you may have to purchase the mattress, cover, and frame separately.

Premiere Futon Mattress

If you already have the frame in place, or simply want to order a futon mattress for your upstairs sleeping loft then here it is.

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With today’s building codes how can you get away with building a garage so that you can convert it into a studio to live in instead of having to construct an entire 1500 square foot plus house on your land?

Is that even possible? Here’s the story of how one guy did it in Hawaii.

Johnny purchased a plot of land with $3000 cash about ten years ago.

He had always wanted a tiny house, but couldn’t get that passed by the city.

So Johnny came up with a great idea. He presented plans for a large house with a separated 400 square foot two car garage and got it approved.

Then he went ahead and built the garage first and got it all inspected and approved legally.

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Photo Credit Faircompanies on YouTube

How to live legally mortgage-free in a garage converted studio

Video length: 10:40

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Phil Thiel of Seattle, Washington, has inspired a whole fleet of tiny human-powered houseboats in the United States, England, and Germany. He calls his quaint canal cruisers Escargots for their slow speed and sells the building plans for just $150. Each 18.5′ by 6′ houseboat fits up to three bunks and is propelled by a combination of pedal and solar power.

The solar drive isn’t strong enough to allow for direct solar power propulsion and the best way to move about is to pedal. At a pedaling rate of 50 rotations per minute, Thiel’s design can puff along at four miles an hour. Keep in mind that the average cyclist pedals at around 60 rotations per minute and professionals can do nearly twice that!

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Human-powered Floating Home

A cute and cozy Escargot canal cruiser

Thiel, now 91 years old, is a naval architect who started enthusing about and building human-powered boats when he was a teenager. Born in Brooklyn and now relocated to Seattle, Thiel has only driven an automobile twice in his life. Houseboats, though, he’s steered plenty of times.

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Living aboard a 36′ Catalina sailboat in the Caribbean… Ah, the good life. Sailboats provide you with a small space so you have little to take care of and clean. Plus, like an RV or motorhome, they give you the ability to travel inexpensively.

I’m Alex Pino and I had the chance to meet up with Derek Diedricksen, author of Humble Homes, Simple Shacks to shoot this video in Cape Coral, Florida. I hope you enjoy watching it, and that it gives you some ideas you can use for your own tiny house, cabin, apartment, or other small space. If you like this post, you’ll also like this post I did on a custom built houseboat in California. Must see!

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36-ft. Catalina Sailboat Cabin

Watch the Video Tour of this 36′ Catalina Sailboat Below

Length: 6:48

I encourage you to watch the video below and if you like it, pass it along. Enjoy..

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Most of you already know Dan Louche of Tiny Home Builders.

He’s currently working on the Tiny Living house model that you’ll see here.

In the past, I’ve given you a video tour of both of his models:

• Tiny Retirement
• Tiny Living

Dan is almost finished with the interior of this one and soon he’ll be starting his next tiny house project.

And guess what..

If you wanted, you can build along with him through his online tiny house workshop which starts soon.

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I encourage you to take a look at the interior video tour below. [continue reading…]

A few days ago I got an e-mail from a guy named Johnny about a tiny house he built on a trailer. After a few exchanges, he said he’d be glad if I shared the information and pictures with you. Some of you might be excited to know that it’s for sale.

The house weighs about 9,000 pounds. Johnny built the trailer from 6″ channel steel which was reclaimed from a tractor plant in Kansas City that was torn down. He said, “It’s good old American made steel from the 1940’s”. The trailer is 8′ 6″ wide and 20′ long.

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Johnny Spire’s Luxurious Tiny Home on Wheels

Photos Courtesy of Johnny Spire

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Have you seen Derek “DEEK” Diedricksen’s 8′ x 8′ x 8′ 64-square-foot tiny house slash micro cabin? It’s made mostly out of plywood and if you’ve read his book, Humble Homes, Simple Shacks, you’ve seen pictures of it already.

They built it in Brooklyn, New York inside the old warehouse workshop you can see below. It was a prefab design done by Derek. It took him two days to create the prefab kit and 5 hours to put it together with 3 people. There are all sorts of cool designs inside and out include a pop up window, lantern and a voodoo owl.

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Diedricksen Bros Build 8×8 Micro Cabin

Photo Courtesy of Derek Diedricksen

When you go inside there’s an Ikea chair, 70s carpet, and a custom-made triangular bed.

Video tour of the 8′ by 8′ tiny prefab house from Deek

Length: 2:45

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Kirsten is going to show you Jay Nelson’s micro house that he built on a customized bicycle. It’s 27 square feet in size and has everything a surfer needs. It even has a roof rack to store and move around your boards!

Jay’s micro vehicle/bicycle home is made out of plywood sheets covered in fiberglass. He even custom made every window that’s on it. This little custom made RV even has a kitchenette with a stove, sink and drain. He uses a manual water pump that’s hooked up to a jug, sort of like this one. There’s even storage underneath the floor to hold everything you’d have to take with you. It stands about 5 feet tall and is 8 feet long and 4 and a half feet wide.

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Jay Nelson and micro houses he’s built on bikes, rowboats, and cars

Photo Credit Jack Halloway via Flickr

I told you it has an electric motor right? It has a range of 10 miles and can go up to 20 mph.

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