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Tag: homeowners
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7 charming off-grid homes for a rent-free life
Want to make rent and utility bills a thing of the past? We’ve rounded up seven off-grid homes that could be the answer to making your dreams a reality. Stylish and self-sufficient, these eco-friendly dwellings promise freedom from the grid. Many are even set atop wheels to let you move with your home to almost anywhere you desire. Keep reading to see seven charming homes that offer homeowners the chance to live off the grid and rent-free.
Powered by solar energy and made from recycled materials, the WOHNWAGON is a beautiful mobile and modern home with a housing footprint so small it fits within the size of a standard parking lot. This larch-clad caravan was designed for homeowners who wish to travel the world and enjoy comfortable off-grid living thanks to energy-efficient features including a green roof, triple-glazed windows, graywater recycling, solar panels, highly efficient insulation and more. Developed for mass production, the WOHNWAGON starts at 40,000 Euros and can be individually customized.
For those who want a little off-grid place of their own with more of a futuristic edge, look no farther than the EcoCapsule. Now available for pre-orders, the tiny egg-shaped home that went viral in 2015 has been displayed around the world wowing visitors with its ability to produce all of its energy onsite with rooftop solar panels and a low-noise wind turbine that feed into a 10kWh battery. Developed by Nice Architects, the mobile home can be moved or dropped in place with a crane or helicopter, giving owners the freedom to live almost anywhere they please.
South Africa-based architect Clara da Cruz Almeida collaborated with local design firm Dokter+Misses to create POD-Idladla, an adorable flat-pack home with off-grid capabilities. Targeted at young adults, the tiny solar-powered was conceived as a customizable eco-friendly home at an affordable price. The modular design can also be expanded upon with additional pods to make multi-unit configurations that house up to 12 people.
If homes inspired by fantasy and fairytale are more your style, you’ll love Moon Dragon. Tiny house builder Abel Zimmerman Zyl of Zyl Vardos designed and built this tiny timber off-grid home that looks like it’d be right at home in Middle-Earth. Outfitted with a solar kit for off-grid living, the beautifully detailed mobile home boasts masterful craftsmanship as well as impressive an impressive suite of features, from a five-burner Range cooker with two ovens to a loft bedroom large enough for a queen-sized bed.
Lovers of travel and modern, minimalist house designs will feel right at home in KODA, a tiny prefabricated home created by Estonian design collective Kodasema. Designed with off-grid capabilities, KODA can be assembled on a variety of surfaces without the need for foundations or disassembled and prepped for relocation in as little as four hours. Fronted with large quadruple-glazed windows, the light-filled modular house can also be expanded with multiple units.
Designed as an escape from city life, the Ark Shelter was created to reconnect people with nature. The self-sufficient modular cabin is prefabricated from durable timber and placed on site atop raised, mobile foundations. Wind turbines, solar power, and rainwater collection allow the home to go off-grid.
Dutch design agency Walden Studio teamed up with carpenter Dimka Wentzel to design a tiny home that’s big on luxury and freedom. Equipped with all the systems needed for off-grid living, the contemporary mobile home is filled with natural light and natural materials like the cork floors and birch plywood paneling. The 17-square-meter home also contains plenty of multifunctional furniture to maximize its small footprint.
http://inhabitat.com/7-charming-off-grid-homes-for-a-rent-free-life/
On – 18 Feb, 2017 By Lucy Wang
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Building an Off-Grid Tiny House? DIY Network Wants to Film You
Building an Off-Grid Tiny House? DIY Network Wants to Film You.
The DIY Network is looking for intrepid homebuilders who are in the planning stages of building an off-grid tiny house. The homes can run the gamut from traditional wood frame to straw bale, Earthship, yurt or even shipping container homes. The best thing? They’ll pay you for your time.
The DIY Network profiles a wide range of builders and homeowners.
The show, “Building Off the Grid”, finished its first season last year and is looking to cast for the show’s second season. The show has featured log hunting cabins in Alaska, a yurt in Montana, and a (larger) dream home near Yellowstone. The show will pay the homeowners $10,000 upon completion of the project.
“Building Off the Grid” will feature any type of home including log, mud or even yurts.
To be considered for the show, you must be ready to build and not already in the process of building. In addition, the home must be built on the land where it will ultimately exist. No off-site homes such as park models will be part of the show. The show will not only document the building of a home, but also off-grid capabilities including solar and wind power, septic, wells and the challenges and benefits of more remote living.
The entire building process will be documented for the show.
DIY Network’s other tiny house programming includes “Tiny House, Big Living” and the 2016 Tiny House Jamboree feature which showed a quick shot of Tiny House Blog founder, Kent Griswold. DIYNetwork.com offers videos, home improvement advice, step-by-step instructions, message boards, blogs and more. For more information and to be considered for “Building Off the Grid”, contact Megan Littlefield with Warms Springs Productions.
The show requires that all homes be built on-site.
http://tinyhouseblog.com/announcement/building-off-grid-tiny-house-diy-network-wants-film/
On – 13 Mar, 2017 By Christina Nellemann
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Manawatu homeowners off the grid after designing alternative solar energy system
Manawatu homeowners off the grid after designing alternative solar energy system
Murray Wilson/ Fairfax NZNorbert Reiser built his own alternative solar energy system and installed it to power his house.
A Feilding homeowner has not paid a power bill in six years after building his very own alternative solar energy system.
Norbert and Renate Reiser have been self-sufficient since 2010, with the $15,000 system converting sunlight into power and servicing all their household appliances.
They also grow vegetables, fruit, chickens and sheep for food.
Norbert ReiserNorbert Reiser’s home-built controller system.
The couple moved from Bavaria in Germany in 2001 and it took Norbert eight years to reconfigure his home’s power circuit.
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* Peer-to-peer platform allows households to use each other’s solar powerThe poor summer and abundance of liquid sunshine hasn’t hindered the couple’s lifestyle where they carry on with showers and use appliances as per usual.
Murray Wilson/ Fairfax NZThe $15,000 system converts sunlight into power and servicing all household appliances.
“It was one of my main reasons to come to New Zealand. Not only is it a lovely place, but I could live my dream to be self-sufficient with my own electric energy,” he said.
“The rising power consumption from a rising Kiwi population creates a lot of stress to our hydro generators and water resources.
“The price of petrol and energy will never go down any more, so being self-sufficient helps. From my perspective, this is the same price, on investment, than you would get on the grid.”
The unit converts energy from sunlight into electricity, which is then stored in two batteries under the house.
Ad Feedback googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display(‘storybody’); });In winter, a wetback heats the hot water cylinder so power can be preserved. Water is circulated through pipes and is heated using heat from the fire.
Norbert Reiser, an industrial electrician by trade, said the couple cooked on a gas stove, with only the fridge and freezer running fulltime.
In case of an emergency, they have a back-up generator. In six years they’ve only had to use it three times.
“It’s for if the weather is really bad – if we have maybe five, six days of constant rain,” he said.
Resier intended to build a garage where he could install more solar panels. The aim was to rely less on two storage batteries.
“I can prove that it is possible to build a self-sufficient house off the grid,” he said.
“I built my own controller circuits and got the main parts from the electronic shops, like inverters, power meters for inlet and outlet.
“It is like being the conductor of an orchestra – all these components then get alternated to my specific needs.”
Living off solar energy required people to be on their toes and thinking all the time with an understanding of how to use energy wisely, he said.
– Stuff
On – 28 Feb, 2017 By KILMISTER
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Building off the grid 3 ways
What would your home look like if you unplugged for good? Tour these one-of-a-kind versions of living that dream as seen in three DIY Network specials of Building Off the Grid: Mountain Man Cave, Tiny House on a Lake and Coastal Maine.
Rugged outdoorsman Joe Donovan decided to build himself a permanent base camp on 10 acres of mountain wilderness. That camp takes the form of a 24-by-28-foot straw-bale cabin, a very old—and, in modern America, very rare—type of dwelling.The insulating straw bales beneath thick layers of stucco at this southern Montana cabin are held together by chicken wire hand-sewn with rope. The load-bearing frame itself is made of massive logs.Composting toilets aren’t for everyone, but this one more than compensates for its rustic ways with a spectacular view of the Montana wilderness. (Bonus: No need to abandon said view to fetch water for the cistern, or to scamper to an outhouse in the middle of the night.)The versatile space behind a Montana cabin’s bathroom features a television and turntable powered by solar panels, as well as a painterly reminder of why its owner chose to build in the wilderness.Thick straw walls are designed to help this space stay cool in the summer and warm in the winter—but given how quickly the weather in the northern Rockies can change, concentrated heat from a wood-burning stove is a must.Scenery is the star of Joe Donovan’s off-the-grid plan, as he designed his home around the Missouri River view he envisioned having from his front deck. Bonus: It’ll face the warmth of the sun in the wintertime.At the northern end of Montana, yurt-dwellers Sean and Mollie Busby take their independent-living plan to the next level by building their dream home overlooking Whitefish Lake. This 12-by-20-foot, two-story home comprises about 480 square feet of interior space.This diminutive dwelling at the edge of Glacier National Park affords its owners plenty of room. The spacious deck nearly doubles its footprint.The live-edge siding on this tiny house can last for up to 30 years. It shares space with reclaimed wood, which rings in at a fifth of what local stores charge for new lumber.The wood from this portion of a tiny home on the shore of Whitefish Lake comes from a timber swap (where the owners exchanged fresh-cut pieces from their property for drier logs that were already seasoned for building).While this northern Montana cabin’s owners plan to live off the grid, their nameplate reflects their interest in maintaining close connections to their community.This outdoorsy family of six built their 16-by-20-foot off-the-grid retreat on Maine’s remote Pemaquid Peninsula in less two weeks (with a bit of help from their friends).This 6-foot-tall black bear welcomes guests to a self-sustaining cabin in Bristol, Maine. In keeping with the homeowners’ lickety-split building plan, their friend carved the sculpture in less than eight hours.A gutter-and-downspout system collects rainfall in a catchment for drinking, cooking and bathing—a very good thing, since the nearest alternative source of water is a half-mile away.While the kitchen in this remote cabin has no light switches or running water, a granite slab countertop and vintage canister set deliver ample (and appropriately rustic) style.On – 22 Feb, 2017 By Lauren Oster
