A Miniature Town – Spur, The Pole of Tiny House Movement

by Paul Ciocoiu · June 17, 2016

There’s probably no other place where the tiny house movement is more acutely manifested than America. This is where most of the bold ideas stem from, as proof of keen desires of absolute freedom, many of them also highlighted by us, too. But if we were to pick a pole of the tiny house movement, well, the specialists located it in the US state of Texas, namely the town of Spur, a 1,000 inhabitant settlement. It is true, not all the locals are happy about the influx of tiny house enthusiasts.

According to Inhabitat.com, the town lies in a semi-arid climate and is surrounded by rolling plains punctuated with farms. In a bid to reverse the long population decline, the town hall began marketing its relaxed building codes, low land prices, and access to ultra-high-speed fiber Internet to tiny house pioneers. While the plan to turn the town into a tiny house mecca appears to have worked—over 60 lots have been sold for around $500 a piece, and 40 more lots are being freed up for sale—talks of plans for yurts, off-grid dwellings, and underground earth homes unnerved some locals.

A miniature town – tiny houses all around

Most of locals are happy with the results. “A lot of these towns out here are dying. These folks coming in are educated, professional and seem like they really have something to bring to the community. They are like a ray of sunshine on an otherwise cloudy situation,” Charlie Morris, a long-time Spur resident, retired federal agriculture inspector, and Dickens County, Texas, commissioner told the Wall Street Journal. “What we don’t want are anarchists or nudists.”

Three months ago though, the town council reversed their open-arms policy and passed an ordinance requiring tiny house designs to be submitted for approval, while prohibiting experimental homes. All tiny houses must be connected to the electric grid, water supply, and sewer system. While some tiny house dwellers are likely to stay put, such as Denise Rosner who owns a traditional-looking, 440-square-foot home, others, like Benjamin Garcia, have opted to build outside Spur. The new ordinance change doesn’t appear to have dampened tiny house enthusiasm for the town by much, however; around 20 more tiny house pioneers are expected to move in by the end of this summer.