Update Oct. 24: The citation appeal to the York County Board of Zoning Appeals has been rescheduled to 7 p.m. Dec. 4.
—–
Karen and Tom Rogers like to live small.
The couple and their daughter, Kaitlin, lived in an RV from 1999 until a tree destroyed it during a storm in February.
To continue living small, they moved into a 415-square-foot customized house on wheels, fitting all of their possessions into a compact, mobile setup instead of a more traditional house.
A few months into living in their new “tiny house,” their minimalist lifestyle may be threatened.
County officials argue the couple cannot keep their home in the mobile home community of Bruton Park without obtaining proper seals to indicate the house meets the Department of Housing and Urban Development requirements for a manufactured home.
The seals come affixed to traditional manufactured homes, but Lil’ Lodges, the company from which the Rogers family purchased their home, does not issue HUD seals. A third party would have to evaluate the house and concede that the specifications matched those required by HUD.
Lil’ Lodges traditionally sell Park Model RVs, but Karen Rogers asked for her model to be built as a manufactured home. Al Maddalena, chief of development and compliance for the county, said the unit would have to be disassembled and evaluated by a third-party engineer before HUD seals could be issued.
“The unit she has is built in a totally different set of specifications,” Maddalena said.
The county cited the couple in August, saying a Park Model RV, which is not for permanent use, is not permitted in a mobile home park and does not meet the proper HUD requirements.
The couple has appealed the county’s citation and will meet with the Board of Zoning Appeals on Thursday. If the BZA denies their appeal, they have several options: They can appeal the citation to Circuit Court; apply to change the county code, which would require them to go through the Board of Supervisors; or move their home out of the county.
Karen Rogers said if the county’s citation against them stands after Thursday’s meeting, she and her family will likely decide to move out of York County and into Surry County.
Karen and Tom Rogers may be the first to park their tiny home in York County, but they are part of a larger movement across the U.S., said Steve Sullivan, the national sales director for Lil’ Lodges.
“People are going toward this, just because everybody is downsizing,” he said. “That’s a huge plus for us.”
The Bear Creek, Alabama-based company that worked with Karen to custom-design her tiny house sells around 250 units per year and ships them from its factory.
Sullivan said each unit costs around $55,000, compared to the median price tag of $316,100 for a house in York County, according to a 2009 U.S. Census Bureau survey.
The Rogerses began living small back in 1999, purchasing a 21-year-old Airstream travel trailer in which they traveled 15,000 miles in three months and crossed 43 states. After a quick trip to Nova Scotia, the family headed west to Snoqualmie Pass in Washington, then moved south for a few years.
“We pulled out of the driveway and didn’t look back,” he said.
They landed in York County a few years ago when their daughter — whom they homeschooled while traveling — wanted to go back to school.
The family spent months living out of hotels and friends’ homes after the tree destroyed their RV before they began researching the tiny house movement.
“There are ways of using space more efficiently, and I think that’s what this new tiny home movement is,” Karen Rogers said. “Everything is small, but you have everything you need.”
After the storm destroyed their RV, they knew they wanted a home safer than RVs or mobile homes they could customize and still take on the road.
Karen and Tom Rogers love their house for its durability: It can withstand winds of up to 130 miles per hour, has triple framing around the windows and doors, is built on a frame with five axles, and has hurricane straps that go around the house and are fastened deep in the ground.
“Nobody builds to the construction codes that we build to,” Sullivan said. “It’s built much, much better than a mobile home.”
He said buyers typically stay in the same location for several years — usually in a mobile home park, an RV park or on privately owned land — but when they decide to move what he calls the “instant-ready house,” all they have to do is disconnect utilities.
Inside, the Rogers family has a cozy living room with space for nine, an upstairs loft that serves as a guest room and a master bedroom with a customized bay window.
The house is decorated with antiques Karen Rogers has gathered over the years — kitchen cabinets are filled with old bottles and ceramics, while stuffed bears and antique tea sets have their own space in the bedroom.
Photos of their two daughters and one grandchild hang on the walls, and plants and flowers are spread throughout the house and outside in the garden, where Tom Rogers likes to work.
“It’s kind of a meeting place,” Karen Rogers said, adding people stop by her home several times a week to admire it.
The Board of Zoning Appeals will meet to consider the application and hold a public hearing in York Hall at 7 p.m. Oct. 23.
