The Hope
I don’t know what I’m doing. Seriously, if I’m honest with myself, and with you—I don’t know what I’m doing. I have no idea if this idea will work, yet here we are, going forward. I’d like to think out loud for a minute about the idea, and try to understand the problem and the hope. For me, writing has often resulted in clarity, and until I write things remain fuzzy. The fuzziness doesn’t always fade after writing, but when clarity comes, it comes by facing the thing in writing.
The problem began personally as problems often do. I found myself working increasingly harder for less and less. For 11 years, I’ve been a teacher. I started that career as a single man living with my parents, and my salary was 40K. It was plenty for me. For a few years, I lived with almost no financial stress or strain, and could easily live within my means. 3 years into my career, I get married, and a few months later my wife gets pregnant. Suddenly, my 40K is being split 3 ways. Suddenly, 40K just doesn’t cut it. I get a 2nd job, and then a 3rd job, and none of it seems to make a difference. Today, I’m up to 60K a year, but when you factor for inflation, that 60K would have been 48K in 2010. In my 11 years in teaching, I got married, got a masters, had 2 kids, bought a house, and continue to live paycheck to paycheck. It feels like it shouldn’t be that way.
An idea came to mind—why not get some passive income flowing by building a backyard tiny home. It seemed simple enough, so I went for it. The process was arduous. It was full of mistakes, and mishaps, but in 2020, I got it done. I was going to use Airbnb to rent it out, and it would bring in $1000-2000 a month. Woohoo! Then an issue was brought to my attention, a neighbor was being displaced from their home. Property values were going up, and their landlord wanted to cash in. No shame or shade on that landlord, we’re all trying to make it. And that got me thinking, can we all make it? Seriously, is there enough for everyone to have enough?
I began to educate myself on housing insecurity and homelessness. I looked at the numbers in my city. In 2019, about 40,000 homes were cost-burdened, meaning 40,000 homes were having to scrap to pay their rent or mortgage each month in Durham alone. That financial stress dries up the creative spirit, and demoralizes the soul. I want a world full of people who have come alive, and can go after what makes them come alive. I want that for myself. The question then popped in my mind, “what if you gave people ADUs for free?” An ADU is an accessory dwelling unit, it’s a backyard tiny house, if you were wondering. Well, I thought, no way, that’s a crazy idea… but let’s explore it. The more I thought about it, the more it made sense. It would be hard, but it seems doable.
The focus would be on underserved areas, to give folks access to an asset they wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford. The extra cash each month would help lift the homeowner from being cost-burdened, and hopefully for the tenant they too would benefit from rent that was far less than the city average, and hopefully the team of builders and administrative folks would be from the community gaining skills and a liveable wage providing this service. Every ADU would be a partnership between Coram Houses, the homeowner, and the tenant, everyone benefiting together.
Our cheapest ADU would cost 30,000 to build. The homeowner would partially own the ADU when it’s built, and they would split the profit with Coram Houses until it was fully paid. Hopefully, this model would allow us to remain financially afloat. The goal isn’t to get rich, but to have enough.
