Welcome to Tiny Home Profiles, an interview series with people pushing the limits of living small. From space-saving hacks to flexible floor plans, here’s what they say makes for the best tiny homes on the planet. Know of a builder we should talk to? Reach out.
Between jobs in British Columbia, Joshua Bell would return home to Ontario and work with his dad on home renovations and building out decks. Much of this father-and-son time was spent imagining where they could take the family business next. “He’d been talking about tiny homes for years and years since they started to grow more popular in the U.S.,” Bell tells us. “I honestly just got tired of hearing him talk about it, so we built a tiny home.” The surprisingly refreshing experience of building something of his own made up Bell’s mind: he would stay put and start Bell Construction and Contracting.
Residential carpentry remains a mainstay for the duo, but it’s the tiny homes that excite them most these days. “I am trying to make something that everyone can own,” says Bell. “We want to make this a reality and provide homes that give you that warm hug when you walk through the door after a long day.” Here, Bell talks about getting his first fully-fledged model to market and how he plans to expand their offerings to reach a wider audience.
Bell Construction and Contracting’s first design is called the Opener. The company is selling the home, which is framed and partly clad in galvanized steel, for $154,900 CAD (around $114K USD).
What qualities make your tiny home stand apart from the rest?
We care. This house was built like it was going to be our own, with quality materials and craftsmanship. This home has everything a custom-built house has, just at 200 square feet. We want the homeowner to feel proud of what they own, and make small living seem large.
The main floor spans 200 square feet, and the sleeping loft is an additional 65 square feet. Both the 11-foot-high ceiling and interior walls are clad in pine.
What makes this tiny home exciting?
When we are contracting, we’re building for others. In this project, we were the clients, and the whole thing was self-funded. We got to customize the materials, which was super cool. We left the Douglas fir untreated so when you shower it smells like the rainforest in British Columbia.
Birch plywood is used for the cabinetry throughout the unit. Surfaces like the butcher block countertops and dining table are made from acacia wood.
The bathroom is reached beyond a pocket door at the end of the home. It comes with an infrared mirror that helps to heat the room.
What does your base model cost and what does that pricing include?
This unit is $154,900 CAD and is 200 square feet with an additional 65 square feet for the sleeping loft. It has an all-wood interior with pine shiplap walls, a tongue-and-groove pine ceiling, poplar trim and baseboards, birch cabinets, oak stair treads and shelves, Douglas fir for the bathroom and floor boards in the loft, and maple for the floors. Shipping and installation are separate costs dependent on where a unit is headed.
The shower booth has waterproof vinyl and tile. The interior polyethylene plumbing connects to exposed copper pipes when they exit the bathroom walls.
What aspects of the design can a client customize?
Everything can be customized. That’s the beauty of our tiny home. You can create something that is yours. Every client will have different needs. One may have five tall pairs of boots, or a dog that needs a bed, or maybe a fish tank, and we want to try and fit these aspects in so the homes meet clients’ needs. From a model standpoint though, we definitely like the way the frame and roof sit with all the windows. It just makes it seem so much bigger. We plan on doing more design work with layouts and different finishes/fixtures to try and find a more diverse clientele.
Ceiling lights and dimmable pot sconces provide adjustable lighting at night.
Where do you ship?
We can ship anywhere. We were just at our first tiny home show up in Ottawa and another company called Minimaliste was shipping a unit to Hawaii. That’s just so cool.
Are there plans to expand to different parts of North America?
There are lots of plans. For right now though, we are just focusing on trying to promote what we can do and the quality that we can do it at. We want to build a following. I am hoping to take this company my main focus—I just have to remember to lay one brick at a time. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither are tiny homes.
The home’s price includes a stainless steel refrigerator and washer/dryer from LG, stainless steel stove from GE, Perfect Aire minisplit heat pump, 26.9 gallon hot water tank, and a Cyclone energy recovery ventilator.
Is your design currently pre-permitted in any U.S. municipalities?
This unit that we have for sale is actually built to the NOAH standard. Up here in Canada we were really having a hard time with our municipalities—there can be a lot of red tape in Ontario—but once we discovered NOAH we were able to start building the next day. The whole process got documented and archived so the new owner will be able to see exactly how things were built. We have since gone out and attained engineered drawings that actually classify the tiny home on wheels as a house, which is huge for us because now we should be able to obtain permitting through municipalities and build to Ontario building codes.
Douglas fir is used to both frame and line the floor of the loft. The millwork is left exposed in the bathroom beneath.
How long can a client expect the process to take after they put down a deposit?
Once the initial consult is completed and the design has been approved with the material choices, we expect a four-month building process per unit once the trailer is received. (Trailer building is usually about eight weeks.) In total, we expect the process to take around six months.
Do you assist with the placement of the tiny home?
It will all depend on where the unit is headed. Our company does do contracting, so if a homeowner would like to have a hands off approach, we can make it happen, no matter where the unit goes.
Bell Construction and Contracting can customize its tiny home model to a customer’s specifications.
