We are doing something a little different, maybe even a little drastic by some standards. We are all going to be living in 720 square feet of space...for the next 6 years while the husband redoes a portion of his bachelors and works on his masters...more on that later. Yes, all  almost 6 of us. Yes, our family and friends think that we are nuts.

We've owned the house for a while now and used it for rental income, which was great. It supplemented the husband's military salary and put a little fun money back in our lives. But after 7 years of ownership, the mortgage is down to a truly tiny amount. Like less than a car payment. We decided to live here so that I could continue to stay home with our kids. We both figure that our kids need us more than they need space. They probably won't always agree with me on that, but while they're little, why not?

When we first started rolling the idea around, we did a lot of research on small-space living. We learned the the average family home in the UK is just 800 square feet, not much bigger than our place. We stumbled onto tiny houses and saw some of the awesome things people are doing with them. We noticed that most small space dwellers cited the ability to save serious amounts of cash or a need to simplify as their reason for downsizing. While some of the families we read about did eventually move up to slightly bigger homes, most stayed put and even had normal, well-adjusted kids :) 

We considered adding on, but quickly nixed the idea. Paying a contractor would eat into our savings and with four kids, major diy construction just isn't feasible. We are gutting the whole house and reworking the space to accommodate all of us better. We'll definitely be putting some "real" money into the house, but when we move to the next chapter of our lives, the improvements should translate into higher rent. Actually, the plan is to use the rental proceeds to help finance private school for the kids. In the mean time, living well below our means should allow us to continue building our savings, putting us in a much better position for retirement and kiddos' college. In addition to the monetary savings, our little house saves us time, too. I can clean the whole thing in record time and when there's less to maintain, well, there's just less to maintain. Our weekends will be spent with each other, our kids, and our hobbies, not maintaining a lifestyle.

With that said, I do realize that putting 4 kids in the same room won't be without challenges. I think the scariest part is going to be sharing one bathroom. But, we'll work it out.

I hope you'll check in with us often as we share our adventures, what is (and isn't) working for us in our space, and our cash-saving, backyard farming lifestyle!