Jeff Wilson spent one of his two years as dean of Huston-Tillotson University in Texas living in a dumpster.
The experience made him embrace minimalist living, and inspired him to launch a tiny home startup, called Kasita, in 2015.
"While the experiment was extreme, the experience I gained by living small and simple made a big impression," said Wilson, who is a former postdoctoral researcher at Harvard and IBM project manager. "At the end of the year, I left the dumpster with the concept for a new category of housing — a beautiful, small footprint home designed as a solution for the growing housing crisis."
Based in Austin, Texas, Kasita offers housing units that can sit by themselves or stack to form apartments. The pre-fabricated homes can be assembled off-site and delivered in two to three weeks, Wilson says.
In 2017, the startup started selling its first tiny homes, which measure 352 square feet and cost $139,000. A newer iteration of the home — which features additional storage — was shown at this year's SXSW festival in Austin, Texas. The latest Kasita homes are now on sale for the same price.
Check out the newest units below.
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Kasita sells tiny housing units. The startup gets its name from "casita," the Spanish word for "little house."
At 352 square feet, white walls help the units look larger than they are.
(For comparison, the average one-car garage measures about 260 square feet.)
The main, open-layout space functions as both a living room and bedroom.
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