Build Small, Live Large- Portland’s Accessory Dwelling Unit Tour- Sunday, June 1st, 2014

Update 5/28/14: There's been a huge amount of interest in attending this tour, which is fantastic. Over 800 people have registered to attend. 

To allow for ample access to the ADUs for attendees, we have decided to cap the ticket sales.  Tickets sales have now ended. We really wanted to sell more, but feel that this cap is in the best interest of the tour registrants and the ADU hosts. 

This blog focuses on the design/build process for my ADU. Occasionally, however, I make other ADU related announcements that will be of interest to readers. In this case, I'm very excited to announce Build Small, Live Large- Portland’s Accessory Dwelling Unit Tour. This will be the first tour of its kind, and promises to be a fantastic event.

This ADU, ten other finished ADUs, and one under construction, will be featured on the tour. Homeowner, architects, and builders for the ADUs will be available to answer questions. There will also be a series of expert presentations held throughout the day. Additionally, attendees will be able to see eight tiny houses on wheels.

The day will jam packed with small and tiny houses, networking opportunities, and access to ADU professionals and experts. If you're planning to build an ADU, this tour (and the ongoing ADU classes I offer) are the best ways to learn from others about the ADU designing, permitting, and building process.

Here's the press release from Caravan- The Tiny House Hotel, about the tour.

Caravan- The Tiny House Hotel, in partnership with the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, the City of Portland, and Metro, is hosting Portland’s first citywide tour of Accessory Dwelling Units on Sunday, June 1st, 2014 from 10am-6pm. ADUs are secondary living units on single-family lots.  Modeled after the City of Portland’s Build It Green Tour, Build Small, Live Large: Portland’s Accessory Dwelling Unit Tour offers attendees the rare opportunity to see the interiors of eleven ADUs in a variety of locations across the eastside of Portland. The self-guided tour gives attendees access to the homeowners, builders and designers of the ADUs, and to comprehensive, educational case studies about the building process of each ADU. There will also be workshops throughout the day presented by local and national experts about a range of topics related to ADUs, from permitting and financing, to designing and building.

Portland has seen a six-fold rise in the number of ADUs built since 2010.  This dramatic increase is the result of a 2010 City of Portland waiver of System Development Charges, which reduced the cost of building permits for an ADU by up to $11,000.  Before the 2010 waiver, approximately 30 ADUs were built in Portland annually, but in 2013 alone, there were almost 200 ADU permits applications.  The waiver’s popularity caused the Portland City Council to extend the waiver until July, 2016, spurring local ADU leaders to develop Portland’s first ADU tour.

Throughout the day, attendees will also have the opportunity to tour four custom-built tiny houses on wheels at Caravan- The Tiny House Hotel. Caravan has received national media attention for being the first tiny house hotel in the United States. Caravan will host a late afternoon networking event from 4-6pm where attendees can meet local advocates, designers, builders and leaders of both the ADU and the tiny house movement. Real estate professionals can earn up to 6 CE credits. Attendees will have the opportunity to earn a special $25 discount to stay at Caravan, as well as enter a raffle for a free stay at Caravan.

Early bird registration is only $25. Learn more and register at http://accessorydwellings.org/adu_tour/

...or 

Finishing The Stairs

(Editor's note: I've authored a related post called Staircases in ADUs on AccessoryDwellings.org)

I'm authoring this post a year after we completed building and moving into the ADU. Dare I say, this is the last substantial construction project for my ADU.

Over the last year, Deb and I have slowly tackled various projects which I've described previous blog posts (the artistic sound barrier, the artistic handrail, landscaping and more). But, as any homeowner knows, it seems as though the work is never done. Once we moved in, it was easy to let the final stair riser tiling project slip off our immediate calendar.

With the ADU being on the upcoming Build It Green tour on Saturday, September 22nd, we motivated ourselves to put the finishing touch on the stair case (the end of this post includes several ADU related announcements which may be of interest to readers).

The finished stair tile risers.

From the outset, the stairs have posed an intriguing design problem. Complying with stair codes is sometime difficult in small and stout houses, such as ADUs. Portland's code requires that an ADU roof must be no taller than 18ft at its mid-point, so fitting a stair with adequate head room (6' 8") on the top stair landing, can prove to be a tricky design challenge.

There are two common design solutions. One can position a straight, simple staircase in the middle of the house, which can interfere with the spatial layout of the main floor. Or, one can position the stairs along the side of the house, and turn the top of stairs toward the center of the house before you reach the 2nd floor landing to avoid hitting your head on the ceiling.

My architect worked through many sketches before finally figuring out a functional, compliant, attractive, and space-efficient staircase design, consisting entirely of "winders". The final stair design consisted of 14 "winders": stairs which are not rectilinear, but have an angled curve as they rise upwards.

This is the architectural drawing of the winding stairs from above

The master framer would built this stairs claimed to have build over 2,000 stair cases and said that he had never built a staircase in which every step was a winder. It was a wonderous feat to watch how he constructed the framing for them.  

In addition to the unique bend of the staircase, we added a few other design elements to the staircase. When staining the stairs, we stained the nose of each tread a lighter color so that it would be easier to see each tread in lower light. Additionally, we added an LED rope light under the nose of the treads, to create an attractive perimeter/safety light solution for climbing the stairs in low light.

The LED rope lighting under each tread accents the stair below it. The nose of each tread is stained a light color in contrast to the rest of the tread, which makes each tread "pop" nicely in any kind of light, such as the low light as shown above.

Then, we added the amazing salvaged steel handrail, part of which is shown below.

Last but not least, we finished the stair risers with tiles this week. We acquired these tiles in New Mexico last year, knowing that we wanted to eventually finish the stair risers with Talavera tile. Here are some pictures of the process and finished product.


Here's a video of the finished product.

Some other ADU announcements:

• As mentioned earlier, this ADU, along with seven others, will be the Build It Green Tour on September 22nd. As part of the tour this year, there will be workshops throughout the day. I'll be leading a short workshop on ADUs at 9am.  

• The next ADU Class for Homeowners will be on Saturday, November 5th. This course is filling up so I'll likely offer another full day class shortly thereafter.

• For the first time, I'm also able to offer CE credits to Oregon's real estate professionals who attend this class, thanks to the Earth Advantage Institute. The class will equip them with substantial knowledge about ADUs, enabling them to help more of residential clients identify suitable properties for ADUs, and provide information on how a residential client can proceed through the ADU financing,designing, and building process.  Please tell Portland realtor acquaintances about the class.

• There will be a one day ADU-focused conference in Portland, Oregon, on Friday, October 26th, held in conjunction with the Portland EcoDistricts conference. I'll be helping lead one session on ADU financing, and there will many fantastic sessions there. 

• Lastly, my ADU was featured in a great blog called Small House Bliss which I'd commend to readers who are seeking inspiration on modern, small house design. 

Sprinting to the Finish

We've moved in fully, so I wanted to give a tour of the finished product. There's some miscellaneous projects left to do, but for all intents and purposes, the interior of the ADU is complete. We've moved our stuff in, including furniture, decorations, and tons of other stuff.

Each time I move residences, I always groan at how much stuff I own, most of which I rarely use. This move was no exception. Except, this time, the limits of the small living space forced my partner and I to be more deliberate about deciding what items enter through these doors. Only the best of the best stuff gets through. Hopefully, we'll sell many of our remaining items this fall.

Part of the push to get fully moved in and decorated was in preparation for a news crew that used the ADU last week as their set. KATU, the local news station, came to film a short piece about the Build It Green Tour that will air on Tuesday, September 20th, at the 5 o'clock news hour. They said that they'd be posting the piece online afterwards; I'll link to it once it's posted.

KATU filmed a promotional piece for the Build It Green Tour

Here's a five minute walk through of the finished ADU. I am very happy at how everything is looking. It feels like a home now, and the most luxurious home in which I've ever dwelled. After a week, I can say that I love being in this space.



Meanwhile, I've decided to rent out the main house as a fully furnished, self-hosted, Bed and Breakfast on AirBNB. I am going to give this a try for a month or two to see whether it works better than a normal long term rental. It's a great house for groups of 4-10 who are coming to visit Portland and would prefer to stay in a sweet old house for less than staying in a hotel.

When It Rains, It Pours: Five Big Announcements

Today was a big day. Here are five announcements that I am very happy to share:

1) We passed the final inspections, which means that the ADU is now officially verified and ready for occupancy! Building the ADU has been a huge undertaking for me and I am relieved to finally have it officially completed. And a big thanks to Stephen Smith, who has served as the builder for this project.

 

Generally speaking, I've found Portland''s Bureau of Development Services, the building permitting authority, to be fair and reasonable, despite being short-staffed. It took a couple attempts for us to resolve relatively minor building issues (eg. guardrail height, smoke detector type) before we were able to passing the final inspection.

Meanwhile, there's still some more finish work to do in the ADU and throughout the site, and I'll continue to post updates on those projects (look for upcoming posts on the water heater, stairs, and the final budget numbers).

2) The ADU has been selected to be on Portland's Build It Green Tour, a self-guided tour of twenty-two of the premier 'green' new construction and renovation projects around the City of Portland, on Saturday, September 24th.

The ADU will be one of several smaller homes on the tour. I visited 15 homes on the Build It Green tour last year, and found some of the projects, particularly the Passivehauses, to be inspiring from an energy use perspective. There are interesting homes on the tour this year; if you're in the Portland area, I encourage you to check it out.

Portland's Build It Green Tour: Saturday, September 24th, 2011, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

3) The ADU has been selected to be featured on KATU, a local TV news station, to help promote the Build It Green tour. They'll be filming here next week and the piece will be aired the week prior to the Build It Green Tour. I hope that they post their pieces online so I can link to it. It's an honor to have the ADU selected for this news piece from amongst all the great projects on the tour, and it has given me added motivation to get the ADU looking good.

4) Earth Advantage Institute is offering a free hour class on "Creating Not So Big Homes", which will be hosted at my ADU on the morning of the Build It Green Tour. Here's a link for registration information.

5) On Saturday, October 15th, I'll be offering a day-long class for homeowners in the Portland Metro area, entitled 'Building an Accessory Dwelling Unit on Your Property in Portland'

With my personal ADU project nearing completion, I am ready to help others who hope to build an ADU in Portland. This class is intended for homeowners interested in building an ADU on their property. Readers of this blog know that the process of building an ADU can be complex, overwhelming and expensive.

The goal for this class is to help homeowners create a more beautiful and functional ADU space that will augment their property, maximize small space, and lower short and long term design, build, and maintenance costs for the ADU. It will cover the essential ADU design/build elements from start to finish, which will result in a more beautiful space and will hopefully help them save significant time and money.

Here's a link to more information about the class and the registration. http://pdxadu.eventbrite.com/ 

Saturday, October 15th, 9am-5pm. 

$95 (or 8 hours work/trade)

I plan to hold the class at my ADU