tiny house

noun

plural tiny houses

: a small house or mobile home that typically has a floor plan of less than 500 square feet and that is usually designed for ergonomics and space efficiency

The Joneses are one of thousands of families around the United States who have chosen to live in a tiny house in the last few years. For some families, it's about saving money. Others love having a house they can move anywhere, because some are actually built on trailers and can be towed with a car.

—The New York Times Magazine

Now, students and recent graduates of Northwestern University are building a home that takes the tiny house concept one step further: a 128-square foot house that is totally off the grid, equipped with solar panels for energy, a battery bank that can store power for times when no solar power is available, and a system for harvesting rain water.

—Rebecca J. Rosen

—sometimes hyphenated when used before another noun

The rhetoric of modern tiny-house living begins with the assertion that big houses, aside from being wasteful and environmentally noxious, are debtors' prisons …

—Alec Wilkinson

Examples of tiny house in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

The tiny house stands out from typical options on the market by offering a full-sized kitchen space, a bedroom, and not one, but two bathrooms. —Alicia Geigel, Better Homes & Gardens, 4 Dec. 2024

There's ample headroom to stand upright in there thanks to it being downstairs – which is by no means the norm in a tiny house. —Adam Williams, New Atlas, 27 Nov. 2024

And the set with the tiny houses was massive and glorious. —Stephen Cox, People.com, 26 Nov. 2024

The league’s only full-time staff member is Barone, who lives, rent-free, in a tiny house to the side of Bryant’s driveway. —Paige Williams, The New Yorker, 25 Nov. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1987, in the meaning defined above