Her Gorgeous DIY $8k Mini Bus Tiny House - Lost Apartment - Found Freedom

Hi, I'm Stephanie, welcome to the dandy bus when I

found

out I had to get out of my

apartment

at the end of the month and that I would probably be out of a job at the end of the month. I totally panicked and had to think very quickly about what I was going to do because of how the whole kovid unfolded, I even stumbled upon life on the bus if it was my mom who asked me how do you know how to get out of fear and decided that . I needed to be small to get rid of all the fears of what could happen during this pandemic.

I decided that I was not going to be controlled by fear and I was not going to be controlled by what else was in the world. I was thinking I was going to make my own path to peace and that's what this bus was about and what it became for me, so I went with a 2005 GMC Savannah 3500, I think it's a v6 and it goes about 15 miles per gallon. and it's still small enough to be able to park in a normal parking space. It has a roof terrace on top and wood cladding on the side. I am a carpenter by profession, so I had to explore the wood and the small dandelion wood burned. accent for the dandy bus, so this is just a telescopic ladder.

I

found

it on Amazon and if you're willing to spend the time looking for a deal, you can find it. Normally it's like a 200 ladder, but I bought it because the box was damaged for 44 dollars, it doesn't get any better than that, welcome to the inside of my

house

, so overall I didn't have much to work with, I had a little of savings, so I tried to cut it as close as possible. For the vehicle itself it was 3500, I got it from the Facebook marketplace and then in total with the purchase of the vehicle it cost about 8 thousand dollars, a little less, for the entire build and most of that came from being able to reduce wood costs with recovery materials. whether it was through my father's connection with construction and sourcing materials that were going to be discarded on job sites, all the wood from the ceiling and walls was salvaged and I only used what I could find and tried to find so many uses for what I had on hand and that saved me a ton of money so it can be done if you're on a budget it can be done so to start with this floor it's actually hardwood it's walnut and I bought it at the market for a hundred dollars.

Since I only needed 100 square feet, welcome to the kitchen, it was very important to me to be able to prioritize hospitality and make space to cook for people or invite people over, so the kitchen was non-negotiable, it had to be big, it had to I have plenty of counter space and interestingly, at 92 square feet I have the most functional kitchen I've ever had of any

apartment

I've lived in. This is a century-old pine tree and it was saved from a

house

and they were just going to throw it away. My cousin saved it and now it is my countertop and it is beautiful.

In the winters this becomes my heater. You turn this guy on, you turn on the propane and you make the fan move the heat all over the place and that was 20 bucks instead of like 70 bucks, mister dude, goes, so since I use it for my heater, right now I'm getting about a month off the 11 pound propane tank in the winter, but it's also Florida so I can get away with not having such a heavy heater. One of my favorite parts of building this bus was finding out how cheap I could make things while still maintaining quality, so Facebook Marketplace, craigslist, any kind of reuse or build connections you can get are a big help, for What these are all glass jars, just poke a hole in it. on top of the glass jar and then screw it there with just a small bolt.

I definitely have to say that my mom and I built this. This house was built by two women. We did it in three months and it was an incredible experience to be able to build this. I went out with my mom, here's my refrigerator, you know, the refrigerator or the freezer is not dual zone, but it works, it works very efficiently and then it has sliding doors just because, you know, on a bus everything is personalized, it has to be and this was a little ikea hack so these bins are less than two dollars each and we used a router to drill some rails into the wood so instead of spending 30 bucks just on cabinet hardware to each drawer, in addition to building a box and a liner, I knew it would be like this. be covered so it was a great budget option that's super functional and everything is really quiet because there's less metal when I'm driving down the road and then I have my fresh water and gray water.

I have 12 gallons of fresh water and about seven gallons of gray use eco friendly products you can dump the gray water wherever you need it and so far it's just me and the rabbits so we don't use much so this works well. I did what I could, what I could, I bit and chewed and not having any experience, never building something like this, it was important that I start somewhere where I felt confident I could do it myself. Somewhat familiar with plumbing only to the extent that I've had to figure things out in coffee shops on the fly, but you know, putting this all together is a huge learning curve, so sticking to what I felt I could process and with what that I was comfortable doing it alone and then as I meet people along the way and learn more that I can improve so that everything I built can be updated as I learn and grow in this life on the bus so I come from a long line of carpenters and my mother is a phenomenal craftsman. and she can build anything and I grew up with that, so when it came time to build a house, she was the first person I turned to.

She has a workshop ready, she taught me how to carve spoons and that's how we now make a living and together, she and I in three months built this bus, just the two of us, my dad likes to say that he had nothing to do with it , who held boards and brought sandwiches, so it was, you know, a woman-driven project and I couldn't have done this without my mom. It is incredible to have shared this project with her and to have helped her bring this space to a much higher level of quality than it could have been.

I made it on my own so it was amazing, I'll never forget it, so the sink and knife rack are just Ikea tricks. I love the round sink, it's nice and deep, good for dishes. I bought this little faucet on Amazon for less than 20. Bucks, it moves and does what you need with that little water pump there, so this is the bus living room or guest room when needed. I'll start from this side, this is the rabbit area, it was super important. for me that they had a space that they could call their own, they didn't choose the small life that I chose, but fortunately it also suits them, so we have only their small area and under the sofa is actually half of it.

Their litter box and hay area look a lot like cats, they mostly just sleep and uh, but they're a lot cuter, so this is my couch, most of the wood on this was made from a old desk that was being thrown away, so again. reclaimed materials and nothing a coat of paint can't fix and this back piece, the back of the sofa, actually goes up and goes to the front to extend out and make this a double guest crib again because hospitality was so important, I think The best advice I got when I was building was to establish your values ​​and your priorities of what's important to you in your life and how important it is to you that your home life feels and looks like that, so I knew that if I wasn't able to hold people, I mean, again, it's a small space, I don't know how many people will want to occupy it, but it was important to me to be able to invite people and have them stay the night and travel with me. so this slides out and again in a small life everything has to have as many purposes as possible so it's also a coffee table again change the mood feel good change the space all these curtains are insulated so when they are down they help keep the The bus is much cooler and really helps keep the heat in and gives a blackout effect which makes my mornings much slower lately.

I knew from the beginning that I wanted to use open shelves just because it is such a small space that I didn't want it to look too closed and since the free space is also very small, I thought it was very important to have the necessary open feeling. This isn't the most practical storage, but you know you've got it. We have so many other bulky storage spaces hidden around the bus that, this becomes more of an art piece, it's much more functional, but you know it's home, so these hold household items that you need day to day. and just help the space not feel so cramped and closed in, so I wanted it to feel really open, which is why I didn't cover any of the windows, so I might pay for that in the summer, but I think for the I feel like it was really necessary to keep it as open as possible, so this is the back of the bus and I'm really happy with how the space turned out.

I have a lot of storage space. Here is my closet with everything. My solar generator is down at the bottom so I'm now running a 1500 x zero target yeti which was a big help being in the

tiny

house community. At first I only equipped myself with a 330 watt solar generator with a 120 watt laptop. panel and I hadn't underestimated too much the amount of solar power I would need and I was able to upgrade it with the help of this community and helping me along the way, so don't panic if you don't know what you're doing at first. you'll learn and then here's my pantry and all my cleaning supplies at the bottom.

At first I thought I would just do some midway partitions and then when we started building the needs were presenting themselves and I realized I wouldn't have done it. enough food storage without or closed storage without these guys so you'll learn as you build the build will tell you what it needs and these are just clipped on with magnets on the top and bottom keep it closed and they really do it. It's good to travel so everything worked out well and I have even more storage underneath. This whole door opens and slides up and underneath is my toilet and I have more heavy winter coats and summer things, so you learn to have your closet more seasonal. to accommodate the small closet space and just some art stuff and all my workshop stuff in the back, but it's my bed area and it feels great, it's a full size mattress and opening them up to wake up with Incredible views has simply been the biggest blessing I could ask for.

I am very lucky now that they have been living in it. It definitely confirmed all my suspicions that I would hit my head on this and I have hit my head on this more than anything else in the world. bus but it's worth it because this air conditioner is connected to the engine and when I really need to cool down quickly this thing pumps so I'm very grateful that I listened to all the forums that recommended keeping the air conditioning unit because it has definitely saved me a or twice, so it's worth having a permanent dent in my head.

I think I have a magnetic curtain that lifts up in the back to block out those windows and it's such a nice pod that you feel so safe in your space at night. It's wonderful, so I have these nightstands on either side depending on which direction I need to put my head if the bus is tilted a little bit, but these just fold up and can be moved out of the way as needed, or but I like. It's like having them on all the time, it's really nice to set up my tablet here and put my keyboard on my lap and just work or watch TV from here, so it's been a nice feature, I've never taken on something like this before.

Mom had all the experience in building things and, in turn, I had always been part of her projects, but I never ever tackled something like this, ever, ever, uh, it was YouTube, it was research, it was knowing how to search Google the right questions to find the right ones. Answer, so I always tell anyone who comes on the bus, seriously, if I can do this, anyone can like YouTube, knowing how to ask questions using what you have and being creative with your resources. I mean, anyone can do it, there are many ways to build. a schoolboy and there are so many ways to enjoy your

freedom

so go out and get it don't wait welcome to my garage it has more rabbit stuff than they have in their diets so we always have plenty of hay on the bus and my tools, his junk, everything I need for the outdoors and then the rest of the space is all my wood carving tools and my pieces that I sell on my trips and that I make on my trips, so that's most of the space back here is dedicated so I have everything I need and it's a really good feeling.

Honestly, I don't think without CovidI would have been brave enough to take the plunge into life on the bus. I just made the decision and didn't really do it. I have time to consider if you know Tiny Living was the right choice, but it was the only choice, so I had to commit to it and then commit to figuring out how to do it and I'm incredibly grateful for the way. that life led me to life on the bus and then it led me to life on the bus. I first bought a travel trailer and tried to renovate it and, you know, with Covid the market was changing and prices were skyrocketing.

The inventory was disappearing and so, I had to rethink my whole plan and they took students from school and I had never heard what that was and the more I researched it seemed like the numbers made sense and to me that was what made the decision to me and I am very lucky and blessed that it was worth it because this is by far the best thing I have ever done for myself, without a doubt, this is all I needed. It has been an open door to a lot of healing. I've been looking in my life and everything is coming full circle here and uh every day I just try to hold that close to like life is this good this how good this life feels and just etch that in my heart and just carry it because it is the best, it is the best way to live.

I love when people follow me. It's a great community to have both in person and online and you can follow it. me on the dandy bus on and the gray underscore and you can follow my wood carving, which is how you can support the journey and support what we're going on here at speed carving just trying to make family heirlooms and pass them down for you and yours, so follow us if you feel like buying a spoon, buy one, but other than that, come on, let's hang out outside, like we're going to go out, let's have fun.