Here’s What the U.S. Would Look Like If Everyone Lived in a Tiny Home

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With reality TV shows, books, blogs, and even lines of specially made major appliances, tiny-home obsession has officially swept the nation. While not everyone dreams of sleeping with their face 2 feet from the ceiling, a simpler life does have its appeal—and it’s weirdly fascinating watching other people try it.

But what if everyone in the United States lived in a tiny home? What would the nation look like without McMansions and ranches and rambling old houses with plenty of space to roam?

A tiny home is usually between 100 and 400 square feet, according to the website Tiny Life. So if all households in the U.S.—more than 118 million of them—lived in 250-square-foot tiny homes, clustered together, we would need 1,060 square miles of land. That’s roughly the size of Rhode Island, the smallest state!

OK, it is a pretty big assumption that all these tiny homes would be touching one another perfectly, without yards, sidewalks, or streets. (In fact, this is a pretty good description of a rather disturbing nightmare we keep having.) Actually many tiny homes sit on comfortable plots of land, making them feel more roomy than they are.

But you get the point, right? Think about all the energy America would save without 8-foot ceilings, and the extra cash we’d have without big mortgage payments.

Still, on average, American homes are getting bigger. The median size of a new single-family house was 2,467 square feet last year, the biggest on record, according to the Census Bureau. Nearly half (47%) of the homes have four bedrooms or more. Keep in mind that the average household size has shrunk to 2.65 people in 2015.

If all households lived in newly built single-family homes—again, all jammed together—we’d take up 10,460 square miles—a little smaller than the size of Maryland.

At the other end of the spectrum, if all households moved into side-by-side megamansions, we’d take over Louisiana. What would happen to the other 49 states? Parkland! After all, we’ll need some places to stretch our legs.

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