Saint John contractor hopes to cash in on tiny homes trend

A contractor in east Saint John is growing his business — smaller.

Leo Girouard and his wife Karen are getting into the tiny home construction business.

Tiny homes, which are built on trailers, have become popular in recent years with the help of a few specialty TV shows.

The Girouards, who own Wee Bitty Builders Inc., and are building their first model. It measures 8.5 feet by 20 feet and will sell for $45,000.

"It's pretty compact, but because of the high ceilings and the windows, it feels bigger," Girouard said.

They already have a number of interested clients, he said, including a couple from Ontario who wants a home that can be moved from province to province.

"They want to bring it in the fall of the year to Deer Island and in summer to Prince Edward Island," said Girouard.

"So they can work and have this property on both ends so they can bring it here for three months and then bring it to another part for the summer, which is perfect."

Girouard said the homes are not for everyone, but seem to appeal to a broad spectrum.

They make ideal starter homes for young people and are perfect for retired people looking to downsize, he said.

They can also be designed to appeal to environmentally conscious people by using solar power and composting toilets.

He and his wife became intrigued by tiny homes after seeing them on TV.

"You look at it and you think, 'Wow, they're pretty cool.' They've got all these neat little things in them that open and you know [are] compact," he said.

Then they did some research online. "The more I researched and looked into it, the more I realized, 'Wow I can do this.' and you realize there's not a lot of people that are doing it.

"It's big in the U.S., but in eastern Canada, there's not a lot. You get the odd person that's building it for themselves, but there's nobody that's actually out there building them for the public."