The trend of tiny homes has hit the Village of Delia as its village council approved the construction of one such home.
A High River couple have put in a permit to build an 800 square foot home in Delia. They are expected to begin construction in the spring.
“We don’t have tons of empty lots but any development is good development and people moving in to Delia is a good thing,“ said Delia CAO Mark Nikota.
The home has many restrictions to adhere to like a permanent foundation and it must be properly skirted. The current land owners are also required to sign the development permit prior to the permit taking effect. A public hearing was held and the permit is now in the final stages of begin accepted.
“The lot they bought was a private deal but the purchasers put in a development permit application and that of course went to council to make sure that was something they wanted to allow,” said Nikota.
Nikota argues that the house isn’t too far off in size in terms of housing in Delia.
“The area that the lot is in is zoned R2 Residential General so it wasn’t like it was a big stretch, it was definitely a much smaller size than what the land use plan calls for but when you look at some of the surrounding houses in Delia, it’s not like it’s way out of bounds and it’s good for the village to have development on an empty lot.”
Delia is not the only community that is embracing the minimalist movement. Big Valley recently opened a section of land with the purpose of intriguing prospective buyers into developing tiny homes.
So far, no one has fully committed to buying a lot.
“We did a number of press releases and we had, I would say, significant interest so there is a lot of people who are interested in it, unfortunately I think a lot of it has to do with the current economy,” said White.
They feel that the idea and interest is there but was introduced early.
“Unfortunately, we might have come up with something that is a good idea but the timing of it might not be entirely the best,” explained White.
Since the zoning introduction back in May, the village has come up with more specific guidelines for the development area.
Height limits, exterior finish, colours and so on are now put in place through the architectural guidelines for houses that would go on the property.
“Council actually didn’t want the cookie cutter kind of style where each house is exactly the same but at the same time we wanted them to be similar enough that there’s not going to be something completely stand-out and incredibly different,” said White.
