California Tiny Home: How She Got Home After the Fire
When the Eaton Fire swept through Altadena in January 2025, it took 9,000 homes and businesses. One of them was the house Marialyce had spent nearly 20 years making her own.
She bought the 1928 Spanish-style house from her best friend from high school in 2005 and moved in with her six-year-old son. Over the years, she slowly renovated and restored it, and by the time of the fire, the work was nearly done.
"We had almost almost finished."
A year later, Marialyce is back on the same property, but her new house hasn't been approved for construction yet. For now, she's living in a 243-square-foot California tiny home, parked on the lot where she can still see where her old house once stood.
At a glance
Home: 243 square feet, about 30 feet by 10
Built by: Cahill Works
Cost: $85,000 in 2025, around $95,000 now
Built in: about 10 weeks
Delivered by: an ordinary Ford pickup, backed onto the lot
Services: a real sewer line, propane outside feeding an on demand water heater
After the rebuild: it becomes her guest house
Why She Bought Instead of Renting
Everything turns on this one.
Her insurance paid out in three parts. One to rebuild the house, one for the contents she lost, and a third called loss of use, which exists because you cannot live in a destroyed home and have to live somewhere else. Most people put that third part toward rent. She looked at what rent costs in Los Angeles, did the arithmetic, and decided she was not going to hand it to a landlord.
"When you pay rent it's gone. It's gone forever. It goes to your landlord's equity."
So she bought a house with it.
"I'd rather own something that I could have forever versus just have, you know, pay rent that's gone forever."
Her insurer paid the whole policy promptly and without a fight. She knows that is not everyone's experience, and says some of her neighbors are still being asked to list every single item they lost before they see money the policy already promised them.
Hers worked out.
How your own policy is worded, and what loss of use will and will not cover, is a conversation with your own insurer. That is not a guarantee about anyone else's.
Want a new tour in your inbox every week? Join the Tiny Home Tours newsletter for a new home every week.
A House That Came on a Pickup Truck
At 243 square feet, the tiny home is about 30 feet long and 10 feet wide. Getting it onto the property was surprisingly simple, too.
"It was transported here by a Ford truck, just a normal truck, not a semi, and they backed it in here for me."
The idea of living tiny came from a friend whose tiny home Marialyce had stayed in before. He suggested that something similar might give her a comfortable place to live while she waited to rebuild, and she decided to give it a try.
One of the biggest appeals was that she didn't have to figure everything out herself.
"Other people have been researching how to do tiny home life for way longer than I've needed mine, and so I appreciated that Tasha Cahill at Cahill Works had done all the thinking for me."
Marialyce chose details like the cabinet colors and the green upholstery on the couch, but much of the layout and functionality had already been worked out. Now that she's living in the home, she keeps finding little details that make the small space easier to use.
The Kitchen That Talked Her Out of Gas
Altadena is encouraging people rebuilding to go all electric rather than reconnect gas lines.
She was against it.
"I hate electric stove and thought I'd never get rid of gas."
Then she used an induction cooktop, and it heats water faster, heats evenly rather than scorching the middle of the pan while the edges stay cold, shuts itself off if you walk away, and has a timer, which her old stove did not.
"Now that I have an induction stove, it really works better than a gas stove."
The rest of it is a farmhouse sink, a faucet with a flexible nozzle, the two burner cooktop and a refrigerator she calls almost normal size. No built in oven. She bought a Breville countertop one separately and it fits a pizza, which is the measure that matters.
Her old kitchen was an L.
This one is a straight line, and she can turn around and reach the fridge.
The One Choice the Bathroom Made Her Make
There is room for a bathtub or room for a washer and dryer. Not both.
She loves baths. She took the washer and dryer.
There is a laundromat nearby and she could have used it, but washing your own clothes at home won, so the compromise is a rain shower head and a shower stool.
"I'll sit on the stool and pretend I'm in the bathtub."
A hot tub is on the list.
The washer shakes the house when it spins, enough that visitors think it is an earthquake, and she is used to it now. The sink is full size. The water is heated on demand by a propane tank outside, and she is emphatic about the showers being long and hot. There is a real sewer line, run to the lot.
What She Carried Over
The fire took almost everything, and she is matter of fact about what that did for the move.
"In terms of stuff in a tiny house, I'm at an advantage in the sense that all my stuff is, I've been relieved of all my stuff, thanks to the fire."
A three bedroom house and a garage, both full. A writer's worth of paperwork and files. None of it would have fitted here.
What she did bring, she chose. Friends ran donation drives in the weeks after the fire and she took the basics even though she had nowhere to put them yet, because she knew people would have moved on by the time she was ready. Her sister stored the boxes while she lived in an RV.
Two things came out of the rubble.
A porcelain heart she found in the debris turned out to have her grandmother's ring inside it. The ring was refurbished and it is back in the heart, on a shelf she can see from the couch.
And the chimney. She asked the Army Corps of Engineers to save the bricks before they cleared the lot.
The path to her front door is made from them.
The Rest of the House Is Outside
The lot already had a cob oven and an outdoor kitchen with a sink and a barbecue, and those survived. She and her son and her handyman built out the rest of it, and someone donated a table, so she can have people over. There have been meals, a party with music, a swim party last summer.
"I love showing off my tiny home to my neighbors and anybody else who wants to come visit."
The neighborhood is loud with construction all day.
Then at four o'clock everyone goes home.
"It's incredibly peaceful here. I have the most beautiful nights."
She has got used to having the street to herself, and says she will probably miss it.
What a California Tiny Home Cost Her
$85,000 in 2025. She believes the same home is around $95,000 now.
Set against an LA rebuild, that is the whole argument.
"For under 100,000 to have a turnkey house that you can live in is a pretty great solution for disaster recovery."
What Happens When the Real House Is Built
Her rebuild plans go in within the week. Several months for approval, then eight months to a year of building. The tiny home means none of that has to be rushed. "The most important thing is I'm not stressing on hurrying my rebuild up, because I am comfortable enough here for the time being."
When the new house is finished, this becomes the guest house. It can also leave, if she ever wants it to.
And she has caught herself wondering whether she needs the big house at all.
"I'm 62, and so I'm just keeping it simple and just trying to get a grip after such loss."
The new one will be straw bale, the most fire resilient option she found.
Why She Thinks This Matters Beyond Her Own Lot
She does not leave it as a personal story.
"We are probably going to continue experiencing climate-driven disasters like fires and floods, and so people lose their homes when those things strike."
Her point is the gap between two timelines. A rebuild takes a year or more. A house like hers takes about ten weeks.
"If you need a way to get back to someplace that you want to be at, I think it's obvious that this is the way to get home."
If you want to see another California answer to a housing problem, a nurse in the Southern California desert chose a destination trailer and retired early. For what these homes actually cost, our cost guide puts five real budgets side by side, and you can see what we have filmed in your state.
FAQ
Can you put a tiny home on your property while you rebuild after a fire?
Marialyce did, on her own lot in Altadena after the Eaton Fire. Her tiny home is connected to a real sewer line, with a propane tank outside feeding an on demand water heater. Whether it is allowed where you live depends on your own city or county, and on what your lot can be connected to, so that is the first call to make.
How much does a tiny home cost in California?
Marialyce paid $85,000 for hers in 2025 and says the same home is around $95,000 now. That is for a finished, turnkey 243-square-foot house. Site work is separate, and hers needed a sewer connection run to it.
How long does it take to build a tiny home?
Marialyce says hers was built in about 10 weeks, and contrasts that with the year or more a rebuild takes. Her new house needs several months for plan approval before construction even starts, then another eight months to a year to build.
How big is a 243-square-foot tiny home?
Hers is about 30 feet long and 10 feet wide, and holds a living room, a kitchen with a nearly full size refrigerator, a bathroom with a shower and a stacked washer and dryer, and a bedroom with a queen bed behind a pocket door. It was delivered on an ordinary Ford pickup rather than a semi.
Want a new tour in your inbox every week? Join the Tiny Home Tours newsletter for a new home every week.
Comments