Photo of environmentally friendly and tornado resistant rest area in Ohio USA courtesy of Oydman at en.wikipedia.
Past, Present, and Future
We are emerging to build homes for the here and now.
Past
Tiny Carriage Houses
Prior to WWII, when most working people didn't own their own homes, many families had a third family member that lived in the home and cared for the aging loved ones. During the Post WWII Era, when home ownership became a hallmark of middle class families, most middle class women didn't work out of the home and often cared for the aging loved ones. When there was not any family member that could or would care for aging parents, household employees were sometimes hired in exchange for a small salary, free carriage house rental, and free "board' or food. Very few people spent their last days in care homes for the elderly.
Affordable Passive Solar Earth-sheltered Houses
During the Post- WWII Era the US economy was kept strong, in large part, by high-school-graduate-only factory workers who worked at the same company for 47 years. Forty of those years were spent earning living-wage salaries. With those salaries workers bought houses with a 30 year fixed mortgages. The middle class grew by leaps and bounds. So many families went from spending their entire lives renting apartments to accomplishing home ownership that home ownership became the US standard for families. There wasn't any concern about being laid off mid-career. There also wasn't any concern about the pollution from homes causing so much pollution that farms were losing a percentage of their crops to death by pollution. In fact, 30 year fixed mortgages for were such a beneficial fit to the 47 year factory career, that workers could pay off their mortgages by 48 years of age, and then use the remaining 17 years of their gainful employment to spoil the grandchildren and travel the world.
Zero Carbon Foot-print Appliances
In the past the closest inventors came to a zero carbon footprint appliances is; a sun tea maker, the cloths line with its cloths pins, and tortillas, pizza crusts, and sliced bread, that reduce the need for washing dishes. We would like to invent zero carbon footprint appliances that reduce resource use from the kitchen to the laundry room.
Present
Tiny Carriage Houses
In the here and now, most women work outside of the home. There are few opportunities to care for aging parents at home. However working families strain to care for aging parents at home because of the tens of thousands of horror stories that have come about since nursing homes become popular. If an aging parent is fortunate enough to remain healthy all of their lives, finding care isn't much of a problem, but if an aging parent can no longer be left alone, it can cost anywhere from $1,000 for 40 hours of Adult Day Care to $10,000 a month for 24/7 bedside in-home care. A small amount of aging parents have prepared for such expenses via long-term care insurance or an IRA. But, most aging parents have only a small retirement income, a little savings, and perhaps a reverse mortgage based on whatever their house is worth. This means that while most aging parents can afford Adult Day Care, most can't afford in home care. Many government agencies offer Medicaid to help pay, for Adult Day Care, in-home care, and nursing home care. In-home care is more affordable for Medicaid than nursing home care.
In Canada, au-pair, live-in care is a popular and affordable way of caring for their elderly at home. Canadian au pairs provide 40 hours of bedside care for only $1,000 per month, plus a bedroom in the house, and board. Many US families, however, are more comfortable if their parent's live-in caregiver can live in a separate tiny carriage house in their back yard; especially if they don't have a spare bedroom, or if they don't have a walk-out basement. This is one of the reasons why Tiny Carriage Houses are a perfect solution for US families.
Tiny Carriage houses can provide the perfect living space for one person who is a full-time live-in caregiver. It can even make it more feasible to allow the care-giver to own a well behaved pet. Instead of providing care in exchange for the package of; a bedroom in the aging parent;s house, sharing the aging parent's kitchen, free food, and a salary of about $1,000 per month, a caregiver can provide care in exchange for the package of; a 200 ft2 one-bedroom carriage house, with its own kitchen, and bathroom, plus free food. Tiny Carriage Houses are separate from the main house, but still on the property, like a detached garage. This raises the comfort level for the caregiver, the aging parent, and the family members, while at the same time making live-in care-giving as affordable as adult day care. Choosing to move a Tiny Carriage House onto an aging parent's property can be much easier, and more affordable than renovating a basement or garage.
Affordable Passive Solar Earth-sheltered Houses
In the here and now, the US middle class is shrinking due to lay offs and foreclosures. Most gainfully employed high school graduates work for a small business, where the current average length of employment is just 20 years, not 47 years. We hope to adapt to the changing economy as by building innovative, and comfortable smart homes that are inexpensive enough to be purchased with a 10 year fixed mortgage. These 10 year fixed mortgages would allow a wage-earner to purchase a home, while they are gainfully employed. Then their home will be paid off by the time their company goes out of business, they get laid off, and are forced to resort to a minimally employed job, like most of the jobs at Walmart, 7-11, or McDonald's.
Even some professionals, who are fortunate enough secure gainful employment at the same hospital, law firm, or computer programming firm for 40 -43 years, may spend 10 - 21 years of their career paying off student loans. In many cases, this leaves only 19 - 33 years of their 40 - 43 year working careers that they can use to purchase a home. Even those who have enough time to purchase a home on a 30 year fixed mortgage will only have 3 years to spoil the grandchild and travel the world, while they are still working. Our inexpensive homes can also help these professionals purchase homes in ten years, in spite of their student loans. This would leave them 9 - 23 years to spoil the grandchildren and travel the world, while they are still working.
We also hope to help families stop relying on over-extending credit in order to become or remain home owners, (which was, in large part, the cause of the mortgage crisis that almost caused the Second Great Depression). So our homes, whether they be blue collar or white
collar homes will be built with the here and now in mind.
Here and now, not only has the availability of living-wage jobs diminished, and not only is the middle class shrinking, but there is so much pollution now that many farmers lose a percentage of their crops to death by pollution.
Our passive solar, earth-shelter homes are a solution to all of these problems and share many of the building technologies that can be found in Bill Gate's Xanadu 2.0. Mansion. Passive solar building technology is extensively unique in that they use free sunshine to power and heat homes, and earth to cool homes. They can be built to not need a furnace or swamp cooler. Therefore, they can save families thousands of dollars a year by eliminating or reducing utility bills. They also have fewer outdoor painting and maintenance costs than a conventional home. Plus,they can also be built, on site, for the cost of a mobile home. So, a lower class family can live at a stable middle class quality of life, on lower class wages. At the same time passive solar homes reduce pollution, by reducing the portion of the brown cloud made from making electricity for conventional homes by using coal fueled power plants. Reductions can average around 90% to 100% per house. Passive solar houses also reduce the damage to the ozone layer from freon, from air conditioning by 100% per house. This stops the death of crops by pollution. Passive solar homes can also be built to conserve water and reduce trash.
We are currently seeking investors and plan to launch a Kickstarter video soon.
Zero Carbon Footprint Appliances
We are currently working on an non-electric atmospheric water converter that we call a dew catcher. It can produce a few gallons of pure water each morning about the time that the dew settles on the grass. We hope to produce this machine in a zero carbon footprint factory. We hope to have a Kickstarter video about this product sooner than the passive solar house video.
Future
Tiny Carriage Houses
We hope to be building our first zero-energy, ultra-water conserving Tiny Carriage House by the Summer of 2019.
Affordable Passive Solar Earth-sheltered Houses
We hope to start building our first community of passive solar, earth-sheltered smart houses by 2021.
Zero Carbon Footprint Appliances
The next product we plan to patent is our edible plate and silverware maker. Based on the idea of pizza, we plan to make a machine that you can feed special dough through one side and have edible plates and silverware come out the other side. Edible plates can sit on a clean table, on a washable or disposable napkins. When dinner is over, there is nothing to clean but the crumbs, napkins, and the liquid holders, such as bowls and glasses. After that, our next appliance is the waterless clothing washer. It will hang on the wall and you can put your clothing in it at the end of the day. By morning, the clothing will be clean and ready to wear again, without using water. After that, we are planning to invent an entire solar kitchen. We are so excited.
