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08/08/2003 Archived Entry: "Credit-card article in Backwoods Home (and small cabin plans)"

THE PRINT EDITION OF BACKWOODS HOME JUST ARRIVED TODAY carrying my article, "Credit-Card Monte: Finance flim-flam and how to foil it." The article describes some ways card issuers use misdirection and fine print to get you to pay sky-high finance charges & gives 11 tips on outwitting their machinations.

This issue also carries an article, "Life in a Chicken Coop," which tells how, after their four-bedroom house burned down, Chuck Davis and his wife turned a 12 x 17-foot log coop into a cute & cozy temporary home. Small dwellings fascinate me (as you can probably guess from where I live), and they make sense if you want a home without a load of debt. After all, you can always expand later.

The Davis's coop sweet coop is a gem. The article is poorly written, but gives a good picture of how the Davises made the conversion. Anybody who can clean out and re-use a space once heavily occupied by chickens -- which have gotta be the filthiest animals on the planet -- has guts.

There used to be a great Web site for tiny cabin plans, the Cherokee Cabin Company. Nothing there but a "dead" front page today. But if you're interested in building a mini-house from scratch, here's another not-bad site.

Pretty funny. When you start looking around for plans for cabins or small houses, you'll find a lot of sites offering designs for homes of 1400-to-2500 square feet. You gotta wonder who considers that "small."

Posted by Claire @ 04:53 PM CST
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