“How do you feel, Page?”
“You know what? I’m pretty much out of my mind excited.”
That was the first thing Paige told us when her new 38ft x 10ft wide deckover tiny house trailer rolled into her driveway in California. And honestly, that’s my favorite part of this job. We build a lot of tiny house trailers, but every delivery is the start of somebody’s dream, and Page’s story is one I had to share.
Meet Page
Page isn’t new to building. In her words, she has “built a million different things on wheels.”
Back in 1985 she took a 1972 International Harvester school bus and turned it into a beautiful redwood one bedroom home. It even made it into a magazine. “A little magazine called Dwell,” as she put it. Four years ago she built her first tiny house, and when she started designing and dreaming about this one, she reached out to us.
Paige is 68, she’s an artist, and like she told us in the video, there’s no way she’s going to buy a $2 million home in California. She has always wanted to build her own home, and this is it.
Why She Chose Tiny House Basics
Page did her homework. She researched all of the companies that sell tiny house trailers, and here’s what she said:
“It was obvious that Tiny House Basics really stood out to me as being just true blue… really good customer service and great confidence.”
She also liked knowing that I had built on this exact style of trailer myself, so I know it well. That means a lot to us. We don’t just sell trailers, we live in and built tiny houses ourselves, and we want every customer to have that same confidence before they put the first wall up.
The Trailer: 38ft x 10ft Wide Deckover
Page’s house is big. So big she said, “I don’t know if it’s going to qualify as a tiny house at this point. We might have to call it a tiny mansion.”
A tiny mansion needs a solid foundation, so here’s what we built for her:
Trailer Specifications at a Glance
- Size: 38ft long x 10ft wide deck
- Style: Deckover
- Package: 21K
- Axles: 120in wide axles, with brakes on all axles
- Crossmembers: Placed flush with the top of the frame, with 16in spacing
- Threaded rods for tying your wall framing down to the trailer
- Extended tongue
- Front jacks: Dual 12K jacks at the front of the deck, in place of a single tongue jack, offset off the frame with a C channel spacer
- Rear jacks: Dual 12K jacks at the back, offset off the frame with a C channel spacer
Why a 10ft Wide Deckover?
With a deckover, the deck sits above the wheels, so you get the full 10ft width across the whole length of the trailer. No fenders cutting into your floor plan. On a 38ft trailer, that’s a lot of extra living space, and it’s a big reason our 10ft and 12ft wide trailers have become so popular.
And because the crossmembers sit flush with the top of the frame, the trailer can be used as your subfloor. It’s ready to build on the day it shows up.
Delivery Day
Getting a 38ft trailer into a backyard is never just “back it up and drop it.” Page wanted the trailer sitting at a specific angle on her lot, so we spent a good amount of time measuring, lining it up with the wood blocking, pulling forward, and backing in again until it was right where she wanted it.
That’s normal, and it’s worth taking your time. Where your trailer sits is where your house is going to live, so get it right before you start framing.
Once it was in place, the dual jacks front and back made it easy to get the trailer set and stable.
A Lifelong Dream
At the end of our interview, Page said something that stuck with me:
“Thank you so much for helping me make literally a lifelong dream come true.”
We put that one at the end of the video, along with photos of her finished tiny house, day and night. Make sure you watch all the way through. She wasn’t kidding about the tiny mansion. Like Page said, “She’s going to be fierce.”
Ready to Start Your Own Build?
Whether you’re planning a 20ft tiny house or a 38ft tiny mansion like Paige, it all starts with the right foundation. We build custom tiny house trailers in any size up to 48ft long and up to 12ft wide, and every trailer comes with lifetime consulting, so we’re here to help you along the way.
Request a Free Tiny House Trailer Quote Today and let’s design the perfect foundation for your tiny home!