Las Vegas company Boxabl is building the $49,500 Casita, a 375-square-foot prefab tiny home.
Elon Musk said he owns one of those units, which he uses as a guest house near his home in Texas.
Take a tour inside the tiny home, which features a bedroom, bathroom, living room, and kitchen.
Tiny homes have turned into an unquestionably well known option in contrast to the exemplary family home or condo.
The tiny living units have even caught the attention of one of the richest men in the world: Elon Musk.
During a podcast appearance on Thursday, Musk confirmed that he owns a prototype unit from Las Vegas startup Boxbell.
Curious to know about the tiny house owned by a man who can afford countless houses?
Well, Boxabl’s first product is the Casita, a $49,500, 375-square-foot, prefab home.
In late 2021, Boxabl said it set up a casita in Boca Chica, Texas – where SpaceX’s launch site is – for a “top secret client”.
Tiramani did not confirm whether Musk, who runs SpaceX, had bought or lived in the casita in an interview with Insider last year.
But the company has dismissed online rumors that Musk lived in one of its units.
Musk denied living in the tiny house, saying he lives in a separate tiny house in South Texas. But in July 2022, he said that he has Boxbell and he uses it as a guest house. He said that he had organized a birthday party there last year.
Boxabl’s identity isn’t just centered around Musk’s interest.
The company’s brief history stretches back to 2017, when the Las Vegas-based team decided to build their own tiny homes after seeing “a huge opportunity to turn building construction around the world into a factory assembly line” like any other everyday product. . did. , An interview last year.
There are many reasons why the housing doesn’t really work at the factory yet, so we’ve studied it and solved all those problems,” he said.
As indicated by Tiramani, other prefab-home creators battle with one obvious problem: transporting planned operations.
But unlike other prefab homes, casitas can be folded down from 20 feet to about 8 1/2 feet while being transported on a truck or pulled by a pickup truck.
Shipping, however, can still cost $2 to $10 per mile from the company’s Las Vegas headquarters.
But houses can also be shipped overseas or by rail if the customer is willing to pay more for shipping.
Nearly all Casita finishes – such as kitchen, bathroom, electrical, plumbing and HVAC – are completed at the factory before being shipped out.
So when the casita arrives at its final destination, the house simply needs to be opened up (which takes a few hours) and then connected to its foundation and utilities before it’s ready to go.
The 19.5-foot-by-19.5-foot buildings can also be stacked and connected to form larger buildings. But if you’re looking for a large prefab home, wait a bit. Tiramani says the company is still planning to release larger units.
But starting with “trendy, cool and popular” tiny homes was strategic because it attracted more customer attention, says Boxbell founder
But Boxabl isn’t just popular because of their tiny houses.
The time, cost, and labor-intensive nature of building homes in factories amid our housing shortage is driving more attention to prefabrication, whether it’s casitas or other factory-built homes, such as 3D printed units.
But back to boxing. The Casita Has Attracted More Than Just Little Enthusiasts and Elon Musk
Boxabl has a waiting list of 120,000 customers, and over 5,000 customers have already submitted deposits.
And many of these future customers — such as large companies — will want more than one unit, so “the real demand for this initial product is incredibly massive,” Tiramani said.
The waiting list is about 100,000 people, but Boxabl says those people are interested in at least 1 million casitas.
And the company doesn’t attribute this popularity to the Musk rumors.
With the help of influencers and social-media marketing, Las Vegas businesses already had a waiting list of 40,000 people before Musk fans could get their attention in 2021.
But when the SpaceX rumors broke, its waiting list reached 47,000 people.
According to Boxabl, the value of the reserved casitas is over $1 billion.
The target audience already heard about it, and then the Musk press brought in the interest of a general audience who may not have cared about housing,” Tiramani said.
The company has built at least 200 tiny houses so far.
Last June, it moved into a 170,000-square-foot factory with hopes of producing one casita — or about 3,600 units — every 90 minutes by the end of 2022 with the help of an automated and standardized process.
The company said a second factory is still up and running.
For comparison, according to Boxabl, it can take an average of seven months to build a typical single-family home.