We discovered a plot of paradise with Rory and Paulette, with their family sized tiny homes living off-grid in NZ with Rory’s brother and mum. Come along on this tiny house tour to learn how to live off-grid with a family and find inspiration from their story.

Eco-living and not having a mortgage were the two catalysts that set Rory and Paulette off to build a tiny house in the Waikato area of New Zealand. After a few years living in the city, they realized they wanted a different life and started down-sizing, getting rid of things they didn't want and determining what they actually needed.

They worked the paddock to get the land ready for building their tiny house. It took six months to get the kitchen up and running and two months without a bathroom. Paulette, who’s originally from town said it was a transition moving off-grid, but she said there’s no way she would go back and left her job after giving birth to her daughter. Going back to working an office job? “Never happening,” she said. Instead, she’s been learning how to live off-grid with a family, volunteering at a local organic veggie garden to learn from them about how to grow vegetables and to volunteer her time. Her daughter plays with their kids while her mom learns. "We're all a bit more tied to the land—doing things to sustain ourselves."

Living off-grid puts family first for Rory and Paulette. His younger brother had been trying to save for his own home but renting and trying to save just were not working out. Rory had the land and his brother set up a tiny house on it. He said, “Maybe he’ll buy some land one day, but until then, he’s got somewhere he can live and we can help him out so he can save.”

Rory’s mum had been living in a “grand” house. After she sold it, she needed a place to live, so she too, moved into one of the family sized tiny homes on the plot of land. "Having Nana here is awesome and she loves it because she gets a lot more time with her grandchildren," said Paulette.

"Because we're all quite like-minded now, we all gel quite well together which is cool.” Their property includes a hut with a wood-fired oven where the family can gather in lawn chairs and just take in the stunning views of the land surrounding them at night as dinner cooks and they warm up.

To power their off-grid family paradise, they turned to GridFree purchasing a Freedom Kit for each of their housing units, ground-mounting the solar panels.

"We went with GridFree because you're off-grid specific. Most of the other companies do offer that as well but they're mainly grid-tied. Knowing that's your focus (off-grid), gave us confidence that the kind of kit you would provide was fit for our purpose.”

Rory said that installation of the GridFree Freedom DIY Solar Panel Kit was easy, “no, mmm what does this thing do? It's just easy." The products arrived in good condition. He said that customer support helped him as he set things up and he has recommended GridFree twice: “GF is definitely that company we are recommending because it's so easy. Because we've done it all ourselves, it's all just been, yeah this is awesome that we've done this we haven't gotten someone else to do it.”

"The best part of being off-grid and having solar is just the freedom—both financial and physical freedom to do what we want, that we can share this with our family, with a minimal footprint on the earth and be who we want to be and hopefully be an inspiration to others." (Paulette: It's possible. You can do it!)

View the Freedom Kit:
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00:00 - Intro
01:54 - Land Tour
02:23 - Living with Family
03:33 - Lounge and Kitchen
04:38 - Challenges
05:19 - Resources
05:54 - Bedroom
06:42 - Changes to Lifestyle
07:46 - Bathroom
08:15 - Composting Toilet
08:41 - GridFree Experience
10:09 - Fireplace Cabin
10:43 - Best parts of Off-grid Living
11:32 - Outro

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