In Vancouver's unaffordable real estate market, there seems to be a constant struggle to invent the next housing craze—so it's hardly a shock when a new teeny-tiny option pops up on the scene.
Meet the Megazebo, an eight-sided steel home, according to a Kijiji ad. It's another laneway home idea, but it has a few surprises up its sleeve.
Billed as an "earthquake resistant superstructure" with full aluminum framed windows on all sides, a ceramic tile roof, a wraparound summer screen, there's also wind turbine on top. The 900 square-foot space has two levels and boasts a 360-degree view from inside looking out.
But what makes this offer particularly interesting isn't the design itself—it's the man behind it.
Megazebo mastermind Denis Braun is seeking a Vancouver landowner who will let him put his laneway home on their property. He wants to live in the house for three months out of the year, letting the owners rent out the space for the remaining months (and share the income with Braun). The Calgary man's terms also state that when he dies, the landowners inherit his Megazebo.
As the Kijiji ad reads:
You provide the land, taxes, utilities, and concrete pad (about $15,000 max). I build and furnish and live in the house for only 3 months per year. 9 months you rent and we share net rental income. When I die its all yours. I am 72, now in cancer treatments, and had open heart surgery 10 years ago, You do the math. No wife, no kids, no pets, no legal hassles after passing. I'm a totally free man.
It was Vancouver Sun columnist Shelley Fralic who summed up the offer best:
"Only in Vancouver’s predictably robust and perpetually unaffordable housing market — bubble, what bubble? — might Denis Braun’s unorthodox proposal actually make sense."
Would you allow one in your backyard?
Megazebos
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