GOODYEAR, Ariz. — A pair of Valley companies have teamed up to try and send temporary homes to the residents of Maui while they recover and rebuild from recent wildfires.
United Tiny Homes and Casa Legos have been partners for the better part of a year. Both companies build out of the same warehouse and both companies support each other.
United Tiny Homes started during the COVID-19 pandemic. As co-founders, Gail Kingsbury and Austin Bennett took stock of their lives, they decided they could help those who were hit hardest by the housing crisis.
“We started this business in order to be able to bring affordable and attainable housing, not only to the Phoenix area but to the entire country,” said Kingsbury.
Their homes range from 300 to 500 square feet. Each home is stocked with full-sized kitchen appliances and modern fixtures. Some even have lofts.
Meanwhile, inventor Adam Ochoa, or Adam O as he’s called, had been working on his latest project: a pop-up home that could be assembled in just a few hours.
“For me, it's to be able to have the vision to see where the housing crisis was going to happen. Homelessness and war veterans basically was the main idea. But unfortunately, it's the timings perfect to help the people in Hawai,” Ochoa said.
The partners started to work on plans to get their products to where they were needed most: Hawaii.
“Right now, you know, we're a startup company,” Kingsbury said. “So we're looking to see if there's, you know, investors or foundations that want to help us at least with the cost to get them there. We have several models here that we literally could send right away. Right now, it's just it's really a cost and a logistics point for us. We're trying to figure out how we can make that happen.”
Ochoa has been working with the contacts that he’s curated over the past few decades. He carries patents for products now used by many federal agencies, including NASA.
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