Tiny House World

- Do you guys like cherries? - Daddy, look!

After years of beautiful countryside,

Tom and Sasha want to buy a second home

in the city of Dublin.

- The house is literally six feet wide.

It's tiny. It's incredibly well designed.

It's really cool.

I love the staircase.

They were ready to downsize,

but with a full house and a pricey market,

going tiny is going to be tough.

- Oh, my God. What's going on there?

It's the most bizarre house I've ever been in.

I mean, we're not gonna fit, babe.

Yeah, we will.

Our big, wide world

is getting a whole lot tinier

as homebuyers across the globe

discover that having less

is their passport to doing more.

Ditch your job. Downsize your home.

Connect with your world.

Tiny living knows no borders.

Tom and Sasha reconnected after studying together

at Scotland's Edinburgh University.

It's been such good weather.

Tom's a journalist and writer,

and I'm a furniture designer and artist.

And we both went our separate ways for a bit,

and then we kind of got back together

and lived in New York for a while.

And after four years,

we decided to move back to Ireland.

- Well, it was a massive culture shock

moving from New York to a potato field

in the middle of Ireland,

but we do really enjoy the good life.

All right, you ready? Here's a tricky one.

- Oh! - Oh!

Come round the back; I'll wash it off.

No, I'll wipe it.

Tom and Sasha settled

in her native County Carlow, an hour south of Dublin.

Their family of five live in two acres

of incredible countryside.

We've got three kids.

Ben is 9, Elin is 7 1/2,

and we've got little baby Johnny, who's 1 1/2.

They love being out here.

They love the animals.

They love the outside space.

They love having their cousins and their friends

across the fields.

But as time passes,

Tom and Sasha are itching for city living

and want a second home.

- There is definitely a feeling, I think,

that we'd like a bit more

of the urban experience back in our lives again, maybe.

- Yeah, I think we'd both benefit

from a bit of urban living.

- What would you like about being in the city

compared to here?

Like, in the country,

you only have, like, cereal or things like that,

but in the city, you're able to get, like, croissants

and things like that and stuff.

The Sykes are ready to sink their teeth

into Dublin's tiny-home market.

And after designing

their current 2,000-square-foot house,

they've picked up some space-saving techniques.

- We made sort of lots of sliding doors,

and we really made use of the height

to make it feel bigger.

So we've already made a step towards the small-house design.

- I'd be totally game on for living in a tiny house.

But I am slightly nervous

about having no outdoor space.

And I think we probably do need to find somewhere

that has a bit of a garden,

or I just think we're going to go mad.

We reckon our budget

is gonna be around about the $200,000 mark.

If we do do it, it's got to be somewhere like

really good location.

You can just walk outdoor

and get, like, a cup of coffee.

Yeah.

What do you think about it, Johnny?

What do you think?

Do you think it'd be good or bad?

I think he thinks it'd be good.

- You think this'd be good?

Yeah.

A quick stroll through Dublin

leads you past architecture dating back

as far as the 11th century.

But the city has more to offer than a history lesson.

Today Dublin's been enhanced by multiculturalism.

Dubliners line up for the newest ramen joint

or order falafel when hankering for fast food.

And traditional manufacturing has been replaced

by a booming financial and tech industry.

I can't believe it.

We're actually going to buy our own tiny house.

You know, you really want somewhere

with, like, character.

Yeah.

- And in a way, that is the thing about Dublin.

It does have this incredible amount

of, like, these really cute little one-bedroom

artisan cottages,

which I think you don't get, really,

in any other capital city.

Expert Sarah Lafferty knows tiny,

but she's anticipating a tough hunt ahead,

especially in Tom and Sasha's 500-square-foot range.

- Even though they're up for being in a really small space,

this small space still has to accommodate five people.

It's going to be challenging,

because their budget isn't huge,

and city center prices in Dublin are very high.

Sarah's first pick is a townhouse

that's just 230 grand.

But that price comes with a kicker.

It's the skinniest house in Dublin.

- Hi. - Hi. How's it going?

- Good. - Great.

So this is it.

Have you noticed how close we are to the city?

- Yes. - Yeah.

I mean, Camden Street is right there,

so some of the best bars and the restaurant

are literally a tiny little stroll away.

Back in the 1900s, what the builder did is,

he started sort of building one house

at one end of the street

and the other at the other end of street

and kept building.

And then when he got to here, they noticed that there was

about six feet of a gap.

So what that means is,

the house is literally six feet wide.

- Wow. - How do you feel about that?

Six feet?

That's like your height.

Let's go check it out.

Let's go and have a look.

Look at this.

Is it like this the whole way through?

- Yeah, so it's 6 feet wide,

but it's actually 11 foot high.

So when you go really small,

you start considering your vertical space.

Wow. Well, this is pretty amazing.

- Yeah, it's the most bizarre house

I've ever been in.

Before we even walked

through the door of this house,

I was really excited about it,

because it's in such a fantastic area.

But it makes you laugh when you walk in here.

It's not ever gonna be a real house.

It's a corridor

that someone's put a roof over.

- Let's take you through to the next room.

So this is...

the bedroom.

- That bedroom is an incredibly creative use of space,

using the height to get the most space

out of a really tiny house.

How would you fancy sleeping up there with me, babe?

Oh, I'd love it.

- I think it'd be very romantic.

It'd be very romantic, yeah.

We could fit all five of us up there.

So this is the hall.

You've got storage under the stairs.

- There's good storage space in there, right?

You can get plenty of space.

Tom and Sasha are country dwellers

starved for the city life.

So they're seeking a small second getaway

in Dublin, Ireland.

As they tour a house that's just six feet wide,

they're realizing going tiny's gonna be a tough feat,

especially for their family of five.

- This little corner here could be a playroom.

- There's a lot you could do there.

You could put a desk, or we could put a cot.

Put a cot.

- Yeah, it's an important space

that you can't waste.

- Breakfast table, maybe.

- I think it's actually got real potential,

and the fact that it's small, I mean, you know,

you can really work with that.

- So in here, there's the bathroom.

It's got everything you need, shower.