Stackable Home Project Begins Downtown

Article originally posted on HERE on April 7, 2023

Two tiny homes last week arrived in downtown Mesa ahead of groundbreaking for an unusual residential project planned to get underway this spring.

ZenniHome, created by SkyMall founder and former state Sen. Bob Worsley, is preparing to stack and lock together prefabricated tiny homes into a 90-unit mid-rise apartment building on Main Street.

Before cranes hoist the homes into place – possibly this summer– the public will have the opportunity to tour two modular homes by appointment at a demonstration site at 29 Robson, next to Cider Corps, in downtown.

ZenniHome’s two models on display are 320 square feet and 640 square feet, respectively. 

The company touts its product as a solution for people who want to add a dwelling unit to their property, or developers looking to create multifamily housing on an accelerated timeline.

Worsley wants downtown Mesa to be the test site to demonstrate the multifamily housing possibilities of the units.

To do so, ZenniHome has struck a deal with Scottsdale-based Caliber Development to construct two tiny home towers atop a ground-floor retail building on a property it owns at 29 Main St., which currently houses a vacant bank building.

A Caliber spokesman said it could begin demolishing the bank and filling in its basement level by May.

The company will then build a new ground-level retail structure that will become a base for the tiny homes apartment blocks above.

Worsley sees his small, shippable homes as a new tool for communities and individuals to fill housing gaps in Arizona and beyond.

“I could see in the Senate that there was a lot of need for housing,” Worsley said.

After he retired from the Legislature in 2019, he saw a lab in Utah where engineers were working on robotic walls and furniture to maximize space.

Worsley was impressed with the concept, but the devices he saw weren’t ready for the market yet.

“After 18 months, I just said, ‘I’m going to do this,’” he said. “There’s good product out there that’s currently offered. … I want to take the house and design it around robotic furniture, because I think that’s the future.”

In the prototype ZenniHomes installed downtown, a bed glides up into the ceiling during the day to create a living room with couch and coffee table and an entertainment center that slides to create a walk-in closet.

Brooklyn-based Ori – as in origami – created the mobile furniture.

At $95,000 and $125,000, respectively, the units are more affordable than a typical starter home in today’s market. ZenniHome estimates additional costs of $30,000 to $50,000 to install the small structures on site.

The homes are built using the dimensions of shipping containers to facilitate shipping, but Worsley emphasized the homes are not made from containers.

According to Worsley, shipping containers are not practical for creating living spaces.

“By the time you take a container and cut into it, you’ve destroyed the structural integrity of the container,” Worsley said, “And if you’re putting in windows and doors, it’s got to be reinforced again.”

The steel bones supporting the ZenniHomes are built “from scratch.”

“We built these with enough steel in the walls that we can stack these five-high,” he said.

Most of the workers who are welding, wiring and finishing the compact homes are Navajos. 

ZenniHome’s factory is one of the first redevelopment projects to open on the site of the Navajo Generating Station coal plant that was decommissioned in 2019, leading to the loss of hundreds of jobs in the rural community.

Originally, ZenniHome planned to source its steel frames from China, but when the pandemic disrupted international shipping, Worsley said the company decided to onshore production. 

He thought bringing jobs back to the NGS site could be a win-win for the company and the communities of Page and Lechee, a neighboring community on the Navajo Nation.

“I was told by so many people ‘Never do it. You’ll never ever get anything done up there. The government won’t let you do it. Navajos won’t let you do it,’ and it’s just not true,” he said.

“In 60 days, we had a lease, an emergency operating agreement, and now we’re talking about really big relationships with the Navajos, because they believe in us because we believed in them.”

Among those touring the modular homes was acting Head of Commerce of the Navajo Nation Tony Skrelunes.

“A lot of Navajos really value that hard work with their brands, so this is certainly significant, because we’re building something that’s premium for our country, and sustainable,” Skrelunes said. 

He said the Navajo Nation is in the process of master planning redevelopment for the NGS site, which is thousands of acres.

Skrelunes said the tribe is also interested in keeping some of the ZenniHomes on tribal land.

“We have a massive need for housing on our nation,” he said. “A lot of our people are excited this could really help us solve a glaring need.”

Skrelunes said the small size of the ZenniHomes works well with Navajo tradition.

“A smaller space ensures communication, ensures storytelling, ensures that interaction happens,” he said.