Couple lived in a bus for six years now they’re spending A$520,000 on a tiny home

A trip that was supposed to last less than a year ended with an Australian couple spending six years living on the road. Now Chris and Bec are making another big change: they are building a tiny home on a block of land in New South Wales.

The couple left Perth in 2020 after Covid-19 disrupted their original plans to travel overseas. Instead of cancelling everything, they decided to explore Australia by road. What started as a six-month to one-year plan kept going.

During those six years, Chris and Bec travelled about 35,000 kilometres, crossed the Nullarbor five times and lived in two different vehicles. Their main home eventually became a 1993 Toyota Coaster 4WD bus.

The bus itself cost about A$65,000. An early conversion added roughly A$7,000, before the couple later spent another A$30,000 to A$35,000 improving the vehicle. Chris estimated the complete setup ended up costing close to A$100,000.

Keeping a house on wheels running was not cheap either. Mechanical repairs added around A$30,000 over the years, while their normal monthly travel expenses usually sat between A$3,500 and A$5,000. In busier months, that figure could reach A$6,000.

Eventually, constant moving started becoming tiring. Finding places to park, packing everything up and dealing with repeated mechanical problems changed how the couple looked at full-time road life. Several breakdowns even forced them to stay in hostels and with other people for a period.

Chris and Bec then bought a 700-square-metre block on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales for A$370,000.

Their next home is very different from a regular suburban house. The custom-built tiny home is 8.4 metres long, sits on wheels and has two loft bedrooms. They expect to spend around A$150,000 on the build, taking the combined cost of the property and tiny home to roughly A$520,000.

The move does not mean the Toyota Coaster is being sold. Chris and Bec plan to keep the bus for shorter trips while using the tiny home as a permanent base between adventures.

The pair also continues to operate Salt and Charcoal, their travel business where they publish Australian road-trip guides and content based on the places they have travelled themselves.