Essex Junction builder makes tiny home kits with sustainable products

Jun 04, 2025

ESSEX JUNCTION — Over the past five years, homebuilder New Frameworks has shifted its focus from building expensive custom homes to building a line of pre-fabricated homes ranging in size from 300 square feet − a tiny home − to 1,200 square feet, utilizing straw structural panels that provide high insulation values while also storing carbon, according to co-founder and CEO Ace McArleton.

Straw structural panels are simply wooden boxes filled with straw, built in a shop rather than on-site to the dimensions required to build the home.

McArleton says he and his co-founders recently wound down their involvement in the lucrative custom home market they had served for about 18 years because they wanted to make a bigger impact as builders for combatting climate change, and for using natural building materials free of toxic chemicals.

"It's ironic, from the outside when you're doing custom building (people think) you can do whatever you want as the architect and builder," McArleton said. "But actually it means you do what the client wants. Often people, even if they mean well, they want something because they saw it in a magazine or their friend did it."

New Frameworks wanted to push the boundaries of materials and construction to show what was possible for environmentally responsible building.

"We can't do that if we're waiting for somebody else's consent or say-so," McArleton said. "We have to forge that path."

The result of that pathfinding is New Frameworks' Casitas Line of prefabricated homes, including the Cabanita 300, the Agua 400, the Terra 600, the Flora 900 and the Arbol 1200, with the number designating the approximate size in square feet. The Cabanita 300, for example, is actually 314 square feet − still a tiny home by any measure.

The homes are available as kits, or as turnkey construction projects built by New Frameworks, if your building site is within an hour in any direction from Essex Junction or Montpelier. New Frameworks' pre-fabricated, pre-designed homes are aimed at the "missing middle" of new home buyers, who don't qualify for subsidized housing and can't afford custom homes, according to Emily Whalen, sales and account manager for New Frameworks.

The Casitas kits range in price from $65,000 to $165,000, with fully finished Casitas ranging from $129,000 to $427,500, not including the cost of land and the site preparation work. New Frameworks estimates site work as ranging from $25,000 to $100,000 on improved land, and from $50,000 to $150,000 on unimproved land.

"Our transition from custom homebuilding to prefab panelized projects is a scale question," Whalen said. "One to two custom homes a year is not enough in terms of fighting the climate crisis and getting sustainable materials into the environment. One or two homes a year at $800,000 plus is not helping our housing crisis. Now we're doing between 10 and 15 homes a year, and we might be able to do between 25 and 30 as of next year. It's about getting as many houses out there at an accessible price point."

McArleton puts the reason for the shift in direction for his company more simply.

"It's because I don't have a million dollars for a house and no one working here could consider anything like that," he said.

New Frameworks recently completed a Terra 600 for Burlington teacher Laura Williams in the backyard of her Burlington home − a structure known as an Accessory Dwelling Unit, or more colloquially, a tiny home. At first sight, the Terra 600 doesn't so much present as a tiny home, with its tall hemlock-clad outer walls reflecting the cathedral ceiling inside. The hemlock − harvested in Vermont − is treated with a coating called LifeTime, made by the Canadian company Valhalla, which claims it lasts for 60 years.

"The treatment is a natural mineralizing stain," McArleton said. "Wood has pores in it. Instead of those pores filling up with rain and snow, when you put minerals to intentionally fill up those pores it's essentially like fossilizing it."

The boards are dipped in the stain before being installed to ensure an even and thorough coating, according to McArleton.

The foundation used for the Terra 600 and the entire Casitas Line is perhaps the biggest departure from conventional construction, next to the straw structural insulated panels (S-SIPs) used to build the homes. Concrete is not involved in the foundation, as it is the most carbon-intensive of construction materials, according to New Frameworks co-founder and lead builder Jackson Mills.

Instead, helical piles − also known as ground screws − are literally screwed into the ground, minimizing disturbance of the soil and providing a degree of flood resistance by creating a space where water can flow underneath the home. Helical pile foundations also typically cost less than poured concrete foundations.

"It's super low impact," Mills said. "It's a really long tube with basically a screw at the end of it and they have this really cool droid thing that's remote-controlled and so they start at 10 feet long. You could add extensions. It drills right down. They plumb it up in all directions while it's going."

The remote-controlled machine that installs the ground screws has a pressure gauge that indicates when the screws are deep enough to provide a stable foundation.

"Obviously you need to get below the frostline, but beyond that it's less about how deep it is and more about the pressure they're able to reach when they're drilling," Mills said. "How much force it requires to keep drilling is how they know it's stable, so if you have sandy soil you'll need to drill farther than a clay-rich soil."

Inside, the Terra 600 is filled with hardwoods and softwoods harvested and milled in Vermont, with maple floors on the first floor and pine floors in the loft, where the single bedroom is. The first floor includes a bathroom, living room and kitchen, with hickory cabinets that are not made in Vermont but purchased from a large supplier out of state.

"These are actually standard commodity cabinets," McArleton said. "We wanted to do something affordable and cabinets can be so expensive."

There is also something you might not expect in a tiny home − a very large hemlock beam, spanning the width of the structure, lending the feel of post-and-beam construction, even though in truth the structure is made of those pre-fabricated straw panels.

"I love that beam," McArleton said. "That's a solid hemlock beam from Vermont. It's the carrying beam for the loft and also helps tie the structure together."

Another surprise are the sprinklers found throughout the home, a requirement of Burlington fire code for homes more than 50 feet from the curb that added $10,000 to the total cost of the house, which was just over $300,000 − about $278,000 for the structure, plus about $38,000 for the site work.

"(The sprinklers) are a downside for people trying to do these affordably," McArleton said. "We want it to be easy for fire responders. Their job is hard enough, but it's one of those things where it might be worth another look as we're trying to densify Burlington and surrounding areas in Vermont. Part of providing more housing solutions for people is to take the land we have and use it better, use it more optimally."

All in all, the Terra 600 presents a warm and inviting space with the feel of an architect's touch. The house also recently won a Best of the Best award from Efficiency Vermont in the single family category for residential new construction.

"To enhance indoor air quality, all finishes are low-VOC (volatile organic compounds), such as the polywhey sourced from Vermont Natural Coatings used for wood finishing, and the hand-applied lime plaster on the interior walls, which adds texture while promoting natural humidity regulation," Efficiency Vermont wrote in a news release. "The ADU (accessory dwelling unit) is equipped with a ducted ERV (energy recovery ventilation) system and a range hood, ensuring excellent indoor air quality while maintaining energy efficiency. The all-electric unit runs without any fossil fuels for heating or cooling."

Williams feels good about the environmental pedigree of her new home, but mostly she just enjoys living in it.

"It’s gorgeous, it’s an incredibly calming space," Williams said. "It’s very simple, and I don’t know, I love it. I love being in the space. Yesterday, we had rain storm and I opened the French doors and sat on the couch doing work, able to enjoy the outside, like I’m in a tropical rain forest."

At the other end of the Casitas spectrum is the Arbol 1200, one of which New Frameworks is currently building for the owners of a farm in Hinesburg. The Arbol 1200 shares all of the energy-efficient, climate-friendly and architecturally inspired elements of the Terra 600, with the added bonus of feeling very spacious, with three bedrooms and two bathrooms, a dining room, kitchen and living room, as well as a back porch.

Then there's the price. The cost for high-performance, energy-efficient and healthy construction in the Northeast ranges from $550 to $700 per square foot, according to Whalen. That would put the cost of the equivalent of the Arbol 1200 at between $660,000 to $840,000. The Hinesburg project − built by New Frameworks − will come in at about $427,500, Whalen said.

"New construction under $500,000 for a house this size is unheard of," she said. "And it's just beautiful. That's what everyone says when they walk in. It's the cathedral ceilings. If you're in a structure with an eight- or nine-foot ceiling it feels so much smaller. This feels so much bigger than 1,200 square feet. We just try to recreate nature in our homes, creating a comfortable version of what we know best."

Contact Dan D’Ambrosio at 660-1841 or [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @DanDambrosioVT.