A 900 Square Foot Plymouth ADU, Built for Theo and Pat

Why did the Fabricius family build an ADU in Plymouth?

Nicole McCann had been trying to get her parents to downsize for a long time. Theo and Pat had a lot of house and a lot of yard in Pembroke, and Theo, an extremely capable man with a garage full of tools, did not like the idea that life was slowing him down. The conversations happened over and over. Each parent, separately, would tell Nicole it was the other one who did not want to move.

Nicole is an only child, so the deciding was hers to push. She and her husband Jason had the property. The question was whether her parents would live on it. Theo's sticking point was that he did not want to invade Nicole and Jason's space. He never wanted to be that parent. Nicole's answer, after discussing it to death: we are okay with it, we are ready, you will still be separate, and we both respect each other's boundaries.

How did the home tours change their minds?

Pat heard Buz on the radio. She and Theo went to the BuildX home tour on Bartlett Road, and that is where Buz first met them, in May of the year before they moved in. They had also been touring used houses, and the problem was the same every time: the price of the house plus the work it needed, and a location at least half an hour from Nicole. Buz's line about that is that ten minutes away might as well be two hours, because you are not going every day.

Theo fell in love with the BuildX product and, Nicole warned Buz at the time, grilled him on every aspect of it. Then he asked his daughter one more time if she was sure. She was. Theo and Pat put the Pembroke house on the market, called BuildX, and the meetings started.

What was the build like for the family?

It was a detached 900 square foot, two-bedroom, one-bath house on Jason's property, built while Theo and Pat were between homes. The tools moved first. Nicole says her father, Theo the tool man, was already using the storage while the house went up, which explains the trailer in the driveway. The family hosted BuildX open houses in the finished ADU before moving in, and Theo, who Nicole describes as stoic about most things, got emotional walking strangers through it. One visitor was convinced the homeowners were paid actors, because nobody is that excited at an open house.

How long did the Plymouth ADU take?

From the first Bartlett Road tour in May to the family sitting in the backyard looking at a finished house was about a year, most of it decisions and selling the Pembroke house. Once the meetings started the build ran on the BuildX schedule, and by the time Nicole sat down for the podcast the family was almost in.

What changed once the ADU was finished?

Nicole's phrase for it is the mental load that came off her. She comes home from work and her parents are home. She knows where to find them. Dinner together is a walk across the yard. When they lived in Pembroke she saw them maybe twice a week. Now it is at least once a day, and on the morning of the podcast Theo was miffed she could not make breakfast.

Nicole's business partner Michelle has lived the same arrangement for years, on a compound she subdivided from her own parents' land, and the two of them run If the Shoe Fits, a personal assistance company that helps other families through exactly this kind of downsizing. Nicole's parents are her proof that it works.

Who helps you downsize a whole house into 900 square feet?

Nicole and Michelle do that for a living, and the podcast this page comes from is an hour on how. The short version: the hard part is not the furniture, it is the conversations, and they do not shy away from those. Start early. Decide what comes, what goes to the kids, and what gets photographed and let go. Theo's tools are still with him. The rest of a big Pembroke house did not need to be.

Can an ADU end a years-long downsizing argument?

It did for this family, and the reason is worth noting. The parents were never against a smaller house. They were against losing their independence, their tools and their distance. A detached ADU on their daughter's land kept all three and removed the drive. If your parents keep saying no to downsizing, ask what they are actually saying no to, and bring that answer to the first call.