The day after AnnMarie Young graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 2021, she and her best friend moved to Fairbanks, Alaska for the summer.
The 23-year-old artist lived in Alaska for three months before returning to Texas. But Young tells CNBC Make It that the moment she left, she knew she wanted to go back to the Pacific Northwest state.
“Something in my heart just didn’t want to leave Alaska,” she says. “I wanted to prove to myself I could tough it out.”
Young used the money she made from selling her art that summer to buy a van that had already been converted into a tiny home. She packed up, headed toward Alaska, and after a week of driving cross country she arrived.
“I was going slow and taking scenic routes,” she says.
Young spent the summer of 2022 living out of her van, but when winter rolled around, she had a decision to make — either go back home to Texas again or find a different living situation there in Alaska.
The artist eventually found a cabin in Fairbanks through word of mouth, but it did come with a catch. The cabin Young was being offered was a dry one — a residential structure without running water. The property did come with an outhouse.
The owner, Mollie Sipe, a retired educator, 71, was renting it out for $500 a month.
Sipe tells CNBC Make It she bought the cabin in 1988. It is one room about 10 feet x 20 feet with a bedroom nook. It includes a kitchen area with a stove and a microwave and a heater that runs on heating oil, which Sipes always fills up before each new tenant.
Young got to see the cabin from the outside, but never got to tour the inside before deciding to accept the rental. Fortunately, it all worked out just fine. “It’s not the dreamy cabin that you imagine but it is really cute on the inside. It was very cozy and perfect for just me at the time,” Young says.
“I had a whole section to do my art stuff and that was the most important thing to me.”
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