National

Jersey Shore woman creates a tiny house out of an old Greyhound bus

ASBURY PARK, N.J. — You can keep your McMansions.

Cavernous, two-story foyers that offer a cold welcome while jacking up your heating bill. Guest rooms where nobody has ever slept. "Gourmet" kitchens for microwave chefs.

A home with character has more soul. A home with some miles under its belt.

That's what Jessie Lipskin got when she transformed a 1966 GMC Greyhound bus into a charming mobile home. The Manhattan native bought the bus in 2015 for $7,000 and poured $125,000 into renovations. This was no easy DIY project. Lipskin relied on local contractors, including C&S Electrical in Oceanport and Sawbucks Contracting in Ocean Grove.

The result is a bright white interior with clean lines, the coziness of a cottage and the echo of the Greyhound's previous life, with its domed windows and spacious driving area, as it shuttled commuters in the San Francisco Bay area.

The 40-foot-long bus has about 100,000 miles on it and runs well, she said.

Lipskin tries to live a sustainable lifestyle, so she was amenable to the idea of the "tiny house" movement, which began as a backlash against the excesses of suburban American homes.

Despite not having a driver's license at the time, she was drawn to the Greyhound.

"I like the aesthetic of the 1966 bus," she said.

Lipskin currently keeps her tiny home on a piece of privately owned land near Asbury Park, backing up to acres of woods where she can take walks and enjoy the outdoors. But it might not be there for long. She has put up her Greyhound bus for sale, in part because she thinks she can make do with something even smaller and because her job in finance will soon take her to Italy and Russia. She also can't drive the bus, which has a manual transmission. The bus is listed on Craigslist for $149,000.

"There's been a lot of interest," she said. "I've received a vast array of messages from people who are considering this lifestyle."

Won't she miss the bus, after putting so much care into making it her home? Or is a lack of sentimentality a requirement for sustainable living, especially in a tiny home?

"You do need to detach from things," Lipskin said. "If you get rid of everything you don't really need, you'll feel lighter and more able to move. You have to select the things that hold value for you. For me, it's things like old books."

Well-worn hardcover classics line a shelf near Lipskin's bed. In the kitchen area, there is a stack of fine china.

"They were from my great-grandmother's tenement on Delancey Street," Lipskin said. "The building burned down, so some of the dishes even have burn marks on them. You can't microwave them or put them in the dishwasher, so they're actually good for my home because I wash everything by hand. I still use them. I kept the whole set."

In her unusual tiny home, Lipskin has found a way to adhere to stringent minimalism without sacrificing creature comforts like family heirlooms.

"I think I get sentimental about some things," Lipskin said. "But I have pictures of the bus. I'm giving it up, but I'm gaining through the experience of having had it."