Woman Reunited With Her Tiny Home After Thieves Drove Away With It
WEST SACRAMENTO (CBS13) – Malinda Crighton was just finishing up building her dream, a tiny home parked in her West Sacramento driveway.
But Monday morning she was facing a big problem.
"I came out this morning a little before 7 a.m. and it was gone," Crighton said.
The tiny house on wheels she'd been building for the last three years had vanished.
"Somebody stole my tiny house!" Crighton said.
At 33-feet long, over 13-feet tall and weighing a whopping 6000 pounds, all that was left were what appear to be large divots in the pavement.
"It's got an overhang with a window, the siding is white, the roofing is blue paper," Crighton said.
A musician, Crighton says the tiny house was a chance at a more secure future.
"It's going to allow me to be financially stable," Crighton said.
Her initial budget was $15,000, but it soon reached $40,000. Work, she says, was almost complete
"I was planning on living in it in just a few months," Crighton said.
But then, a break in the case. During our interview, a neighbor said he spotted the tiny home at a nearby shopping center.
Malinda notified police, who met her there.
"I'm so glad it's here and not farther away," Crighton said to a police officer. "Can I hug you? Thank you!"
"Somebody hooked up to it and dragged it away," said Sgt. Roger Kinney with the West Sacramento Police Department. "I'm not sure what happened when they got over here. This was as probably far as they were going to go."
Police say they'll be checking on leads tracking down who's responsible. But for now, the tiny house theft doesn't matter to Malinda who is just relieved her tiny house can go back home.
"Next time I'll have to anchor it to a tree or something," Crighton said.
Police are now looking at footage from surveillance cameras that likely caught the thieves trying to drive away with the tiny house in tow.