Our property is perfectly suited to having a backyard cottage — we could demolish the south shed, widen the foundation slab by eight feet, build a 20′x20′ house to one of many many plans on the internet, and privacy-fence off the southeast corner of the property. Voilà! Backyard cottage with parking space and (small) lawn!

I’d happily use it as a guest cottage, a mother-in-law (in the unlikely and hopefully far-off event that any of our parents need to live with us), a semi-independent living unit for our daughter when she’s sixteen or so, or (most useful in my mind) a rental unit that could offset our mortgage payment by 33% or so.