Many times inspiration for the smallest homes is taken from campers and house trailers, boats and trains, all places where space is at a premium. Many of the showers, bathroom facilities, kitchen items and even the heating and cooling systems are salvaged from old campers and trailers, boats, or ordered new from factories which make them for these purposes. So you could say they "repurpose" many of these things for small houses.

500 to 700 sq. feet is about the size of a typical one bedroom apartment, so lots of people have experience living in a space that size.

A house, instead of an apartment, might have some challenges if there are several rooms, as each room will be tiny. But there's no reason you couldn't have normal sized kitchen appliances in a relatively normal sized kitchen in a 500 sq. ft. home.

My home is about 700 sq ft. Very livable. I have photos on my blog below, we have normal sized appliances in the kitchen.

Here is a link that might be useful: cottage blog

Just getting back here Thank you for your comments. My someday hope is to move to an island area and buy some land and build a small home there. That is a good point about apt being small. My house is about 1000 sq ft and there is a lot of unused space. In one of the places I have been looking into for retirement it was suggested buying land and building can be less expensive than to buy something builders are selling - unless you have the $$$$--I'm not looking for perks, just something simple
Thanks
Char

before we bought the house we are currently living in, we contemplated building our own small home. This book gave us so many good ideas about how to use small spaces, layouts and using smaller appliances were only the start of ideas presented here. I am sorry I sold the book we had before we moved in here. I wish I still had a copy. fortunately I can remedy that!

Here is a link that might be useful: compact cabins reference book link

Small houses have its on beauty and I think 500-700 sq ft is enough space to make a nice house. Can you tell me how many family member are you who are going to stay there ?