Would you buy this spaceship home?

We've seen a lot of striking tiny homes over the years, but this retro (yet futuristic) portable home for sale has us speechless.

Designed in 1968 by Finnish architect Matti Suuronen, the Futuro was originally intended to function as a ski cabin or holiday home. It's estimated that fewer than 100 Futuro homes were ever constructed, all throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s. Now, only a small number remain in reasonable condition across the globe.

This UFO-shaped home has been listed in a sealed-bids sale, in Christchurch, New Zealand, after being in storage for years. It comes with a guide price of £155,600.

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The current owner inherited it from a step-grandmother who lived in it for 15 years (although it's currently set-up as a museum piece, pictured above).

At eight metres wide, the Futuro is being sold as-is. Included in the sale are couch units, a fibreglass kitchen bench, shelving wall units and the original custom-shaped mattress.

Partial restorations have been undertaken, although it still needs a gel coat so the new owner will be able to select their own shade as part of finishing the outside shell.

Originally intended as a transportable ski cabin / chalet that would be easy to built and heat, with a structure that could be dismantled and reassembled in two days, the Futuro was designed to be compact.

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Just 140m3 in capacity, the space efficient spheroid heats quickly. The shell was transported in pieces and could be put together from a kit-set in just two days. Due to its relatively light weight (2,500kg), the Futuro is portable, opening a range of 'landing options' to the prospective holidaymaker or homeowner.

When the Futuro was introduced in 1968, it was met with fascination. After 1970, with international demand for unique dwellings strengthening, manufacturing rights were sold to developers outside Finland and Futuros soon characterised landscapes all over the world. The 1973 oil crisis, however, caused the price of plastic to triple. Too unusual (or perhaps just ahead of its time), and ultimately too expensive to market to the masses, production of Futuro homes waned and eventually ceased in the mid-1970s.

The Futuro captured the attention of many artists, and visitors included the princes of Kuwait, Andy Warhol, Arthur Paul, the publisher of Playboy magazine, and Christo, the artist. Christo even transformed a Futuro into an artwork by wrapping it up.

Without restrictions on overseas buyers, the Futuro can be relocated to anywhere in the world for an extra cost — as long as a cradle is installed for it to rest on.

This Futuro house is for sale in a 'deadline sale' which means would-be buyers should submit confidential offers until the fixed date of midday (NZDT) on Saturday 5 December.

The guide price is £155,600 ($300,000 NZD). Interested buyers should contact futurochchnz@gmail.com.

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