New ways to build housing

Chuckanut

Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
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The high cost of housing is problem in the USA. We often builds using the stick method where most of the house is built from scratch or near scratch at the site. But, there are other ways to build housing and supposedly it is cheaper.


With their cold winters, short summers, and limited daylight hours during much of the year, Scandinavian designers face challenges that are unique to the region. Despite this—and in many ways because of it—more than 80 percent of the Scandinavian housing market is comprised of prefab single-family houses because of the simplified fabrication and construction. While many of these residences are more traditional in their appearance, there is also a strong current of thoughtfully-designed modern prefabs designed by renowned architects that are growing in popularity. Here, we've profiled some of the most exciting, inspiring Scandinavian prefab homes in Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Denmark.


We are a prefabricated housing company and architecture studio for modern homes with avant-garde design and premium quality. inHAUS is a leading company in the sector of modular single-family homes and luxury homes in Spain. We build houses for the whole of Europe and have advanced projects in France, Germany and Switzerland.​

 
I think one of the main reasons we have a housing problem is that no one seems to want to build small houses anymore. There are old neighborhoods around me with houses under 1000sqft. I’ve never seen a new neighborhood going up with that size house today.

Yes, they could be modular and that would probably decrease their cost and improve their quality, but no one seems to want to build them. I’m sure some of it has to do with expectations inflation, but those small houses raised the post war families just fine and, those families were probably larger than the current average family.

In my area, they did a tiny house village. Better than nothing and they were sold to financially disadvantaged people (homeless) but that is at the other end of extreme. There is affordable housing options, but the current focus of government seems to be in higher density (multi family) dwellings versus single family homes.
 
I think one of the main reasons we have a housing problem is that no one seems to want to build small houses anymore. There are old neighborhoods around me with houses under 1000sqft. I’ve never seen a new neighborhood going up with that size house today.

Yes, they could be modular and that would probably decrease their cost and improve their quality, but no one seems to want to build them. I’m sure some of it has to do with expectations inflation, but those small houses raised the post war families just fine and, those families were probably larger than the current average family.

In my area, they did a tiny house village. Better than nothing and they were sold to financially disadvantaged people (homeless) but that is at the other end of extreme. There is affordable housing options, but the current focus of government seems to be in higher density (multi family) dwellings versus single family homes.
Exactly, this modular home builder is going multi-family and commercial. The problem with the small home is that there is no profit in it, the overhead in developing the neighborhood is cost prohibitive. Plus cities, despite their pleas for more affordable housing, stand in the way when opportunities arise. On the edge of our city a developer wanted to create a small trailer park. I wasn't prime land next to a light industrial area, but the city wouldn't budge, but they are happy to "talk" about affordable housing.

 
I think that many US cities have a hangover from the cheap and shoddy mobile homes of the past. They have codes and ordinances that preclude the building of modular homes, no matter the quality of modern ones. Many communities also have minimum square footage requirements.
 
I think one of the main reasons we have a housing problem is that no one seems to want to build small houses anymore. There are old neighborhoods around me with houses under 1000sqft. I’ve never seen a new neighborhood going up with that size house today.

Yes, they could be modular and that would probably decrease their cost and improve their quality, but no one seems to want to build them. I’m sure some of it has to do with expectations inflation, but those small houses raised the post war families just fine and, those families were probably larger than the current average family.

In my area, they did a tiny house village. Better than nothing and they were sold to financially disadvantaged people (homeless) but that is at the other end of extreme. There is affordable housing options, but the current focus of government seems to be in higher density (multi family) dwellings versus single family homes.
There were four small houses built near me on a small empty lot. About 1000 sq feet each. Cheapest one was $800,000. The land in my area is just to expensive to build a small single family house and sell it cheaply to first time owners. So they built four little ones on the lot. Not my idea of a deal, but they did sell.

Other small houses built decades ago on big lots are being bought, torn down, and then two bigger homes built on the now divided lot.

Even modern modular factory built housing won't help in areas where land itself is the high priced commodity. But, in areas where the land is available, they might help keep the final cost down.
 
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I think that many US cities have a hangover from the cheap and shoddy mobile homes of the past. They have codes and ordinances that preclude the building of modular homes, no matter the quality of modern ones. Many communities also have minimum square footage requirements.
Obviously, factory build modular homes assembled at the site will need to meet safety codes such as for earthquakes, tornadoes, fire, etc. I don't see this as a problem. I would think it would be cheaper to design and build homes to modern earthquake standards in a factory than do it on site.
 
I think one of the main reasons we have a housing problem is that no one seems to want to build small houses anymore. There are old neighborhoods around me with houses under 1000sqft. I’ve never seen a new neighborhood going up with that size house today.
But there's no profit, no incentive to builders and their shareholders. Why build small inexpensive homes when they can put a house double the size for far more income?

Unless there is a wider public effort, ie, governmental, and well, then you know how that goes.
 
What are the cost for one of those homes?
 
But there's no profit, no incentive to builders and their shareholders.
So what changed? Didn’t someone make a profit on the smaller homes in the 50’s? I realize that labor/materials, costs in general, have gone up but so has income - especially when you factor in two income households. For example, a couple, each making $15/hour is grossing $60K. Wouldn’t that be worth more than the single income of the 50’s? I realize the $60K is not ultra low income, but neither was the single income being made in the 50’s.

I think people of that time were just more willing to live in what today we think of as small, low end housing. I mean, everyone needs their own bedroom and bathroom now, not to mention a large kitchen that they never use.
 
Lots of reasons. Here's one strictly on supply and demand.
There was a nice old farmhouse in my neighborhood with an extremely large lot. Looked like it would support 8-10 other homes the same size. When the homeowner died, the heirs sold it to a developer who immediately tore it down and put up 23 new homes (yes, squeezed in right on top of one another) that quickly sold out at an average price of just under a million.
I couldn't figure it out until my neighbor explained the deal. It was the last buildable property just inside the best school district in the state. So affluent young families beat a path to the developer's door.
 
So what changed? Didn’t someone make a profit on the smaller homes in the 50’s? I realize that labor/materials, costs in general, have gone up but so has income - especially when you factor in two income households. For example, a couple, each making $15/hour is grossing $60K. Wouldn’t that be worth more than the single income of the 50’s? I realize the $60K is not ultra low income, but neither was the single income being made in the 50’s.

I think people of that time were just more willing to live in what today we think of as small, low end housing. I mean, everyone needs their own bedroom and bathroom now, not to mention a large kitchen that they never use.
My parent's real world example of what changed. I grew up in a small neighborhood (20 houses) of 900 sq ft houses built outside the city limits. They were on 1/8 of an acre and very affordable ($9k in 1962, so about 90k or so today). The county was not happy and passed an ordinance that future subdivisions (outside the cities) had to be on a min 1/4 acre and if and any "stand-alone" house built had to be on a min of 5 acres.
 
I've owned (rented out to others) a manufactured home, and owned and lived in a modular home, and they were both awful. My opinion is the 'better quality' is just sales talk not real. I'd much rather live in a stick built home.
 
As with many other things, we've all upscaled our expectations. When I was a boy, we lived in trailer parks and apartments. The family had one car and one bathroom. The first time I lived in a single family house, I was in my senior year of high school. It was only about 1000 sqft and there were insufficient bedrooms for everyone, so I slept in the basement. I don't think people are willing to live that way anymore. I'm sure not.
 
I've owned (rented out to others) a manufactured home, and owned and lived in a modular home, and they were both awful. My opinion is the 'better quality' is just sales talk not real. I'd much rather live in a stick built home.
I think this is the general reality, however, the technology does exist to do better. Building modules inside a controlled environment should produce a better product.
 
My parent's real world example of what changed. I grew up in a small neighborhood (20 houses) of 900 sq ft houses built outside the city limits. They were on 1/8 of an acre and very affordable ($9k in 1962, so about 90k or so today). The county was not happy and passed an ordinance that future subdivisions (outside the cities) had to be on a min 1/4 acre and if and any "stand-alone" house built had to be on a min of 5 acres.
Regulations are definitely part of it. When I built my first, they wouldn’t allow anything under 1500sqft. I was at about 1800sqft so no problem, but if someone wants to live smaller, that wouldn’t have been an option.
 
Regulations are definitely part of it. When I built my first, they wouldn’t allow anything under 1500sqft. I was at about 1800sqft so no problem, but if someone wants to live smaller, that wouldn’t have been an option.
Yes, zoning regulations are heavily skewed to protecting the asset value of the current homeowners and limiting supply, which drives up prices.
 
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Thanks for starting a thread, Chuckanut. Better here than the general inflation thread.

This problem fascinates me. I used to watch a lot of home improvement TV. Back when "This Old House" was the only game in town, say the early 90s, they even featured trips to such factories. I think they even did a build with one of these.

But it never seems to catch on.

I recently got to visit a truss plant. You know, the roof trusses they put on stick built houses. One could argue this is a form of automation as many, if not most, stick built homes now have trusses.

It was an interesting place. The designer puts in a few parameters like the size, the shape of the truss, and the desired roof pitch. And out pops trusses designed for the proper loads in our region. They feed this into a machine which sucks in 2x4' wood that is about 30' long, and bam, bam, bam, out come the pieces, all spray marked with numbers.

These fit onto a template where workers manually beat down the joining screens. It doesn't take long.

I recently was involved with a build where I was responsible for obtaining these trusses. I had a little help from an architect, and actually needed his services, because the truss company requires an engineered stamp of the structure the trusses land on.

When the trusses were delivered, they were spot on to the 1/8". Precision. And very affordable.

So there is some automation that has caught on. I believe there is much room for more.
 
My now deceased BIL had invented a way to prefab panels and assemble a house onsite for a significant reduction in cost as the panels were assembled in a warehouse and shipped to the sites... there was a connection system that held the walls together tightly. After the shell of the house was assembled then the plumbing, electrical, HVAC etc came to finish it up. It never did catch on... I think he did this in the late 60s or early 70s but could have even been the 80s..

One advantage was that you could actually disassemble the house the same way and move it... now, people do not normally move houses much but it was an option...

He did build some houses with this system and you could not tell the difference if you were in one from a stick build onsite...
 
I still remember being impressed when I visited Expo 67 by the modular housing units that were a feature.
Habitat 67
Habitat 67 comprises 354 identical, prefabricated concrete forms arranged in various combinations, divided into three pyramids, reaching up to 12 residential storeys, with a parking level, and a building services level. Together these units created 146 residences of varying sizes and configurations, each formed from one to eight linked concrete units. The complex originally contained 158 apartments...
Each unit is connected to at least one private landscaped garden terrace, built on the roof of the level below, which can range from approximately 20 to 90 square metres (225 to 1,000 sq ft) in size. The apartments each had a moulded plastic bathroom and a modular kitchen...
1722282990804.png
 
My now deceased BIL had invented a way to prefab panels and assemble a house onsite for a significant reduction in cost as the panels were assembled in a warehouse and shipped to the sites... there was a connection system that held the walls together tightly. After the shell of the house was assembled then the plumbing, electrical, HVAC etc came to finish it up. It never did catch on... I think he did this in the late 60s or early 70s but could have even been the 80s..

One advantage was that you could actually disassemble the house the same way and move it... now, people do not normally move houses much but it was an option...

He did build some houses with this system and you could not tell the difference if you were in one from a stick build onsite...
This guy built a net zero house in MA using prefab panels. However, it is anything but affordable.
 
Another form of automation is "muscle memory". My dad worked for a housing company in the late 40s. It wasn't prefab, but it was close. As you may recall, there was a bad housing crunch back then too. The solution was all those new workers back from the war could build simple houses. In NY, this was Levittown.

It was a different name in the midwest, but similar.

Dad was an apprentice tradesmen. Each house had like 30 guys working on them per day, with one task to complete. The master would teach the apprentices on the first house, then the apprentices moved on down, house-to-house, day-to-day, doing just that one thing. The way dad said it went like this: "Yeah, for one month, I cut pipe to 15' and put a thread on it."

They would march down the houses in a chain and at the end would come back to the start with a new mind-numbing task. However, he said they built a hell of a lot of houses.

In later years, we visited the neighborhood he helped built, and he marveled at all the little changes and additions people installed through the years to give them a more unique look.
 
When the homeowner died, the heirs sold it to a developer who immediately tore it down and put up 23 new homes (yes, squeezed in right on top of one another) that quickly sold out at an average price of just under a million.
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Those 23 new homeowners had to be living somewhere. In effect they freed up 23 other places to live (house, apartment, condo, etc.) for others to live in.

What I am wondering is if the builder used some of these new construction methods could he/she have sold the new houses for less money and still made the same profit?
 
As with many other things, we've all upscaled our expectations. When I was a boy, we lived in trailer parks and apartments. The family had one car and one bathroom. The first time I lived in a single family house, I was in my senior year of high school. It was only about 1000 sqft and there were insufficient bedrooms for everyone, so I slept in the basement. I don't think people are willing to live that way anymore. I'm sure not.
Agreed. Not only were the 1950’s homes smaller, they didn’t have air conditioning ( at least very few did) and many didn’t have garages. Add in regulations, insurance, cost of land, more people so more demand etc etc and I don’t understand why people are surprised homes cost more now than they did back then.
 
The house I grew up in was about 850 square feet. 3BR, 1 bath, and my parents and I shared it with my grandparents. In the beginning, just a little coal stove for heat, although we upgraded to a gas furnace and radiators when we could. No sewer lines, just a cesspool in the back yard. And it was one of the nicest houses on the block. This was in NYC. How times have changed!
 
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