Those can be an alternative, but aren’t great for longevity. They’re almost always essentially entirely concrete, which means if you want to get to, say, a pipe in the wall, be ready to smash through rock and then have to fill in a vertical hole in the wall with concrete again. This weakens structural integrity over time any time you’ve gotta do repairs, and makes them more expensive to do.
The more sane alternative for most people will be prefab housing, where either the entire house is sent in as either a single prefab unit, or a unit for each room that’s simply connected and stacked, or where just each wall is a pre-made unit that’s then assembled. The latter has become much more common in construction already, and the former is growing market share rapidly right now, to the point you can, right now, literally order a prefab house from Amazon.
You mean manufactured or mobile homes? They’re built like shit by companies that mostly just take advantage of people knowing it’s all they can afford. It’s pretty much impossible to return the house once it’s delivered, and getting HUD to enforce standards takes years of constant work.
Technically, but specifically I’m talking about the ones we’re seeing a pretty big expansion in the market for right now, which are built of the same materials as a regular house, with all the same wood, insulation, etc, just in a format that makes them more modular and easy to build and deploy.
It does technically fall under the same umbrella category of those other homes, but it’s becoming more common now since it’s a good middle ground between a shitty mobile home and an overly expensive full-size house, and it’s made of higher-quality materials. It’s more about deployment than it is about cost, it’s just that they tend to be much smaller, and quicker to deploy, thus saving on cost in the process.
As someone who lives in a prefab, I really have to disagree with them being the answer. Unless they stop using vinyl-on-gypsum and the cheapest materials possible…
Water damage is a major issue in these kinds of homes. They’re not made with actual wood or conventional building materials, and fall apart so easily. Replacement parts are not standard, making it extra costly and difficult to repair.
Adding, when I walk into an actual house, I can feel the difference as I walk through.
They’re not made with actual wood or conventional building materials, and fall apart so easily.
I’ve seen tons of prefabs being made now out of solid wood, just like a normal house. It’s just that they segment the usual house design into one that can be modularly attached/expanded, and position beams such that they can be directly attached to one another at the ends with little effort. If your prefab isn’t made of actual wood, then that’s not a good prefab, nor is it the kind of prefabs I’m talking about here. I agree those shouldn’t be the norm, of course.
while theyre typically worse for repair if you need an immediate one, theyre significantly better when it comes to insulation, thus leading to lower hvac costs, in particularly cold or hot regions.
the 3d printing process itself also doesnt dictate that the entire build has to be concrete. its just there to minimize the cost of production in the spots that needs it.
Oh I totally understand, it’s just that it’s relatively hard to work with multiple materials in the way these houses are printed, so you commonly only see them made of concrete, without much else in the way of materials, and the way they’re designing the manufacturing processes seems to be more focused on all-concrete production since that’s what’s cheapest.
im just waiting on 3d printed houses to become cheaper (than it already is now) and mainstream.
Those can be an alternative, but aren’t great for longevity. They’re almost always essentially entirely concrete, which means if you want to get to, say, a pipe in the wall, be ready to smash through rock and then have to fill in a vertical hole in the wall with concrete again. This weakens structural integrity over time any time you’ve gotta do repairs, and makes them more expensive to do.
The more sane alternative for most people will be prefab housing, where either the entire house is sent in as either a single prefab unit, or a unit for each room that’s simply connected and stacked, or where just each wall is a pre-made unit that’s then assembled. The latter has become much more common in construction already, and the former is growing market share rapidly right now, to the point you can, right now, literally order a prefab house from Amazon.
You mean manufactured or mobile homes? They’re built like shit by companies that mostly just take advantage of people knowing it’s all they can afford. It’s pretty much impossible to return the house once it’s delivered, and getting HUD to enforce standards takes years of constant work.
Technically, but specifically I’m talking about the ones we’re seeing a pretty big expansion in the market for right now, which are built of the same materials as a regular house, with all the same wood, insulation, etc, just in a format that makes them more modular and easy to build and deploy.
It does technically fall under the same umbrella category of those other homes, but it’s becoming more common now since it’s a good middle ground between a shitty mobile home and an overly expensive full-size house, and it’s made of higher-quality materials. It’s more about deployment than it is about cost, it’s just that they tend to be much smaller, and quicker to deploy, thus saving on cost in the process.
As someone who lives in a prefab, I really have to disagree with them being the answer. Unless they stop using vinyl-on-gypsum and the cheapest materials possible…
Water damage is a major issue in these kinds of homes. They’re not made with actual wood or conventional building materials, and fall apart so easily. Replacement parts are not standard, making it extra costly and difficult to repair.
Adding, when I walk into an actual house, I can feel the difference as I walk through.
I’ve seen tons of prefabs being made now out of solid wood, just like a normal house. It’s just that they segment the usual house design into one that can be modularly attached/expanded, and position beams such that they can be directly attached to one another at the ends with little effort. If your prefab isn’t made of actual wood, then that’s not a good prefab, nor is it the kind of prefabs I’m talking about here. I agree those shouldn’t be the norm, of course.
while theyre typically worse for repair if you need an immediate one, theyre significantly better when it comes to insulation, thus leading to lower hvac costs, in particularly cold or hot regions.
the 3d printing process itself also doesnt dictate that the entire build has to be concrete. its just there to minimize the cost of production in the spots that needs it.
Oh I totally understand, it’s just that it’s relatively hard to work with multiple materials in the way these houses are printed, so you commonly only see them made of concrete, without much else in the way of materials, and the way they’re designing the manufacturing processes seems to be more focused on all-concrete production since that’s what’s cheapest.
Man Ive seen those videos online… just amazing.
Can’t wait.