3D home printing has matured enough as a technology to be viable. Yet despite the global housing shortage, chronic to so many countries, has yet to take off. Here the $37,600 price includes finished rooms inside. The company is aiming to build on cheap land in Japan’s smaller cities. They specifically mention targeting remote and work-from-home workers as customers.
This way of doing things could work for 10’s of millions of other people around the world, especially as starter homes. The pandemic accelerated a permanent shift to WFH for many people. If some of them had a choice between never being able to afford a home in big cities, but but getting on the property ladder with this option, it seems obvious to me millions of people around the world would choose it.
The house isn’t the problem, we’ve solved the cheap construction problem a long time ago.
Have we? Why can’t we do it then?
We do, it’s land prices that make houses expensive, not the house itself. The price listed for these homes is not including the land
How so? I can buy land in my area for 50k, but it’s gonna cost me 450 to build.
450 in an area where land is 50k is expensive as fuck, have you gotten quotes?
Lots here is 100-150k and I got a rough estimate of 250-300k for a 4br/2ba with a full basement and 2 car garage
I’ve haven’t but family has. A few builder were looking at roughly 400-450 for a small 1.5k slab home without finishing.
without outing yourself, where are you located(roughly) I’m always curious if a lot of our high cost comes down to geography/laws/red tape. Im in Northern Minnesota.
I don’t mind because my living plans changed drastically - I was looking to build 30-45 minutes outside of Chicago. Not a super rich suburb but one with a highly rated school system
Gigantic swaths of exclusive mcmansion-only zoning is a big problem in most cities.
Not really, building a house still produces a hundred tons of waste. This solves that.
Is the implication here that the cost of building a home doesn’t nearly match what it is sold for?
I’m curious just how much inflation there is due to supply/demand.
No, they aren’t that cheap and no, they won’t solve any current housing issues.
But I’m not an expert, so here is a longer explanation by Belinda Carr on the topic.
The USA has a much different paradigm to housing than Japan. There’s good reasons that some of those drawbacks might matter less outside of North America.
The reliance on concrete instead of some other pourable material is not a permanent problem in my opinion.
Prefab is also getting better and better.
They aren’t solving issues right now because construction methods aren’t part of the problem. It’s neat, like PLA 3d printing used to be neat. Now these pla printers are being used for prototyping, repairs, hobbies, and prop production.
For comparison, new 3D printed houses in Austin, Texas start at $475,000.
Absolute fucking madness.
Now compare those homes to other homes of similar size nearby.
Let’s pretend I did.
What would I find out?
That it’s about market value for a new construction home in that zip code.
Mind you the georgetown development was by Lennar an established homebuilder, as other companies(particularly those new the industry) scale up, the prices should come down.
Presumably even higher costs than that
Yes but they look like a polystyrene ice cream container
So what you’re saying is, it’s a marketing issue.
Think of the children who want to live in a cup of ice cream.
I don’t think children are the ones buying houses.
looks around
I can’t find anyone buying houses, tbh.
Surely that’s fixed with plaster/render
I mean the shape is fugly
I’m all for it, but do the have to look like Tatooine huts?
As a usual blue milk drinker I completely disagree.
I assume they’ll put siding on it
This is interesting considering that Japan actually has a surplus of houses due to the dwindling population and people moving out of smaller towns and cities to the bigger ones.
They also culturally hate pre-lived in homes. It’s a thing they’re trying to change:
https://www.rethinktokyo.com/2018/06/06/depreciate-limited-life-span-japanese-home/1527843245
I quite like these - and hope for the best
Finished rooms? Does it include electricity, plumbing, flooring, wall finish, windows, land?
Thats not a bad price. If you can get a property for $13k you would get a mortgage payment of ~$400/mo plus insurance, taxes, and possibly PMI should put you around ~$550ish.
