Printed houses

 Curious way to build a house.  Will this make homes more abundant and affordable? Only if government frees up land to build on.  But don’t count on tat happening any time soon. 

In the political establishment’s current climate crisis mode of thinking, single family homes are out, no matter how much people want to own a patch of land and a home of their own.  Climate alarmists demand more compact, dense dwelling units in high-rise urban developments - planners don’t even call them homes any more.  :-(

Best part of the article is the Comment section - see a few below.

3-D Printed Houses Are Sprouting Near Austin as Demand for Homes Grows

Project would be biggest 3-D printed housing development in U.S

Wall Street Journal   By 

 Oct. 26, 2021

A major home builder is teaming with a Texas startup to create a community of 100 3-D printed homes near Austin, gearing up for what would be by far the biggest development of this type of housing in the U.S.

Lennar Corp. and construction-technology firm Icon are poised to start building next year at a site in the Austin metro area, the companies said. While Icon and others have built 3-D printed housing before, this effort will test the technology’s ability to churn out homes and generate buyer demand on a much larger scale.

“We’re sort of graduating from singles and dozens of homes to hundreds of homes,” said Jason Ballard, Icon’s chief executive.

If 3-D printing succeeds at this more ambitious level, it could offer a response to America’s chronic shortage of homes for sale, especially in the affordable price range. Mortgage-finance company Freddie Mac estimated that the national deficit of single-family homes stood at 3.8 million units at the end of 2020.

Icon’s 3-D printed houses use concrete framing instead. Its 15.5-foot-tall printers can build the exterior and interior wall system for a 2,000-square-foot, one-story house in a week, Mr. Ballard said. The printer squeezes out concrete in layers, like toothpaste out of a tube. The machines can print curved walls, allowing for more creative house designs, he added.

Comments:

Homes will be sold for market price, no matter what they cost to build. That means,  in Austin,  they will NOT be 'affordable.'  Think for just a minute,  why a market like Austin was chosen in the first place. The biggest reason 'affordable' housing is in short supply, according to numerous WSJ articles,  is government regulations...another reason a red state was chosen.

Pricing for new construction will still depend upon the cost of buildable land.  Politicians, planners and environmentalists have kept vast amounts of land locked up and out of reach to home builders for years forcing lot prices into the stratosphere.  Despite the fact that most home buyers want a detached, single-family home in the suburbs, their betters want them to live in dense, compact dwelling units, preferably mixed-use high-rise. In walkable, vibrant neighborhoods.  That disconnect comes at a steep price.  Do home purchasers understand how much the market has been manipulated by bureaucrats to keep them out?  

actually, home buyers are kept out of neighborhoods by existing homeowners. Bureaucrats do what their constituents tell them to. 

From my experience, politicians are more likely to listen to bureaucrats like city administrators and planners and developers far more than mere citizens.  The residents who want to preserve large lots are being out-voiced by those who want to cram in more dwelling units per acre. Unfortunately their dream of lower housing costs does not materialize because the market sets the price and the supply of land - even by chopping up the suburbs- isn’t going to offer enough supply to meet demand.  Only when the older generation dies in greater numbers will there be relief.