And I'd personally forgo any ornament, "playfull detail" or shade of color if the insulation and ventilation was good enough to lower my energy bill signicantly. What good does a skylight that leaks, a flat roof that sags, a gigantic living room that sacrifices insulation for "floor area". Give me my first Minecraft house, but with an effective R40 and high-quality HRV. 4x4 blocks and a ceiling barely higher than my head is plenty enough.
Exactly this, after the first few weeks it’s the performance, comfort, uptime is systems, longevity, and cost to live in/ run the building that matters in the long term that 90% of the world cares about, everything else is just window dressing. We need to get out of way of builders taking on all the risk of delivering homes and apartments.
Building the basic components of a home in a factory makes a tremendous amount of sense from a quality control perspective. Imagine shipping 3,000 parts to a mud pit and trying to build a car. Modular homes can also reduce weather delays and in construction “time is money”
I vividly recall back to the early 1980's when new dorms were being constructed at Texas A&M University. These were the new "modular dorms" as they came to be known afterwards - I was able to get a front row seat as the sites were prepped, foundations laid, giant heavy-lift cranes set up, and then saw the pre-fabbed modules trucked in over a period of weeks. One by one the modules were lifted off the trucks and set precisely on the foundation, then atop one another, like an enormous Lego project. Each module was fully outfitted with utilities and they simply needed to be interconnected once in place. It was an amazing sight to watch.
Yep, 1 out of 3 single family homes have been factory built for the last 40 years. The youtube promotion is the only new thing. I've been In construction for 25 years and we know about tech. Ignore anyone that says we fight new technology.
This is amazing. I LOVE that they glue the panels to the studs. I've been trying to get the builders I work with (doing efficiency consulting) to do this. It really helps with tightening up the building. You said "there's nothing to tell these were factory built". I'd say it's the other way round: "there's everything to tell it wasn't built by humans." Those nailing patterns!!
I bet with a lot of standardized shapes and sizes, the cutoff’s would be similar sizes too. I’d like to see the excess materials being sold for cheap or repurposed into OSB and other materials. This is pretty cool.
Any savings would not be passed on to the home owner. When the government gave a $7k rebate for electric vehicle purchases, Ford raised the price of their electric vehicles by $7k.
The issue with housing is not construction sadly, it’s companies buying land they shouldn’t own to monopolize the market. Lawmakers need to force companies to not own houses that aren’t for employees.
Governments need to stay out of the housing business. They are the issue and won't approve new housing at the rate it needs to be approved. The reasons companies bought houses is because they were for sale. Too many people where approved for houses they could not afford. The government being in the housing business, again, thinking everyone should own a home. A disaster.
Good point. But then, a more productive way to build multifamily, especially for seniors who need a smaller place, is a good thing. Tent cities aren't the solution, yet San Francisco paid $60,000 per tent for them, when the solution shown here isn't much more and is way safer, cleaner, and better in every way.
@JL-vi8my than a tent. Not better in every way than a site build house. This costs more and they have the same labor issues. It's just factories wanting to make the money builders are. That's it. They point out there isn't a cost savings on all these factory build videos.
You mean we need robots to fill out all formulars? A large part of the housing crisis is bureaucracy. And robot politicans who could come up with more sane zoning laws.
The issue is actually unfettered capitalism. If there were no permitting and regulations, it would be just as expensive, but a complete nightmare. Property as a means of investment, beyond familial generational wealth artificially inflates the market. If housing was regulated such that one person could own one house, housing would be affordable.
@@BicycleFunkI absolutely agree with you. Indeed, DOWN WITH CAPITALISM! What is needed, which I'm certain you'll agree, is the complete control of housing by the government. This can only happen, as you know, when socialism replaces capitalism. Since this country is half way to socialism, to complete it, Democrat politicians MUST win every office in 2024, especially the presidency. Who will be our candidate and our deliverer to full socialism? I think it will be Gavin Newsome. But a "dark horse candidate," so to speak, will be Michelle Obama! Yes, she will finish what Barack started and deliver socialism to us. After, everyone will be equal and no one will be rich. African Americans, Michelle's greatest supporters, will finally see racial justice when Michelle will pay appropriate reparations for Black slavery and Black racial injustice to every African American who voted for Michelle. And lest I forget, under Michelle and with Democrats in control, and with Republican approval, affordable, and even free, housing will be available to everyone, though African Americans who were "red lined" and denied a chance to live in decent housing in safe White neighborhoods, will be given first dibs to choose their housing. BicycleFunk, I thank you for your clear-sighted comments, and I thank you for reading my reply
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A big problem with the housing crisis is that there are many vested interests who want to keep house prices high - often including politicians who disproportionately own many second homes or can be influenced by large building firms lobbying them. The other groups are building companies that want to maximise profits. And older groups who tend to have more money invested in property and also tend to vote more. Can robots really solve these problems?
construction companies have a vested interest in making money. that means building houses. they aren't going to roll over and let regulation kill them, they are going to lobby back.
The main vested interest is regular voters who see their house as an investment/retirement plan. That's a big part of why countries with the housing crisis is less severe in countries/cities with low home ownership rates.
@@majorfallacy5926 Well in Germany this is not true anymore. We were very well doing in the 2008 crisis and never had a housing bubble but now we are in serious shortage of affordable homes. Now the high rent is hurting our work-life balance, turning it into a work-but-no-life unless you are on social welfare balance
Things will get very interesting once the Baby Boomers start dying off. They are going to free up a lot of property and prices should lower respectively.
We don't have a labor shortage, we have an urban land shortage. Zoning reform is the only thing that is going to bring housing costs to something reasonable.
The crisis is driven by 3 things, none of them are construction-related. 1: Zoning in many cities only allows single-family homes in 90% of the land area. 2:Privete equidity companies are outbidding people on the existing homes driving the costs higher for any remaining homes. 3: Many people do not have the cash reserves for down payments or the extra income for the monthly payments.
There is 100% a housing shortage. Just because there are vacant homes in Fort Dodge, Iowa doesn't mean those are relevant to people in California or New York.
Not true. The housing market is wide open if there was an excess supply the prices go down. Go to all the small farm towns in the Midwest where one family can now farm thousands of acres instead of 100. No labor is needed there so you can get all kinds of houses there for 50k.
@@JayHernandez12 Corpopropaganda. Trying to keep the salaries low and skyrocketing the house prices at the same time. Kicking out skilled contractors out of the equation will only increase their profits even further.
The skilled contractors retired out of the system. They were pushed out by lower priced workers. The construction trades are on-the-job training shops. The "training" is now so watered down that the quality is much lower than in years past. The factories can bring the quality up but it will cost far more. @@MrBl3ki I think the factories are cool but I know first hand that the new modern units rent for way more than older existing housing.
Oh what is you ignorant explanation? Corporate landlords have bought less than 1 out of 50 homes on the market the last few years. And the had more than that built so they add housing.
@@MrBl3ki Skilled contractors are still used in these methods, and their bodies last longer because they aren't lifting 200 lb beams and slinging hammers 10 hours a day.
The housing crisis is in part because large companies are buying up inventory and letting it sit, doing so purposefully in order to limit supply relative to demand and keep prices high. It's great to see innovation in construction, and we need modern net-zero building and remodeling, but that part is well ahead of the red tape elsewhere!
I think there is less intentionality than that, but the effect is the same. Real Estate Investment Trusts have become huge in the financial industry as a diversification tool for clients. If you are in a pension plan or 401k you probably own some. In order for the trusts to exist, they need to buy up real estate. They then sell shares to clients. As long as the value of the underlying properties continue to rise, the value of the client’s shares continue to rise and they are happy. You can see how this would have an incredibly inflationary effect on prices. This isn’t so bad in commercial real estate because you’ve got companies making money by using a building for their business and then paying rent to the REIT, so real value is created. But in residential, well, you are either raising rents much faster than actual inflation to make money, or you are counting on the value of the property to rise faster than inflation. I think this is driving a land speculation bubble that is causing a lot of near term pain, and will likely burn the mom and pop investors when it bursts. I’ve wondered if we need to make it much more difficult for REITS to invest in residential real estate.
There are plenty of houses. It’s not a construction issue that causes the housing crisis. It’s a banking issue. It’s a foreign investment issue. It’s a density issue (people want to live and work in the big cities, that have more rich people to sell to thus bringing up the prices). It’s a job issue. Construction techniques can’t help affordable housing.
He// no, I do not want to live and work in a big city. I don't like living close to other people who don't share my values about peace and quiet. I want to live where I see people I know at the grocery store. I want some privacy.
@@freethebirds3578 If you don't live in the city, there is affordable housing. Suburbs count as the city. But 80% of the country is Urban, because people want to live at the cities, in general.
@@Tang-qi6zw I do live in a city, because there is no affordable housing outside of the city here. It's all farmland or people's lake homes. If you go into the edge of the city, you must settle for an HOA (heaven forbid). Further out, you have to buy a large piece of land and build on it. Nope, not affordable here. Besides, nothing is affordable now. A 2 bedroom apartment is at least $1200 per month, and this state does not pay incomes that live up to the demands of government-created housing problems.
In my jurisdiction the only limiting factor is wealthy NIMBYs who oppose densification. We've had a number of panelization plants in our region for over 15 years that can expedite the construction of very high quality and high efficiency mid rise buildings but city politicians support the wealthy home owners aka electors who want to keep the "undesirable" elements out. Meaning people need 2-3 million bucks to buy a home in my city and no amount of change in the manner of construction will or can change that.
If someone sinks their life savings into buying in a neighborhood of single family homes where they can have some peace and quiet, they don’t want to see greedy developers start buying up the houses there and turning them into apartment buildings that tower over their home and turn their streets into congested, noisy parking lots. The quality of life they worked so hard to attain plummets, while the developers make bank. Make no mistake, it’s the developers who are the real driving force behind this whole “let’s get rid of zoning” push. On the other hand, I agree we need answers to the affordability crisis, and I wish I could point to some good ones. Population growth has consequences and costs and we are paying them now.
If someone wanted to build a duplex behind me (where there's now a single family home) I'd be fine with it. If they wanted to put an 8 unit apartment building there, I'd have a problem. There's a difference between a homeowner building with a little income in mind as opposed to a "developer". Context matters.
I have viewed many factory house built videos in the last few years. I generally find that factory-built housing is more costly than onsite stick built homes. The comeback from the manufacturer is usually about shorter wait times and more ecologically produced via less waste. My guess is most buyers are more concerned about cost and functionality than the small pile of waste wood.
That's surprising outcome - less cost for on-site stick built rather than factory built using automation. Perhaps there is a little too much capital involved that needs a return on factory based construction?
Yep, it's the transport and placement cost along with manufacturer margins. Still good for areas without workers. Think of a county with a population of 20k and no material supplier with 60 miles. Easier to just do a modular.
Producing living spaces as products is more efficient and quality is more consistent. It just needs to advance. The fact that this is the first with this level of automation says something about how primitive construction still is. How many of us would prefer to wash our clothes with rocks by the side of the river? How many wear handmade clothes. How many drive a car made by hand in their driveway? Housing as a product is an idea whose time is overdue by 100 years. It will take time to catch up.
@JL-vi8my you don't know what you're talking about. 30% of single family homes have been built in factories for decades. The construction industry knows all about technology. You get sparkles in your eyes when you see a youtube video, and suddenly you're an expert.
I am a developer/builder and see local governments talk about this issue, but wont approve projects at the rate they need to. They want to control the hosuing stock. This is great for me because they cant help themselves and lack the political will to do something about it, so supply is constrained. All the local governments need to do is say YES to projects. Our industry can produce a ton of product. Unfortunately, modular is more expensive and it is very hard to capture the "time savings" as advertised. Typically it is a the local building official (a wild card in the process) can derail all the time savings with one bad decision. Typically that bad decision ks a fear based decision. Meanwhile all that automation money was spent and one guy/gal is the linchpin.
My dad was an accountant in manufactured housing (see: modular homes / trailers / manufactured houses) my whole life, and I'd often get talked to about the specs and quality of the materials going into those houses. Thicker walls, more efficient electrical, plumbing and HVAC because it all has to be able to work in a compact space, and for less than traditional houses, but even with the changing technology, there's still a stigma on manufactured houses.
No. The main issue with affordable housing is not the production cost of a house. Most of the cost of a house is in the interior finishes after all. You can DIY build a big, furnished 2000-3000 square foot house yourself on a vacant plot of land for about 150-180 thousand dollars of today's money. Including the cost of the land; depending on where the land is of course. ~300k if you have contractors do every bit of work for you. Manufactured housing is not cheaper than a site built house either. It is often slightly more expensive. Worse, there is no way that manufactured house pricing would drop significantly even if all their work was done by robots. That is not something shareholders would allow in the US. The actual main issues are strict permitting, land cost and availability, and the biggest issue of all: zoning codes. Zoning codes across the US almost universally restrict any type of affordable housing from being built. Duplexes, triplexes, quadplexes, etc are not allowed to be built due to how zoning plans are made. Luxury apartments are the only type of apartments that make financial sense to build. Luxury single family housing and luxury condos are the only homes being built for the same reason. This is because demand, and therefore pricing, of housing is held artificially high because zoning laws across the us prevent builders from even attempting to build starter houses and low cost apartments. This restricts the availability of lower priced housing and results in everyone fighting for the only type of housing being built: single family homes. So, pricing for homes is always driven up. Further pressure is added by international investors buying up properties as investments and Landlords leaving rental properties empty instead of renting out at actual market rate prices. Fix zoning laws and allow builders to make a profit from affordable housing types and you will increase the availability of housing enough to make houses affordable again.
I really love these videos. But I noticed that last year Belinda released a video titled "5 reasons why there ISN’T a housing shortage." And this one is titled "Can we solve the Housing Shortage with Robotic Construction?" So, like, does Belinda believe that there is a housing shortage or not?
I don't want to be negative, and I am by no means an expert, but I have been learning a lot about the housing market lately and I don't think this can help the housing crisis. No matter how efficient. I mean we can already build really cheaply and quickly without robots. I just don't think that meeting the supply is the problem. This is a mass over-simplification but I realize that there are two major forces at play that are directly opposed to each other. People without homes want cheap homes. And people with homes don't want their property value to go down. These two things are diametrically opposed to each other. It's simply impossible for everyone to get cheap homes and have current property value stay the same. The problem is the people with properties have vastly more time energy and political power than the people who don't have homes. People in apartments can't go to town hall meetings because they're working all the time to keep their apartment up. So we're stuck with horrible regulations that always ensure property values go up and never go down. I know this is an incredibly complex problem that's different everywhere but this fundamental truth is unavoidable. We need high-level political leaders to take a hatchet to bad housing regulations. Not robots. Technology simply can't fix this problem.
Here we go... reading all the comments from others who have not actually researched the negative side of this. Which, by the way, there are many. If these start going up, we will all still be in the same position and probably even worse.
I love it! Flood the market. Eventually the multi-$T asset-management companies that have been using cheap credit to price everyone out of the market will need to accept that they're sitting on too many empty rentals, and start unloading them. The sooner that happens, the sooner regular people will be able to afford a home.
Right now developers flat out refuse to build houses or apartments that not high priced “luxury” units. They claim building costs are so high that they can only make a profit on high end homes. (Yet they are constantly buying up and demolishing affordable apartment buildings and homes in order to put something expensive.) If that’s really the case, then maybe something like this would allow them to afford to actually build starter homes and affordable apartments.
It's true, the margin is in the high end. The bones cost the same. The concrete slab, the roof, nor the wall studs care if a million dollar owner or a hard working middle-class family, but the bank does. There must be a yield, and unfortunately the higher end provides it. The numbers must make sense. The risk is enormous for developers. Why don't local governments float/issue bonds for rental apartments like they do toll roads or schools? Because they don't yield enough at the rates they want to charge to attract any investors to buy those bonds. It's about yield! Sorry, the nums don't lie.
Don't put out paid content for companies without clear labelling it's paid. If you label it, I will still watch. But if you don't label it, I don't want to support that stuff and will unsubscribe. Just clearly label it!!
Like with any easy form of construction automation, I love that these new modern methods can solve the problem of shortages and safety risks. But I severely doubt the financial savings are going to be passed on the the individual buyer. instead the savings will get passed on to big investors, who will undoubtedly sweep these new homes up for way more than they're worth, and continue to make them impossible to rent, and even more impossible to buy. For these people it's more about the land than the house sitting on it. They don't want normal people to own anything to pass on to future generations since for them it's all about power. So in a distant future, when we are past inventory shortage, i think we would be more likely to see pristine ghost suburbs that are mere assets to big investors (like the empty billionaire row condos except more spread out and less fancy), and normal people will still be stuck with the oldest shoebox apartment slums if they want to rent affordably, along with a housing market that will continue to be unapproachable from an individual buyers standpoint.
A) This won't make homes cheaper just like 3d printing DIDN'T. B) Doesn't matter how cheap anything is if you've unemployed everyone & no one has any income to buy it.
The argument of affordable housing was never about purchasing a house until the real estate industry decided it should be. It was originally about affordable rentals. This wondrous system of ours placed a baseline on earnings (minimum wage) without establishing a baseline for accommodation. Thus making it near impossible for individuals earning minimum wage to thrive solo. I am of the thought that all new multi-family structures should include a number of Baseline housing units. These would consist of a mere 300 square feet and have a simple bath and kitchenet. These units could only rent for 40 hours wages. Use a salary cap of + 25% for eligibility.
This is excellent so far, but all the mods look the same (which is fine for their mission.) I'd use the automation to produce wall sections applicable to any design, skip the wiring and plumbing but pre-drill for wires and pipes, and ship them off as flat packs. Then you could expand. Just a thought.
The problems with building more affordable housing are WAAAAAY more complex than just using robtic modular construction to build cookie-cutter units that often don't fit into existing parcels or optimize existing spaces. They have their usefulness but it's not nearly solved. I'm also a little worried that Belinda Carr is getting too cozy with these various businesses that invite her into their freshy-cleaned factories and pay her way to demo new stuff. Don't simply repeat their sales pitch. If she went there unannounced during busy times she might see a much more dysfunctional side.
No it's shows the section of homes that are put together onsite. You obviously know nothing about construction. I work on a 5 story factory build apartment building 3 years ago.
I _hate_ wood construction, and I'm skeptical how much productivity this really gains vs. just building standardized apartment buildings, but still interesting to watch
Their is no housing shortage. The banks, loan company's, foreign investment are buying up the houses and property's to rent out not to sell so they control the home prices, now few can afford to compete with the banks and loan company's. they want you to rent for life because it is a constant money stream for them.
Exactly this, after the first few weeks it’s the performance, comfort, uptime is systems, longevity, and cost to live in/ run the building that matters in the long term that 90% of the world cares about, everything else is just window dressing. We need to get out of way of builders taking on all the risk of delivering homes and apartments.
Isn't one of the biggest problems the zoning laws in US and CA? That there can only single-family homes or downtown highrises, but nothing in between? This causes distances to be huge, more space wasted for individual traffic infrastructure, etc.? @BelindaCarr : I would find it interesting if you could break down, what the full impact is of building medium-high. Of course wood won't suffice, so higher prices and higher skill requirements for initial building, but long term it should be better? e.g. my apartment building is built to last 100 years, not 25 and common costs are shared between the all owners. shorter distances to work/school, etc.
The technology is great but I fear that it will only be used to make homes for poor people in poor areas while wealthier communities will essentially ban it in their building/zoning codes (if it's even economical in that kind of application). So what? I mean if rich people want to pay more per square foot/amenities what's the big deal? Problem is that humans are extremely status conscious and once we see a type of house or construction style as being housing for the poor it gains a stigma and people don't want to live in them j and you hit the same spiral as traditional manufactured homes.
There are many houses that could be affordable rental homes, but those who own them are not willing to take a smaller profit than the maximum their local market can support. Too many Mr Potters, and hardly any George Baileys. As more and more people buy property to rent for profit as an investment, the market is flooded with people competing to set the highest rent on the cheapest property. Cheaper new homes can help, but I think it's a smaller than average piece of the problem.
I'm not really certain how robots building a house is going to get those people better jobs to be able to afford a house. The problem with robots is they put people out of work.
This won't solve anything. Until there is legislation stopping corporations from buying every house they can get their greedy hands on the crisis will continue. It's entirely manufactured by the wealthy.
That was a nice presentation. Now let's talk reality. Robotics haven't lowered the price on cars, appliances or anything else they produce. All they do is increase the profit margin of the company. For-profit companies aren't very good at producing affordable housing.
It is sad that we think working virtually, with a computer joystick, is an advancement over being a hard-working construction laborer. As the country's youth keep losing their marbles and are addicted to staring at their phones they are unhappier than ever. We believe the answer is... we need to make it even easier for them.
I'm not so keen on seeing automation as the solution. Prefabrication has been the dream of housebuilding for a long time but even prefrab homes need some intense installation and sight prep to be useful. I still think homes being sight built with dimensional spec products is going to be the most common solution. Prefabrication and modular homes have become as expensive as traditional homes as the have gain parity with quality. It was the case in the past that trailers were only cheaply built with low quality material and the prices reflected this. Now homes fabricated off sight have achieved very high quality standards but when they do the cost seem to be parallel to site built homes.
That’s really interesting. And my fear is that as these companies try to get rid of as much of their workforce as possible, not only will they skimp on the on-site crew work, but the skilled workers capable of doing the on-site work correctly will become very scarce. This has happened in many industries since the 80s and it becomes a vicious cycle.
And why would they not be the same cost as stick built, the US housing market is the single largest market in the world. That competition evens the prices. More units is the only way prices will come down. That isn't happening because construction workers have been denigrated for 50 years. Honestly we're all just sitting back and laughing at the whiners. Workers have to control now.
Sorry this is not a technical problem. It's political. But indeed new building tech is needed. People are getting poor. I can tell you they are not getting happy whatever lunartics in Europe and elsewhere tell us. A new economy was needed yesterday.
North America has a big infrastructure issue. Building more single family suburban homes isn't going to fix that. Until a prefab company starts building midrises cheaply, they're gonna stay niche.
This is a magnificent execution of modular home technology. However, there are so many empty houses that have been foreclosed on, that it would be less expensive and less time wasting to get homeless people into those homes, rather than let them rot in place in the name of profits.
Forclosed homes have many causes, and are not a realistic solution to homelessness. We have a 7.4 million home shortage and ~400,000 homes forclosed anual nationally. That's not even enough homes to keep up with population growth, let alone make a dent in the 7.4 million missing homes.
I am in charge of small homes that sit unoccupied. The reasons are not profits but rather the cost of insuring employees, the local regulations that have been added to existing codes. Although it is sad, these homes are not available for people to use because there is too much red tape increasing the budget. (It should be noted, that we want to offer home for rent at $500-$700 dollars. If we were to borrow money to remodel, the homes would then rent for $1,100...better to remodel slowly and keep the cost to the tenant down).
Hello @@aliannarodriguez1581 Workman's comp insurance polices. Because working on houses requires ladders and power tools the comp policies are up there. That is just the tip of the ice berg....state and federal withholding taxes etc.
Affordable housing projects come largely from economic stimulus. So that money can't be allocated unless the project meets the criteria. Here's some info I found about it: According to the federal government, housing is “affordable” if it costs no more than 30% of the monthly household income for rent and utilities. Most affordable housing developments are built for families and individuals with incomes of 60% or less than the area median income (AMI).
I'm setting up a little workshop to build small garden sheds. tHanks to this video, I would like to have framed pictures of working robot machines along the walls of my workshop.... My way of laughing at the old fashioned methods of hammer & nail that I still use. (Does anyone have any duct tape?...I hit my finger with the hammer again).
The real question is why houses are expenses if the construction is so much easier than it was before? 100 years ago people didn't have sheetrock or plywood or nailing gun or all the other machines. Were I live the unions and government taxation is responsible for it. Thus this is a partial solution as it's replacing the unionized worker by robots and replaceable factory workers.
No, we can solve the housing crisis by ending unfettered capitalism. There are actually plenty of already existing housing. As with everything, we don't need more, we need to do more with what we have. On the other hand, this kind of factory should be used immediately to provide emergency housing in areas where disaster or extreme poverty make shelter an imminent need.
The biggest problem in USA is lack of mixed neighborhoods, zoning, high taxes and upkeep of the house. Also spread of everything is causing issues with transport and logistics. Building more single family houses far from work, shops and leisure centers is main reason why there is not enough apartments in US. This kind of companies are trying to solve the problem with the wrong ideas and tools.
If we want people to live in apartments long term instead of moving to houses, then new apartments are going to have to become more practical for long term living. The trend for a long time has been to squeeze people into smaller and smaller spaces, with less and less storage. Naturally people start to run into limits and want more space, so they leave apartment living as soon as they can afford to do so. An older man once told me he grew up in a NYC apartment that was perfectly roomy and had plenty of space for a family with three kids. Multiple bedrooms, roomy kitchen and living areas, den, lots of closets, etc. He wasn’t from a rich family but he said such apartments were normal at one time.Nothing like that gets built now except for the billionaire class.
all 'sad' and done..."affordable rental homes...." not that anyone would want to OWN an affordable home...38 seconds in this statement earned a thumbs down; but a loyal subscriber will keep watching!!
@sparksmcgee6641 Why ask me just tell me what percentage of wood and what kind of wood is being used. Usually, people boast about how superior their products are, but you're not? Is my house belt better? Yeah, it's a stick house. It's over 100 years old, old growth red wood looks great, great details, large porch they don't built houses like this anymore. We let's just say it's not a pop tart house, will still be standing long after fab house has fallen apart me thinks.
@@DKLGalactus5 first of all its a joke in construction when people say " they don't build them like they used to", when your remodeling some 1910 mansion someone pulls apart something, sighs and says "they don't build them like thwy used to" and everyone else say ""Thank God". People like you compare the exceptional home from 100 years ago to the common homes of today. The tract homes of 1880 are just like tract homes of today. You made a nonsensical statement since the lumber requirement in the code of these houses are the same as a site built. Saying something looks crappy without knowing what your looking at gets you a comment like mine. You redwood doesn't care load the LVLs in the video.
@@sparksmcgee6641 lol it's a joke in the construction business these days because people lack skill and do things on the cheap like foam trim that looks like wood. yeah older home need some work at times but the craftmanship and details can be outstanding a skill long gone.
@DKLGalactus5 then say that as a comment. And yes I know the difference between you lumber and what's used here bit I. Not going to type the whe lumber rating system and load capacities in a comment. And you knock it out of the Parke with you ignorance of "they don't build them like my house anymore". We build better. Is yours better than this fab? Maybe. Sound like the only thing you think matters is the size and amount of lumber. Most people want livable conditioned space, there are all kinds of rating where this could be better including life cycle. I have 4 houses that were build in the 1800s as laborer housing. I'm sure the people building them expected them to last 20-30 year and would have laughed at you if you told them it's would be in use as is 125-150 years later.
I like this technology. But I prefer what fbr are doing . But I can see these houses been needed by the millions as worldwide we need hundreds of millions of homes
Labor shortages, maybe you should look into that too. Money attracts new talent, just like they do to get a good CEO. But not for workers on the bottom. You will pay more for health care at the end of your career, then you make. Ask gramps about it. You wonder why people try to get their kids a good education?
The labor issues focused on in this story are, in my opinion, something of a “red herring.” If industrialized construction comes to dominate the building industry, I believe that the resulting reduction in labor costs will not be passed on to the consumer. Rather, the savings will go to increased executive income. Unfortunately, our culture is no longer oriented to receiving a fair price for a product, but rather to squeezing the last penny from both the employees and the consumer for the benefit of the few at the top. Expecting industrialized construction to change this dynamic is naive. Making construction jobs more financially attractive is likely the solution to the industry's labor issue.
Maybe homes aren't affordable because we keep automating well-paying jobs (skills-based jobs) and the only jobs left are low-paying (non-skills-based jobs) ones.
this is the future of housing - economies of scale, automation, robotic construction and standardization, just like automobiles, flat pack houses will be the solution to housing
What a shame the modules aren't being built in a closed loop, cradle-to-cradle system. Why not construct to lock-up stage that can withstand the outdoors? They could avoid all that plastic shrink wrap. If we're going to standardise and automate, there's so much we could choose to include or exclude in production from the outset. Solving the housing crisis by creating more waste and pollution than is necessary or should be expected at this advanced stage of our climate and pollution crisis is counter-productive to say the least. Design thinking combined with technology and careful use of resources and materials can solve our problems, but profiteering and fashion in design creates more problems... Individual pride in bespoke designs or social and environmental benefit for all? I'd prefer the latter... Humans are incredibly smart until we start thinking only about ourselves at the expense of others and our shared environment - built, social and natural.
Automation is so hard and much of it is in improved tools and systems - nail guns, better drivers, house wrap systems, etc. - because labor is a huge cost. Land is also a hot mess. Materials are the only bright spot if you just kinda... forget 2020/2021. These modular systems bundle so many of the labor savings while still producing a great product, and as much as people love bespoke there's a reason every post-war Dingbat in Los Angeles looks the same once you get inside.
There are a lot of intelligent and well thought out questions in this comment section. All of the suggestions on here would help, if a solution to this problem were desired by the elite. Unfortunately all of this is part of the planned destruction of western democracies and the ending of national sovereignty. There is a very interesting book everyone should read, but few will. It's called The Creature from Jekyll Island. It's about the creation and history of the Federal Reserve. It sounds boring, but reads like a mystery novel. Read that and the Report from Iron Mountain. Everything happening in the world will make much more sense.
I can tell you NO before watching the video. It is not a construction problem hut a socio-economic problem coming from local, state, and federal regulations on land use, work permits, and employment laws to name a few.
I can probably speak for millions of people saying that I don't care if my home doesn't have a "bespoke design". I just want a home.
I can confidently say you speak for millions of people.
That's why commie blocks are low-key awesome. The esthetic isn't great but still better than North American suburbs
And I'd personally forgo any ornament, "playfull detail" or shade of color if the insulation and ventilation was good enough to lower my energy bill signicantly.
What good does a skylight that leaks, a flat roof that sags, a gigantic living room that sacrifices insulation for "floor area".
Give me my first Minecraft house, but with an effective R40 and high-quality HRV. 4x4 blocks and a ceiling barely higher than my head is plenty enough.
Exactly this, after the first few weeks it’s the performance, comfort, uptime is systems, longevity, and cost to live in/ run the building that matters in the long term that 90% of the world cares about, everything else is just window dressing.
We need to get out of way of builders taking on all the risk of delivering homes and apartments.
In this era of ultra capitalism we’re more likely to be charged a monthly fee for breathing than to have affordable homes you can own for the masses.
Building the basic components of a home in a factory makes a tremendous amount of sense from a quality control perspective. Imagine shipping 3,000 parts to a mud pit and trying to build a car. Modular homes can also reduce weather delays and in construction “time is money”
I vividly recall back to the early 1980's when new dorms were being constructed at Texas A&M University. These were the new "modular dorms" as they came to be known afterwards - I was able to get a front row seat as the sites were prepped, foundations laid, giant heavy-lift cranes set up, and then saw the pre-fabbed modules trucked in over a period of weeks. One by one the modules were lifted off the trucks and set precisely on the foundation, then atop one another, like an enormous Lego project. Each module was fully outfitted with utilities and they simply needed to be interconnected once in place. It was an amazing sight to watch.
Yep, 1 out of 3 single family homes have been factory built for the last 40 years.
The youtube promotion is the only new thing.
I've been In construction for 25 years and we know about tech.
Ignore anyone that says we fight new technology.
This is amazing.
I LOVE that they glue the panels to the studs. I've been trying to get the builders I work with (doing efficiency consulting) to do this. It really helps with tightening up the building.
You said "there's nothing to tell these were factory built".
I'd say it's the other way round: "there's everything to tell it wasn't built by humans." Those nailing patterns!!
I bet with a lot of standardized shapes and sizes, the cutoff’s would be similar sizes too. I’d like to see the excess materials being sold for cheap or repurposed into OSB and other materials. This is pretty cool.
Most excess materials are used or recycled.
@@JL-vi8my what country are you in? Canada we create tons of waste in construction. Even the companies that do recycle, only do so if it's convenient.
Any savings would not be passed on to the home owner. When the government gave a $7k rebate for electric vehicle purchases, Ford raised the price of their electric vehicles by $7k.
The issue with housing is not construction sadly, it’s companies buying land they shouldn’t own to monopolize the market. Lawmakers need to force companies to not own houses that aren’t for employees.
exactly, there isn't really a housing shortage, probelem are corporations like Blackrock and Bill Gates
Governments need to stay out of the housing business. They are the issue and won't approve new housing at the rate it needs to be approved. The reasons companies bought houses is because they were for sale. Too many people where approved for houses they could not afford. The government being in the housing business, again, thinking everyone should own a home. A disaster.
False. It's all open market sales.
Good point. But then, a more productive way to build multifamily, especially for seniors who need a smaller place, is a good thing. Tent cities aren't the solution, yet San Francisco paid $60,000 per tent for them, when the solution shown here isn't much more and is way safer, cleaner, and better in every way.
@JL-vi8my than a tent. Not better in every way than a site build house. This costs more and they have the same labor issues. It's just factories wanting to make the money builders are. That's it.
They point out there isn't a cost savings on all these factory build videos.
You mean we need robots to fill out all formulars? A large part of the housing crisis is bureaucracy. And robot politicans who could come up with more sane zoning laws.
A large part of the crisis is made up
The issue is actually unfettered capitalism. If there were no permitting and regulations, it would be just as expensive, but a complete nightmare. Property as a means of investment, beyond familial generational wealth artificially inflates the market. If housing was regulated such that one person could own one house, housing would be affordable.
@@BicycleFunkI absolutely agree with you. Indeed, DOWN WITH CAPITALISM! What is needed, which I'm certain you'll agree, is the complete control of housing by the government. This can only happen, as you know, when socialism replaces capitalism.
Since this country is half way to socialism, to complete it, Democrat politicians MUST win every office in 2024, especially the presidency.
Who will be our candidate and our deliverer to full socialism? I think it will be Gavin Newsome. But a "dark horse candidate," so to speak, will be Michelle Obama! Yes, she will finish what Barack started and deliver socialism to us. After, everyone will be equal and no one will be rich. African Americans, Michelle's greatest supporters, will finally see racial justice when Michelle will pay appropriate reparations for Black slavery and Black racial injustice to every African American who voted for Michelle.
And lest I forget, under Michelle and with Democrats in control, and with Republican approval, affordable, and even free, housing will be available to everyone, though African Americans who were "red lined" and denied a chance to live in decent housing in safe White neighborhoods, will be given first dibs to choose their housing.
BicycleFunk, I thank you for your clear-sighted comments, and I thank you for reading my reply
You did a really good job on this video Belinda, What you say rings true to me.
Great video, thanks for the information! I've been hearing a lot about the housing market lately. Is now a good time to invest in real estate? I'm considering buying a rental property. Any tips for first-time real estate investors?
It really depends on your location and long-term goals. In some areas, housing prices are soaring, but in others, it's more stable. Research your local market carefully.
Rental properties can be a good source of passive income, but make sure to factor in all costs, including maintenance and property management if needed..
It's important to evaluate your financial goals and risk tolerance either on your own or with the help of a financial advisor. A hot market can offer opportunities, but it also comes with higher prices and potential risks.
Exactly! Which is why I appreciate giving a financial advisor the power of decision-making. Giving their specialized expertise and education, as well as the fact that each and every one of their skills is centered on harnessing risks for its asymmetrical potential and controlling it as a buffer against certain unfavorable developments, it’s practically impossible for them to underperform. I have made over $370k working with John Desmond Heppolette, for more than five years.
Such a priceless tip. I just discovered his exceptional resume when I made a google research of his full names online. Base on his online resume, he appears knowledgeable and well accredited I drop him a message and book a call session with him! Thanks so much for the information..
Remember that financial decisions should be made carefully and with consideration of your individual circumstances, seek professional advice. Absolutely! A financial advisor can help you create a tailored investment plan that aligns with your unique financial situation and goals.
A big problem with the housing crisis is that there are many vested interests who want to keep house prices high - often including politicians who disproportionately own many second homes or can be influenced by large building firms lobbying them. The other groups are building companies that want to maximise profits. And older groups who tend to have more money invested in property and also tend to vote more. Can robots really solve these problems?
construction companies have a vested interest in making money. that means building houses. they aren't going to roll over and let regulation kill them, they are going to lobby back.
The main vested interest is regular voters who see their house as an investment/retirement plan. That's a big part of why countries with the housing crisis is less severe in countries/cities with low home ownership rates.
Yes
@@majorfallacy5926 Well in Germany this is not true anymore. We were very well doing in the 2008 crisis and never had a housing bubble but now we are in serious shortage of affordable homes. Now the high rent is hurting our work-life balance, turning it into a work-but-no-life unless you are on social welfare balance
Things will get very interesting once the Baby Boomers start dying off. They are going to free up a lot of property and prices should lower respectively.
We don't have a labor shortage, we have an urban land shortage. Zoning reform is the only thing that is going to bring housing costs to something reasonable.
And government with the will power to approve more housing.
There is definitely a labor shortage in my area, and I agree about zoning. My local government is more than happy to approve luxury apartments!
The crisis is driven by 3 things, none of them are construction-related. 1: Zoning in many cities only allows single-family homes in 90% of the land area. 2:Privete equidity companies are outbidding people on the existing homes driving the costs higher for any remaining homes. 3: Many people do not have the cash reserves for down payments or the extra income for the monthly payments.
I would be great to be able to make smaller homes for 50-100k but zoning and local laws block good solutions
There is NOT a housing shortage! There is a shortage of affordable home$ and an abundance of low paying jobs.
There is 100% a housing shortage. Just because there are vacant homes in Fort Dodge, Iowa doesn't mean those are relevant to people in California or New York.
Not true. The housing market is wide open if there was an excess supply the prices go down.
Go to all the small farm towns in the Midwest where one family can now farm thousands of acres instead of 100. No labor is needed there so you can get all kinds of houses there for 50k.
Nope, the issue is not with the labor, despite the claims.
it seems too overly simplistic to blame labor shortage...
@@JayHernandez12 Corpopropaganda. Trying to keep the salaries low and skyrocketing the house prices at the same time. Kicking out skilled contractors out of the equation will only increase their profits even further.
The skilled contractors retired out of the system. They were pushed out by lower priced workers. The construction trades are on-the-job training shops. The "training" is now so watered down that the quality is much lower than in years past. The factories can bring the quality up but it will cost far more. @@MrBl3ki I think the factories are cool but I know first hand that the new modern units rent for way more than older existing housing.
Oh what is you ignorant explanation? Corporate landlords have bought less than 1 out of 50 homes on the market the last few years. And the had more than that built so they add housing.
@@MrBl3ki Skilled contractors are still used in these methods, and their bodies last longer because they aren't lifting 200 lb beams and slinging hammers 10 hours a day.
The housing crisis is in part because large companies are buying up inventory and letting it sit, doing so purposefully in order to limit supply relative to demand and keep prices high. It's great to see innovation in construction, and we need modern net-zero building and remodeling, but that part is well ahead of the red tape elsewhere!
Net zero is an impossible fantasy. Striving for it solves nothing.
I think there is less intentionality than that, but the effect is the same. Real Estate Investment Trusts have become huge in the financial industry as a diversification tool for clients. If you are in a pension plan or 401k you probably own some. In order for the trusts to exist, they need to buy up real estate. They then sell shares to clients. As long as the value of the underlying properties continue to rise, the value of the client’s shares continue to rise and they are happy. You can see how this would have an incredibly inflationary effect on prices. This isn’t so bad in commercial real estate because you’ve got companies making money by using a building for their business and then paying rent to the REIT, so real value is created. But in residential, well, you are either raising rents much faster than actual inflation to make money, or you are counting on the value of the property to rise faster than inflation. I think this is driving a land speculation bubble that is causing a lot of near term pain, and will likely burn the mom and pop investors when it bursts. I’ve wondered if we need to make it much more difficult for REITS to invest in residential real estate.
List is a total lie, your spamming that has nothing to do with the video. Hit thw report button for people like this people.
"no, lol"
so many houses are vacant because if they were to be sold for cheap
the housing bubble would burst
they speculate on prices going up
There are plenty of houses. It’s not a construction issue that causes the housing crisis. It’s a banking issue. It’s a foreign investment issue. It’s a density issue (people want to live and work in the big cities, that have more rich people to sell to thus bringing up the prices). It’s a job issue. Construction techniques can’t help affordable housing.
It definitely would help. A lot. It wouldn't fix everything though for the reasons you pointed out
it's blackrock
He// no, I do not want to live and work in a big city. I don't like living close to other people who don't share my values about peace and quiet. I want to live where I see people I know at the grocery store. I want some privacy.
@@freethebirds3578 If you don't live in the city, there is affordable housing. Suburbs count as the city. But 80% of the country is Urban, because people want to live at the cities, in general.
@@Tang-qi6zw I do live in a city, because there is no affordable housing outside of the city here. It's all farmland or people's lake homes. If you go into the edge of the city, you must settle for an HOA (heaven forbid). Further out, you have to buy a large piece of land and build on it. Nope, not affordable here.
Besides, nothing is affordable now. A 2 bedroom apartment is at least $1200 per month, and this state does not pay incomes that live up to the demands of government-created housing problems.
Another great video! I appreciate that your explore many different aspects of the construction industry and provide relevant links.
Excellent video. Hope it comes to residential construction soon.
In my jurisdiction the only limiting factor is wealthy NIMBYs who oppose densification. We've had a number of panelization plants in our region for over 15 years that can expedite the construction of very high quality and high efficiency mid rise buildings but city politicians support the wealthy home owners aka electors who want to keep the "undesirable" elements out. Meaning people need 2-3 million bucks to buy a home in my city and no amount of change in the manner of construction will or can change that.
If someone sinks their life savings into buying in a neighborhood of single family homes where they can have some peace and quiet, they don’t want to see greedy developers start buying up the houses there and turning them into apartment buildings that tower over their home and turn their streets into congested, noisy parking lots. The quality of life they worked so hard to attain plummets, while the developers make bank. Make no mistake, it’s the developers who are the real driving force behind this whole “let’s get rid of zoning” push. On the other hand, I agree we need answers to the affordability crisis, and I wish I could point to some good ones. Population growth has consequences and costs and we are paying them now.
@@aliannarodriguez1581 no NIMBY... you are your kind are the problem. Always have been.
@@aliannarodriguez1581 translated your comment is really saying "only the wealthy matter, and fuck those who can't afford multimillion dollar homes."
If someone wanted to build a duplex behind me (where there's now a single family home) I'd be fine with it.
If they wanted to put an 8 unit apartment building there, I'd have a problem.
There's a difference between a homeowner building with a little income in mind as opposed to a "developer". Context matters.
@@mk1st yeah .. no surprise that's called nimbyism.
*DID Belinda forget* to show a house built with those blocks?
I always enjoy the videos inside of clean factories. tHanks for posting.
I have viewed many factory house built videos in the last few years. I generally find that factory-built housing is more costly than onsite stick built homes. The comeback from the manufacturer is usually about shorter wait times and more ecologically produced via less waste. My guess is most buyers are more concerned about cost and functionality than the small pile of waste wood.
That's surprising outcome - less cost for on-site stick built rather than factory built using automation. Perhaps there is a little too much capital involved that needs a return on factory based construction?
Yep, it's the transport and placement cost along with manufacturer margins.
Still good for areas without workers. Think of a county with a population of 20k and no material supplier with 60 miles. Easier to just do a modular.
Producing living spaces as products is more efficient and quality is more consistent. It just needs to advance. The fact that this is the first with this level of automation says something about how primitive construction still is. How many of us would prefer to wash our clothes with rocks by the side of the river? How many wear handmade clothes. How many drive a car made by hand in their driveway? Housing as a product is an idea whose time is overdue by 100 years. It will take time to catch up.
@JL-vi8my you don't know what you're talking about. 30% of single family homes have been built in factories for decades. The construction industry knows all about technology.
You get sparkles in your eyes when you see a youtube video, and suddenly you're an expert.
@@sparksmcgee6641 Probably depends on where you live. It wouldn't even be remotely close to 30% on Oahu.
I am a developer/builder and see local governments talk about this issue, but wont approve projects at the rate they need to. They want to control the hosuing stock. This is great for me because they cant help themselves and lack the political will to do something about it, so supply is constrained. All the local governments need to do is say YES to projects. Our industry can produce a ton of product. Unfortunately, modular is more expensive and it is very hard to capture the "time savings" as advertised. Typically it is a the local building official (a wild card in the process) can derail all the time savings with one bad decision. Typically that bad decision ks a fear based decision. Meanwhile all that automation money was spent and one guy/gal is the linchpin.
My dad was an accountant in manufactured housing (see: modular homes / trailers / manufactured houses) my whole life, and I'd often get talked to about the specs and quality of the materials going into those houses. Thicker walls, more efficient electrical, plumbing and HVAC because it all has to be able to work in a compact space, and for less than traditional houses, but even with the changing technology, there's still a stigma on manufactured houses.
No. The main issue with affordable housing is not the production cost of a house. Most of the cost of a house is in the interior finishes after all. You can DIY build a big, furnished 2000-3000 square foot house yourself on a vacant plot of land for about 150-180 thousand dollars of today's money. Including the cost of the land; depending on where the land is of course. ~300k if you have contractors do every bit of work for you. Manufactured housing is not cheaper than a site built house either. It is often slightly more expensive. Worse, there is no way that manufactured house pricing would drop significantly even if all their work was done by robots. That is not something shareholders would allow in the US.
The actual main issues are strict permitting, land cost and availability, and the biggest issue of all: zoning codes. Zoning codes across the US almost universally restrict any type of affordable housing from being built. Duplexes, triplexes, quadplexes, etc are not allowed to be built due to how zoning plans are made. Luxury apartments are the only type of apartments that make financial sense to build. Luxury single family housing and luxury condos are the only homes being built for the same reason. This is because demand, and therefore pricing, of housing is held artificially high because zoning laws across the us prevent builders from even attempting to build starter houses and low cost apartments. This restricts the availability of lower priced housing and results in everyone fighting for the only type of housing being built: single family homes. So, pricing for homes is always driven up. Further pressure is added by international investors buying up properties as investments and Landlords leaving rental properties empty instead of renting out at actual market rate prices.
Fix zoning laws and allow builders to make a profit from affordable housing types and you will increase the availability of housing enough to make houses affordable again.
I really love these videos. But I noticed that last year Belinda released a video titled "5 reasons why there ISN’T a housing shortage." And this one is titled "Can we solve the Housing Shortage with Robotic Construction?" So, like, does Belinda believe that there is a housing shortage or not?
This is very cool. Thank you!
It takes humans to care for humans , build with hempcrete, i hate robots i love freedom
I don't want to be negative, and I am by no means an expert, but I have been learning a lot about the housing market lately and I don't think this can help the housing crisis. No matter how efficient. I mean we can already build really cheaply and quickly without robots. I just don't think that meeting the supply is the problem.
This is a mass over-simplification but I realize that there are two major forces at play that are directly opposed to each other. People without homes want cheap homes. And people with homes don't want their property value to go down. These two things are diametrically opposed to each other. It's simply impossible for everyone to get cheap homes and have current property value stay the same.
The problem is the people with properties have vastly more time energy and political power than the people who don't have homes. People in apartments can't go to town hall meetings because they're working all the time to keep their apartment up. So we're stuck with horrible regulations that always ensure property values go up and never go down.
I know this is an incredibly complex problem that's different everywhere but this fundamental truth is unavoidable.
We need high-level political leaders to take a hatchet to bad housing regulations. Not robots. Technology simply can't fix this problem.
No, the construction part is usually not the bottle neck, the issue is usually the permit process which in many cities and counties takes years.
Here we go... reading all the comments from others who have not actually researched the negative side of this. Which, by the way, there are many. If these start going up, we will all still be in the same position and probably even worse.
Reported as misinformation.
Report these ignorant liars.
I love it! Flood the market. Eventually the multi-$T asset-management companies that have been using cheap credit to price everyone out of the market will need to accept that they're sitting on too many empty rentals, and start unloading them. The sooner that happens, the sooner regular people will be able to afford a home.
Right now developers flat out refuse to build houses or apartments that not high priced “luxury” units. They claim building costs are so high that they can only make a profit on high end homes. (Yet they are constantly buying up and demolishing affordable apartment buildings and homes in order to put something expensive.) If that’s really the case, then maybe something like this would allow them to afford to actually build starter homes and affordable apartments.
It's true, the margin is in the high end. The bones cost the same. The concrete slab, the roof, nor the wall studs care if a million dollar owner or a hard working middle-class family, but the bank does. There must be a yield, and unfortunately the higher end provides it. The numbers must make sense. The risk is enormous for developers.
Why don't local governments float/issue bonds for rental apartments like they do toll roads or schools? Because they don't yield enough at the rates they want to charge to attract any investors to buy those bonds. It's about yield! Sorry, the nums don't lie.
Affordable is the key word. There are pleanty of vacant homes.
So cool! 🤩 Thanks 🤗
Don't put out paid content for companies without clear labelling it's paid. If you label it, I will still watch. But if you don't label it, I don't want to support that stuff and will unsubscribe. Just clearly label it!!
there is a shortage of people? skilled people available to work ? Good report Belinda.
Yep. I'm in the business 25 years and a contractor now. We've know this is coming and it has at least 15 years to go.
Like with any easy form of construction automation, I love that these new modern methods can solve the problem of shortages and safety risks. But I severely doubt the financial savings are going to be passed on the the individual buyer. instead the savings will get passed on to big investors, who will undoubtedly sweep these new homes up for way more than they're worth, and continue to make them impossible to rent, and even more impossible to buy. For these people it's more about the land than the house sitting on it. They don't want normal people to own anything to pass on to future generations since for them it's all about power. So in a distant future, when we are past inventory shortage, i think we would be more likely to see pristine ghost suburbs that are mere assets to big investors (like the empty billionaire row condos except more spread out and less fancy), and normal people will still be stuck with the oldest shoebox apartment slums if they want to rent affordably, along with a housing market that will continue to be unapproachable from an individual buyers standpoint.
Construction automation, yes please!
The issue is with land prices and limited construction of social housing. This is political.
A) This won't make homes cheaper just like 3d printing DIDN'T. B) Doesn't matter how cheap anything is if you've unemployed everyone & no one has any income to buy it.
It’s a cool system but the cost of building a house has almost nothing to do with house prices or our capacity to build new homes
❤🧡💛💚💙💜Your videos are awesome! Greetings from Hungary!
The argument of affordable housing was never about purchasing a house until the real estate industry decided it should be.
It was originally about affordable rentals.
This wondrous system of ours placed a baseline on earnings (minimum wage) without establishing a baseline for accommodation.
Thus making it near impossible for individuals earning minimum wage to thrive solo.
I am of the thought that all new multi-family structures should include a number of Baseline housing units.
These would consist of a mere 300 square feet and have a simple bath and kitchenet.
These units could only rent for 40 hours wages.
Use a salary cap of + 25% for eligibility.
This is excellent so far, but all the mods look the same (which is fine for their mission.) I'd use the automation to produce wall sections applicable to any design, skip the wiring and plumbing but pre-drill for wires and pipes, and ship them off as flat packs. Then you could expand. Just a thought.
Hi Belinda, great video. Do you have any videos of the finished product (exterior and interior)?
The problems with building more affordable housing are WAAAAAY more complex than just using robtic modular construction to build cookie-cutter units that often don't fit into existing parcels or optimize existing spaces. They have their usefulness but it's not nearly solved.
I'm also a little worried that Belinda Carr is getting too cozy with these various businesses that invite her into their freshy-cleaned factories and pay her way to demo new stuff. Don't simply repeat their sales pitch. If she went there unannounced during busy times she might see a much more dysfunctional side.
"indistinguishable from a normal home" while the video shows a parking lot of what looks like mobile homes 😂
No it's shows the section of homes that are put together onsite. You obviously know nothing about construction. I work on a 5 story factory build apartment building 3 years ago.
I _hate_ wood construction, and I'm skeptical how much productivity this really gains vs. just building standardized apartment buildings, but still interesting to watch
Their is no housing shortage. The banks, loan company's, foreign investment are buying up the houses and property's to rent out not to sell so they control the home prices, now few can afford to compete with the banks and loan company's. they want you to rent for life because it is a constant money stream for them.
Exactly this, after the first few weeks it’s the performance, comfort, uptime is systems, longevity, and cost to live in/ run the building that matters in the long term that 90% of the world cares about, everything else is just window dressing.
We need to get out of way of builders taking on all the risk of delivering homes and apartments.
Can you do a comparison between this type of construction vs the BOXABL type of construction?
That would be cool.
Isn't one of the biggest problems the zoning laws in US and CA? That there can only single-family homes or downtown highrises, but nothing in between? This causes distances to be huge, more space wasted for individual traffic infrastructure, etc.?
@BelindaCarr : I would find it interesting if you could break down, what the full impact is of building medium-high. Of course wood won't suffice, so higher prices and higher skill requirements for initial building, but long term it should be better? e.g. my apartment building is built to last 100 years, not 25 and common costs are shared between the all owners. shorter distances to work/school, etc.
Large companies are destroying the possibility of home ownership in the United States.
We live in Twin Falls Idaho where is this factory located?
The technology is great but I fear that it will only be used to make homes for poor people in poor areas while wealthier communities will essentially ban it in their building/zoning codes (if it's even economical in that kind of application).
So what? I mean if rich people want to pay more per square foot/amenities what's the big deal? Problem is that humans are extremely status conscious and once we see a type of house or construction style as being housing for the poor it gains a stigma and people don't want to live in them j
and you hit the same spiral as traditional manufactured homes.
There are many houses that could be affordable rental homes, but those who own them are not willing to take a smaller profit than the maximum their local market can support. Too many Mr Potters, and hardly any George Baileys.
As more and more people buy property to rent for profit as an investment, the market is flooded with people competing to set the highest rent on the cheapest property.
Cheaper new homes can help, but I think it's a smaller than average piece of the problem.
Diversity is not necessary in the workforce, efficiency is.
I'm not really certain how robots building a house is going to get those people better jobs to be able to afford a house.
The problem with robots is they put people out of work.
This won't solve anything. Until there is legislation stopping corporations from buying every house they can get their greedy hands on the crisis will continue. It's entirely manufactured by the wealthy.
There's probably a time saving & waste saving to this process, but are the robotics expensive? Can they run 24 hrs, like those dark factories in Asia?
That was a nice presentation. Now let's talk reality. Robotics haven't lowered the price on cars, appliances or anything else they produce. All they do is increase the profit margin of the company. For-profit companies aren't very good at producing affordable housing.
It is sad that we think working virtually, with a computer joystick, is an advancement over being a hard-working construction laborer.
As the country's youth keep losing their marbles and are addicted to staring at their phones they are unhappier than ever. We believe the answer is... we need to make it even easier for them.
Was this paid for by P4?
I'm not so keen on seeing automation as the solution. Prefabrication has been the dream of housebuilding for a long time but even prefrab homes need some intense installation and sight prep to be useful. I still think homes being sight built with dimensional spec products is going to be the most common solution. Prefabrication and modular homes have become as expensive as traditional homes as the have gain parity with quality. It was the case in the past that trailers were only cheaply built with low quality material and the prices reflected this. Now homes fabricated off sight have achieved very high quality standards but when they do the cost seem to be parallel to site built homes.
That’s really interesting. And my fear is that as these companies try to get rid of as much of their workforce as possible, not only will they skimp on the on-site crew work, but the skilled workers capable of doing the on-site work correctly will become very scarce. This has happened in many industries since the 80s and it becomes a vicious cycle.
@aliannarodriguez1581 the reason they exist is the lack of site labor.
And why would they not be the same cost as stick built, the US housing market is the single largest market in the world. That competition evens the prices.
More units is the only way prices will come down. That isn't happening because construction workers have been denigrated for 50 years.
Honestly we're all just sitting back and laughing at the whiners. Workers have to control now.
Sorry this is not a technical problem. It's political. But indeed new building tech is needed.
People are getting poor. I can tell you they are not getting happy whatever lunartics in Europe and elsewhere tell us.
A new economy was needed yesterday.
North America has a big infrastructure issue. Building more single family suburban homes isn't going to fix that. Until a prefab company starts building midrises cheaply, they're gonna stay niche.
Worked on a mid rise 3 years ago. They've been doing it for decades.
This is a magnificent execution of modular home technology. However, there are so many empty houses that have been foreclosed on, that it would be less expensive and less time wasting to get homeless people into those homes, rather than let them rot in place in the name of profits.
Forclosed homes have many causes, and are not a realistic solution to homelessness. We have a 7.4 million home shortage and ~400,000 homes forclosed anual nationally. That's not even enough homes to keep up with population growth, let alone make a dent in the 7.4 million missing homes.
I am in charge of small homes that sit unoccupied. The reasons are not profits but rather the cost of insuring employees, the local regulations that have been added to existing codes. Although it is sad, these homes are not available for people to use because there is too much red tape increasing the budget.
(It should be noted, that we want to offer home for rent at $500-$700 dollars. If we were to borrow money to remodel, the homes would then rent for $1,100...better to remodel slowly and keep the cost to the tenant down).
@@Dancing_Alone_wRentalsCan you explain a bit more about insuring employees? Do you mean like rental agents?
Hello @@aliannarodriguez1581 Workman's comp insurance polices. Because working on houses requires ladders and power tools the comp policies are up there. That is just the tip of the ice berg....state and federal withholding taxes etc.
Even if you could build a home for pennies on the dollar, the seller would still increase the price for max profit.
Affordable housing projects come largely from economic stimulus. So that money can't be allocated unless the project meets the criteria. Here's some info I found about it:
According to the federal government, housing is “affordable” if it costs no more than 30% of the monthly household income for rent and utilities. Most affordable housing developments are built for families and individuals with incomes of 60% or less than the area median income (AMI).
NO. Buyers would bid the price up to its market value.
We need to build generational buildings and not buildings that we'll need to be demolished in 50 years time!
I'm setting up a little workshop to build small garden sheds. tHanks to this video, I would like to have framed pictures of working robot machines along the walls of my workshop.... My way of laughing at the old fashioned methods of hammer & nail that I still use.
(Does anyone have any duct tape?...I hit my finger with the hammer again).
Oh please. We can spot a manufactured home from miles away. Also, they never use quality finish products.They have a “trailer feel” when inside.
That is not a vacuum robot that was a bridge crane with a vacuum gripper a guy was moving it.
The real question is why houses are expenses if the construction is so much easier than it was before?
100 years ago people didn't have sheetrock or plywood or nailing gun or all the other machines. Were I live the unions and government taxation is responsible for it. Thus this is a partial solution as it's replacing the unionized worker by robots and replaceable factory workers.
They need to start producing robots in India to make them competitive world wide
No, we can solve the housing crisis by ending unfettered capitalism. There are actually plenty of already existing housing. As with everything, we don't need more, we need to do more with what we have. On the other hand, this kind of factory should be used immediately to provide emergency housing in areas where disaster or extreme poverty make shelter an imminent need.
There is no housing shortage! There are government regulations that greatly restrain us from building “affordable “ housing.
Mostly local. And mostly to do with minimum parking requirements.
The biggest problem in USA is lack of mixed neighborhoods, zoning, high taxes and upkeep of the house.
Also spread of everything is causing issues with transport and logistics.
Building more single family houses far from work, shops and leisure centers is main reason why there is not enough apartments in US.
This kind of companies are trying to solve the problem with the wrong ideas and tools.
If we want people to live in apartments long term instead of moving to houses, then new apartments are going to have to become more practical for long term living. The trend for a long time has been to squeeze people into smaller and smaller spaces, with less and less storage. Naturally people start to run into limits and want more space, so they leave apartment living as soon as they can afford to do so. An older man once told me he grew up in a NYC apartment that was perfectly roomy and had plenty of space for a family with three kids. Multiple bedrooms, roomy kitchen and living areas, den, lots of closets, etc. He wasn’t from a rich family but he said such apartments were normal at one time.Nothing like that gets built now except for the billionaire class.
all 'sad' and done..."affordable rental homes...." not that anyone would want to OWN an affordable home...38 seconds in this statement earned a thumbs down; but a loyal subscriber will keep watching!!
Less workers means less people can afford to buy the houses because they don't have a job
the wood looked really cheap, what is the estates life of the house in savvier wather.
You think a stick built house has better wood??????
@sparksmcgee6641 Why ask me just tell me what percentage of wood and what kind of wood is being used. Usually, people boast about how superior their products are, but you're not? Is my house belt better? Yeah, it's a stick house. It's over 100 years old, old growth red wood looks great, great details, large porch they don't built houses like this anymore. We let's just say it's not a pop tart house, will still be standing long after fab house has fallen apart me thinks.
@@DKLGalactus5 first of all its a joke in construction when people say " they don't build them like they used to", when your remodeling some 1910 mansion someone pulls apart something, sighs and says "they don't build them like thwy used to" and everyone else say ""Thank God".
People like you compare the exceptional home from 100 years ago to the common homes of today. The tract homes of 1880 are just like tract homes of today.
You made a nonsensical statement since the lumber requirement in the code of these houses are the same as a site built.
Saying something looks crappy without knowing what your looking at gets you a comment like mine.
You redwood doesn't care load the LVLs in the video.
@@sparksmcgee6641 lol it's a joke in the construction business these days because people lack skill and do things on the cheap like foam trim that looks like wood. yeah older home need some work at times but the craftmanship and details can be outstanding a skill long gone.
@DKLGalactus5 then say that as a comment.
And yes I know the difference between you lumber and what's used here bit I. Not going to type the whe lumber rating system and load capacities in a comment.
And you knock it out of the Parke with you ignorance of "they don't build them like my house anymore". We build better. Is yours better than this fab? Maybe. Sound like the only thing you think matters is the size and amount of lumber. Most people want livable conditioned space, there are all kinds of rating where this could be better including life cycle.
I have 4 houses that were build in the 1800s as laborer housing. I'm sure the people building them expected them to last 20-30 year and would have laughed at you if you told them it's would be in use as is 125-150 years later.
I like this technology. But I prefer what fbr are doing . But I can see these houses been needed by the millions as worldwide we need hundreds of millions of homes
Labor shortages, maybe you should look into that too. Money attracts new talent, just like they do to get a good CEO. But not for workers on the bottom. You will pay more for health care at the end of your career, then you make. Ask gramps about it. You wonder why people try to get their kids a good education?
The labor issues focused on in this story are, in my opinion, something of a “red herring.” If industrialized construction comes to dominate the building industry, I believe that the resulting reduction in labor costs will not be passed on to the consumer. Rather, the savings will go to increased executive income. Unfortunately, our culture is no longer oriented to receiving a fair price for a product, but rather to squeezing the last penny from both the employees and the consumer for the benefit of the few at the top. Expecting industrialized construction to change this dynamic is naive. Making construction jobs more financially attractive is likely the solution to the industry's labor issue.
I disagree. Zoning laws are the key limiting factor. Everyone thinks there should be more housing built -- just not next door.
Do all the robots have names? 🤖
Yes.
Please be safe, homelessness frostbite never produces afterlives, no matter what authoritarianism say$.
Timmy!
Maybe homes aren't affordable because we keep automating well-paying jobs (skills-based jobs) and the only jobs left are low-paying (non-skills-based jobs) ones.
The one on the right should be called Rob instead of Bob short for robot😂😊
Build homes period..affordable period..
this is the future of housing - economies of scale, automation, robotic construction and standardization, just like automobiles, flat pack houses will be the solution to housing
What a shame the modules aren't being built in a closed loop, cradle-to-cradle system. Why not construct to lock-up stage that can withstand the outdoors? They could avoid all that plastic shrink wrap. If we're going to standardise and automate, there's so much we could choose to include or exclude in production from the outset. Solving the housing crisis by creating more waste and pollution than is necessary or should be expected at this advanced stage of our climate and pollution crisis is counter-productive to say the least. Design thinking combined with technology and careful use of resources and materials can solve our problems, but profiteering and fashion in design creates more problems... Individual pride in bespoke designs or social and environmental benefit for all? I'd prefer the latter... Humans are incredibly smart until we start thinking only about ourselves at the expense of others and our shared environment - built, social and natural.
Just build soviet style high rises. Its cheap.
This and 3D printed housing are the future
Automation is so hard and much of it is in improved tools and systems - nail guns, better drivers, house wrap systems, etc. - because labor is a huge cost. Land is also a hot mess. Materials are the only bright spot if you just kinda... forget 2020/2021. These modular systems bundle so many of the labor savings while still producing a great product, and as much as people love bespoke there's a reason every post-war Dingbat in Los Angeles looks the same once you get inside.
There are a lot of intelligent and well thought out questions in this comment section. All of the suggestions on here would help, if a solution to this problem were desired by the elite. Unfortunately all of this is part of the planned destruction of western democracies and the ending of national sovereignty. There is a very interesting book everyone should read, but few will. It's called The Creature from Jekyll Island. It's about the creation and history of the Federal Reserve. It sounds boring, but reads like a mystery novel. Read that and the Report from Iron Mountain. Everything happening in the world will make much more sense.
I can tell you NO before watching the video. It is not a construction problem hut a socio-economic problem coming from local, state, and federal regulations on land use, work permits, and employment laws to name a few.