After decades of experimentation, prefab housing still isn't taking the housing industry by storm. The permitting still takes longer and there are still kinks in the transportation. However, these issues shouldn't outweigh the massive benefits. What future will prefab hold for housing?
Design magazines love them. So do movie stars and environmental activists. New technology, including the use of robots in factories, makes them even easier to build.
So why are advocates of prefab houses still talking about “disrupting” the home-building industry?
Architects, environmentalists and some forward-thinking builders embrace prefab construction — whose products run the gamut from affordable manufactured homes to sleek tiny houses with ultramodern finishes to contemporary mansions — as the way every home should be built in the future, says Greenwich, Conn.-based Sheri Koones, author of “Prefabulous Small Houses” and other books about prefab houses. But despite having been around for decades, prefab or modular homes made up just 2 percent of new single-family houses in 2016, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Prefab construction gained traction in the 1970s when builders and architects recognized they could save on build time and labor costs by moving the majority of the building process into a factory. Initially, says Koones, modular homes were fairly basic and boxy, but over time architects, builders and factory owners have improved their methods, and nearly anything that can be built on a homesite can now be assembled first in a factory.
