Everyone is happier working with the known, not the unknown, and the housing industry is no exception. For those building houses for the free market, construction know-how includes an appreciation of how to wring profit from every step of the process.
But with housing prices rising faster than the ability to pay, there is increasing pressure on developers to change their spots and abandon tried and true (and profitable) construction techniques for more efficient and economical ones1.
In the UK, modular housing may be referred to as ‘offsite activity’, as in ‘construction that takes place away from the actual building site.’ A recent article laments the downturn in manufacturing in general, and offsite activity in particular, which may find its primary cause in the uncertainty surrounding Brexit2. However, the article spends most of its time talking up the benefits of efficiency and economy that come from using modular building units for housing construction. This sales pitch approach seems to suggest that while offsite activity is making inroads into housing construction, the conventional building industry is far from embracing the process wholesale. Read more in Housing Today: Offsite Activity ‘Can Boost Flagging UK Manufacturing’
Brexit uncertainty aside, offsite activity is still far from being an integral process for creating more affordable housing. See also in Housing Today: Offsite Housebuilder McAvoy Slides To Loss
Footnotes
- Try: “Everyone delivers houses in days, except here.” So What’s The Problem, America?
- Britain’s exit from the European Union . . . or maybe not
