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Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

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Re: Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

#191

Post by seibelj »

phobosanomaly wrote: post #179
seibelj wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very well put! And I agree that our retraining systems are horrendous. I’m probably not anywhere near as reasonable as you, as I can point to the government for every problem - why is college so expensive? Federally backed loans you can’t discharge in bankruptcy. Why do so many jobs need licenses that take years and tens of thousands of dollars to get when, for example, cutting hair is something you can learn on Yout…

So, yeah, I'm glad you're a free-market guy because I don't have enough free-market guys to drink beer and argue with. Although I'm not drinking beer (if you are, cheers), and we're not really arguing. I am curious what the mechanism is from the free-market side to prevent increasing income inequality, and regulatory capture by corporations and the wealthy? If we de-regulate, what stops Bezos and Exxon, EvilCorp, and…

I concede we need the state and am therefore not an anarcho-capitalist. My ideal state is as small as possible and no larger. Military and nuclear weapons are my biggest gotchas that I can’t reason my way around.

So you are asking me the wrong premise - if the state has no power, what regulation can a corporation capture?

I like corporations because businesses provide value. They can fail. The organizing principle has a straight-forwards goal of earning money. I don’t see any states failing (except for socialist ones like Venezuela) in a way that can put them out of business - they tend to grow forever in all directions, capturing more wealth and diminishing freedom.

The next question - do I care about inequality as a given? If everyone on earth had a healthy, purpose driven life but one family had 99.99% of all the wealth, would this be a problem? Basically do we dislike inequality because of envy or because most people genuinely have nothing?

You are correct that corporations are already running the show. Our biggest corporations are more powerful than most countries on earth. Because innovation in free societies is emergent and decentralized, the best the government can do is play whack-a-mole every few years as the free market laps them over and over.

I like the chaos, I like the unpredictability, I like weird people, I like having the freedom to do whatever I want. I want maximum freedom in all things and the least amount of coercion.

One area you should look at if you aren’t familiar is cryptocurrency. This is the most powerful innovation in regards to regaining individual freedom - financial freedom - that has come in centuries. The ability of governments to print their way out of debt is coming to an end, and individuals all over the world are going to have an escape valve from corrupt elites.

This was kind of a rambling response, no beer involved. Cheers

Re: Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

#192

Post by phobosanomaly »

seibelj wrote: post #191
phobosanomaly wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, yeah, I'm glad you're a free-market guy because I don't have enough free-market guys to drink beer and argue with. Although I'm not drinking beer (if you are, cheers), and we're not really arguing. I am curious what the mechanism is from the free-market side to prevent increasing income inequality, and regulatory capture by corporations and the wealthy? If we de-regulate, what stops Bezos and Exxon, EvilCorp, and…

I concede we need the state and am therefore not an anarcho-capitalist. My ideal state is as small as possible and no larger. Military and nuclear weapons are my biggest gotchas that I can’t reason my way around. So you are asking me the wrong premise - if the state has no power, what regulation can a corporation capture? I like corporations because businesses provide value. They can fail. The organizing principle ha…

Ok, so this is kind of interesting because to increase freedom, we would have to actively reduce existing legislation. So both sides, the side that sees government as the problem, and the side that sees government as the solution, have to get legislators on-board to actually do something to implement their plan.

Oh man, things aren't looking good for any of us on either side.

Let's check back in 10 years.

Re: Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

#193

Post by phobosanomaly »

solarmist wrote: post #189
phobosanomaly wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, yeah, I'm glad you're a free-market guy because I don't have enough free-market guys to drink beer and argue with. Although I'm not drinking beer (if you are, cheers), and we're not really arguing. I am curious what the mechanism is from the free-market side to prevent increasing income inequality, and regulatory capture by corporations and the wealthy? If we de-regulate, what stops Bezos and Exxon, EvilCorp, and…

Yeah, I can’t see how this goes on for much longer without the rise of a new land independent nobility that “employs” everyone else as “contractors” for food, clothing, shelter and very little else. This year amazon has grown enough to “hire” 500 more families in this city. Please put in your family’s application for warehouse attendant now. With the “white collar” jobs becoming like the butlers/valet of yesterday (t…

What are your ideas for how to shift things in a more positive direction?

If I were to write my congressman tomorrow, what do you think I should say? What are the top-5 key actionable bullet points?

Genuinely curious. I like to hear all sorts of ideas for how we can steer the country (hell, the planet) in a more positive direction.

Re: Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

#194

Post by ardy42 »

presentation wrote: post #186

I live in Japan, prefab homes here are extremely common [1] - there's an Asahi Kasei prefab 3-story apartment building going up next door to where I live, and from the old house's demolition to the new building's completion, the notification I received in the mail says it'll be about 6 months from start to finish. [1] https://www.curbed.com/2017/10/25/16534122/prefab-homes-manu...

> I live in Japan, prefab homes here are extremely common [1]

Could that have anything to do with how the Japanese dislike "old" homes, and tend to demolish an existing home when buying a lot in order to build a new one for the new owner?

Re: Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

#195

Post by secabeen »

seibelj wrote: post #191
phobosanomaly wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, yeah, I'm glad you're a free-market guy because I don't have enough free-market guys to drink beer and argue with. Although I'm not drinking beer (if you are, cheers), and we're not really arguing. I am curious what the mechanism is from the free-market side to prevent increasing income inequality, and regulatory capture by corporations and the wealthy? If we de-regulate, what stops Bezos and Exxon, EvilCorp, and…

I concede we need the state and am therefore not an anarcho-capitalist. My ideal state is as small as possible and no larger. Military and nuclear weapons are my biggest gotchas that I can’t reason my way around. So you are asking me the wrong premise - if the state has no power, what regulation can a corporation capture? I like corporations because businesses provide value. They can fail. The organizing principle ha…

The problem with a state with no power is that it has no ability to prevent organizations from externalizing all of the costs of their profits. A simple place to see this is in environmental regulations. I can give plenty of examples, but before the rise of environmental regulation in the late 20th century, wide swathes of our country were regularly and freely polluted. We fixed lots of that through application of government power and imposed costs on polluters, both large and small.

Re: Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

#196

Post by august125 »

rapsey wrote: post #184
poulsbohemian wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely correct. In fact to expand on this slightly... I've had a lot of clients wanting to find land to build...what they don't understand is how few lenders are willing to lend on just land / single home building projects (at least in my market). Then you add in the well and septic where so many just waive their hands "no big deal right?" Um - it sure is a big deal if you are the "lucky" party who doesn't hit wa…

People lease land to build on instead of buy? That sounds absolutely bananas. (I'm not from the US so unfamiliar with your market).

Although I think throwaway is correct that that isn't what they meant, people do indeed lease land in the United States. It's more common in commercial real estate, but there are also (predatory, in my opinion) land leases for "manufactured" (i.e. mobile) homes where the resident buys the home but doesn't own the land under it.

Re: Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

#197

Post by epa »

danans wrote: post #166
jeffbee wrote: post #4

Prefab is the wrong optimization. It targets a minor improvement in a small part of the overall budget. Most of the time and money of construction in America is tied up in land prices, permitting, and regulation. Prefab solves zero of these issues. There is a building going up in Oakland right now where Factory_OS put out a press release that they had built it in ten days. But they spent 7 years getting approvals, 18…

> There is a building going up in Oakland right now where Factory_OS put out a press release that they had built it in ten days. But they spent 7 years getting approvals, 18 months in site prep, I'm currently gut remodeling a small house in Oakland. Permitting and regulations are a whopping 3% of the cost. The land (the existing property) is 50%, and 40% is building costs. Land costs (addressed via incremental upzoni…

I don't fully agree given that housing and materials prices rise every year. 7 year delay adds how much $ to a project in inflation?

Re: Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

#198

Post by seibelj »

phobosanomaly wrote: post #192
seibelj wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I concede we need the state and am therefore not an anarcho-capitalist. My ideal state is as small as possible and no larger. Military and nuclear weapons are my biggest gotchas that I can’t reason my way around. So you are asking me the wrong premise - if the state has no power, what regulation can a corporation capture? I like corporations because businesses provide value. They can fail. The organizing principle ha…

Ok, so this is kind of interesting because to increase freedom, we would have to actively reduce existing legislation. So both sides, the side that sees government as the problem, and the side that sees government as the solution, have to get legislators on-board to actually do something to implement their plan. Oh man, things aren't looking good for any of us on either side. Let's check back in 10 years.

I have a minority view well outside the mainstream. Libertarians do best on individual issues. When analyzed in isolation the libertarian argument wins out for many things.

While libertarians lack official power, the market is so powerful that it drives tons of human activity without people even being aware. Also, the belief that the government is all-powerful and can actually solve problems is 99% fiction. So while people look to the president as someone to blame for problems or praise for solutions, the truth is that very little of consequence is in the president’s (or government’s) control. So being a libertarian is a state of mind - the acknowledgment that the source of happiness and purpose is ultimately your own concern and no one else can do this for you. Not having a seat in government means nothing because libertarians generally don’t want government and it’s usually fairly easy to ignore, legally avoid paying taxes to through a variety of loopholes and structures in our Byzantine tax code, and is so ineffective it’s mind boggling that it ever gets anything done beyond corruption and graft.

So to come full circle, I believe governments are far weaker than most admit or recognize, and power is increasingly in the hands of private people and organizations. And I welcome this shift in power.

Re: Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

#199

Post by poulsbohemian »

Townley wrote: post #170
poulsbohemian wrote: post #159

Real estate agent here... in my market there are a number of mid-century homes that have the very square look of a manufactured home. Even looking vaguely like a manufactured home is enough to keep people away from them. My own observations are that newer pre-fab / manufactured can be very well built. We have a lot of people coming here looking for rural retreats - truth is, if you are way off the grid, a manufacture…

If you don’t mind sharing (I imagine it only increases business) what market is this that has plentiful, cookie cutter houses being declined? As someone in a big city, daydreaming about picking the family up to a bigger living arrangement, hearing that there are perfectly-serviceable houses being ignored sounds like a great opportunity

Hello Townley - I sell in Washington state, but plan to be licensed in Oregon before the start of 2021... looking at your profile, it looks like you have been primarily centered in large cities... you might be surprised at the cost of homes and quality of life in small town, rural America. Where I live is a ~35 minute flight to Seattle, has several hospitals, everything within a fifteen minute drive, four mild seasons, and an average house price of $300K. It's also wine country. Main thing our market lacks is people with capital willing to update and reinvest in older homes and/or build out non-cookie cutter new homes.

Depending on what you are looking for in life, I suspect there are lots of places in the world that could work for you.

Re: Why hasn't prefab construction taken over?

#200

Post by solarmist »

phobosanomaly wrote: post #193
solarmist wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I can’t see how this goes on for much longer without the rise of a new land independent nobility that “employs” everyone else as “contractors” for food, clothing, shelter and very little else. This year amazon has grown enough to “hire” 500 more families in this city. Please put in your family’s application for warehouse attendant now. With the “white collar” jobs becoming like the butlers/valet of yesterday (t…

What are your ideas for how to shift things in a more positive direction? If I were to write my congressman tomorrow, what do you think I should say? What are the top-5 key actionable bullet points? Genuinely curious. I like to hear all sorts of ideas for how we can steer the country (hell, the planet) in a more positive direction.

I wish I had actionable ideas.

For a top 5 (or 7) wish list it would be along the line of:

- Outlaw billionaires the same way we’ve outlawed (at least on paper) monopolies. At that scale individuals have the power to sway governments. (A billion is likely not the right number, but it’s a good starting point.)

- Kill the money in politics. Make lobbying illegal.

- Kill the filibuster

- Kill the electoral college

- Decouple healthcare from employment (The only realistic solution I know of is socializing it).

- Provide a robust safety net (but get rid of the checks balances to prevent “abuse”). Just blanket give everyone $2000/month.

- Eliminate exemptions to providing benefits make it proportional to hours worked (worked an average of 10 hours a week for a month? That employer must provide 1 week of benefits to that person.) There is no common good from giving employer a massive expenses break to employ 2 people at 20 hours a week instead of just hiring one full time employee. This is gaming the system plain and simple.

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