Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Modular Homes for Under $50k

boxabl.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–190 of 343 posts

Re: Modular Homes for Under $50k

#181

Post by throwaway0a5e »

thesausageking wrote: post #4

This house is 375 sq ft and uses low end materials, and it doesn't include setup, so it's going to cost ~$100k, or $266 / sq ft. Most new home construction is more like $150 / sq ft. And with this system, you're very limited in what you can build. Who's the target customer for this?

>Who's the target customer for this?

80% people who want the ease of setup of a double wide but really, really, really want to visibly distance themselves from the stereotypes and can afford to pay a premium and give up a lot of square footage to do so. (There's a reason this is on the front page of HN.)

20% developers who will pay big bucks to skirt some local busybody ordinance that says "no trailer homes".

Re: Modular Homes for Under $50k

#182

Post by dkdbejwi383 »

zimpenfish wrote: post #120
0xfaded wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In old English man was gender neutral. Wer, as in werewolf, was the masculine. World comes from Wor-old, or literally, age of males.

Are there any countries or communities that currently use "old English" as their native language?

No, that's why we call it "old" English, as opposed to "South-African", "New Zealand", etc.

Re: Modular Homes for Under $50k

#183

Post by vel0city »

egman_ekki wrote: post #151
pacetherace wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The construction prices you quoted are not correct at least in the Bay Area. And I am guessing $150/sq ft achievable at scale. Pricing ADUs is tricky because the some of things in a house cost same for a small to medium size home. For example, the costs of plumbing, electrical, kitchen, bathroom, etc are more of less the same between a 500 sq.ft. house and a 1000 sq. ft house.

> the costs of plumbing, electrical, kitchen, bathroom, etc are more of less the same between a 500 sq.ft. house and a 1000 sq. ft house. Don't larger houses have multiple bathrooms, thus not the same cost for plumbing? At least when I watched Selling sunset, it seemed it's about having at least 3-4 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms in a house...

The 1000sqft house versus a 500sqft house probably only adds a half bath. Its not like you're going to jump from one bath to five in another 500sqft. The plumbing work on adding a half bath in new construction really isn't too much when properly planned.

Re: Modular Homes for Under $50k

#185

Post by monkeynotes »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #179
thesausageking wrote: post #4

This house is 375 sq ft and uses low end materials, and it doesn't include setup, so it's going to cost ~$100k, or $266 / sq ft. Most new home construction is more like $150 / sq ft. And with this system, you're very limited in what you can build. Who's the target customer for this?

Looking at this primarily on a cost per square foot basis seems like the famous slashdot mistake of 2 decades ago of dismissing the iPod because it had less memory than a shitty competitor. I mean, it's an ADU, designed to be small, but would basically have the same fixed costs (appliances, plumbing, electrical) of a house twice the size, and I'm sure the manufacturers could make a house twice the size with only a ma…

The headline touts cost, I think it's fair to look at the actual cost benefits. If Apple designed the iPod and promoted it based on cost Slashdot would have had a point. Apple never says 'hey look how affordable our product is'.

This headline caught my eye as I'm interested in how the fuck people are going to afford homes in the near future. I am disappointed. The "home" is not somewhere young people can raise a family. It appears to be aimed at home owners who want more home which is entirely uninteresting to me.

Re: Modular Homes for Under $50k

#186

Post by bigthymer »

mywittyname wrote: post #24
tomc1985 wrote: post #8

How about we bring back Sears' prefab housing?

The standardization in the building trade didn't exist back in the Sears catalog days. For example, 2x4s come in 8ft lengths, using 16 on center studs, 8 2x4s will provide 8 foot of wall, and two sheets of drywall will cover it. And you can order all of the cabinetry, trim, shower enclosures, etc in a form that's ready for installation. A Sears prefab home would not be cheaper today because the inefficiencies that th…

> it's infeasible for a person to construct their own house anymore, given building codes and such

What has changed that this is no longer possible any more?

Re: Modular Homes for Under $50k

#187

Post by kozak »

wombatpm wrote: post #59
robotresearcher wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (wo)man 'Person' is the non-gendered word that goes here.

But with ‘son’ in the word doesn’t it’s usage continue to promote the patriarchy?

In my native language (Ukrainian), the word "person" (людина) is always feminine. Even if someone wanted to say "I'm a very masculine person", they would still need to use a feminine form of the word "masculine" to say "masculine person". And no one has ever had any issues with that, ever.

Re: Modular Homes for Under $50k

#188

Post by engineer_22 »

Johnythree wrote: post #149
amelius wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need a better way to distribute land than the one we use now (=based on money and inheritance). This is the problem which smart people should be working on, not some prefab home.

There is no shortage of cheap land. There is however a desperate shortage of land on which you can legally build. And that of course is due to zoning regulations.

There's a lot of buildable land. It's just not highly desirable. The land is good, and green, and the neighbors are agreeable, but it's not close to a major city.

EDIT: Case in point, my first purchase in 2017 was 5 acres of buildable land 30 minutes from a tertiary city, with an existing 900 SF manufactured home and 400 SF garage. Total price: $30,000

Re: Modular Homes for Under $50k

#189

Post by engineer_22 »

amelius wrote: post #129
eddy_chan wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment deserves to be higher. People just think you can put these anywhere but you need water connection, sewer connection, electrical, telephone line/cable, permits and red tape, by the time you're done it'll be double. And I don't think these solve any of our housing affordability problems, the land in a desirable area will be far more expensive than what's on top.

We need a better way to distribute land than the one we use now (=based on money and inheritance). This is the problem which smart people should be working on, not some prefab home.

What if we flip the problem around, and figure out how to distribute high quality lifestyles, like the ones offered in the big cities, to the outskirts where land is plentiful and cheap?

Re: Modular Homes for Under $50k

#190

Post by zie »

coderintherye wrote: post #30

I imagine the margin isn't there for it, but I wish someone would target the I'd have to guess the market just isn't there for it, maybe everyone else just doesn't mind dealing with the building codes and permit requirements for larger units?

RV's & trailers are right @ 120sq ft usually. Pick 1 from any of the few manufacturers and enjoy life.

There is even such a thing as a "destination trailer": https://www.keystonerv.com/rv-type/destination-trailers

which almost exactly describes what you are looking for.

Price: $30->50k brand new. Used models cheaper.

Post reply on HN