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Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

nytimes.com

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Re: Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

#141

Post by cocacola1 »

chrisseaton wrote: post #136
oftenwrong wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same problems are pretty much everywhere in the US. This brings to mind a proposed project in Boston that faced a lot of friction, in part because prefab construction was proposed: https://www.universalhub.com/2016/lagrange-street-residents-... >The Zoning Board of Appeals this week rejected a proposed condo building on the site of a former asthma-inhaler factory in West Roxbury, citing neighborhood concerns abou…

What's the relevant of 'who wear sneakers'? It seems so orthogonal that I think it must be some kind of local joke?

Perhaps he's trying to structure it as "Those people from Maine are going to take our jobs."

Re: Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

#142

Post by jmalicki »

chrisseaton wrote: post #136
oftenwrong wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same problems are pretty much everywhere in the US. This brings to mind a proposed project in Boston that faced a lot of friction, in part because prefab construction was proposed: https://www.universalhub.com/2016/lagrange-street-residents-... >The Zoning Board of Appeals this week rejected a proposed condo building on the site of a former asthma-inhaler factory in West Roxbury, citing neighborhood concerns abou…

What's the relevant of 'who wear sneakers'? It seems so orthogonal that I think it must be some kind of local joke?

They’re not wearing steel toed boots, therefore aren’t real respectable tradespeople.

Re: Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

#143

Post by ThrustVectoring »

d1zzy wrote: post #134
vkou wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Every locality thinks that everyone else should relieve the burden of housing because they are already "crowded" and new residents mean more money needed for services, which is a hard ask in a place like CA where raising local taxes is fiendishly difficult. The localities have a point. Why should existing residents pay for new infrastructure, to accommodate housing for 10,000 new residents (All because large tech f…

Aren't local tech companies offices paying taxes that should take care of that? Unless you mean that tech companies should build private roads and infrastructure which sounds very bad... The way you get money from private parties and use it to build public infrastructure is through taxes :)

Tech company office taxes incentivize local municipalities to open offices, not to build houses. And in fact that's exactly what happens - offices go up, but the people to work there have to commute in from outside the municipality.

Re: Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

#144

Post by StudentStuff »

kurthr wrote: post #7
edmundhuber wrote: post #5

The problem is the price of buildable land, not the buildings on it.

Exactly... when an uncovered parking space rents for $400-1k/mo it's hard to see how building practices are going to help. Outside of towncenter land costs are lower, but transportation is lacking. Really, it's driven by a combination of growth in high paying tech jobs, restricted geography, and tax/financing structures, as much as, zoning laws or building costs.

Parking is often one of the most expensive things to build in land constrained areas due to the dead load of cars that parking structures must support, with a standard spot requiring 200sqft itself, add to that 50% for ingress/egress space. Generally parking spots cost a fraction of what that space would go for if it were allowed to be lived in.

Re: Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

#145

Post by davmre »

pxeboot wrote: post #140
reeddavid wrote: post #138

Quality prefabricated homes and apartments are a great idea. There's a negative association with prefabricated homes, but I've seen a lot of newer companies that seem to be focusing on quality and efficiency, often targeting the higher end of the market. And lots of new homes built on-site are of very poor quality these days: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/where-we-live/wp/2017/05... This approach doesn't seem l…

The article claims a per unit cost of almost $800k in SF. Cheaper, prefabricated units could make a significant difference here.

That per-unit development cost is almost certainly including the cost of acquiring the land. Labor in SF is expensive, but not that expensive.

Re: Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

#146

Post by gnopgnip »

jgibson wrote: post #10
Joeri wrote: post #6

I’ve always found it odd that house construction is so bespoke. All that pouring and sawing and drilling and slathering of raw materials to do one-off designs for houses that are then filled with standardized ikea furniture which fits the custom room shape poorly. Manual labor is too costly for such a bespoke approach. Either we make carpenter and bricklayer robots to do the bespoke work cheaply, or we build homes fr…

I'm not so sure. Whats the average lifespan of a house? 50-80 years? To me it makes sense to invest the time to optimize design to make best use of the land area. I guess you could still use somewhat standarized parts though, spend more effort in the design phase.

The lifespan of a house is a ship of theseus type question. The wiring in the walls, plumbing, foundation and frame could last 50+ years if everything else was done right, and there is no water going where it is not supposed to. Modern roofs, windows, air conditioner and heater last 25-30 years. A water heater is going to last about 15 years. Exterior paint, interior paint, carpet, all last about 10 years. After 50 years you will have replaced a substantial portion of the value of a house even if it looks more or less the same.

Even if the home is habitable there are other reasons they are removed. After a certain point it makes more sense financially to tear a home down and rebuild than to continue to renovate it. Also markets change over time, and homes are not always built in a way that maximizes the use of the land. An area that was mostly bungalows and ranches can have homes replaced with larger homes or multifamily buildings.

Re: Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

#147

Post by paulie_a »

tomatotomato37 wrote: post #15

I wonder how hard it would be for mobile home manufactors to support the modular stacking of units. It would look redneck as hell, but could probably go up even faster then wooden prefabs that still needs a building finished around it

There are some gorgeous homes made out of shipping containers, the best ones I've seen probably were not cheap but the design is modular and relatively simple.

Re: Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

#148

Post by jmkb »

The New York City Office of Emergency Management has a "pre-fab brownstone" demo assembled in downtown Brooklyn. They're hoping to be able to relocate entire neighborhoods when another event like Sandy hits.

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.6996729,-73.9898138,3a,65.6y...

Re: Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

#149

Post by branchless »

rictic wrote: post #126
branchless wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Zoning isn't going to fix all of this for you. It's highly unlikely supply will ramp up to avoid bidding at the monopoly price.

> to avoid bidding at the monopoly price. Can you expand on this? What's the monopoly of?

No more land can be manufactured, supply is inelastic. In urban areas you are going to have to bid against everyone else and the highest bidder, who agrees to work for the most years for the land, wins.

Rezoning isn't going to fix this IMHO. It might help, but you will reach a limit and then have the same root cause to deal with: rentiers.

Re: Developers are manufacturing prefabricated apartment buildings

#150

Post by Iv »

ohazi wrote: post #8

I find it hilarious that a CA company is leading the charge in new, efficient, high-quality pre-fab design and construction. These units are going to improve construction quality and lower costs in every state except CA, thanks to our asinine zoning laws.

"leading the charge"? In the US maybe, but the world has not waited for them.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2015/apr/30/china-bu...

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