It's Expensive To Build Housing. California Lawmakers Say Factory-Built Is The Future | KQED

"A key piece of making housing more affordable is bringing down the cost of construction. Factory-built housing is not a silver bullet, but it can be part of the solution to our housing crisis. A report from UC Berkeley's Terner Center for Housing Innovation found factory-built housing could cut costs by up to 20% and slash building timelines in half."

"The construction industry has worked the way it's worked for 100 years, and there are many different silos. Every player has their own little piece of the puzzle on how you put a house together or an apartment together. But industrialized construction consolidates that system into one factory, and that runs up against regulatory and financing norms."

California lawmakers are focusing on reducing housing construction costs to address the state's affordability crisis and meet the goal of building 2.5 million homes by 2030. A UC Berkeley Terner Center report found that factory-built housing, also known as prefab or modular housing, could cut costs by up to 20% and slash building timelines in half. While factory-built housing is not new in California, many construction firms offering these units have failed to scale up and closed their factories. The construction industry has remained largely unchanged for decades, with fragmented processes and separate players handling different components. Industrialized construction consolidates this fragmented system into one factory operation, but this approach conflicts with existing regulatory and financing norms.

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