3D-printed housing developments are suddenly booming – this is what they look like

Barely a month ago, a 3D-printed house was for sale to the public for the first time in the US

Now a small, 3D-printed community in Texas follows suit. Another, larger California community is also in the works.

In other words, 3D-printed real estate is booming.

That first house for sale hasn’t even been built yet. The company, SQ4D, printed a show home in a concrete yard on Long Island, New York, staging more than a hundred performances. The new home will be printed on many in the neighborhood.

ICON, a pioneer of 3D printed homes in the US, has just completed four homes in East Austin, Texas. In partnership with Kansas City-based developer 3Strands, the two- to four-bedroom homes are now on the market, starting in the $ 400,000 range.

“Demand was off the charts, even difficult to manage,” said Gary O’Dell, co-founder and CEO of 3Strands. “The feedback couldn’t have been more positive.”

The city of Austin, one of the country’s fastest-growing metropolitan markets, has already embraced the concept of 3D-printed homes, so the zoning and permitting process was relatively straightforward, O’Dell said.

“We built four houses in the configuration we did because we could do it in the existing zoning plans,” he added.

A year ago, ICON printed seven one-story, 400-square-foot homes in Austin, in partnership with Mobile Loaves & Fishes, an Austin nonprofit. The homes are part of a homeless community. That experience, along with printing about a dozen homes on another project in Mexico, gave ICON all the knowledge it needed to make rapid progress with the new larger homes now for sale.

“We’re going from houses by the dozen to houses by a hundred graduating,” said Jason Ballard, CEO of ICON.

ICON prints the houses on site using the Vulcan construction system, which spits out a “proprietary extrudable concrete,” said Ballard, adding that this is the fastest speed and lowest cost method. It also allows for the most flexibility in floor plans.

In the new development, ICON 3D printed the first floor and then built the second floor conventionally, but this allowed them to certify the wall system for a two-story construction.

“It’s the fastest way from imagination to built options,” said Ballard. “You can make things that look very lofty and high-end, but are no more expensive to deliver than a straight wall would be.”

Ballard said construction of the houses is 10% to 30% cheaper and several months faster than conventional construction. This is especially important given the rising costs that builders are seeing for conventional building materials, such as steel, aluminum and especially wood.

“Housing was an economic bright spot amid the Covid-19 pandemic, but the industry’s potential to advance the economy is limited as long as building materials remain expensive and scarce,” wrote researchers from the National Association of Home Builders earlier this month. . “Builders are committed to avoiding pricing out-of-home for consumers, while still maintaining the competitive prices needed to run their businesses.”

There is also an acute labor shortage in the housing sector. 3D printed houses require very few workers as the printer takes care of most of the construction.

The ICON community in Texas may be the first, but a much larger community is being planned on its heels in Rancho Mirage, California, by competitor Mighty Buildings.

In partnership with developer Palari Group, the company has just announced that it will place 15 3D printed homes in what it considers “the world’s first planned community of 3D printed homes … focused on integrating technology and sustainability.”

Mighty Builders claims that the 3D printing manufacturing process eliminates 99% of construction waste and is 30-40% cheaper than traditional building. It will also use solar energy.

Mighty Builders started inventing a polymer composite that is similar to synthetic stone in 2017. It made the home in panels in a factory and then moved them, but for the Rancho Mirage community, the homes will be printed on-site.

“This is completely different from concrete because our material is thermally efficient,” said Alex Dubov, chief operating officer at Mighty Buildings. “We strive to achieve a net energy-neutral standard for each unit. Our material has a lower thermal conductivity. There is no loss of heat and cold between inside and outside.

Whether made of concrete or a polymer, these houses have proven to be much more energy efficient, durable and resilient than conventional wooden houses.

Just ask Tim Shea, 70, who lives in one of the ICON homes built for the homeless in Austin. It weathered the recent cold and ice storm there without a hitch.

“I didn’t even know there was one until I lifted the blinds,” Shea said. “It’s great. I can just give a lot of adjectives, but it’s a fantastic place. It’s the most unique place I’ve ever lived. Houses, apartments, I’m like a bug in a carpet in this place.”

ICON’s homes in Mexico have already withstood a major earthquake without damage. Since the houses are made of concrete, they are resistant to mold, termites, water and rot.

Mighty Buildings is still assessing whether the material is strong enough to withstand hurricane winds as it seeks to increase its geographic footprint.

“We have some interest from Florida and the East Coast,” Dubov said. “We serve customers all over California, so we are 100% confident that our homes can withstand earthquakes or wind. The only exception is hurricane tests have not been completed.”

With the demand for 3D printed homes so high, the biggest challenge for these companies is how to scale up quickly. ICON has four printing systems and is already building more. Ballard, who now employs 40 people, said he expects the company to grow to more than 100 employees this year.

ICON announced a $ 35 million Series A funding round led by Modern Ventures in August 2020. The investment brings ICON’s total funding since its launch in 2018 to $ 44 million. Investors included Oakhouse Partners, Cielo Property Group, the nation’s largest home builder DR Horton and Emaar.

“The biggest challenge for ICON is that the supply is limited. There are more people asking us to build houses than we now know what to do with them,” said Ballard. “Every building system we have is fully booked for the next 24 months.” He calls it a “champagne” problem.

“It’s every entrepreneur’s dream,” he said.