Spanning about 71.5 sq m, a flat-packed house will arrive move-in ready, complete with a bedroom, kitchen, independent bathroom – and even preinstalled windows.

  • hansolo@lemmy.today
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    9 hours ago

    Everyone seems to forget how kit houses used to be a thing. They actually still are.

    And I’ve stayed in a couple Chinese-made prefab container houses used as cabins. First 3-5 years were OK per the owners. Typically, moving parts, like windows and any taps fail first.

    • boonhet@sopuli.xyz
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      1 hour ago

      My tiny country has multiple manufacturers of those, some sell globally. Seems there’s enough demand.

  • EvilBit@lemmy.world
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    24 hours ago

    So we solve the housing problem by lowering our standards instead of ending the game played by billionaires with us as pawns?

      • innermachine@lemmy.world
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        4 hours ago

        Houses honestly aren’t super expensive. Really it’s the land their on that typically cost! My house is worth less than the half acre plot it’s on. I paid 285k, 160k or imthat is just the land it’s on. So if we take 160 + 25k for the prefab house here + assuming 5k delivery minimum and it needs a slab to sit on is another 10k easy your looking at 200k and change before any utilities are hooked up. Probably 220k before you can think about actually living in it (if u were to put on an equivalent plot as my house is on anyhow) and now you have paid nearly 80% of the money as to have a “real” house. Mind you I have a nice attic for storage and a basement as big as my house for storage and a garage to work in with a driveway. These cheap prefab houses sound awesome and cheap untill you add up what it would take to actually live in it. Sure it could be done cheaper than I have in my bullshit example but just goes to show that of all the things required to use this product, by far the prefab house is the cheapest part of it.

    • jubilationtcornpone@sh.itjust.works
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      4 hours ago

      What are you talking about? This is all <brown-persons> fault. They’re stealing all of our <job-I-was-never-going-to-do-in-a-million-years>! We need reverse taxes for billionaires, where the government gives them money instead of them paying taxes, so some of it will finally trickle down to us. And, we need to deport all the <brown-people-whos-country-I-cant-find-on-a-map>. Make America Magic Again!!

      /S

      I may not be the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree but I’m not that stupid.

  • Albbi@piefed.ca
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    21 hours ago

    Spanning about 71.5 sq m, a flat-packed house will arrive move-in ready, complete with a bedroom, kitchen, independent bathroom – and even preinstalled windows.

    I don’t think “move-in” ready is accurate if you also need a crane to set the thing up.

  • frongt@lemmy.zip
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    1 day ago

    How are they on safety and code compliance? How about offgassing of VOCs and other harmful vapors left over from the manufacturing process?

    • GraveyardOrbit@lemmy.zip
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      1 day ago

      Considering the price difference to a normal capitalist house you can spend the other $275,000 remedying any problems

      • Tiral@lemmy.zip
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        9 hours ago

        What exactly are you remodeling? The walls are paper thin, you have zero idea what building code if any they’re going off of or if it’s even truthful if they tell you. What are you going to sue them in Chinese court for lying? Good luck with that.

        • GraveyardOrbit@lemmy.zip
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          6 hours ago

          With how much I make and how much houses cost I don’t really give a fuck about building codes or truthfulness. Even if I get completely fucked I could just buy a different one, then a different one, more than 10 times before reaching cost parity with new home construction

      • CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works
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        24 hours ago

        Good luck getting a bank to give you a $275,000 loan on a house that costs $25,000. You’d also wind up paying $400,000+ for a $25k home (plus land) which isn’t tne wisest decision.

        • Fisch@discuss.tchncs.de
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          23 hours ago

          I don’t think you’d actually have to pay another $275,000 to fix those problems. The point was that even if you have to spend more money on fixing them, it’s still gonna be cheaper unless it’s more than that. It’s probably not anywhere near that amount.

          • CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works
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            22 hours ago

            I get that it was a sort of tongue-in-cheek comment but it is something to consider if you were to consider buying one of these homes.

            Mobile homes are a perfect stand-in for these prefabbed houses and are generally considered bad investments financially but also a pain to work on because they don’t use any of the building standards used in traditional homes. Your toilet or faucet goes out and you can’t just buy one at the store because they’re specially made just for mobile homes meaning you’re going to have to special order and pay 5x the price.

            • GraveyardOrbit@lemmy.zip
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              22 hours ago

              A house of this size would fit comfortably on less than 10k sqft of land. So if 1/4 acre is costing you $400k perhaps don’t try to put this in manhattan

              • Fredselfish@lemmy.world
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                19 hours ago

                Most towns will outlaw you putting this on a lot. Does that include the cost to ship it? And the United States we can’t get those Chinese electric cars. Doubt we will be allowed one of these.

          • CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works
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            22 hours ago

            That’s your $275,000 plus interest. When people buy homes they generally don’t have that money available as cash and get it loaned them witn the structure and property as collateral. Therefore they wouldn’t automatically have that money available for remediation of a $25k home without taking out a loan.

  • pikachus_ghost_uncle@lemmy.world
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    23 hours ago

    If dooms day prepper shows have shown me the cheapest is just buying those shipping container and burying them unground. Now you got a kick ass under ground house and no one will know where you live when society finally collapses from corporate greed.

    • backalleycoyote@lemmy.today
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      19 hours ago

      That’s exactly what I did. Bought a 1964 Shasta Astrodome in good shape for $400, currently gutting it for an upgrade/restore. Solar, composting toilet, updated insulation, modern appliances. It’s enough space for one person, two dogs, two cats, a tortoise, and some chickens outside. Most of what’s going into it is second hand materials from places like the Habitat restore and rv scrapyards. There’s also a lot of folks who buy brand new rvs and immediately strip the built in systems like AC that are inadequate for modern giant rvs but perfect for something this small and then sell them unused for cheap. I’ll probably be $5-$8k total by the end. The real cost is the land ($75-$100k for ~.75 acre in the mountains) and the well. Lots aren’t selling as fast as they used to and I’ve noticed more price drops over the last year.

    • KoboldCoterie@pawb.social
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      1 day ago

      You’d pay a lot more than 25k for a 750 sq. ft. RV. Quick search suggests RVs typically range from 150-500 sq. ft, so this is 50% bigger than the largest model that range covers.

  • xep@discuss.online
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    24 hours ago

    Why not buy local? China isn’t the only place that makes prefab housing.

    • vagrancyand@sh.itjust.works
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      23 hours ago

      Because the cheapest manufactured homes in the US are now 100k shipped from the factory.

      Inflation in the US (i.e. pure greed) is off the charts. People that think manufactured homes are affordable haven’t looked in 20 years.

  • Jessica@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    1 day ago

    I’ve seen many of the pre-made homes, some with (at least styled) shipping containers, on AliExpress. Some of them look pretty interesting.