Rise | We've Done the Research
Prefab Report: A Trend That’s Here to Stay
The internet is talking about "prefab homes" 52% more this year compared to last year. What does this mean for the homebuilding industry? We created a report, "Off-Site Built Homes: An Online Media Analysis," to get to the bottom of things.
Table of Contents
Why Prefab?
Prefab homes (also called "off-site built homes," "volumetric built homes," "factory-built homes," or "industrialized construction") are actually a simple concept. Instead of building all aspects of a home on-site, parts of it are constructed in an off-site facility then shipped and assembled on-site.
The touted benefits of this way of building are many:
- Predictable and consistent construction
- A dramatic reduction in construction waste
- A dramatic decrease in emissions associated with transportation
- A higher-quality product that has protection from the elements during construction
- Faster build time (think weeks vs. months)
Prefab has a bit of a reputation problem tracing back to the 1970s when the focus was building homes fast and cheap. Nowadays, prefab is one of the fastest-growing trends in residential construction.
In the age of digital, web traffic is something that the majority of companies pay attention to. For Rise, it's how we understand what is important to our audience. So you can imagine our surprise as we observed the ever-growing popularity of any article that mentions "prefab." We began to predict high web traffic days if we were planning to publish another prefab article. It's like clockwork!
As the voice of the homeowner, we set out to understand the consumer's perspective on this growing trend and produce a report with our findings. Namely, we wanted to know:
- What aspects of prefab homes appeal most to consumers?
- What are their main questions about prefab?
- How are they researching prefab homes?
The Online Conversation About Prefab Homes
When we queried the web for terms related to "prefab homes," "modular homes," "off-site built," etc. we got over 500,000 results over the past year (July 10, 2019 - July 10, 2020). What's even more interesting is that it's up over 50% from the previous period.
Prefab is more than just a trend here in North America - it might just be the new norm. This way of building is not a new development, and some nations have already widely adopted it. In Norway, Sweden, and Finland, 45% of current housing is built modularly.
What is driving this trend? According to McKinsey, this shift is driven by technological improvements, economic demands, and a change in the way we think. Widespread adoption of prefab home building practices can give the building industry a massive productivity boost. It can address our housing crisis through scalability and cost savings.
