The Answer to the Housing Crisis : Flat Pack Housing
Discussion
Great idea and bizarrely this is very much what our European cousins do, well certainly the Scanidies at least. Several friends of mine in Finland bought a flat-pack house, took 6 weeks off work during the summer and built it! Two of them are main residences and the others are 'summer houses' as they say in Finland. Bloody great they are too. Its got all of the ticks:
1) Sustainable - its wood!
2) Cheap - its wood!
3) Easy to build - its wood!
4) Easy to extend or change - its wood!
5) Easy to heat - its wood!
..
You get the idea - its wood so has a number of natural attributes which lends itself to this type of house. £13,000 for this one from Argos does sound pretty good, but I suspect that this is without anything like plumbing or heating. So you will need to add that in and then there is the land and planning consent to have a permanent residence on said land. I would guess that all up a 5 room house like this should be £20,000 to £25,000 all up - which is still pretty stunning value for money (excluding land which is the biggest cost I suppose).
Why they cannot do this to help people who cannot get property? Because there isnt enough money in it. Our wonderful national house builders have a vested interest to maximise profit (which is fine to a point) and insist on throwing up any old crap. They generally have a poor reputation and our country is blighted with the carbuncle that is 'the housing estate'......
1) Sustainable - its wood!
2) Cheap - its wood!
3) Easy to build - its wood!
4) Easy to extend or change - its wood!
5) Easy to heat - its wood!
..
You get the idea - its wood so has a number of natural attributes which lends itself to this type of house. £13,000 for this one from Argos does sound pretty good, but I suspect that this is without anything like plumbing or heating. So you will need to add that in and then there is the land and planning consent to have a permanent residence on said land. I would guess that all up a 5 room house like this should be £20,000 to £25,000 all up - which is still pretty stunning value for money (excluding land which is the biggest cost I suppose).
Why they cannot do this to help people who cannot get property? Because there isnt enough money in it. Our wonderful national house builders have a vested interest to maximise profit (which is fine to a point) and insist on throwing up any old crap. They generally have a poor reputation and our country is blighted with the carbuncle that is 'the housing estate'......
even if this idea was taken seriously here, most examples of flat pack houses and their land would be unmortgagable I would think..
It may be cheap at being tens of thousands instead of hundreds of thousands but the people who would probably consider buying these might not have the cash up front anyway to buy?
Hence you use the cash as a deposit and buy a conventional house.
Or have I missed the point?
It may be cheap at being tens of thousands instead of hundreds of thousands but the people who would probably consider buying these might not have the cash up front anyway to buy?
Hence you use the cash as a deposit and buy a conventional house.
Or have I missed the point?
Parrot of Doom said:
Getting the land would be the expensive bit. I love the idea though, theres no reason why one couldn't have one of these houses.
I can think why - the planners, I can't see them being too keen on this idea.Although I agree it is not bad per-se, a bunch of these together, if not looked after, could look (dare I say it) a bit shabby and gypo-esque?
princeperch said:
Parrot of Doom said:
Getting the land would be the expensive bit. I love the idea though, theres no reason why one couldn't have one of these houses.
I can think why - the planners, I can't see them being too keen on this idea.Although I agree it is not bad per-se, a bunch of these together, if not looked after, could look (dare I say it) a bit shabby and gypo-esque?
trumpet600 said:
princeperch said:
Parrot of Doom said:
Getting the land would be the expensive bit. I love the idea though, theres no reason why one couldn't have one of these houses.
I can think why - the planners, I can't see them being too keen on this idea.Although I agree it is not bad per-se, a bunch of these together, if not looked after, could look (dare I say it) a bit shabby and gypo-esque?
One may as well buy one of those mobile homes type things that crop up every so often, i've seen some around the south coast before for 50k or thereabouts.
Again, no one will lend against them so you'll need the cash, which leads us back to the original problem.
It's a circular problem.
trumpet600 said:
Asterix said:
trumpet600 said:
£13K for a large shed. Pointless if you don't have the £150K+ for the land to build it on.
Another great idea that should be filed here
Is that a self opening bin? looks like brabantia with a infra red jobby thing.Another great idea that should be filed here
Or my hand.
Shame - nice hand
trumpet600 said:
£13K for a large shed. Pointless if you don't have the £150K+ for the land to build it on.
Another great idea that should be filed here
Actually we are thinking of getting along these linesAnother great idea that should be filed here
Buy a lump of land and stick one of these on it.
Then sell the house we currently live in to release the capital
Wait a few years while working our ass off and living in a large shed.
Build a large house and then have the large shed in the garden for guests
So not entirely useless.
thinfourth2 said:
trumpet600 said:
£13K for a large shed. Pointless if you don't have the £150K+ for the land to build it on.
Another great idea that should be filed here
Actually we are thinking of getting along these linesAnother great idea that should be filed here
Buy a lump of land and stick one of these on it.
Then sell the house we currently live in to release the capital
Wait a few years while working our ass off and living in a large shed.
... then have the large shed in the garden for guests
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