Building the Future: Habitat for Humanity reinvents affordable housing for 21stC

In the past 100 years, not much has changed in the way homes are built: Material - about 10-25% more than is actually needed - shows up on site and is chopped up into smaller pieces using various imprecise and dangerous electric and manual saws. Hopefully everything is cut correctly, or else the problems will be noticed later and studs and joists will need to be removed (measure twice, cut once!). When all goes well and after many months, assuming the team has enough experience building homes, you end up with a beautiful house that - with all the measuring, cutting, wasted material, and the little mistakes building up - costs too much for many people to afford.


In the case of Habitat for Humanity projects, this is slightly different. Materials are often paid for via donations (from generous people like yourself!), and regardless of how long the build takes, the labor costs the same - free! - because of other incredibly generous people, the volunteers (who could be you as well!). However, the problems of wasted materials, excess time, and the need for professional builders are still incredibly important.


So many more families need homes than any given Habitat affiliate could hope to build. But if the process can be faster, waste less material, be safer, and be easier for volunteers to do with less oversight from stretched-thin expert volunteers, we can get closer to sharing the dream of affordable homeownership with many more families. The Greater Plymouth, MA affiliate of Habitat has found one way of doing this.

Teaming up with Homebuilt LLC (http://www.homebuiltcompany.com/), an MIT spin-off with expertise in using robots to help make houses, and ShopBot Tools Inc. (http://www.shopbottools.com/), the industry leader in providing robots for local, computer-controlled (CNC) fabrication, our team is elated to pioneer the volunteer-building of homes using advanced robotic manufacturing combined with time-tested, code-compliant details.


The process is very much like how some of the most popular furniture and cabinetry is built today:


(1) Using sophisticated CAD (computer aided design), a 3D computer model is made of the building, including all studs, rafters, and even screws.





(2) That CAD model is sent to a robot designed specifically to cut each part of the building using high-quality, code-compliant building materials. Precision is at 1/1000th of an inch!




(3) Each robotically-cut part is packaged such that the first one needed is on top and the last one is on the bottom, and each has a unique number that is engraved right into it by the robot.




(4) The kit, itself manufactured by a small-scale, local business near where the building will be located, is shipped to the building site.




(5) Habitat for Humanity volunteers, as well as family members, friends, and neighbors, grab the parts from their crate and put them together, quickly, easily, and without the use of tape measures, saws, or other imprecise or dangerous tools.




(6) Because each part (e.g, a stud) interlocks with its connecting part (e.g, a header), the assembly is both stronger, more precise, and much easier to put together. (Think of the interlocking building blocks we all played with as kids!) All that's needed are screws or nails to go into pre-piloted holes already included by the robot in exactly the right locations.




We are extremely excited about this initiative both because we've started building like this already and can see the potential, and because we think that this technology can be used by Habitat for Humanity affiliates across the country and maybe the world!

What's needed, however, is your support. We want to get this off the ground much faster than our typical build/funding schedule permits because, frankly, this will allow us to build more in less time. To do so, we need materials, and hence your help in buying those materials. We're starting small however, because we'd rather build a bunch of small buildings, show them off to more people, and start building a critical mass around this innovative way to build affordable housing. Starting with beautiful "tool houses" (think of them as very nice sheds), moving on to Tiny Houses, then quickly to full-sized family homes.


Please help us to help others, more others, faster.


For more info, please see: http://www.habitat-homebuilt.org/