OUR MISSION
Connect first-time buyers to factory-built home manufacturers, streamline permitting, and scale proven affordable housing solutions nationwide.
OUR VISION
Empower first-time homebuyers in Southern Indiana through factory-built homes priced 25-35% below market.
NextHouse46: Factory-Built Homeownership Innovation – Southern Indiana Regional Model
Lead Organization:
- Purdue University: Center for High Performance Buildings
Collaborators:
- Town of Nashville
- City of Bloomington
- City of Columbus
- Clayton Homes Southern Indiana
- Indiana University (School of Architecture)
- Volumod
THE CHALLENGE: Southern Indiana faces a critical homeownership crisis: first-time buyers earning $75K can afford just 47% of available homes, down from 87% in 2020. New construction below $250K is economically impossible using traditional methods. Without intervention, an entire generation of working families will be permanently locked out of homeownership.
NEXTHOUSE46 SOLUTION: NextHouse46 transforms this crisis into opportunity through factory-built housing priced 25-35% below market. Twenty demonstration homes across three Southern Indiana communities will prove that factory-built housing can deliver quality, affordability, and speed simultaneously, ultimately breaking the iron triangle that has constrained housing production for decades.
INNOVATION: Our approach disrupts three systemic barriers: (1) Consumer knowledge gaps through our digital design/purchasing platform; (2) Manufacturing inefficiency through automated, quality-assured factory production; (3) Regulatory bottlenecks through AI-powered code compliance. Unlike subsidies that treat symptoms, we address root causes by building a sustainable regional ecosystem where manufacturers, communities, and buyers collaborate seamlessly.
IMPACT & SCALE: Beyond 20 homes, we’re building regional capacity: establishing manufacturing partnerships, training workforces, and creating replicable models. Our rigorous evaluation framework tracks costs, quality metrics, and homeowner satisfaction. Importantly, our approach generates evidence for national replication. By demonstrating that factory-built housing can meet community-defined quality standards at entry-level prices without perpetual subsidies, we create a durable pathway to homeownership nationwide.