able housing technology. But in most areas of the country, 3-D printing could be the go-to technique for affordable housing. Printing apartments and stacking them may be a possibility for denser populated areas. Even today, hotels are constructed by building the rooms in a factory and transporting them to the hotel site where they are stacked like Legos. 3-D print - ed rooms or apartments could be combined in much the same way and would be even less expensive than the current methods. Also, 3-D printing opens up all kinds of design options that just cannot be easily built using alternate technologies. Houses could become works of art, perhaps even abstract works of art. Of course, architects have always tried to innovate in their designs. But the majority of homes and buildings are rectangular boxes because they are cheaper and easier
to build. When 3-D printing becomes a standard approach for buildings, it will be not only possible to create striking designs, but those designs will be roughly the same cost to con - struct as the boxes. Taking design capability a step fur - ther, why couldn’t software be creat - ed to allow people to design their own homes? As long as software could enforce structural integrity using some sort of algorithms (probably the same calculations that architectural engineers would use) for the design of wall thicknesses, weight and stress of overhangs, etc., anything goes. 3-D printing could launch a renaissance of architectural design. It may also spawn numerous eyesores, but so did the 1960s and 1980s. A few cautions. Building standards have not caught up with the idea of 3-D printing. Your structures will have to comply with existing building regulations. And many jurisdictions
may require you to pause for inspec - tions of various sorts. We would hope in the near future that specific plans could be pre-approved for compli - ance so that printing multiple houses of the same type might actually have fewer inspection concerns. As a real estate investor, especial - ly if you are a developer, you should be looking into 3-D printing technol - ogies for your unique development. Even today it may be possible to con - struct beautiful structures at half the cost and a tenth of the time. Get an edge on your competition by reduc - ing your cost while simultaneously creating unique designs. •
Steve Streetman is a real estate consultant specializing in deal structuring and the use of cryptocurrency. Look for his book
“Cryptocurrency and Real Estate: How Bitcoin and Blockchain Will Transform Real Estate Investing” available on Amazon early in 2021.
thinkrealty . com | 55
Made with FlippingBook Online newsletter