In 1947, American architect Karl Koch designed a folding house for Acorn Homes. He wrote asking:
This combination of 2D panels and 3D cores is a meaningful idea. It was clear to me that 50 years ago I designed a summer camp at an architecture school, which was made up of shipping containers, the kitchen and bathroom were in a box, and everything else was rolled up and covered with an awning.
As stated in the patent application by Paolo Tiramani, Galliano Tiramani and Kyle Denman, here is a good description of Boxabl:
“On the one hand, these patent documents provide for prefabricated wall, floor, and ceiling assemblies that are folded together to form a compact shipping unit, which is then transported to a predetermined location and unfolded to form a structure that folds and folds. using hinges can make it easier to deploy components.”
Koch was never able to get his folding house into production. He received thousands of letters from interested buyers, offers of land, and requests to “purchase 4,000 apartments within the next three months.” But he could never put it together.
“Over the next year or so, we tapped as many leads as we could. But we were haunted by the same problems as at the beginning – the chicken and the egg: no proven product, no funding, no factories. no plants, no merchandise to display… It’s easier to go to the moon.”
Boxabl did not suffer this fate and built a large plant in Nevada. He is preparing to sell thousands of houses.
The 375-square-foot Boxabl Casita, its first offering to the public, is cleverly designed to fold down to the size of a 20-foot shipping container, so it can be economically transported anywhere on a standard low-slung trailer.
Half of the kitchen and bathroom are rendered in 3D, and the wall and floor panels fold down to cover the open space.
As with the 1947 Acorn, you can remove the closet as a partition between the bedroom and living room.
I will complain, as usual, that for a 375 sq. feet does not need a 36-inch wide refrigerator. If the company had used European-style appliances, it might not have had to leave the washing machine in the middle of the room.
A permanent dining table that is an extension of the kitchen counter doesn’t make sense, and neither do those uncomfortable stools. But these are minor problems with interior design.
For $50,000 you get a lot. “Boxables are made of steel, concrete and styrofoam. These building materials do not decompose and serve for the entire service life. The walls, floors and roof are made of structural laminate, which is much stronger than conventional buildings.”
We’ve always disliked drywall or drywall because they melt in water, but they’re cheap. However, Boxabl doesn’t come cheap here: “Boxabl doesn’t use wood or drywall. The building material will not be damaged by water and will not overgrow with mold. This means that if your Boxabl floods, the water will run off and the structure will remain intact.”
Boxable says it can also withstand hurricane-force winds. “They can handle the harshest wind conditions in North America.” Casita is covered with non-combustible materials and is designed for snow loads. The website does not state how long the house will last, but it certainly sounds like it was built with durability and quality in mind.
“Boxabl buildings are very energy efficient. In fact, they use much smaller air conditioning systems than conventional homes. This is due to the high thermal insulation, dense building envelope and limited thermal bridge.”
As I have found in my small green prefabricated home business, there are usually a few exceptions that severely limit the size of the market: Finding land, obtaining permits and connecting services is expensive and time consuming.
The list price of around $50,000 is for the house alone, although it is not yet fully completed. You will still need land, site setup, installation, foundations, utilities, roofing systems, permits, landscaping and other finishing work – these costs will vary. “Depending on your location and the complexity of your site, this can range from $5,000 to $50,000.”
UPDATE: Boxabl says it is no longer committed to offering fixed prices on its website due to “record inflation and very long waiting lists.” “For example, if you pre-order Casita today and it takes a year to receive it, we don’t know how raw material prices will change in a year, so we can’t fix the price. When we get to your queue, we will contact you to confirm prices and next steps.
Despite this, the company said it still considers Boxabl to be “the most cost-effective housing solution ever created.”
However, the Boxabl market is much larger. This is a product that can be delivered quickly and can be used anywhere, deployed in emergency hospitals or emergency homes, and we will probably use them more often.
Right now, Boxabl is only available as a box, but it has big plans for the future, including larger devices.
Boxable built Housing Goldilocks. We’ve been complaining about shipping container houses for years because there’s so little space inside. We complained about the modular design because the case was too big to transport. Combining the best qualities of modular and panel enclosures in a movable enclosure, Boxable can come in handy.
However, if you want one of these Casitas, you must be on the waiting list. The company said the wait list was long, but reassured potential customers that it is also working on ramping up production. In terms of shipping, she’ll ship the Casita to any location you’re willing to pay for shipping (the farther you are from Las Vegas, the more expensive).
Post time: Feb-12-2023