Stick-built construction has been the housing industry’s modus operandi for decades. But an explosion of new technology — from AI-enabled design and 3D printing to micro-factories and smart materials — has the potential to usher in a new era of housing construction — and that innovation promises meaningful investment benefits.
The housing industry is seeing an uptick in innovation applied across design, materials and building processes. The ongoing challenge is how to pull the cool stuff happening on the periphery into the mainstream and drive change at scale across the broader industry.
“We have a lot of innovation in the industry, but we don’t have a culture of research and development needed for intrinsic change,” says Andrew McCoy, managing director of Virginia Tech’s new Coalition for Smart Construction and associate director of research and innovation and professor at the Myers Lawson School of Construction.
Among the many hurdles to advanc
