NAMPA, Idaho — Could the future of homebuilding solve the housing crisis? Almost assuredly not. But if you ask the folks at Autovol, a local company that uses automation to create modular housing, they can at least ease the housing crisis. I talked to the co-founder, got a factory tour, and chatted about the future of homebuilding.
Autovol is housed in a 400,000 square foot facility in Nampa. It’s a manufacturer that focuses on building affordable housing by creating multistory, multifamily apartments, one module at a time.
"We started the first automated manufacturing plant in the country." Rick Murdock is the CEO and Co-Founder of Autovol. "The robots do 90% Of all the construction work," he said.
About 285 people work there, but the robots do all the literal heavy lifting. They also work a little faster. But Murdock says the main advantage is something else, "Really what we're getting out of it is the precision."
After the robots are done, trades people step in to finish the work, before the modules are shipped to the building site and pieced together into an apartment complex. Murdock says the robots help with the significant construction worker shortage, without completely cutting out skilled workers, "We don't ever want to replace people. We just want to have people doing the job that they're designed to do."
Murdock also explained other advantages, all the work is done out of the weather, everything happens under one roof, and a lot of the construction phases can happen at the same time, "At the same time we're setting walls we've already got people in here plumbing showers and plumbing tubs and running all the electrical. It's not waiting for one to get through before the other starts."
While the idea of manufacturing is obviously nothing new, it is newer to Americans when it comes to homebuilding. Murdock says, "Everything we own has been manufactured. If we stop and think about it, we don't own anything that wasn't manufactured. So why not housing?"
It was a bit of a change, even for Murdock, who spent decades building homes the traditional way. This just made sense to him. "If you look at our housing landscape across the country, I think that the need for housing is alarming. And I think it's becoming crisis mode all across the country. I think the only way you're going to fulfill that is very similar to the automobile industry. You've got to really understand the technology, and you've got to develop the technology to mass produce. And with mass production comes the hopes that you're drawing cost down, and you're supplying more for more people."
And Murdock said consumers are getting used to the idea, "There's pretty high demand for what we do. And it's growing."
He said modular homes made up about 3.4% of the industry about 4 years ago, but that's now doubled to 7%. Murdock believes a large majority of homebuilding will be done this way in the future. That's because this type of building is quicker, more efficient, and more affordable. He says they're saving people as much as $100 a square foot, where they're shipping modules in California. But unfortunately, that type of savings will not translate locally. "It really works best in high market areas, high-cost market areas."
You might be thinking, 'Aren't things already high cost around here?' Yes, but they're not quite high enough cost for Autovol to be doing any local projects, yet.
"We've seen prices go up; housing prices go up. We've seen our labor go up. We've seen all those things go up to a level that we haven't seen before,” said Murdock. “So, I think that it won't be long until we're going to fit very well in this market. And not for all projects, but for the affordable side. And that's really what we concentrate on, because it's the largest number of people out there needing housing.
So, is automated modular housing the solution to that housing crisis gripping the nation and this area? Murdock said, "I don't know if we'll ever fix the housing crisis. What we're trying to do is contribute in a positive way to the housing crisis by making housing more affordable, more plentiful, and be able to service people's needs and give them an address."
As of April, Autovol had produced about 1.7 million square feet of apartment space and more than 23-hundred living units.
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