Extract

The world population growth can potentially lead to a shortage of appropriate houses in many countries. It can also increase the cost of land, which will directly affect the price of houses. Given the advantages of prefabrication, this method has the potential to provide numbers of high-quality houses in a short time. However, despite many historic attempts to produce prefabricated houses, there have been many failures. This paper presents a review of previous house prefabrication schemes to better understand the factors involved in their failure. Prefabrication schemes in five different time periods have been reviewed. The review looks at the construction-related needs in each period, the way the method of prefabrication responded to those needs, and any weaknesses of the method. The review ends by suggesting the most important factor for the potential of prefabrication is the current negative perceptions of stakeholders, including house owners and financiers. These negative perceptions come from early prefabrication schemes which focused on quantity and speed over quality and aesthetic aspects, and the fact these schemes were often linked to shortages of conventional building materials.

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