Prefab Report: A Trend That’s Here to Stay
Last Updated: Feb 8, 2025The internet is talking about "prefab homes" 52% more this year compared to last year. What does this mean for the homebuilding industry? We created a report, "Off-Site Built Homes: An Online Media Analysis," to get to the bottom of things.
Table of Contents
- Why Prefab?
- Creating the Report
- The Results of the Rise Prefab Home Report
- What's Next For Prefab Homes
- Download the Report
- Who is Rise?
Why Prefab?
Prefab homes (also called "off-site built homes," "volumetric built homes," "factory-built homes," or "industrialized construction") are actually a simple concept. Instead of building all aspects of a home on-site, parts of it are constructed in an off-site facility then shipped and assembled on-site.
The touted benefits of this way of building are many:
- Predictable and consistent construction
- A dramatic reduction in construction waste
- A dramatic decrease in emissions associated with transportation
- A higher-quality product that has protection from the elements during construction
- Faster build time (think weeks vs. months)
Prefab has a bit of a reputation problem tracing back to the 1970s when the focus was building homes fast and cheap. Nowadays, prefab is one of the fastest-growing trends in residential construction.
In the age of digital, web traffic is something that the majority of companies pay attention to. For Rise, it's how we understand what is important to our audience. So you can imagine our surprise as we observed the ever-growing popularity of any article that mentions "prefab." We began to predict high web traffic days if we were planning to publish another prefab article. It's like clockwork!
As the voice of the homeowner, we set out to understand the consumer's perspective on this growing trend and produce a report with our findings. Namely, we wanted to know:
- What aspects of prefab homes appeal most to consumers?
- What are their main questions about prefab?
- How are they researching prefab homes?
Creating the Report
Gathering the Data
Our team used a media monitoring and social listening platform to analyze aggregated online media conversations. The sample size is 500K+, with English-language media mentions worldwide and all major online media sources.
The data was gathered by entering search queries containing keywords and instructions for relationships and exclusions with related keywords. For example, you might want to include mentions of "prefab" alongside "house" "home" or "housing" and exclude references to "gaming" or "PC." The platform provided many pre-made analyses, while others were done manually.
Organizing the Data
One of our burning questions was to uncover which aspects of prefab homes appeal most to consumers. We chose four features and created lengthy queries of related terms. In short, some of these associated keywords were:
- Durability: high-performance, long-lasting, resiliency
- Affordability: low budget, tight budget, cheaper, affordable
- Build time: faster build, shorter time, reduced time
- Sustainability: climate change, emissions, embodied energy
With the data in hand, we were then able to compare, contrast, and extract the stories and trends that were the most interesting to Rise and our friends in the home building industry.
The Results of the Rise Prefab Home Report
We highly recommend you read the full report for all of the results, but we can't help but share our favorite insights here.
The Online Conversation About Prefab Homes
When we queried the web for terms related to "prefab homes," "modular homes," "off-site built," etc. we got over 500,000 results over the past year (July 10, 2019 - July 10, 2020). What's even more interesting is that it's up over 50% from the previous period.
Prefab is more than just a trend here in North America - it might just be the new norm. This way of building is not a new development, and some nations have already widely adopted it. In Norway, Sweden, and Finland, 45% of current housing is built modularly.
What is driving this trend? According to McKinsey, this shift is driven by technological improvements, economic demands, and a change in the way we think. Widespread adoption of prefab home building practices can give the building industry a massive productivity boost. It can address our housing crisis through scalability and cost savings.
How Are Home Buyers Researching Off-Site Built Homes?
The pie chart shows the Share of Voice between the four attributes of off-site construction that we chose to compare. Durability (resiliency, high-performance) is neck and neck with build time. Sustainability (climate change, emissions, embodied energy) is neck and neck with affordability.
We were surprised by the prevalence of sustainability as a topic. But, it makes more sense when we understand that sustainability (as a general topic) has seen a massive 118% jump in the last year.
Affordability was a close second, with some home buyers believing that prefab is a more affordable option. It seems that this goes hand-in-hand with a preference for small square footage in bungalows, accessory dwelling units (ADUs, or laneway homes), and solutions for affordable housing (at the macro-level). There doesn't seem to be much "buzz" about medium-to-large prefab homes, perhaps because homebuyers don't understand (or care about) the ubiquity and flexibility of this building method. Download the full report to see the top stories from the past year.
This sustainability and affordability paradigm tells us that home buyers are seeking simplicity. A live stream Coffee Talk with the Housing Innovation Alliance (HIA) was quite informative. We learned, from Stantec's David Dixon, that "the attraction to cities and dense, walkable neighborhoods is here to stay." In 2019, the NAHB observed a shift toward a preference for smaller square footage. During the same HIA Coffee Talk, Nancy Keenan of Dahlin group discussed their Americans at Home report. It found that consumers are leaning toward flexible, multi-use spaces over additional square footage.
Whether they're looking to reduce their carbon footprint or shrink their financial burden, first time home buying Millennials are Googling "prefab" and "modular." Meanwhile, ADUs are experiencing a surge too. Homebuyers are leveraging these small dwellings as a way to add walkability and affordability to a neighborhood. Some homeowners are opting to add ADUs to their properties, instead of buying bigger homes. They are using them as offices, income properties, or aging-in-place retirement suites.
Download the full report to see the top keywords related to prefab affordability, durability, build time, and sustainability.
What's Next For Prefab Homes
Now that we understand what homebuyers have on their mind, how should the industry respond? "This data confirms what we have been experiencing for the last two years from an anecdotal perspective," says Dave Cooper. We looked to the experts in the industry to identify the next steps the industry should take.
Meet the Demand for Prefab Homes
Anyone in the off-site residential home building industry will tell you there is enough business to go around. Reduced build time of prefab and modular building already puts these builders ahead of their traditional-building counterparts, but improvements can be made.
Ivan Rupnik of MOD X argues that a lack of data and standardization is holding back the prefab homes industry. He looked at the housing shift in Japan and Sweden and noted that standardization (not customization) allowed them to be competitive and to scale to meet demand quickly. North America has a love affair with customization. Still, fewer options allow for a more industrialized approach that produces predictable, high-quality results.
Rupnik also suggested developing standards for designs and processes of homes, modules, and panels. Standards and best practices can be achieved through the sharing and collection of manufacturing data. This data collection will require extensive collaboration and trust amid builders in the off-site built homes industry. The result could be a robust data set that would help builders across the industry optimize their processes for wider margins.
