When my husband and I first learned the lease would not be renewed on our Pacifica, California home that we’ve rented for the past decade, the first thing I did was cry.
The second thing I did was Google prefab homes.
My husband and I have dreamed of owning a simple, sustainable modern home that we could afford and still retire by the time we’re 70-ish. We have loved living on the coast and dream of continuing to raise our daughter close to the ocean. However, when we started looking for homes to buy (follow our house hunt journey here) we realized the current ocean-view real estate market is not exactly in our budget.
Prefab companies promise sustainability, sleek design, lower prices and speedier build times than traditional stick-built homes. In theory it seems like the perfect, obvious choice for us.
But when I started digging into buying land, the moving parts involved felt overwhelming. Flat land is best to accommodate a prefab, and the utilities hook-ups and permit approvals required seemed like a daunting process. Friends and real estate agents have warned us that, all things considered, it can be just as expensive as building a home the traditional way. I’ve also heard stories of never-ending waits for approvals and pushback from neighbors who equate prefab with mobile homes.
But one prefab company I came across, Connect-Homes, promises to manage the process for you. Engineers submit drawings for local permits, and you’re quoted a fixed cost up front, eliminating the surprise costs and delays that often come with traditional builds. Your home is built in the company’s San Bernardino factory in six weeks, then shipped and assembled on site in one day.
Connect-Homes cofounders Jared Levy and Gordon Stott helped launch Marmol Radziner’s prefab arm in 2004. After their designs won multiple awards, regularly graced the cover of Dwell and were the first prefab homes featured in Architectural Digest, they wanted to make stunning and sustainable prefab design accessible to as many people as possible.
They spent two years designing a modular prefab system that dramatically reduced the construction and delivery costs that in the past made high-end prefab homes prohibitively expensive for most people.
Delivery is a significant expense when it comes to prefab, and Connect-Homes dramatically reduced that cost with a patented system that eliminates the need for oversized trucking loads. A five-module home could cost more than $100,000 to deliver cross-country and $400,000 for overseas using traditional shipping. Connect-Homes has reduced the price to between about $5,000 and $8,000 respectively.
The total cost for a Connect Home ranges from around $200,000 to approximately $997,000.
Five years ago, Ben Munday became one of Connect-Homes happy customers. In fact, he was so happy with his experience that he’s now the company’s Northern California representative.
I caught up with Ben to dig into some of the details fo building a Connect Home, read on to learn more.
How is Connect Homes different from other prefab companies?
“Transparency with budgets and timing. We're the only company to do our own finish work on-site rather than use a local contractor. We also have a patent on using shipping container-sized modules so trucking is inexpensive.”
What is the average time from purchasing a Connect Home to finished home? How does that differ if the land is unimproved?
“It depends on the local planning department as they need to approve plans. It only takes six weeks to build in the factory, but often the process start to move in is more like 18 months. Unimproved versus teardown doesn’t really change the timing. It just helps with costs as having utility connections already in place saves money.”
“It's a fairly even split, but the C8 and the C5 are common choices for main houses, C2 is the most popular ADU.”
When financing a Connect Home, does the customer use one lending company for the entire transaction, or one for land and the other for the home?
“You can do it either way and we can recommend financing options.”
What are the biggest benefits of building a prefab home?
“Speed, cost, transparency of costs early in the process, less client involvement—i.e. it’s not a full time job like a traditional architect/general contractor build.”
You live in a Connect Home, how long has it been since you moved in and how would you describe the experience of living there compared to a traditionally built home?
“We’ve lived here for five years. I love the modern design, I like that everything works and I’m not having to constantly fix things like you do with an older house. It is very efficient so bills are small.”
What should people look for when searching for land to buy?
“Flat is ideal. Here are some helpful tips for finding the best spot.
And that answers another common question about prefab: will it hold its value? Listed at nearly $3.7 million, the Sonoma property seems to be a resounding yes.
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