Introducing WorldHaus

WorldHaus manufactures and builds customized, weatherproof homes for families in the developing world at a price they can afford, employing a modular building system that allows families to build to any size and configuration they desire. With a WorldHaus home, a family also can include amenities like clean burning stoves, toilets, and solar electricity systems. WorldHaus' base model – a one-room, 20 square meter (220 square foot) home – can be built in about 10 days at a starting cost of below $2,000. With our local construction model, we can cut the cost of a quality house in half.

We are working with mortgage providers to make our homes available for monthly installments of $40, well within the reach of rural and semi-urban families making between $3 and $10 a day. We are also in the process of setting up partnerships with state governments, NGOs, and landlords to make the homes available to families making less than $2 a day through subsidies and rental housing programs.

Stand-alone Sustainability WorldHaus allows families to build their own stand-alone houses independent of the constraints of housing projects or utility grids. Affordability $20 monthly payments make WorldHaus affordable to a target market of aspiring middle class income earners. Strength and Stability Innovative wall and roof technology using local materials provide protection from extreme weather. Customizability Design structure that allows families to add stories, rooms or features to meet changing needs. This can include solar electricity, clean-burning stoves, toilets or water storage. Convenience Local on-site house construction makes WorldHaus cheap and easy to assemble. Community Benefits Local construction, a local dealer network and factory supply chain all serve to stimulate local economies.

The World's Largest Unserved Housing Market

Over the last decade, governments and global institutions have struggled to address the acute lack of affordable housing in the rapidly growing economies of the developing world. According to the UN Human Settlements Program, over 1.5 billion people live in substandard housing without access to electricity, nearly two thirds lacking access to clean water. In India alone, over 500 million people, almost half the population, want and need better housing. The need is so great that Ashish Karamchandani of Monitor Inclusive Markets estimates the Indian affordable housing market opportunity to be more than $250 billion.

Families in poverty seize every available opportunity to own a quality home. Indians take pride in their homes, patching them up after they crumble every monsoon by scavenging bricks and building their homes a wall at a time.

The problem, however, is that a quality house is getting further and further out of reach for the common man and woman with bricks, mortar and labor costs up over fifty percent in many areas across India over the last three years. A severe lack of financing for the rural poor without land title makes quality housing difficult to attain. WorldHaus is working to solve this problem and to meet this growing demand.