Auckland house-in-a-day: Fletcher unveils high-speed process

Fletcher built a house in just one day at Hobsonville Pt.

Fletcher Living has just built a three-bedroom house in a day and hopes it will inspire others to use new techniques and build faster to meet Auckland's pressing housing needs.

Fletcher Residential and Land Development chief executive Steve Evans this morning showed off the 170sq m $800,000-plus house at Hobsonville Pt, which he said was put up between 7.30am and 5pm yesterday.

It usually takes six to nine months to build a house in Auckland, he said. But Fletcher Living's panelised components could enable others in the sector to regularly put up a home in a single day, he said.

"It's all about providing the New Zealand dream much quicker," Evans said of the duplex on Pheasant St, yet to be finished inside. It took Fletcher Living just one-and-a-half days to put up the other side of the duplex, he said.

Evans acknowledged weeks of work behind making the panels for the fast-built homes. These were made in a former Laminex factory in Papakura, he said.

Fletcher built about 1000 houses a year but its new fast-build process was not just for his company, he stressed.

"We're providing these products for other home builders as well. This is an innovation the entire sector can use," he said. "There's no end to the opportunities for panelisation housing."

Pamela Bell, chief executive of industry organisation PrefabNZ, was on Auckland mayor Phil Goff's housing taskforce, examining ways to get more houses in the city. Her industry entity has long advocated off-site house manufacturing, assembling whole buildings or substantial parts of buildings before installation at their final location.

Small components, two-dimensional panels through to complete new buildings can be prefabricated, the organisation says.

Steve Evans of Fletchers, advocating panelisation to speed up house building. Photo/Jason Oxenham

House-building and design business Box is establishing a factory in West Auckland and is also making many housing components off-site. The pre-fabricated house-building business is leasing part of the premises where superyachts were built for decades.

Dan Heyworth of Box said the business would move into part of the former Alloy Yachts premises, a 900sq m building at 8 The Concourse in Henderson. Construction of the first modular-style Box house in that factory will start this month, Heyworth said.