MARCH, University of Cincinnati, 2014, Design, Architecture, Art and Planning: Architecture

What if I told you that architects, even residential architects, don't design houses? They design homes, sure – stylish, enviable, beautiful homes. But what about houses, those durable goods with stable values and long economic lives? Why don't architect's design houses? Is there really a difference between the two – homes and houses – beyond the semantically superficial, and does it even matter? The architectural profession has had a longstanding flirtation with the notion of industrialized housing. Unfortunately, it's a flirtation that has born little fruit. Many have failed and so many others are floundering, presenting modest pre-fab boxes when the market seems to ask for gaudy neo-eclectic mash-ups. The reality is that architects are not product developers, manufacturers, marketers, or business-people in the broader sense. This is unfortunate, given the scope, value, and environmental and social impacts of the American housing industry. There were 502K houses sold in 2012. As the average price for a new house in 2012 was $292.2K, the new housing industry is annually worth about $150B, or about 1% of US GDP. In other words, the housing industry is important – so important that we are still feeling the aftershocks of the burst of the housing bubble in 2008, when new housing accounted for more than 3% of US GDP. Of the aforementioned 502K houses sold in 2012, only 47K were “owner built.” The rest, a staggering 90%, were either “built for sale” or built using contractor-backed financing. The conventional, developer-driven model dominates the housing industry, which leaves architects on the outside, looking in. Architects provide a service - an expensive service. So-called “custom” homes come at a premium that puts them beyond the reach of most of the American public. It's not that these people aren't being serviced; they are, and in a big way. There are 160,000 house building businesses in the U.S. While these entities are predominantly sm (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Michael McInturf M.Arch. (Committee Chair); Aarati Kanekar Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Architecture

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2009, Economics

My dissertation research aims to fill two gaps in the literature on empirical economics of housing. In chapter 1, I use two blocks of American Housing Survey (AHS) national data to test four hypotheses about the determinants of housing value volatility, and reach consistent empirical findings using both AHS samples. While there are a number of studies of housing price volatility at the aggregate level, there are few studies of the determinants of the volatility of individual houses' values. My findings show: 1) House values at both ends of the quality distribution are more volatile than those at the center. 2) House values in predominantly black areas are more volatile than those in white areas. 3) The more atypical a house is, the larger the volatility of house value. 4) The more highly land leveraged a house is, the larger the volatility of house value. In addition, there exists significant difference of housing value volatility among states. In chapter 2, I study potential factors that prompt households to choose owning a manufactured home over owning a traditional home or renting. The AHS 1985-2003 national sample is applied to a nested logit model. Explanatory variables include both attributes of housing choices and characteristics of households. We found that: 1) Housing user cost significantly negatively affects housing choice. 2) Households with previous experience of living in manufactured homes are more likely to be manufactured home owners. 3) Households of low and medium-income, relatively young, and small sizes are more likely to own manufactured homes. 4) Married and white people more likely become homeowners of both manufactured and traditional homes than single and black people.

Committee: Donald Haurin (Advisor); Stephen Cosslett (Committee Member); Lucia Dunn (Committee Member) Subjects: Economics

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2003, Engineering : Civil Engineering

Productivity improvement of manufactured housing (MH) production systems has been a great concern to manufacturers and production managers. The evaluation of the production system efficiency in the factory is essential for meeting the growing demand of customers with respect to design and size of the manufactured housing product (MH). The purpose of this research is to resolve some of the problems of the MH production system. The problems of the existing system are identified in the masters thesis, Abu Hammad 2001, as follows: i) process bottlenecks hindering productivity, ii) unbalanced processes, and iii) layout limitations to the production capacity. Moreover, a lack of technology is observed in the existing MH operations. Existing production systems employing the traditional production line have low throughput and are inefficient. This dissertation research explores alternative layout designs that are proven via simulation to be more efficient and productive. Additionally, an advanced MH production system employing recent theories in technology and manufacturing is addressed in this research. The major contribution of this dissertation is to develop a decision support system (DSS), which provides the MH industry with an efficient tool to streamline the performance of existing MH facilities. This dissertation investigates the interrelation impact of multiple factors on the productivity of four modules: (i) market, (ii) factory, (iii) manufactured housing processes, and (iv) production system layout. The following objectives have been achieved in support of the stated goal: 1.Develop a streamlined MH process; 2.Develop optimization models to streamline the activities and predict relevant parameters; 3.Develop advanced layout designs employing recent theories in manufacturing (i.e., lean production theory). The DSS provides assistance in the following decisions: (i) selecting an efficient system layout matching user requirements, (ii) streamlining activities and op (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Dr. Ossama Salem (Advisor) Subjects:

MS, University of Cincinnati, 2002, Engineering : Civil Engineering

This thesis is concerned with the production enhancement of the Manufactured Housing processes in construction. The Manufactured Housing industry in U.S.A. offers a good solution for the increasing demand on the low cost housing compared to the site built houses. The main objective of this research is to identify ways by which the productivity of a manufactured housing factory could be improved leading to a cost effective and efficient system. A manufactured housing factory provides a controlled arena for studying the manufacturing process and to develop ways of improving the productivity and efficiency of the system. To achieve the objective of this research, a through literature review was carried out in the field of Manufactured Housing followed by process data collection at two manufactured housing factories in Indiana. A simulation model was developed using Arena simulation software to study the production process and to determine process bottlenecks. The model describes the production line and the logical flow of the production unit in the factory. The simulation model is aimed to depict the reality in the factory. Arena software enables the modeler to simulate very sophisticated levels of activity relationships and also has the advantage of animating the simulation process. Hence, animation serves as a verification tool throughout the continuous development of the model. A comparison was done between the output measures of the model and the factory data to validate the simulation model. The simulation study identified several process bottlenecks that when present could limit the efficiency of the production process in a manufactured housing factory.

Committee: Dr. Makarand Hastak (Advisor) Subjects: