Fox Modular home truths are out there

IF the growth trajectory of Jess Berry’s business is anything to go by, modular housing construction is no longer considered a marginal building method.

Since she and her husband Nicholas Berry formed Fox Modular three years ago, the Gnangara-based company has increased sales significantly.

“It has doubled every year,” Ms Berry told Business News.

“We will close out this year on about $55 million in sales, and about $35 million of that is what we have built.

“We are staying ahead, so we will probably be doubling again in the next year, if we can.”

Fox Modular, which grew out of Mr Berry’s transportable home business Fox Transportables, recently expanded into the higher-end market with the Pique brand, which encompasses architecturally designed modular homes.

Ms Berry said the brand, which now makes up 70 per cent of Fox Modular’s business, grew from an increasing demand for modular homes to service the mainstream residential market.

“Modular has typically been about needing a house in a location where a traditional method doesn’t apply … in remote areas where you can’t get brickies [or] there’s no concrete batching plant nearby so you can’t get the concrete,” she said.

“What we are trying to do is take modular to the masses.” Ms Berry said modular construction still relied on the same trades as conventionally built homes and used similar processes. However, the key difference was that the structures were built off-site.

"The constraint is how many trucks you would like to have turning up at your property,” she said.

“It’s like designing in LEGO … the pieces may be smaller but it’s up to your imagination as to how many you actually want to construct.

“In the Pique brand, most of the homes are three to four modules … and you can just keep adding onto them.”

Ms Berry entered the modular homes space after a career at BGC, looking after its now defunct Terrace townhouse brand.

She explained that her team, which has grown from five to 65 in the past two years, followed similar career paths.

“Most people in the business at Fox have really come from a large-volume builder,” she said.

“We were all very dedicated and always wanted to do something more innovative, and we all ended up getting really attracted into modular.”

Ms Berry said modular homebuilders faced the same constraints as every business in the construction sector, with labour and material shortages delaying builds.

However, rather than the two-year construction timeframe for many conventionally built homes, it takes as little as three months to complete a modular home through Fox Modular’s processes.

“We’ve still got the same kind of restraints … [but] … we [will] get the same benefits as the market changes, when that time will probably halve again, but it’s still a 12- to 18-week build time for a four-by-two home,” she said.

Jubilee Homes has rolled out modular homes in many of WA’s regions, including Karratha, pictured. Photo: Jubilee Homes

Shortage 

Recent Australian Bureau of Statistics data showed a record 21,524 houses are under construction in Western Australia. 

Labour and material shortages have led to considerable delays in home builds at a time of high demand, leading to the high number of builds in the construction phase.

Housing Industry Association of WA and Real Estate Institute of Western Australia forecasts show the state needs at least 20,000 new homes annually.

However, WA is currently building between 13,000 and 14,000 homes each year.

Modular housing is seen as tool in the arsenal to tackle the state’s housing crisis, given it’s a faster and cheaper way to build than more traditional methods.

HIA WA regional executive director Michael McGowan said modular housing made up about 3 per cent of the state’s housing stock, but its growth was constrained by institutional practices designed for more traditional homebuilding methodology.

He said banks tended to only provide finance at the start of a project, at about 6.5 per cent of the project cost, and then once a project was complete.

Traditionally, residential properties need to be valued on site.

“This results in the business having to hold a lot of the financial burden and hence [modular home companies] tend only to work with cash clients like farmers etc,” he said.

North Fremantle’s My Homes project utilises prefabricated building methods. Photo: Michelle Blakeley

Affordability

Myaree-based Jubilee Living has been producing modular homes since 2010, mainly for the affordable housing and resources sectors.

In addition to complete homes, the company designs and manufactures prefabricated core modules to be incorporated into hybrid houses.

These modules can include elements such as kitchens or bathrooms, which are transported to a residential site.

Jubilee Living director Richard Simpson told Business News modular homes could provide a solution not only to the housing shortage but also the affordability crisis.

However, he said, a paradigm shift needed to occur in terms of what constituted an affordable product.

“If affordability is your main desire, then you have to create some adjustments in order to achieve it,” Mr Simpson said.

“But if you are wanting to create the existing housing stock at a more affordable price, that’s a different undertaking, and it’s actually, in my view, not achievable.”

Jubilee Homes, which works with Perth architects Hubble Design, has collaborated with government on affordable housing projects across regional WA.

The company is currently working with Rio Tinto on a housing development in Paraburdoo and is negotiating with the Shire of Coolgardie to produce a 100-person camp in that town.

Jubilee Homes is also working in metropolitan areas, including Baldivis, on prefabricated homes using recycled materials including tyres that act as insulation.

In addition, it is formulating a flooring system using recycled plastic bottles that are reduced into a mesh.

Mr Simpson said this system allowed homes to be built with a thinner slab, of about 40 millimetres as opposed to the standard 80 to 100mm.

Architect Michelle Blakeley utilised modular building methods in her My Home project in North Fremantle, which comprises 18 self-contained units for women experiencing homelessness.

As the project was approaching completion earlier this month, Ms Blakeley told Business News about the rationale behind choosing prefabricated homes.

Not only did the construction method save time and money, she said, it reduced waste and allowed for a sustainable approach.

Jubilee Living’s modular home process involves creating core structures for hybrid homes. Photo: Jubilee Living

Ms Blakeley designed the homes using passive house principles, which meant an emphasis on building orientation, materials with high thermal capacity, and cross ventilation.

“In every project I do, I try and look at how I can get rid of air-conditioning or minimise air-conditioning because it’s so expensive to run,” Ms Blakeley said.

“It’s big user of energy, and if you can get rid of that it significantly reduces power bills and is much healthier.”

She added that the homes in the My Home project were energy efficient, thermally comfortable, and built from timber instead of steel.

“It’s [also] just a much more efficient way of building, particularly when you’ve got in our case 18 houses that are the same,” Ms Blakeley said.

It took builders Offsite Construction Perth just 20 days to erect all 18 units at the North Fremantle site.

Housing Minister John Carey acknowledged there’s a place for modular homes to help plug the gaps in the state’s housing shortage.

He referred to the state government’s pilot modular build program, which was set up in 2021 as a reform to provide an alternate pathway to accelerate the delivery of social housing.

“In a difficult construction market, flexible delivery models are a key consideration for this government,” Mr Carey said.

“More than 100 modular homes have been completed or are under contract or construction throughout WA, in particular throughout regional WA including in the Pilbara, Great Southern, South West, Wheatbelt, Goldfields and the Kimberley.”