Invited Talk: A Case Study on the Use of Existing Buildings As a Sustainable, Cost-Effective Solution for Affordable Housing

As populations continue to migrate into cities, housing affordability and long term infrastructure sustainability become pressing issues. In USA 31.5% of households are considered cost burdened, meaning they pay more than 30% of their income towards housing. In urban communities, that number rises to 46 percent.

Interestingly, some urban neighborhoods also possess a clustering of vacant, distressed properties. The collocation of economic issues with viable cost-effective infrastructure is an opportunity to meet the social challenge.

By extending the useful life of existing structures through renovation, economic and social resiliency can be introduced to otherwise overlooked neighborhoods. The embodied energy from the initial construction is put back into service and the building is rescued from functional obsolescence with conscious renovation. The purchase, renovate to rent model allows a targeted approach by focusing on gaining a critical mass in a specific geography. Furthermore, a greater production of housing units at all price points could play a pivotal role in reversing the longer-term rise in housing cost burdens.

In this work, we offer a case study of individual properties that function as catalyst for change in so called “Growth Value Neighborhoods”. Moderate, functional renovations that leverage existing materials prevent additional waste to landfill while simultaneously addressing the housing shortage plaguing the midwest United States.