Student Competition Promotes Innovative Solutions to Housing Affordability
Housing affordability is an ongoing challenge that continues to impact the country. According to the latest data from the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index (HOI), housing affordability is at its lowest level since the Great Recession. Challenges such as lack of lots and labor and rising material costs persist to hamper affordability issues, but the home building industry continues to look for ways to help alleviate these issues.
One such example is the Ivory Innovations' upcoming “Hack-a-House” competition — a 24-hour live event to promote innovative and scalable solutions. The competition invites student teams to pitch a proposal based on a selected theme — homelessness, environmental challenges and construction technology, or sustainable renting and affordable homeownership — and encourages teams to “consider how their solution interacts with existing policy, finance and/or construction and design practices.”
Teams will receive a prompt on Sept. 30 at 12 p.m. MST to kick off the competition. Four monetary awards totaling $10,000 will be given to winning teams.
Individuals or teams can register by Sept. 29 to enter the competition. More details are available at ivory-innovations.org/hackahouse.
Latest from NAHBNow
Dec 23, 2025
Lumber Capacity Has Peaked for 2025An annual revision to the Federal Reserve G.17 Industrial Production report shows current sawmill production levels above 2017 by 7.5%, but just 0.3% above 2023 levels.
Dec 22, 2025
Can Offsite Housing Solve the Housing Affordability Crisis?Offsite construction – a method in which components are planned, designed, fabricated in a factory setting and then transported and assembled onsite – is something more community-based organizations (CBOs) are turning to as a solution to the housing affordability crisis.
Latest Economic News
Dec 22, 2025
State-Level Employment Situation: September 2025In September 2025, nonfarm payroll employment was largely unchanged across states on a monthly basis, with a limited number of states seeing statistically significant increases or decreases. This reflects generally stable job counts across states despite broader labor market fluctuations. The data were impacted by collection delays due to the federal government shutdown.
Dec 19, 2025
Existing Home Sales Edge Higher in NovemberExisting home sales rose for the third consecutive month in November as lower mortgage rates continued to boost home sales, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR). However, the increase remained modest as mortgage rates still stayed above 6% while down from recent highs. The weakening job market also weighed on buyer activity.
Dec 18, 2025
Lumber Capacity Lower Midway Through 2025Sawmill production has remained essentially flat over the past two years, according to the Federal Reserve G.17 Industrial Production report. This most recent data release contained an annual revision, which resulted in higher estimates for both production and capacity in U.S. sawmills.