Quick-fix housing

Parikhshet Nayar had to wait for over a decade before the idea he imported from the US could take business roots in India. Nayar, director of the Delhi-based Catapult Instafab, is trying to sell the idea of pre-fabricated houses.

"It is a hassle-free housing solution. All you need is an open space; no bricks, no mortar, no months waiting for your house to be ready. We'll get a house built in six weeks time as compared to over nine months that conventional construction takes," he says.

Pre-fabricated houses do not use conventional building material. The basic frame is made of steel; the outer walls and the roof are made of either bison boards or cement sheets; laminated boards or gyp boards can be used for inner walls.

The walls can have wall paper or wood panelling. Wooden floors or Italian marble or tiles are there as per the customer's preference. Inside the house there are no beams or pillars.The whole structure stands on stilts.

"The most important aspect is the insulation between the inner and outer walls," says Nayar. "The insulation helps in eliminating outside sound and keeping the house warm." The material used for insulation is a layer of specially-made thermocol, glass wool and wire mesh to hold the wool to the thermocol.

"The first step is to approve the design and lay out plans. We then fabricate the walls, roof and floors at our workshop. It takes around a month to get everything together. The pieces are then carried to the customer's site where it is put together like a jigsaw puzzle.

"It takes a maximum of six weeks from the date of design approval to having a complete house," says Nayar. It takes around 10 days to dismantle the house. According to him prefabricated houses are a great idea in places prone to seismic shocks.

He quickly adds that the housing solution that his company is providing is not cheaper than conventional construction. A standard structure may cost Rs 650 per sq ft, which can go up to Rs 1,200 per sq ft. His client base is the middle and upper middle class.

As for the decade-long wait for his dream to materialise, he says that over the last ten years or so the mindsets of people have changed and customers are more open to new ideas.

Catapult Instafab, a division of Neha Deep Constructions, was launched in November, 2003. In the last couple of months there have been close to 300 enquiries of which five per cent have been converted to customers.

Nearly 80 per cent of this are people who have terraces and want to add another floor; there are also resort owners who want to carry pre-built houses to the hills; another segment are plot owners in the Gurgaon region who now want to build houses that can be rented out.

Nayar is positive that in 12 months his company will do business worth Rs 1.5 crore.