An Oklahoma builder is creating America's first Airbnb community with foldable Boxabl homes in Stillwater. This project, called Pasadera, represents a radical shift in how housing gets built amid a supply crisis that has persisted for over a decade. The U.S. housing shortage, estimated at over 4 million units, has driven prices to record highs and excluded millions of Americans from the housing market. Boxabl, a Las Vegas-based technology company, is applying automotive assembly-line logic to housing construction, producing units in hours rather than years. This approach could fundamentally redefine how we address the nation's most urgent housing crisis.

The Big Picture

Foldable modular housing is gaining ground in a U.S. real estate market facing multiple structural challenges. The skilled construction labor shortage has reached critical levels, with over 400,000 open positions according to industry data. Simultaneously, material costs have increased more than 30% since 2020, and traditional construction timelines have significantly extended. Boxabl addresses these problems through a factory manufacturing model that produces complete homes in a controlled environment. The foldable design solves modular construction's historic shipping problem, allowing two units to travel on one truck while arriving completely finished and built to withstand extreme weather conditions, mold, and fire.

Boxabl's model works across multiple use cases, including backyard accessory dwelling units (ADUs), affordable housing communities, vertical duplexes, and short-term rentals, making it one practical and scalable response to the housing shortage. Zach Punnett, the builder behind the Pasadera project in Stillwater, Oklahoma, has been in the industry for 20 years and began seriously examining homebuilding's future eight years ago, motivated by the growing skilled-labor shortage and need for more efficient solutions. "Traditional construction is getting tougher every year with labor shortages and rising costs," explains Punnett. "Boxabl solves that by delivering homes that are already 95% finished from the factory, significantly reducing timelines and cost uncertainty."