Gamifying the Housing Market

Sarah Murray — a digital housing developer and a key player in the establishment of PLACE Technologies, delivers a talk on sustainable housing, in which she highlights the present crisis and offers tech-friendly and cost-effective solutions. In a search for democratized design and construction that allows for individuals to have greater control and input in the development of their own home, Sarah Murray creates the PLACE game. This is essentially a gamification of the housing market, by way of digital tools and computer-aided design.

The premise of the initiative is to elevate the soon-to-be homeowner "from spectator to player" and provide them with full visibility of cost and environmental impact. Sarah Murray advocates the modular components of her gamified construction system as they have the potential of "decreasing construction costs by 20% and environmental waste by 15%." In addition, the players who are constructing their own home, are contributing to a home for someone in need at a ten-to-one ratio.

During the remainder of her talk on sustainable housing, Sarah Murray expresses her hopes for the PLACE game and her deep belief that 3D printing and other computer-aided design is a way to solve the housing crisis and lower the environmental impact of construction.