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Peri 3D Construction is 3D-printing part of a three-floor, six-unit affordable apartment building in Germany.
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The max rent could range between $398 to $528 depending on the size of the unit.
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The first residents could move into their 3D-printed home in October 2024.
German residents will soon have the opportunity to move into an affordable apartment building with a futuristic twist — 3D-printed walls.
Peri 3D Construction, a prolific player in this burgeoning construction-tech industry, has a resume filled with projects like a two-story printed home currently underway in Houston.
Now, it's taking its concrete mix and BOD2 3D printer to the former coal-mining city of Lünen in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, to print a six-unit apartment building where rent could be capped at $528.
This project is on track to become Europe’s first publicly funded 3D-printed apartment building, according to the company.
Peri 3D Construction is a subsidiary of scaffolding and formwork manufacturing giant Peri Group. These days, its construction-tech arm has a packed schedule: The company is also printing a soccer clubhouse and data center in Germany.
The three-floor, six-unit building will span about 7,007 square-feet.
The individual apartments could range from about 657 square feet to 872 square feet.
As a publicly funded building, rent must be capped at 6 euros per square meter, or about $6.50 per 10.8 square feet.
This means renters could pay a maximum of 366 to 486 euros, or about $398 to $528.
Peri expects to complete its printing work by the end of November.
The team began construction in September and is predicting a total print time of less than 100 hours.
But that doesn’t mean the homes will be move-in ready next week: Only the walls of the first and second floor are being 3D-printed.
The top floor will be constructed using a "hybrid timber construction method," according to a release from COBOD, the maker of Peri's 3D printer.
Everything else, including the building's foundation, will be built traditionally, which is still common practice for the nascent 3D printing construction-tech.
The building could welcome its first residents in October 2024.
The North Rhine-Westphalia government is tapping into two investment pools to fund this project, which costs 1.9 million euros, or a little over $2 million.
According to a spokesperson for Peri, the state's "innovations in construction" and "public funding for living space" programs will pitch in 1.7 million euros, almost $1.85 million.
The final 200,000 euros (about $217,580) will come from the project's manager, real estate company WBG Lünen.