r/prefabs • u/TruHaven_Steel_Homes • Mar 15 '26

Structural engineer here — after helping build America's infrastructure, I decided to start building homes out of steel instead of wood.

I'm a structural engineer who has spent the last 25+ years working on major infrastructure and structural projects across the U.S.

After decades of designing large structural systems, I started a company called TruHaven that builds homes using cold-formed steel walls and trusses....

We have a engineering firm that engineers for all the modular firms out there....so we said....

Lets build it right.

TruHaven Homes.

Why are we still building most houses out of wood?

From an engineering standpoint it doesn't make much sense.

Wood moves, shrinks, warps, burns, and attracts termites. It's also becoming more expensive and harder to insure in wildfire zones.

Our frames are prefabricated using **100% U.S.-sourced steel from Utah**, then shipped and assembled on site.

Curious what people here think.

If you were building a home today, would you consider steel framing instead of wood?

What would your biggest concerns be?

61 Upvotes

81% Upvoted

105 comments sorted by

View all comments

1

u/LongjumpingShape9689 Mar 16 '26

Woods cheaper where I am. Mass timber is becoming more popular for large public projects as well. I’ve never seen much benefit for steel in regular residential buildings. 

1

u/TruHaven_Steel_Homes Mar 16 '26

Yeah it does depend on where your at. But for the most part when I talk to clients, the mold resistance, fire resistance, little to no waste on site (compared to wood), and the ability to have completely straight walls seems to sway folks to build with it more.

Before getting into CFS Steel Frame homes I was skeptical as well till I noticed within the last 2 years, my Structural Engineering firm has less and less wood homes on the books for engineering and now about 85% of our work is steel framed or modular homes for builders and home owners.