Most houses in Australia are built with wooden frames and whilst steel frame houses have been around for a long time, they never hit the mainstream. Why a steel frame home? There’s several reasons that helped influence this decision.
Structural Stability
Steel frames don’t warp or expand like wooden frames can. Having worked for a major real estate website and talking to a lot of real estate agents, I’ve heard a lot of horror stories of structural issues with wooden houses. I’m sure most wooden houses are fine, but it’s not really something I want to risk.
Steel frames are also more resistant to strong winds and earthquakes. These aren’t really concerns where we live, but it’s nice to know!
Lower Termite Risk
I’ve never had a termite problem in the past, but they aren’t something I ever want to worry about. I suppose they could probably try eating the plaster or the floorboards, but I don’t think they’d bother with our place when there’s plenty of nice wooden frames nearby for them.
Less Prone to Water Damage
Wood can be prone to fungus and rot if exposed to water, steel does not.
Lightning Resistant
The steel frames act like a lightning rod and sends the current straight into the ground. The chances of your house getting struck by lightning is very, very low, but who knows what nature will throw at you.
Faster Build Time
There can always be delays when building a home, but with prefabricated frames, the build can be slightly faster than wooden houses. I wouldn’t consider this a big selling point, but it’s a nice bonus.
I Loved the Design
We were originally looking to buy an existing home but struggled to find anything that suited a particularly large wall unit of cabinets I have that I’d like to bring from my parents’ place. My mum was looking at display homes and found this one that suited perfectly. This was probably the biggest factor, as well as the house and land package being in a better part of our town than other places we’d been looking at.
