A term referring to houses which are used for a limited period of time, then thrown away. A blessing to short-sighted bureaucrats and a bane to many urban planners, disposable housing is a phenomenon that plagues many urban areas in the midst of a housing crisis. People look to build houses as cheaply as possible, and as a result, the houses constructed in such a matter tend to fall apart extremely rapidly.
Disposable housing is primarily found in two areas of an urban area. The first area it's found in is the inner city, where it often takes the form of inexpensive apartments for low income families. The second area it is found in is large housing developments in the suburbs, where middle class families migrate to in search of inexpensive housing away from the crowds of the city. Though the two areas are far from each other, economically speaking, they often share many of the same problems.
The problems take the form of the countless small annoyances which pop up almost immediately. There may be a draft from a supposedly airtight window, or a hard to open door because the developer didn't take into account the fact that houses settle after time. More often than not, there is grossly inadequate soundproofing, leading to the ability to hear what a person upstairs is doing. Things just seem to break much more frequently than they should.
Perhaps one of the larger problems, though, is how it affects a growing neighborhood. The clearest example of this is how old and shoddy low income housing looks after a relatively short amount of time; cheap housing sometimes looks tired and old after only a couple years. That new housing development that was supposed to bring hope to the less fortunate quickly devolves into looking like any other nearby building - cheap and run-down. The cure quickly becomes just another symptom of the disease of urban blight.
Most cities and homeowners are fighting disposable housing due to its detrimental effects on a city. Legal action, such as lawsuits, and injunctions, have been brought against contractors who build shoddy, and in some cases dangerous, housing. Additionally, civic planners are beginning to keep a closer watch on new housing projects, so that they can better control the quality of new housing going into a city. Homeowners are fighting it for a very simple reason: a house is the largest investment a person makes, and no one wants to live in a quarter million dollar lemon.
The largest problem with disposable housing, though, is that it's one of those major issues that no one truly wants to talk about. Craftsmanship is a non-glamorous issue, especially when one consders that we're constantly being bombarded with rising housing costs and other issues related to a housing shortage. Additionally, most home buyers don't think about the components when they look at a new home. They look at the fact that everything looks shiny and new, and just take the word of the developer that everything is of the highest quality. As a result, it's up to the buyer to ensure that their home is of good quality; if quality can't be determined, your best bet is to buy another home. Dealing with a shoddy home is just not worth the hassle.