Modern Methods of Construction

The UK Government sees modern methods of construction (MMC) as vital to its ability to deliver 200,000 extra homes by 2016 and the creation of sustainable communities.

Timber frame is the ‘original’ modern method of construction. It’s as mainstream and low risk as you can get if you’re a developer or housing association interested in embracing MMC, but it embodies all the benefits:

• Full range of timber frame systems to match the different MMC categories – open panel, closed panel, volumetric, hybrid systems and SIPs
  
• All designed and produced with factory precision
  
• An integrated process, providing efficiency savings at every stage – design, offsite manufacturing and on-site erection
  
• Embraces the ‘Egan agenda’, including the spirit of partnering and supply chain integration

Mortgage lenders have no problems with timber frame – it satisfies all their key concerns about saleability, marketability and asset value. As Andrew Heywood from the Council of Mortgage Lenders told delegates at the BRE’s Offsite2005 conference (June 2005): “From a lenders’ perspective, timber frame is a real success story in terms of MMC.”

The Association of British Insurers says: “Insurance companies generally draw no distinction between modern timber frame and brick and block construction in their premium rate assessment, providing the external roof covering is also of tiles, natural or mineral sales or concrete.”

The Housing Corporation and English Partnerships have also confirmed that all forms of timber frame construction, including open panel timber frame systems, meet their definition of MMC (see Press Release.)"