BillionBricks Net-zero Affordable Homes and Communities

BillionBricks addresses two problems: access to affordable housing and climate change.

Housing Crisis: Globally, 1.8 billion people lack adequate housing, with projections surpassing 3 billion by 2050. In the Philippines, 6.5 million people are in need of housing and there is an annual shortfall of over 100,000 affordable homes.

Carbon Emissions: The building sector is responsible for 34% of global carbon emissions. The largest construction sector globally is housing. Construction of buildings, especially affordable housing is inevitable and essential. Most countries across the world have pledged to reduce their carbon emissions. This is specially challenging in developing countries where growth rates are high and as more people are coming out of poverty, their footprint is increasing.

BillionBricks offers a unique solution to these problems. Our net-zero communities with integrated solar energy directly reduce housing costs for homeowners, lower energy consumption, and combat carbon emissions. This approach makes homeownership more attainable while driving a transition towards sustainable energy.

BillionBricks designs affordable, net-zero homes and communities. Our core product is a 45 sqm, 2-story house with a 10 kWp solar roof. Communities with 1,000 of these houses create a 10 MW rooftop solar farm, enabling separate solar infrastructure financing through long-term PPAs. Revenue from energy sales are shared with homeowners, reducing homeownership costs by 20%. The combined development is completely net zero for its embodied and operational needs over its 60-year lifespan.

Product Concepts & Prototypes:

Concept Video: 

Prototype Video: 

We enhance construction efficiency through partial prefabrication, reducing construction time by 20%. The homes are built for earthquake and typhoon resilience, offering higher quality living. Our proprietary PowerShade roofing system eliminates the need for a traditional roof, integrating solar panels directly to the house for cost savings.

BillionBricks has developed a design and master planning software to streamline project development and expedite decision-making. All homeowners are given a tablet with a BillionBricks app installed to track energy consumption and mortgage savings in real-time, promoting transparency and informed energy use.

Affordable housing is a significant challenge for low-income families in the Philippines, particularly for those working in low-income jobs such as security guards, drivers, factory workers, and entry-level professionals with a monthly household income of USD $400-$800. These families often struggle to qualify for commercial bank loans due to their financial constraints and are typically served by government-backed mortgage programs such as PAG-IBIG, which offer low-interest long-term mortgages. However, these programs also cap the selling price of homes, limiting the options available to these families.

Despite an active affordable housing construction market in the Philippines, the demand for such housing still exceeds supply by over 50%. Many low-income families either live in rental housing or with their extended families. One of the reasons for this shortfall is the lack of financing options for developers, particularly mid-sized and smaller ones who rely on their balance sheets to fund housing projects.

There is increasing demand for clean and renewable energy. Many fortune 500 companies and governments have pledged to reduce their carbon footprint and shift their usage to renewbale energy. Therefore there is increasing demand. Building solar infrastrucutre requires large areas of land which could otherwise be used for agriculture and other economic development. BillionBricks uses rooftops to meet this demand in inner city areas.

BB's team members hold expertise in both real estate and renewable energy. They are people who have on ground experience in executing projects and staying close to the community. Most of our team is local in the Philippines and they therefore have a strong understanding of the people, their needs and aspirations. We spend significant time visiting houses, interviewing people at the community, interacting with businesses that hae demand for renwable energy, engaging with government officials and reaching out to all stakeholders involved.

For community feedback, we have conducted online and offline surveys. We have ran social media campaigns to gather interest, contact lists and receive feedback through comments. We have conducted focus group studies with real estate agents and future homeowners. We have built a show house to learn of their first hand experience. These collaborations have guided the designs and features of the BillionBricks net-zero home and communities, taking into account the country's specific climate and cultural factors.

We have built strategic partnerships with local developers such as Cathay Land, Sitoza, and Archinet International to strengthen our local knowledge in real estate, construction, and home financing. In addition, we have engaged in productive dialogue with key government agencies, such as the Department of Energy and the Energy Regulatory Commission, to ensure that our housing solutions are fully compliant with all relevant regulations and policies.

BillionBricks is in the Pilot Phase. We have successfully constructed four prototype houses, sold 8 houses and 16 houses are under construction for sale. We also have an additional pipeline of 26 houses that will be built within 2024.

The prototypes have helped validate:
1. The cost of construction our house
2. Experience and acceptance of living in our house
3. Validated a concern of insurance agencies that people can live under a large solar roof with no negative impacts or risk of fire etc.
4. Test incrementally improved versions of our PowerShade roof and improving the water tightness and measuring insulation properties of the roof
5. We can raise funds and have the ability to build them with localy contracted labour

The first 16 homes will validate:
1. We can receive permits and all regulatory approvals
2. Housing finance agency's appraisal value on a BB home and what concessions will we receive for building a sustainable house
3. Willing home buyers are paying holding deposit in our house. We have received US$900 holding deposit for our first 8 houses
4. We can partner with developers to co-build the houses
5. We can make profit in these projects

The next 26 houses will validate:
1. We can sign up more projects than one
2. We can work with regulations across different local government units
3. We can be consistent with our business model
4. We can reduce risk and be more efficient in our returns.

BillionBricks seeks to accelerate the scaling of our affordable, net-zero housing model. We believe Solve's network and resources can help us overcome key challenges and achieve greater impact:

Technology: Guidance on integrating the latest smart home technologies and further maximizing energy efficiency in our designs.

Global Expansion: Connect us with partners in other developing countries facing similar housing and energy challenges, allowing us to scale and replicate our model.

Community Engagement: We want to partner with organizations specializing in community-driven design to ensure our solutions are culturally appropriate and truly meet the needs of the communities we plan to serve in.

Business Model Refinement: We'd value mentorship on refining our product-market fit and overall growth strategy.

Financial Support: Access to funding and guidance in pitching to investors would be instrumental as we scale.

BillionBricks' core innovation is our financial model that integrates affordable housing with rooftop solar energy generation. By constructing net-zero housing communities that function as utility-scale solar farms, we shift the cost of solar infrastructure away from homeowners. Instead of bearing upfront costs, homeowners benefit from free electricity, monthly cashbacks, and essentially get a roof at no additional expense.

This integrated approach has several advantages:

Accessibility: It makes homeownership financially viable for a much wider demographic.

Dual-Purpose Investment: Our model combines housing and energy investment, reducing risk and potentially increasing ROI compared to separate ventures.

Sustainability Funding: It channels clean energy investment into the affordable housing sector, where funding is often limited.

With continued development and scaling, this model could be replicated across the globe. It has the potential to revolutionize affordable housing by demonstrating that financial feasibility and environmental sustainability can coexist, attracting new investors and incentivizing similar models worldwide.

Theory of Change:

Activities: Develop net-zero affordable housing communities, partner with energy off-takers, and implement a homeowner revenue-sharing model.

Outputs: Increased number of affordable net-zero homes, increased home ownership amongst low income families, reduced homeownership costs, clean energy generation, reduction in carbon emissions

Outcomes: More disposable income amongst low income families to spend on education, health, jobs and entertainiment, increase in construction activity will lead to overall economic development, job creation and increase in GDP growth; savings in mortgages will enable financial institution to reduce their risk and provide capital to more people; clean renewable energy usage will help local and national governments meet their renewable energy and carbon emission targets

Increased Homeownership: Enable a greater percentage of low-income families to become homeowners (measured by the number of homes sold and the average income of buyers).

Reduced Costs: Significantly lower housing ownership and electricity usage costs (tracked through average monthly savings on mortgages and electricity bills).

Climate Impact: Promote net-zero housing and renewable energy adoption to reduce carbon emissions (measured by clean energy generated and reduced CO2 emissions).

Community Well-being: Create safe, convenient, and empowering communities for women, children, and the elderly (measured by resident satisfaction surveys).

Financial Investment: Facilitate the flow of capital into affordable housing and clean energy. To date, BillionBricks has raised USD $10M for project development, demonstrating the viability of our model.

BillionBricks leverages a combination of hardware and software technologies to optimize construction, reduce environmental impact, and enhance the homeowner experience:

PowerPlan: Our proprietary feasibility software automates design and financial modeling, streamlining project development by over 90%.

PowerShade: This patent-filed integrated solar roofing system eliminates the need for traditional roofing, reducing material costs by 5%. We are also developing light gauge steel prefabrication technologies for efficient mass production.

The 'B' App: The homeowner app provides construction updates, energy performance tracking, and enables homeowner-to-homeowner communication. We are partnering to expand app features to include services like online healthcare and education.

Full-time : 12
Part-time: 6

We have been working on this solution since March 2020.

BillionBricks prioritizes diversity, equity, and inclusion. We have formal policies in place promoting equality, fair recruitment, and protection of vulnerable groups. Our team is 45% female and includes local hires in the Philippines, amounting to 75%. We actively recruit individuals with diverse backgrounds and skillsets, and have hired people with disabilities and of varying ages. We have staff members who are proudly from the LGBTQIA+ community. Our processes aim to minimize bias, creating a workplace where individuals of all backgrounds and sexual orientations feel respected and valued.

BillionBricks is a triple bottom line social business which combines affordable housing and rooftop utility scale solar farm into a single financially viable business proposition. Our core product is a standardized and replicable solar social housing property development of 1,000 homes and 10MW rooftop solar PV that are built on the back of housing mortgages and of long-term PPA’s. The housing revenue and solar revenue support each other and thus allows the house mortgage costs and solar tariffs to outcompete stand-alone offers in each category, making it synergetic.

The communities are developed as standard infrastructure projects in special purpose vehicles that are financed on the basis of equity and debt, generating above normal project returns in comparison to independent projects.

How this model works:

Project Financing: BillionBricks builds housing using traditional methods of raising initial capital based on market feasibility and subsequent capital on the basis of pre-sales of homes. The homes are financed through government-backed mortgage programs targeted towards low-income families.

Solar Infrastructure Financing: The solar rooftop infrastructure is financed, separately from the houses, against long-term PPA contracts with local businesses and distribution utilties.

Cost Reduction: Combining housing and energy generation reduces development costs, leading to a projected blended equity IRR exceeding 18% over 25 years (againgst 11 to 13% for energy and affordable housing).

Homeowner Benefit: Energy sales generate free electricity and monthly cashbacks for homeowners, reducing homeownership costs by 20%.

Environmental Impact: Communities become net-negative in carbon emissions, attracting green financing, accessing new revenue streams (like RECs), and potentially lowering mortgage rates for homeowners.

Construction Innovation: BB is investing in construction technologies to further reduce construction costs by 20% over the next 5 years.

Potential for scale: Replicating our model to meet just 40% of housing shortfall in the Philippines will generate 28.3 GW of clean renewable energy which will double the countries current capacity. It would reduce the countries' carbon emissions by 4.6% and saving homeowners over USD 28B in mortgage payments.

BillionBricks has a multi-phase strategy to achieve financial sustainability:

Phase 1 (Completed): Construction of 3 prototype houses in India and the Philippines, funded by grants (Omidyar Network, Shell, Mercy Relief, and others), validated the feasibility of the concept and its ability to attract capital.

Phase 2 (Completed): Identified Philippines as the launch market. We built a new prototype house based on customer feedback. Feasibility studies and MOA's with two local housing developers and one energy company yielded positive results, attracting USD 3 million in seed funding from angels, corporate and impact investors. We also received over USD 10 million as a credit line to develop our first community project.

Phase 3 (In Progress): We have signed 3 projects for a total of 42 homes for our proof of concept (POC). We've completed construction on 8 homes and have an additional 16 under construction. These homes validate regulatory compliance, homeowner acceptance, and our ability to collaborate effectively with partners that have mutual financial and impact objectivesd. These projects generate a moderate return of 20% and is profitable.

Phase 4: POC success will unlock our first 1,000 home/10MW community projects. We are currently pursuing 5 such opportunities in the Philippines. We will be raising additional venture funding and project financing to deliver these projects.

Phase 5: Our goal is to scale to 5,000 homes/50MW annual development capapcity within the next five years. In this phase, we will be highly profitable and impactful. We will be raising capital from PE funds, international development organisations and governments to deliver the above capacity.

Phase 6: Expanding into one additional emerging market where we've seen strong interest (Indonesia, Malaysia, India, Nigeria) through a demand study. We will be relying on our own funds, possible joint ventures, or VCs to expand into the new market.