> Instead, people break ground knowing they do not yet have the funds to finish. This is pretty common actually. You build one room, make it livable, and then

> Instead, people break ground knowing they do not yet have the funds to finish. This is pretty common actually. You build one room, make it livable, and then build the next room, then the next, and when you run out of land, start on the second story. The end result is that a young family with children can own their own home, and live within their means immediately, rather than spend a decade renting and saving towards a down payment. You can see this over and over in the favellas of South America, and even on the outskirts of major cities in Vietnam like Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City ("Saigon"). Modern/western building codes do not allow for this kind of piecemeal construction, which is probably why it seems so odd to us.