It's my pleasure to welcome you here at the Clark Howard Show, our mission to serve and empower

you so you make better financial decisions in your life.

In today's episode, I want to talk about one of the partial solutions to the many, many

millions of housing units were short in the United States.

I've talked about many facets of this and you may wonder why I dwell so much on dwellings.

The reason is it is the largest individual expense people have in their lives for the place

they rent or the house they're buying.

And it is a key determinant about how financially secure or insecure people are, is what percent

of their take home pay they're devoting to housing.

And as you move up the percent, you start wheezing financially where there's no give

in your budget at all.

Well, we have lots of things we could be doing and you've heard me address some of them.

Recently, I talked about how 3D printed houses could make a big impact.

Now doing houses and factories or more often now apartment buildings are built in factories

and each apartment is put on a truck and then lowered into place by a crane and you can

build a lot quicker and cheaper.

And I want to talk about something else that is below the radar but quietly is changing

the possibilities in improving the financial picture for an existing homeowner and providing

an opportunity for more available housing, potentially a lower cost to others.

And that is what the urban planners call ADUs, accessory dwelling units.

And a lot of communities around the country, ADUs are illegal or against zoning.

But they appear anyway where people will sneak in a garage apartment or something like

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