Who actually builds these
Eight companies, four business models, and wildly different answers to the question of whether the thing they sell you is legally a home.
Boxabl
The category anchor. Boxabl builds the Casita, a 361 sq ft studio unit that folds down to roughly 8.5 feet wide so it can be towed on a standard highway trailer and unfolded on site in about an hour. The company's pitch is assembly-line housing: one factory footprint in North Las Vegas, one product, high volume. It is the most searched and most argued-about name in foldable housing, and the only pure-play foldable home maker trading on a US exchange.
Brette Haus
Brette Haus (legal entity Brette Haus SIA) builds hinged CLT-and-timber cabins that fold flat for transport and are craned into position, with the walls and roof rotating into place in a few hours. The line spans compact studios (Compact 18/27) to two-storey cabins (Rustic range), and the aesthetic is Nordic rather than industrial. Brette Haus ships to North America as an export order at added cost, but no US certification is confirmed — budget carefully for ocean freight, duty, and permitting.
Ten Fold Engineering
Ten Fold (UK entity incorporated 2010, folding technology unveiled around 2015) builds a patented counterbalanced lever system that lets a transportable box unfold itself into roughly three times its travel footprint in minutes, with no crane and no site assembly. It now markets the TF-20 as a product it intends to build and sell rather than a pure licensing play — but it has never shipped a commercial unit and its timelines have repeatedly slipped. Treat it as pre-production, not a retail purchase.
Nestron
Nestron makes fully finished capsule homes with a strong industrial-design identity — curved shells, integrated smart systems, delivered furnished. They are not foldable in the hinged sense; they arrive complete and are craned into place, which makes them a direct competitor for the same buyer even though the engineering is different. The lineup spans Cube One/Two/Two X and Legend One/Two/Two X. US buyers should verify certification and permitting before ordering — approval is local and case-by-case.
Chery Industrial
A US-based (Garden City, NY) heavy-equipment and prefab importer/reseller that has become one of the highest-volume sellers of expandable container buildings, largely through its own site plus Walmart and Amazon. The units are cheap, fast to deploy, and honestly described as portable buildings rather than permitted dwellings. They are the entry point of the category and the reason so many people believe foldable homes cost around $20,000 — though the 19 ft × 20 ft unit now starts closer to $30,000.
Jupe
Jupe builds flat-packed hospitality units designed to be deployed in under two hours by two people with no foundation and no grid connection. The target buyer is hospitality, landowners, and remote workers rather than the permitted primary-residence market. Its current lineup is a single ~106 sq ft unit; the earlier 'Rest/Care/Plus' names were a 2020 COVID-era healthcare line, not the consumer product. It is the clearest example of a foldable structure that is deliberately not trying to be a house.
Ecocapsule
Ecocapsule (by design firm Nice Architects) builds a small off-grid pod. The famous 2015–2018 original had an integrated wind turbine; the currently sold egg model ('Ecocapsule Home', €99,000) is solar-plus-battery only, and the company's 2026 flagship is a new rectangular 'Box' line. Production runs are limited and the price per square foot is the highest in the category by a wide margin. It belongs on this list because it repeatedly shows up in foldable-home shopping research, and because buyers deserve to know it is a boutique off-grid product, not a housing solution.
PackPrefab
A US seller of expandable and folding prefab homes operating across Texas metros (Houston, Dallas, Austin), notable for a rare public price list and published engineering ratings (wind, seismic, fire). It claims a 500,000 sq ft manufacturing hub operating 'since 1998', but that history is marketing-stated and unverified, and no unit carries a HUD or modular certification seal.
EROMMY
An established US direct-to-consumer outdoor-goods brand (business addresses in Ontario/Fontana, California) that expanded into expandable container houses, sold through its own store and Amazon. Manufacturing is overseas; the US entity is the retail/import arm. It offers clear US shipping and a 60-day return window, but final pricing is deposit-plus-configuration and no unit carries US residential certification.
M.A.Di Home
M.A.Di (by Italian wood specialist Area Legno, designed by architect Renato Vidal) is a folding cross-laminated-timber A-frame house that ships flat and is pitched up into shape with a crane and three people in about six hours. It is a genuinely different format from Boxabl and the container units, with documented anti-seismic performance. The brand is active in Europe, but a current North American purchase path is unconfirmed and its published pricing dates from 2017–2019 press.
Feekercn
A Henan, China manufacturer (Henan Feeker Import & Export) selling folding/expandable container houses into the US via Amazon under the Feekercn brand. It publishes concrete folded and deployed dimensions, but the construction is generic, no unit carries code certification, and buyers take on Chinese import logistics.
CHOMEX
CHOMEX Corp. (CHOMEX stands for Container Home Expandable) is a Brooklyn-based retail operation — incorporated April 2024, BBB-accredited October 2024 — that sells a lineup of Chinese-manufactured expandable container homes direct to US buyers via its own Shopify store, with free nationwide delivery on the continental US. Its models range from a 195 sq ft 10-ft pod to an 865 sq ft 40-ft three-bedroom unit, all sharing the same wing-fold expandable design. Prices are posted publicly — rare for this category — and Affirm financing is available. The units are manufactured overseas (the company's business certifications list the Chinese Ministry of Commerce), and they are not wired to US electrical code; a licensed electrician is required to finish hookups. No HUD, modular, or RV certification is carried. What CHOMEX offers that most competing importers do not is a clear US point of contact, a published 3-year structural warranty, and a BBB A rating.
Hapi Homes
Hapi Homes (legal entity HAPI HOMES HOLDINGS INC.) is a New York-based, vertically integrated prefab home builder co-founded in 2020 by Mary O'Brien and Mohamed Ahmed. The company's central innovation is a patented folding technology that compresses a fully pre-assembled home to roughly one-quarter of its deployed volume for transport, then unfolds and anchors on site in as little as eight hours. The lineup spans compact foldable emergency units (Heuston, Glenflesk) through to light-steel-frame panelized residences and ADU lines. Hapi Homes is not a container-home importer — it designs, engineers, and manufactures its structures using precision light-gauge steel framing, and manages permitting, installation, and certified-installer networks in the US. The company holds ISO 9001, CE, CNAS, Bureau Veritas (BV), and ICC certifications. Confirmed deliveries include projects for the US Virgin Islands Bureau of Corrections, the Odesa Red Cross in Ukraine, and residential customers in New Hampshire and other US states.
Magic Box Tiny House
Magic Box Tiny House (MBTH) is a factory-direct Chinese manufacturer of aluminium-frame tiny homes, shipping to all 50 US states, Australia, Canada, and 60+ countries since 2015. Its ISO 9001-certified facility in Yantai, Shandong produces laser-cut 6063 aluminium-frame units — lighter, non-corrosive, and termite-proof compared to steel-frame competitors. The flagship product for US buyers is the MagicSlide, a patented slide-out tiny house on wheels (THOW) that compacts to highway-legal width for transport and expands via electric motors on site. All THOW models carry ANSI A119.5 (park model) certification verified through QAI and are DOT-approved for towing in all 50 states. There is no US dealer network — the company sells factory-direct with logistics handled end-to-end from Yantai. Pricing is quote-based; no public price list is published for the expandable MagicSlide line.
JEEZOO
JEEZOO is a China-based expandable container house manufacturer operating under the VOLFERDA parent company, with two production facilities totaling 40,000 m² in Foshan, Guangdong (10,000 m², near major ports) and Hengshui, Hebei (30,000 m², for steel fabrication and batch runs). The brand focuses on residential and commercial applications, selling factory-direct globally with documented US projects in Texas (RV parks, farm accommodation) and Colorado (resort). Its lineup spans 10 ft to 40 ft wing-fold expandable container houses — all shipped folded in standard 40HQ containers and expanded on-site using a two-wing system in hours. ISO 9001 and CE certified; monthly production capacity exceeds 200 units across both facilities. JEEZOO gained specific US-market attention in a September 2026 Offsite Builder Magazine feature on foldable homes. The brand is relatively new (website content dated February 2026), and sells via quote-and-order direct from China with no US entity, showroom, or service center. Electrical wiring is AS/NZS coded (Australian standard) rather than NEC; US buyers must hire a licensed electrician for final hookups.
Unfold House
Unfold House Inc. (Creve Coeur, Missouri) builds the Ori, a 482 sq ft studio ADU that ships in two steel-framed modules — a stationary core and a folding wing — which are craned into position and unfolded on-site in one day, with 4–6 days of finish work to complete the envelope and utility connections. The concept is positioned directly against Boxabl: factory-built, fully furnished on arrival, designed to the 2022 International Building Code, and listed at $80,000 including import tariffs. The manufacturing facility is in China and is described as still being established; deliveries are geographically selective and require a project feasibility review before production starts. The company claims at least one confirmed US delivery as of mid-2026. What differentiates Unfold House from Chinese container-home exporters is the degree of US-code alignment: 100A UL-listed electrical panel, NEC-designed factory wiring, IBC/IMC/IPC/IECC-referenced materials, and a published spec book. What it lacks is any US state modular or HUD certification seal, so local permitting remains the buyer's responsibility.