mg,
I respectfully disagree that "people are not given options" in housing. I have personally used the options of living in a 10-feet-wide house trailer, a concrete high-rise dormitory, a new brick house in a subdivision, a 1950s brick-and-stone-and timber mishmash, and a old farmhouse. My grandfathers each designed and built their own homes. My parents have had two houses built to their specifications (one a partly stone, mostly frame house and the other a log cabin, both in West Virginia, where tsunamis are unknown, tornadoes are rare, and stone and wood are plentiful). My wife and I are currently in the long, slow, expensive process of remodeling a partly-bricked wood frame house. If we were required to remodel with stone or brick, the process would be even slower. We know a good carpenter. We don't know a good mason. Just one more reason we like having liberty (and we'd like a little more, please).
Kent Davis