Chapter 5

The year of impulse.

2017 was the year in which we finally started to see balance sheets with volume: several homes in production at the same time and many conclusions on the table. The clearest of all: if we wanted to continue growing, we had to scale up. It was essential to increase the company’s capacity. More people, more structure and more production.

Meanwhile, the quality of our homes continued to rise, and our customers noticed. So much so that they asked for more. More design, more noble materials, more complex installations… Each house was a new challenge: for its structure, for the technical requirements, for the suppliers or for the innovation of the materials. And we, as always, with the energy to the maximum to solve and continue learning.

One of the most important highlights of the year was the launch of our first large catalogue of houses. It was a before and after. For the first time we unified all our models under the EMOHA construction system, and we offered a selection of more than 70 different houses, ordered by distribution, size or style. The catalogue also included a standardised quality report, with several levels and a wide selection of materials, something pioneering in the sector. But we also presented for the first time a series of success stories with homes that had already been built, which helped to visualise the final result with real examples. It was a very powerful tool to explain what we were doing and, above all, to show it. Here, Alfonso, an Italian architect who has been with us since the beginning and who by then had already become the guardian of the architectural quality of inHAUS, did his best. The work was brutal: he led the development of the catalogue together with part of the team, and many of the homes that appeared bore his stamp.

At the same time, the sales department was growing steadily. My brother led that part with an incredible capacity, and sales were multiplying. Many of them were homes of between five and six modules, the type of product that we had mastered to perfection at that stage. In order to be able to respond to all this movement, we expanded the team and increasingly professionalised the internal machinery: customer service, design, technical office, purchasing… Each new addition helped to consolidate the company model we were building.

And 2017 ended with a huge joy for everyone: Rubén was awarded Young Entrepreneur of the Year at the AJEV awards, at a gala that took place at the Reina Sofía Museum in Valencia. It was recognition not only for his tireless work, but also for the entire inHAUS project and the team that made it possible. A sign that, although there was still a long way to go, we were on the right track.
And then came the recognition: the awards started pouring in, one after the other. It was a real madness. But about that… I’d better tell you about it in my brother’s next letter.