Building Community Through Innovation: Let's Build Oregon 2025

All photo credits: Miguel Higgins Moy

At the Missing Middle Housing Fund (MMHF), our vision is simple...housing for everyone. That was the underlying motto of the day at Let’s Build Oregon on June 12th, where housing innovators, developers, and community leaders came together at Autodesk's SE Portland facility to collaborate on solutions for Oregon's housing production challenges. The event demonstrated the power of bringing together diverse stakeholders to tackle one of our state's most pressing issues.

A Day of Innovation and Collaboration

Let’s Build Oregon opened with an Innovation Trade Show in the morning, featuring 20 cutting-edge companies showcasing solutions across the housing innovation spectrum. From AI-powered development tools to sustainable mass timber construction, the exhibitors represented the future of housing production across the four innovation quadrants of products, design, and assembly; financing and funding; regulations and policy; and workforce and labor.

Companies included:

• 3PO Networks - Modern sewer and fiber optic broadband where limited infrastructure exists

• Big River Community Land Trust - Affordable homes maintained through land ownership and stewardship of the trust

• CedarStone - First CLT home pre-approved as ADU

• CivCheck - Code compliance education software that speeds up permitting

• Corbu - Advancing AI-powered housing design tools

• Green Canopy Node - Prefabricated, sustainable building kits

• HumanKind Homes - Design-manufacture-build system with a fire-resistant kit of interlocking bricks, beams, and panels

• Mahonia NW - Prefabricated panel cottage cluster developments

• Mods PDX - Sustainable, energy-efficient offsite construction modules

• Oregon Department of Forestry - Supporting mass timber solutions and healthier forests 

• Oregon Homeworks/Snug – Curated cottage home designs

• Prophetic - Real estate development software that integrates zoning maps with development opportunity analysis

• Scoreboard AI - Software that reads construction drawings and identifies problems to solve early in the process

• Simplicity by Hayden Homes - Attainable, high-quality homes and workforce housing solutions

• Tallwood Design Institute - Interdisciplinary research collaborative focused on advancement of mass timber and other wood product solutions

• TruForm Tiny– Pioneers in tiny home construction

• Ulama - Unlocking building permitting bottlenecks through automated code compliance analysis

• Unbrick USA - Modular cross laminated timber (CLT) homes with roots in the Netherlands

• UrbanForm - Digitized zoning navigation platform

• Alphaledger - Blockchain technology platform that provides a municipal loan and bond marketplace that streamlines debt financing (Did not exhibit in person)

Several of the companies are also part of Autodesk’s Research Residency Program, which aims to connect and launch innovators with the assistance of Autodesk’s software and mentorship resources. Autodesk served as one of the summit’s sponsors, which helped to fund partial travel stipends for innovators traveling to Portland from NYC and the San Francisco Bay area.

Following the trade show, participants engaged in facilitated breakout sessions focused on helping these innovators to launch plans to reduce barriers, achieve their goals, and scale their products and services across the region.

Immediate Impact and Ongoing Projects

The energy and momentum generated during "Let's Build Oregon" has already translated into tangible action. Multiple project teams formed during the event, with many already beginning to actively collaborate and plan their first meetings.

Project examples include a private-public-non-profit workforce housing development partnership on the Oregon Coast; the creation of an incubation fund to help finance R&D costs for housing innovators; the creation of a missing middle directory and technology platform that would help connect parties interested in workforce housing collaboration; and the creation of an innovation hub that would enable workforce housing organizations to test and build housing in a shared facility.

Celebrating Our Partners and Sponsors

At the MMHF, gratitude is one of our core values. We’d like to give thanks to the many partners and sponsors who made our first innovation-focused Let’s Build summit a success.

A huge shoutout goes to Cara Turano from the Oregon Entrepreneurs Network (OEN), who delivered an inspiring lunch presentation that energized participants for the afternoon sessions. Cara gave an overview of OEN’s role in supporting innovators across Oregon and shared candid stories about braving the challenges of starting a new business (hint: taxes need to get filed with the state, not in the file drawer) and the huge rewards attainable on the other side (examples: the corn dog and maraschino cherry were born out of Oregon start-ups!)

Additionally, we are grateful for the generous support of our event sponsors, including Autodesk, Simplicity by Hayden Homes, League of Oregon Cities, and Summit Bank. A delicious pizza lunch was provided by Baby Doll Pizza in SE Portland.

Autodesk deserves special recognition not only as our primary sponsor but also as our gracious host, providing the perfect venue that embodied the spirit of innovation and collaboration overlooking the Willamette River and Portland city skyline. What made Autodesk such an excellent partner extends far beyond their generosity. They have been actively addressing the housing crisis through generative design to support modular housing that is sustainable, habitable, and cost-effective, aligning perfectly with the Missing Middle Housing Fund's mission. Their research initiatives and commitment to solving complex design challenges made them an ideal collaborator for this inaugural innovation event.

Lastly, a huge thanks to our outstanding facilitators who helped guide the breakout groups and get teams to the finish line with their project solutions. Their energy and enthusiasm embodied the spirit of our Let’s Build events. Thank you, Daisy Goebel, Doug Rux, Micah Child, Alana Mongkhounsavath, Keni Nelson, Ian Cahoon, Loren Guerriero, and Ryan Olsen.

Looking Forward: Building on Success

The success of "Let's Build Oregon" demonstrates the power of bringing together diverse stakeholders around a shared mission. Our approach of facilitating collaboration rather than simply presenting information created an environment where real solutions could emerge and take root.

As our CEO, Nate Wildfire, often says, the scale of Oregon's housing challenges means "all of us are needed." This event proved that when innovators, policymakers, developers, and community leaders come together with a shared commitment to action, meaningful progress becomes possible.

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