If you have the budget to buy the ugly box, you have the budget to buy the cardboard house, knock it down and build something you like that isn't so enormous. We didn't have the budget for either so are just slowly renovating and hardening the house we bought.

My point isn't that houses are too expensive - that is beyond question at this point. Even your cardboard box would cost too much now for most anybody. What I do not understand is rich people buying ugly prefabricated stuff in general. I would use that budget for something bespoke.