Honestly, at this point, I'd rather see a 'housing' option that is more like a settlement (or a completely-isolated area per person/FC) completely outside of the cities.

You get your land cheap/free, but you have to gather enough materials to actually build the entirety of the house.
I know people were joking about buying tents, but that'd actually be a good option; Get your land, gather some cloth, rope, etc. and set up a tent until you can start getting enough lumber/metal to build up a framework, then go from there...