Only the developers can say for certain, and they don't seem to like to talk about the topic much.

One would think they could create an infinite amount of instanced housing for people that don't care about having/seeing player-neighbors, but they seem to be dead-set on the ward system. I hope improvements are in the pipeline, but I certainly haven't heard anything about it.

Personally, I refuse to buy an house so long as the inactivity-house-destruction timer is in place.