Comparative literature synthesis of sustainable low cost housing materials and a preliminary adaptive material selection framework

Abstract Selecting materials for low-cost housing requires simultaneous consideration of economic constraints, environmental burdens, technical performance, durability, and implementation feasibility. This article presents a comparative literature-based synthesis of a retained 29-source corpus with a recent-literature emphasis on 2021–2026 rather than a comprehensive historical boundary. One seminal 2019 review was retained for conceptual continuity. Because original search logs, duplicate-removal records, and exclusion lists were unavailable, the corpus is neither exhaustive nor fully reproducible and the article is not presented as a systematic or scoping review. Seven analytical material categories were compared using five author-defined criteria: affordability and life-cycle cost; environmental performance; technical performance and durability; implementation feasibility; and sustainability and circularity relevance. Environmental performance was most strongly represented, whereas complete life-cycle cost, long-term durability, code acceptance, and verified implementation capacity were less consistently documented. Conventional systems retained advantages in standards, supply chains, construction familiarity, and scale. Low-carbon conventional systems offered a potentially pragmatic transition pathway, while earth-, bamboo-, recycled-, plastic-waste-, and bio-based materials showed context-dependent benefits that varied with intended function, climate, treatment, quality control, maintenance, and regulatory acceptance. Direct cross-material ranking was constrained by heterogeneous functional units, life-cycle boundaries, service-life assumptions, transport distances, and maintenance scenarios. A preliminary adaptive material selection framework is proposed using transparent 1–5 scoring, context-specific weighting, evidence-confidence flags, and non-compensatory safety checks. The framework is illustrative, nonoperational, and nonvalidated; expert elicitation, stakeholder consultation, regional case testing, sensitivity analysis, and comparison with actual housing decisions are required before project-level use.