Clicked because I want an $8800 house. The key part seems to be this line:

“But who is going to pay for these houses?” he asks. “The same donors who are currently failing to pay for adequate coverage with long-lasting insecticidal nets, costing about $1.20 per person-year of coverage?”

Put it that way, and even running the trial seems like a waste, because there's no way this was ever going to be cost-effective compared to nets. Perhaps it's meant to lead to more convenient housing techniques which could be applied with acceptable marginal cost; but if that's the case, why not just develop and test those cheaper techniques in the first place?