Activating all houses gives extra 580 hp which can't be called useless, however most of players NEVER use it. Here I'm not talking about players which are in divison 4, but I'm talking on behalf of div (1-2-3) which are the majority of erepublik.
I'm not going in economical details but I will point the biggest problem about houses; http://prntscr.com/75s6wa
We can't use them since gaining exp is the harshest thing in erepublik for us lol. So we demand those work tickets to be used without ganing exp, so that many players in div (1-2-3) will certainly start using them, especially quality 1 since using it makes profit! Lefting those tickets to rot makes houses meaningless to use for many players.
Regards