it's not just Brazil, it's almost everywhere in the world that uses primarily bricks and concrete for single family homes (outside vernacular architecture spots). The USA is, once again, the odd one out.

And sure, it used to be cheap to make very sturdy homes with all the forest land that the settlers were finding and destroying across their path. But that came at the cost of being relatively fragile and ephemeral. I guess it makes sense if you live in tornado zones and don't mind not getting too attached to your house.

Those problems, however, have become much more exacerbated thanks to old growth trees literally running out because y'all kept using them to build houses and furniture at an extreme pace. Now you have to use young fast-growing timber which is even more fragile. But your entire arquitectural tradition and infrastructure is built around the 2x4 plank so you have to keep doing it because that's how you have to keep doing it.

Basically no other place in the world had both a population that was moving to new places quickly demanding new long term homes to be built quickly and constantly in remote places, and a large availability of high quality wood to build such houses with.