The article mentions it at the bottom briefly, but Gigabyte's gaming box basically does what the hacked together Thunder 2 setup does and at a lower cost ($100 premium over the graphics card alone): https://amzn.to/2NPyXEM.
It also comes with Thunderbolt 3 instead of 2. I'm not sure why the author simply buy that unit and be done with it since it's probably cheaper than the combined costs of all his parts and doesn't have a giant desktop power supply sticking out the back.
Author here. Unfortunately, according to numerous accounts[1], the TB3 to TB2 adapter does not work when you're trying to use an Nvidia eGPU with a Macbook that has an Nvidia dGPU. (Mine has the 750M.) Additionally, the gaming box uses a custom card (so less resale value) and seems to have limited support for other GPUs (thus reducing its use as a general-purpose case).
But yes, for most people, it's almost certainly the better buy. (Though it's still not officially supported, apparently.)
It also comes with Thunderbolt 3 instead of 2. I'm not sure why the author simply buy that unit and be done with it since it's probably cheaper than the combined costs of all his parts and doesn't have a giant desktop power supply sticking out the back.