manufactured houses that really appeal to me

[catherine]

I do like Countryview, but I also find Homestead appealing. Mostly I like the picture in Homestead that shows a wine refrigerator in the office area! That's the way to work from home!

[happystuff]

I like them both, actually, but they are still a bit bigger than I would like. Love the openness and the porches.

[iris lilies]

I regularly look at new houses in my hometown in Iowa because it is a classic middle-class ro low-middle class suburb and I like to see what schlock is being built.

They are building 1200, 1300, and 1400 ft.² houses so these are smallish. These houses are super expensive though in my view, they’re like $350,000+ and for that you get typical grey finishes of engineered wood and white/grey everything. Oh and also, you get giant garages, a 2 car and a 1 car both sitting in front of the house.

I have nothing against paying $350,000 for an architect designed smallish house with quality finishes, but these are not that.

I suppose this high price is reflecting the cost of building materials going up in today’s environment?

[KayLR]

I like both of them, would prefer one-story at this time of life, though.

I always get eye-rolls from DH (and others) on the subject of manufactured homes. Like they're low-class, upscaled trailer homes. What is your take on that perspective?

To me, they're on foundations, simply manufactured off-site. What else is the difference?

[JaneV2.0]

My take on that perspective is that it's common, but not particularly well-thought out. I shared it once upon a time--until a relative bought one in a park geared to old folks. She has complete privacy, no lawn/property to speak of, and low, low property taxes--all of which appeal to me. Add in minuscule cost, and you've got my vote.

I would hope that as housing prices continue to skyrocket, more and more attractive alternatives to single-family and condo living will become available. Houses like the ones pictured give me hope.

[iris lilies]

My take on that perspective is that it's common, but not particularly well-thought out. I shared it once upon a time--until a relative bought one in a park geared to old folks. She has complete privacy, no lawn/property to speak of, and low, low property taxes--all of which appeal to me. Add in minuscule cost, and you've got my vote.

I would hope that as housing prices continue to skyrocket, more and more attractive alternatives to single-family and condo living will become available. Houses like the ones pictured give me hope.

OK I’m curious as to what you see here as an alternative to single-family housing. This *IS* single Family housing. It does not address low low property taxes which is a function of your municipality or county.

There are plenty of attached condo homes with tiny lots and shared green spaces. My momlived in one And we sold that to my cousin when she died. For me as a single person in retirement, I wouldn’t want that much space. She had two bedrooms and two bathrooms and a basement.

[sweetana3]

There are several reasons for high cost:
1. land pure and simple. Lots downtown here have gone from less than 10,000 to 50,000 or more and there are several for 200,000-400,000.
2. water and sewer connections and perhaps gas (infrastructure of property.
3. government charges. Some places have building impact fees that are thousands.
4. cost of materials and labor. Material costs for everyone have in some places doubled or are unavailable.

lastly profit for developer and builder.

Not much of anything new around here for less than $250,000.

[jp1]

We had looked at some manufactured homes in Palm Springs a couple years ago. They were relatively small (800-1300 sq feet) and quite nice. The builder (manufacturer?) had gone to great lengths to build a product that was every bit as good quality as a site built home. They would all meet the definition of a double wide but the layouts were crafty enough that if you weren’t aware that they were manufactured you would never figure it out.

[iris lilies]

Is the basic idea with manufactured homes that they haul them in on a truck? Doesn’t that limit how wide they can be due to highway restrictions?

If they truck them in one side at a time, does that mean these houses have a giant seam down the middle?

I don’t see how they would be substantially cheaper or even marginally cheaper than stick built homes in place unless they are just using cheap materials.

Here in my neighborhood a recent thing with new houses is basement built with cement forms that are trucked in. Rather than pouring forms in place, they are brought in to the site.

[SteveinMN]

I always get eye-rolls from DH (and others) on the subject of manufactured homes. Like they're low-class, upscaled trailer homes. What is your take on that perspective?

To me, they're on foundations, simply manufactured off-site. What else is the difference?

Two things:

For many years, pretty much all manufactured homes were travel trailers or their close relatives, mobile homes. These were not built to even residential construction code standards: wall insulation was minimal, electrical wiring was not low-capacity, and so on. After all, if you're not planning to live in it for extended periods in all seasons and you need to move it from place to place, why tow any more than you need to? But the metal panels fairly quickly started corroding, the cheap windows that never did a great job with temperature extremes anyway started failing and letting in water and wind (which caused further damage), and the whole unit just started sliding toward being beyond economic repair. Local zoning codes that prohibited manufactured homes eliminated these problems.

These same zoning codes had the additional benefit of excluding poor people who could not afford to buy even a used stick-built home in a given area. And it solved the issue of transients living in an area without having the social/financial stake that property owners had.

So manufactured homes even like these have been grandfathered in under the codes created long ago to control recreational vehicles and mobile homes. Not every bank will write a 15- or 30-year mortgage for one of these if they classify them as manufactured homes. We even see this code come up when people discuss ADUs, which often skirt local rules against outbuildings by having wheels so they can be considered legally as recreational vehicles even though that's not ever the intention with an ADU.

So, yeah, long history of being treated as substandard housing associated with poor people. It's been a hard stereotype for most manufactured home builders to get past.