For many, many years manufactured homes just couldn’t ‘get no respect.’
Inexpensive, certainly. Mobile? Not really. They just picked up that reputation by snuggling up to real — and real dinky — trailer homes and caravans in trailer parks everywhere. After a decade or two, you often couldn’t change locations with a single wide, or double wide, even if you wanted to. In America, some states won’t allow them back on the roads. Abandoned, they rot in place.
And they were flimsy, even as they were admired for the space they provided compared to those dinky caravans. Not only were they flimsy, but they also took foolish advantage of their natural habitat — trailer parks that pretended to cater only to ‘trailers.’ Manufactured homes were often not anchored properly, merely propped up on breeze blocks or similar pretence of a foundation. The result? They blew away or were squashed flat in wind storms. They still are.
Finally, they were victims of an economy that helped make them such desirably affordable housing. Trailer parks — supposedly collections of actual mobile homes — could be, and were, sited on inexpensive land in flood plains. Mobile (nudge nudge, wink wink) manufactured homes could supposedly leave if threatened by a flood. Except that they couldn’t, and often fell victim to the destructive force of water.
Yes, manufactured homes have long been valuable as inexpensive housing, without a doubt. However, with their safety record there is little wonder they couldn’t ‘get no respect.’
But in America, now they can. With the affordable housing crisis worsening, well constructed and sited manufactured homes offer the promise of safe, solid housing and equally as important — affordable financing. Read more about why and how in HOUSINGWIRE: Freddie Mac will now allow conventional financing for manufactured housing
