PitbullMidwest
Platinum Member
cowboydoc,
I know several people who own Design Homes and they are quality built. Now a disclaimer. My friends who own Design Homes purchased them 15-20 years ago. Recently a Design Home was placed in a new subdivision locally and a realitor friend said it leaks like a funnel.
We looked at CSI and was not impressed with their product at all. My wife is a QC manager and she thought their practices looked shoddy. We stopped at AllAmerican in Dyersville and they seemed to be pretty good. High quality cabinets, quality carpet and floor coverings, solid oak mouldings and trim and the actual home construction seemed to be on par with site built practices.
My wife and I researched modular homes for a long time, we looked at 10 different builders and showed up unannounced at each of their factories and asked for tours. 2 refused our requests all the other said ok. We talked to owners and finally settled on Homera from Tracy MN. Very high quality home, good work practices, pricing was reasonable but our sales rep turned out to be an idiot, as I described in another post.
Lessons we learned:
1. If the company builds both modular and manufactured homes (double wides) move on down the road. ALL factories we toured that built both share materials between the assembly lines.
2. Tour as many of their houses you can find, don't rely on company referals as most of these companies pay referal bonuses if someone buys after touring your home.
3. Take the time to talk to the Modular Home Council, realtors and local contractors who have been involved in any way with the home company.
4. Don't rush into anything, but as related already on this thread, even if you are careful you can still get burned.
I know several people who own Design Homes and they are quality built. Now a disclaimer. My friends who own Design Homes purchased them 15-20 years ago. Recently a Design Home was placed in a new subdivision locally and a realitor friend said it leaks like a funnel.
We looked at CSI and was not impressed with their product at all. My wife is a QC manager and she thought their practices looked shoddy. We stopped at AllAmerican in Dyersville and they seemed to be pretty good. High quality cabinets, quality carpet and floor coverings, solid oak mouldings and trim and the actual home construction seemed to be on par with site built practices.
My wife and I researched modular homes for a long time, we looked at 10 different builders and showed up unannounced at each of their factories and asked for tours. 2 refused our requests all the other said ok. We talked to owners and finally settled on Homera from Tracy MN. Very high quality home, good work practices, pricing was reasonable but our sales rep turned out to be an idiot, as I described in another post.
Lessons we learned:
1. If the company builds both modular and manufactured homes (double wides) move on down the road. ALL factories we toured that built both share materials between the assembly lines.
2. Tour as many of their houses you can find, don't rely on company referals as most of these companies pay referal bonuses if someone buys after touring your home.
3. Take the time to talk to the Modular Home Council, realtors and local contractors who have been involved in any way with the home company.
4. Don't rush into anything, but as related already on this thread, even if you are careful you can still get burned.
