Modular Homes - Good/Bad experiences... I am considering this pretty seriously...

[MossflowerWoods]

My current home is a modular (not a trailer, but prebuilt in a factory, trucked out and assembled on site) atop a full basement.

The previous owner did it all himself, and so there are "issues" plus it is older style, 7'4" ceilings and such. It is 2 bedroom with unfinished basement and attic, plus the roof desperately needs to be redone.

In the process of collecting quotes for the roof, and for finishing the attic (previously I've had a local builder quote remodeling the attic to a full 2nd floor, and when I bought Summer of 2010 I had plans drawn up to completely gut & remodel the place.

I love the property itself but the house...

Back on track... My fiancee and I went to a Clayton Homes lot a couple weeks ago and looked at a NEW modular with 9' ceilings, very open floor plan, and they have a number of 2 story plans. There is one from Oakwood we like, and like nine from R-Anell. Virginia code just updated to 2x6 outer walls, and better insulation...

There is also the thought that this whole process could take as little at 30 days "homeless" is pretty shocking.

Finally, instead of charging me to take down my existing home, they are offering some sort of "Trade-in" where they will take down my house, and move it...

So as TBN is famous for, I'm here to LEARN.

Please share your good or bad stories of modular homes and I will listen closely.

Thanks in advance!

Be well,
David

 

[jeff9366]

Here is a manufacturer of steel pre-fabs, not too far from you:

GreenSteelHomes - Low Cost, Hurricane Resistant, Enviromentally Friendly


Closer is Deltech near Asheville, NC, which has been around a long time:

Prefabricated Homes | High Performance Homes | Round House | Prefab Home Kit | Hurricane Proof | Circular Houses | Modern Home Plans | Deltec Homes

I have been mulling one of Deltech's Ridgeline/traditional models. In Florida, concrete composites have just about displaced wood siding in new construction.

 

[Parkanzky]

No direct experience, but I'm curious what the savings would be for a "comparable" stick-built home. Modular home attitudes seem to be a regional thing, but I've watched dozens of friends shop for and purchase homes around here (and we've purchased two) and most of them will squint at the pictures and say, "That looks like a manufactured home" and move on without even considering it. Around here, it lowers your resale value and increases your time on market so much that I wouldn't consider building one new.

My boss' boss has a cottage on a nice lake an hour north of here. It was pre-manufactured, but they talked themselves into it for the lot and location. A few years into it and they're starting to make plans to have the current home hauled off and a new one stick-built in its place. He says that it's a nice place, but there are just a lot of compromises with the manufactured home.

 

[Rustyiron]

I have a year's of experience having been a "sub contractor" with 4 "phases" at the finish end of a modular plant 30 years ago. Structurally, they are very tough. It's the finishes and quality that I think has room for improvment. This is prolly driven by the final price point they are looking for. Things may have changed as this was a long time ago, but if offered, I'd would order it maybe finished only up to being insulated. Make sure that the windows satisfy you, I used to tell friends that were building to skip or leave something else unfinished but get good windows that you can buy parts for in 15 years. While maybe not the best "energy performing" windows, I know you can buy parts for 20+ year old Andersen windows.

 

[Mysfyt]

We did exactly what you are looking at doing 20 years ago. The trade in thing was the deal maker for us. We are very happy with our house. 2x6 walls, R38 insulation in the attic, three 2x12's around the perimeter, a ten year warranty,etc. Do your homework and talk to people who have purchased from the manufacturer you're looking at.

 

[s219]

My dad sold/installed a few modulars when he was in the construction business, and I was always impressed with them. Cost savings over stick built can be substantial and I think the quality can be as good or better on the higher quality homes (framing is actually better just because of the delivery/install requirements). If you don't want a custom floor plan and are happy with the models/selections/options they have, it seems like a good option to me.

I remember one we installed up on a lake on the CT/Mass border, and it looked like it was meant to be there among the trees. Another one was interesting -- we stick-built half-walls on shallow basement walls, and then the modular sat on top to create a raised ranch (the site's water table wouldn't support a full basement, so that was the solution to get the desired floor space).

Access to the site (roads, overhead power lines, trees, etc) needs to be taken into consideration, both on your property and on the way to your property.

 

[Will_C]

Much depends on regional pricing whether it is a savings over stick built. I have been getting quotes for a new 1800 ft ranch house. A custom built stick built house is about 20k more than the modular pricing, but if I upgrade the windows, doors, etc. on the mod they are equal-and when you fold the cost for an attached garage, etc. into the equation, the stick built is actually cheaper.

Will

 

[EddieWalker]

I've been hired to work on a few, and looked at quite a few more that I didn't get the jobs because of how much it was going to cost. Biggest issue is in the finish and what's used to after the walls are up. Every one I've seen had low end cabinets, flooring and the cheapest doors I've come across. I think that those people who ordered those homes picked the lowest priced items to save money, so the possibility of better components exists.

If you are wanting something framed up quickly, that's a good option. Personally, I feel thre is still nothing better then stick building a house on site. This is also why I do not like SIPS.

 

[truckdiagnostics]

Current house is modular on a foundation. You can't tell by looking at it. When we did it during the housing boom labor was an issue and I contracted everything myself, with that and financing, bank liked idea of guarantied completion, foundation in, land everything paid for. We stick built the attached garage and front porch. Not disappointed. If I had to do over, no basement, build it like a commercial building concrete slab in floor hear, nice base for tile and wood floor. Geothermal make in floor heat, then air handler in attic for AC. How one goes a lot depends on your area..... here now I can get good framers and contractors are falling all over themselves for the work. When we purchased the house visited the factory, liked the quality control on the framing, which is standard stick framed delivered on a trailer, then crane set. Everything square after 15 years no sages dips or squeaks. Good luck, not all modular house manufacturers are equal.

 

[dmccarty]

After we bought our land, we and a friend looked seriously at modular homes but in the end we went for stick built. By the time we upgraded to decent cabinets, doors, counter tops, windows and added more phone, power, and network options, the price was getting close to stick built. The other problem with modular homes is that your are limited to floor plans based on the width of the module. While the modules can be stacked together the module width requires some very good design to work around. At the time we were looking, NC had just passed a law that allowed 16 foot modules on some roads vs the 14 foot wide modules that were standard. That extra two feet can be pretty important in a design.

If the house is designed right, nobody will now it is modular without looking in the attic and the crawlspace/basement. Another clue about a house being modular, is the joining walls between modules will be thicker than normal, but if the house is designed just so, you won't see the extra wall thickness.

What we found was that the price for a decent quality modular was not much different from stick built, however, the modular homes we looked at were VERY well built and I suspect would be better quality than many stick built homes.

A big advantage of modular was how fast the home is built on site and ready to move into.

Maybe pricing is better today than it was when we were looking since back then the economy was booming.

There is a factory I drive by that makes wall sections for stick built homes. Before the Great Recession hit, the factory parking lot had very few empty car spaces. After 2008, the place was all but empty but I have noticed this year the parking lot has slowly filled back up. Last week, I could only see a few empty parking spaces.

We had planned to build a lower cost house, pay it off and then build our dream house. This did not work out since the cost of the intermediate house, modular or stick built, was not much different than just building the dream house and we would have lost all of the years not living in the dream house.

The builder who built our dream house lived in a modular home. :laughing::laughing::laughing:

Later,
Dan