The Growing Role of Manufactured Housing In Addressing The Shortage Of Affordable Housing

The following includes excerpts from a recent report titled “The State of The Nation’s Housing 2023,” by the Joint Center For Housing Studies Of Harvard University

Housing costs remain high relative to pre-pandemic levels. Between the beginning of 2020 and early 2023 nominal home prices rose an astounding 37.5 percent, helping to push up the median sales price for existing site-built homes from $283,000 just before the pandemic to $375,400 in March 2023. In the face of higher home prices, first-time home buyers must save even more to afford the up-front and down payment costs needed to secure a mortgage and require ever-higher incomes for the ongoing payments.

In 2021, just 24 percent of new site-built homes – or 236,000 units – were under 1,800 square feet, compared with 37 percent of new completions in 1999, likewise, manufactured housing, offer an even more affordable option, totaled just 113,000 shipments in 2022, the highest number of homes shipped in a decade, although up from recent lows, manufactured home shipments regularly topped 200,000 units annually in the 1980’s and 1990’s. Manufactured homes, with an average sales price in 2022 of just $127,000, excluding land, provides a more affordable alternative to site-built housing.

Increased mortgage interest rates (6.5% to 7.0% today) have led to significantly higher monthly payments for potential home buyers, and demand has cooled in response. As long as interest rates remain elevated, home prices are unlikely to continue to slow.

Manufactured Housing: The Quality Affordable Home Ownership Alternative

The following are a few of the factual reasons why manufactured housing is the ideal alternative in solving the continuing affordable housing crisis.

• A manufactured  home is a sound investment, with a cost  up to 50% less (not including land cost)  per square foot than a comparable site-built home, equal and often superior in quality of construction, appearance and amenities.
• Multiple financing choices are available, whether the home is placed on private property or within a land lease community. A manufactured home affixed to real estate will qualify for mortgage financing, including interest rates and conditions similar to a site built home, including FHA and VA. Because the total consideration is lower, the required down payment will be proportionately less.
• Manufactured homes are the only form of housing regulated by a federal building code which includes health, safety, energy efficiency and durability.
• Technological advances allow manufactured home/modular home builders to offer a variety of architectural styles and finishes that will allow a manufactured home to blend seamlessly into most neighborhoods.

Nearly 22,000,000 people in the United States live in manufactured housing and/or mobile homes with manufactured homes as the door to homeownership for families who, in many housing markets, can not afford to buy a site-built home.

Today’s manufactured housing represents “everything a home should be,” and is the key to addressing the nation’s affordable housing crisis.