Ron DeSantis Praises ‘Resilient’ Mobile Homes As Idalia Approached Florida
Newer manufactured housing ‘handled it decently’ after 2022’s Hurricane Ian, DeSantis said.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis continues to offer evaluations of how various types of construction in Florida fare during hurricanes.
Speaking in Lake City, the Governor praised the surprising sturdiness of manufactured homes.
“I was surprised at how resilient some of the mobile homes were during Ian,” DeSantis said. “And there was obviously damage, don’t get me wrong, but you actually had some of the newer mobile homes that handled it decent for how strong that was.”
DeSantis said that for many in the path of the storm who aren’t in danger of a direct hit from eyewall, mobile homes might be sufficient shelter for this event.
Manufactured Homes built after 1994 HUD Code changes found manufactured homes to be as safe or more safe than traditional site-built homes.
Gov. DeSantis mentioned how newer manufactured homes tended to perform well during hurricane Ian, as opposed to “mobile homes.”
In 1994, The U. S. The Department of Housing and Urban Development raised the building standards for manufactured housing.
The Manufactured Housing Institute, the national trade association for the factory-built housing industry, claims, “Manufactured homes are as safe as traditional homes during a storm, and in hurricane zones, the standards for manufactured homes are more stringent than regional and national building codes for site-built homes,” the group says. “The building materials in today’s manufactured home are the same as those used in site-built homes. The homes are engineered for wind safety based on the geographic in which they are sold.”
Modern manufactured housing can be built to withstand 150 mph winds. Since the advent of post-Andrew wind standard, a mobile home on the Florida coast has to have double wall studs, double roof trusses, thicker nails, and double tie-downs anchored in concrete.
Florida is home to 822.000 “mobile” and manufactured homes, and almost two-thirds of them were built before 1994.
For more information and independent studies regarding manufactured home wind safety, click our previous post – “How And Why Newer Manufactured Homes Survived Hurricane Ian Impressively.”
