These days, a lot of fear has circulated around the affordability of housing – or lack thereof. Some of this is for good reason: in 2022, site-built home prices have increased by 20% compared to the year prior, according to CNBC. And that’s before you take into account the rising price and unavailability of rental housing across the nation. While there has been a slowdown in how high these site-built home prices have gotten, it hasn’t stopped completely.
All of this leads to the question of how best to provide affordable housing in 2022. We’re here to provide the answer: manufactured housing, or factory-built housing.
In fact, this answer is so profound that President Biden has recently outlined a plan to develop new financing options for manufactured housing. The drive to make this form of affordable housing even more accessible makes it perhaps the best solution to affordably own a home in 2022.
So, it’s worth taking a deeper dive into what manufactured homes are, what their features are, and how they’re making affordable homes incredibly easy to find.
What Are Manufactured Homes?
Manufactured homes are homes built in a factory before being shipped to the home site. Commonly known as mobile homes, they’re often far less costly than homes that are built where they stand – also called “site-built homes.”
Though they’re often sold and titled differently than site-built homes, manufactured homes are an incredibly accessible means of homeownership. This is the result of production efficiencies from building in a controlled environment, which keeps the build quality high while streamlining construction.
One key distinction to make with manufactured homes comes from the year 1976. This was the year the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) enacted building codes that regulate how manufactured homes are built to this very day. In fact, manufactured homes are the only type of housing built to a federal building code.
Homes built before June 1976, when the federal building code was enacted, are often referred to as mobile homes rather than manufactured homes. However, the two terms can be used interchangeably when talking about modern manufactured housing.
What Do Manufactured Homes Offer?
Contrary to popular belief, manufactured homes and mobile homes offer incredibly high-quality lifestyles for just about any kind of homeowner.
It’s not hard to find a manufactured home or mobile home with the latest luxury fixtures. For example, smart appliances and countertops made of premium materials have increased in popularity in manufactured homes.
Manufactured homes also offer extremely high safety standards. Like we mentioned earlier, all manufactured homes built since June 1976 meet strict quality control standards. This also includes protections against extreme weather and high winds.
Manufactured homes are also incredibly popular for their amenities. If you live in a mobile home park. In a park or community setting, you can be a part of a tight-knit neighborhood where you can take advantage of walking trails, pet-friendly facilities, athletic courts like shuffleboard, tennis, and pickleball, and so much more.
Many communities even have clubhouses where you can get together for a fun game or social outing!
All of this is offered at an affordable price that can be much more attractive than a site-built home. After all, being able to own your own home in 2022, one that’s right next to your favorite athletic facility or walking trail, is a dream that can’t be beat. Manufactured housing makes that dream possible.
What Makes Mobile Homes So Affordable?
There are a few key factors that make manufactured homes in 2022 such an affordable and attractive option.
The biggest one is their factory-built nature. In this aspect, the construction process is quite different. Unlike site-built homes, which are built on their permanent home site, mobile homes are assembled in a factory and then shipped to the home site.
While this might not seem like a major difference, the reality is that this has a MASSIVE impact on their cost. Because they’re built in a factory, they can be made much more efficiently when it comes to sourcing building materials, labor, and the lack of weather delays. And, factory-built housing means a team of builders can put homes together one after the other far faster than they can a site-built home.
This is the perfect antidote to homeownership fears in 2022. Because many are worried about the rising cost of apartment rents and site-built home prices, manufactured homes offer a solution for both problems. And, you can find a mobile home in a community with pretty great amenities, too. Bet your apartment doesn’t have a pickleball court, does it?
All of this is to say that a manufactured home is perfect if you’re looking for lower costs. You don’t have to settle for an apartment with $2,000 due per month in rent, or agonize over a mortgage that seems out of reach.
The State of Manufactured Homes in 2022
Mobile homes are one of the most affordable sources of housing in America in 2022. During a time of increasing stress and anxiety surrounding housing costs and inflation, manufactured homes are here to help relieve that stress.
One of the best parts is that it couldn’t be easier to find an affordable manufactured home that’s perfect for you. With MHVillage, you can browse mobile homes for sale or rent in your area based on a number of filters. So, if you want to look for a mobile home with three bedrooms, two bathrooms, and is in an all-ages mobile home park, you can look for exactly that.
MHVillage sees over 25 million unique visitors annually, and processed over 80,000 manufactured home sales in 2021 alone. When you buy your dream home with MHVillage, you know you’re using the most visited, most relied upon website in all of manufactured housing.
Are you ready to start your affordable home search today? If you are, then head over to MHVillage to get started.
