Because the housing market costs out increasingly more People, federal lawmakers are taking a more in-depth have a look at manufactured housing as a extra inexpensive supply-side different to a conventional stick-built residence.
Nonetheless, misconceptions about new manufactured housing communities — that they’re dilapidated, ugly, or unsafe — proceed to beleaguer a phase of the single-family, indifferent housing market that’s currently home to 7.2 million U.S. households.
Legislators in each events more and more see manufactured properties as an important solution to enhance housing affordability. The Reasonably priced HOMES Act, which the U.S. Home of Representatives passed last week, is a part of that imaginative and prescient.
The laws, largely aimed toward boosting and streamlining manufactured housing growth, would take away regulatory burdens. For instance, it might give HUD sole authority over manufactured housing vitality effectivity requirements and remove overlapping oversight by the Division of Power. Lawmakers declare that lowering such purple tape might decrease manufactured housing costs by as much as $10,000 per unit.
The Manufactured Housing Institute reviews that new manufactured properties promote for lower than a 3rd of the worth of site-built properties. The relative affordability of such properties is clearly one thing that lawmakers in Washington have taken discover of.
Gene Kim, Government VP of CRE Methods at Ascent Developer Options (AscentDS), informed The Builder’s Each day that manufactured housing can and will play a significant position in boosting housing affordability. AscentDS, a personal lending and institutional debt platform backed by Elliott Funding Administration L.P, serving single-family, homebuilder, and multifamily builders, not too long ago announced an growth to offer financing to manufactured housing builders.
Nevertheless, persistent misconceptions and longstanding stigmas about manufactured housing communities proceed to weigh on the trade, and typically make acquiring native approval troublesome.
Misperceptions proceed to hamper manufactured housing
There may be nonetheless a significant NIMBY impact impacting manufactured housing. Whereas new manufactured communities are usually constructed to greater security requirements and more and more function high-quality housing, many individuals nonetheless affiliate these properties with outdated, greater–danger cellular residence parks.
A latest temporary from the National Association of Home Builders notes:
“Manufactured properties are a selected sort of factory-built housing that adheres to the U.S. Division of Housing and City Growth’s (HUD’s) Manufactured Dwelling Development and Security Requirements code. To qualify, a manufactured residence have to be a ‘movable dwelling, 8 ft or extra huge and 40 ft or extra lengthy, constructed on a everlasting chassis.’”
Amongst native issues are generally held assumptions that manufactured communities cut back neighboring property values and negatively have an effect on an space’s aesthetics, crime charges, and extra infrastructure prices. AscentDS’s Kim stated these views are sometimes misguided.
“When folks say cellular residence parks, a variety of occasions, their thoughts jumps to a Nineteen Sixties trailer park. However the communities delivered at the moment are of a lot greater high quality. It’s nearly essential to have a separate asset class and asset theme class, as a result of the standard is so excessive, each in the neighborhood general and the standard of the properties,” he defined.
Nonetheless, prevalent NIMBY activists could make it troublesome to entitle manufactured housing, that means new manufactured communities are usually on the bigger aspect, Kim famous.
“For those who’re in a position to safe these entitlements, they’re going to be for larger-sized communities, north of two, three, 4 hundred websites.”
There may be additionally a standard false impression that manufactured housing doesn’t admire in worth as a lot as stick-built housing. This will typically create a destructive notion that dissuades some folks from shopping for into such communities.
Information from the Census’s 2025 Manufactured Housing Survey runs counter to that view, nevertheless. Between 2000 and Q2 2025, typical promoting costs of manufactured properties and site-built properties appreciated at almost the identical price.
Geographic distribution of manufactured properties
Manufactured housing makes up about 5.4% of all housing inventory nationally, in response to a December Storage Cafe report. Nevertheless, there are huge variations relying on the state. New Mexico (15%), Mississippi (14%), West Virginia (13%), Alabama (12%), and Louisiana (12%) have the best variety of manufactured properties as a share of whole housing inventory.
All of these states have excessive ranges of rural poverty and rank within the backside ten for median family earnings. This shouldn’t be shocking, since manufactured properties are a important housing possibility for households residing in sure rural areas or small cities. Nearly 55% of manufactured properties are positioned in rural areas, compared to lower than 25% of single-family homes.
“Whereas most manufactured residence residents (53%) dwell in rural areas, single-family residents are largely concentrated (67%) in urbanized areas — outlined as territories with a inhabitants of fifty,000 or extra. As compared, solely 33% of manufactured residence residents reside in urbanized areas. Residents of each manufactured and single-family properties are much less widespread in city clusters — areas with populations between 2,500 and 50,000 — comprising simply 13% and 9%, respectively.”
Solar Belt markets like Texas, Florida, and Arizona are large hotspots for manufactured housing proper now, resulting from sturdy inhabitants progress and permissive zoning. General, the South continues to dominate the nationwide housing market, because the area accounted for almost 70% of new homes sold in October.
