The waste-control measures practiced by modular home manufacturers, as well as the bulk discount rates they pay for their materials, are just two of the factors which lower the end-prices of their homes, making the financing of modular homes much easier on consumers’ pocketbooks.

Financing a Modular Home: You May Like What You Learn

Are you hesitant to look into purchasing a modular home because you don’t know how the financing will work? If so, you can relax, because the skyrocketing demand for modular homes now has banks and mortgage companies viewing them as mortgage properties just like traditionally constructed homes.

Financing a modular home is not difficult and buying and building a modular home will probably cost less than building a stick home of the same square footage. So your mortgage costs could be surprisingly low.

The Modular Home Manufacturing Process
Because sections of modular homes are all produced at a single factory, the materials which go into those sections will all be shipped to that factory from wherever they are produced. Centralized modular home production means cost savings; the materials used in traditional homes are bought from various supply housed and then delivered to the building site. And often the delayed delivery of one item can hold up the entire construction schedule, even if all the other materials are on site.

Another of the reasons for the lower costs of modular homes is that, because their sections are constructed in the protected environments of factories, their manufacturers can buy materials in bulk, when prices are low, and store it out of the elements until it is needed to fill orders. And because those materials are machine cut with precision, there is very little waste.

Modular Home Construction
There is an equally small amount of waste in the modular home construction process. Each section of the modular home is assembled according to the home’s plan, and mounted on a prepared permanent foundation. Because so much of the wiring, insulation, and plumbing is already done, there is little delay caused from various contractors’ not having the time to spend at your building site.

Once all the sections of your modular home have been fixed together, which is normally a matter of weeks, and not months, you will be ready to move in. You won’t have to find and pay for alternative lodging, and keep you belongings in storage, while you wait for your new home to be completed.

All these lower costs mean that the amount of money you will need for financing a modular home will also be lower, and so will your mortgage payments.

The entire modular home process, from start to finish, is designed to lower the cost on housing. And the system works; financing a modular home, if you have been paying a mortgage on a traditional one, may give you a very pleasant surprise!.

While both a general building contractor and a modular home builder are responsible for seeing that a foundation is dug and poured before the actual home construction process begins, the general contractor has to assume responsibility for every facet of the traditional home, while the modular home builder simply has to have a crane on-site to lift the pre-assembled home modules into position on the foundation, and to oversee a crew w which joins the modules during the tow to three weeks it takes to complete the modular home.

The Modular Home Builder: Not Your General Contractor

You know what role a general contractor played in getting your home built. But do you have any idea of what a modular home builder does in the process of getting a family settled in a new modular home? The differences in the two jobs may be greater than you imagine.

The Differences
When a new stick home is being built, the general contractor digs and pours the foundation, erects the framing and walls ad ceilings, puts on the roof, adds wiring, insulation, and plumbing and the heating and cooling systems, puts in the flooring and perhaps carpeting, cabinetry, and storage spaces, and paints and papers the walls.

When a modular home is constructed, the modular home builder digs and pours the foundation, and then moves on to another foundation until the sections of your modular home arrive on a truck.

Modular homes are prefabricated homes, the walls, floors, and ceilings of which are built into “modules: in the clean, climate-regulated confined of a factory. All the details of every modular home fabrication are controlled by computer, to ensure that the finished modules will fit together with minute precision. Compare that to the hand levels and chalk lines common on a traditional home construction site.

Modular homes have factory-installed wiring, insulation, and plumbing; there is no waiting around for the local plumber’s or electrician’s or drywall hanger’s union to finish someone else’s job so they send someone to begin yours.

General home contractors will have their individual suppliers ship materials to the building site, where they can be exposed to the elements for weeks or months at a time, or subject to theft or vandalism, while waiting for a construction crew. A modular home builder does not need individual suppliers, and everything which is delivered to your home site is contained in a finished module. Modular home construction is the simple process of fitting those modules together on the permanent foundation, and it takes not months but weeks.

Modular Home Construction
A modular home builder will make sure that a crane is ready to start lifting the delivered modules into place as soon as they arrive. Each module will be attached both to the home’s foundation and to the modules which adjoin it. Modular home construction seldom requires more than one plumber or electrician to connect the wiring and pipes, which were installed at the factory, to the home’s power and water sources. Not only were they installed at the factory; they were examined by certified inspectors.

Some modular home builders will even include landscaping as a part of the process; you can inquire when you order your modular home whether it will be included in the price. But when you sit down and total how much you have just saved by having a home ready to move into in weeks instead of months, you may feel like paying for landscaping is no big deal!

The modular home manufacturing and construction processes have been carefully planned to minimize waste and labor, and to guarantee the lowest possible material and shipping costs. Those benefits of economies are passed along to the consumer in the form of a lower home price, which translates in turn into a smaller monthly modular home mortgage payment.

A Modular Home Mortgage: Pleasantly Surprising

Because the demand for modular homes has seen exponential growth over the past decade, more and more home mortgage lenders are seeing this market as a very lucrative one. They make no distinctions between modular homes and stick-built ones, and are willing to offer modular home mortgages at competitive rates. And because modular homes are often less expensive than traditional homes of the same square footage, a modular home mortgage can be less expensive than a traditional home mortgage as well.

Why Modular Homes Cost Less
What makes a modular home less expensive than a similar traditional one? First of all, modular homes are built from modules, or “building blocks” produced in clean, climate-controlled factories. The module’s production never stops because of inclement weather, and the modules themselves are never exposed to weather-related damage.

The assembly-line production of the modules allows their manufacturers to buy supplies in bulk, qualifying for significant discounts. Because the macular homes are ordered in advance, the manufacturer knows exactly what materials, and how much of them, need to be purchased, so there is almost no waste involved in the module production. The larger parts of the modules are precisely cut by computer regulated machines, again reducing waste. The economies practiced at the factory all contribute to the lower costs of a modular home, and a lower modular home mortgage.

Building Your Modular Home
The finished modules are delivered to the building site where the modular home builder will have dug and poured the specified foundation, and will have a crane waiting to begin lifting the modules onto the foundation. The constructing crew will use fasteners include with the modules to attach them both to the foundation and to each other in the correct sequence. Because there is absolutely no measuring or cutting required, the construction of a modular home goes far more quickly than that of a traditional home. Lower construction labor costs translate to a lower modular home mortgage.

Your modular home will have to meet all the state, Federal, and municipal standards that apply to traditional stick built homes, but its wiring and plumbing will have been inspected at the factory by a certified inspector. You’ll essentially be buying a home which you know in advance will meet all the safety standards. This may not lower your modular home mortgage payments, but it will save you time spent waiting for inspections.

The speed and precision with which modules are manufactured; the discounts which the manufactures can get for buying materials in bulk; and the need for a smaller construction crews for a shorter amount of time all result in a lower modular home mortgage than you would expect for a similar traditional home.