The Manufactured Home as an Affordable Housing Option

Mobile homes are often perceived as a cheap housing alternative of last resort. This paper reviews the history of the mobile home from its trailer house beginnings to its present manufactured home status. Manufactured homes (HUD Code mobile homes) located in manufactured home land lease parks are an affordable and preferred housing choice of many housing consumers. Furthermore, manufactured housing is one of the most cost effective types of ownership housing available. First time home buyers and retirees constitute the majority of manufactured home owners. California and Massachusetts, states with severe housing affordability problems for first time home buyers, regulate manufactured home placement differently. California regulates in favor of manufactured housing, while a majority of Massachusetts towns regulate against that housing form. The housing affordability situation in Massachusetts is verified by the response to public sector housing initiatives, an example of which is discussed. This housing product is compared in cost to the purchase of both the average priced conventional and manufactured home in Massachusetts. The purchase of the manufactured home purchase is the least expensive. The low production cost and the disaggregation of the manufactured home from the land contribute to its low cost. This study surveyed a group of manufactured home parks in Massachusetts in an effort to determine the demand for park spaces. The zero vacancy level indicates a demand for the manufactured home as a housing option. A case study of the Leisurewoods manufactured home community strengthens the conclusion that there is demand for this housing product in Massachusetts. The paper concludes that the manufactured home in a land lease community is a housing option for which there is potential demand but which is not readily available to Massachusetts housing consumers. Property tax revisions and up-dated perceptions about manufactured home living will make this housing alternative acceptable to municipalities. Regulatory reforms will encourage developers to provide this affordable housing alternative to Massachusetts housing consumers with no expenditure of state housing program funds. Thesis Supervisor: Sandra A. Lambert Title: Lecturer, Department of Urban Studies and Planning