The one thing that sucks about living in a manufactured home

The BBQ Pit
1

OK, let’s get one thing straight. What I live in is nothing like a trailer. It looks like a site built home and we’re on a foundation. It would be just as difficult to up and move this house as it would a site built house. So, for all intents and purposes, it’s just like a site built house. Anyway onto the rant. Actually, make that two. I’m pitting myself as well.

No, my rant (mild and somewhat lame, but I have to get it off of my chest). A month or two ago my wife and I saw adds for variable rate mortgage loans at around 4% or so. Yeah, they’re variable, so of course later on down the line it could get a lot bigger, but we figured that with everything we could pay off with the money we’d save in the short term, it would be worth it. Plus, if need be, we could try to refinance again if the APR got to big.

Now, on hearing that our monthly payments could be cut by over $400, possibly even close to about $500 I got over excited and charged a little to much on my card, not caring because I stupidly figured that we’d get a loan. Yeah, you see on TV all the time people spending money they don’t have, like say, thinking they’ll get a Christmas bonus and then they don’t. I always felt superior thinking I’d never do that, and yet, there I went, charging left and right.

Well, needless to say, my card gets maxed out. I think, no problem, the loan will fix everything. Nope, almost nobody finances manufactured homes. Now, if we were living in a trailer, like my grandmother who lives in a trailer park does, I’d understand. But again, this is nothing like the trailer homes of 20 or 30 years ago. Nothing about this house is like a trailer house, but, the only place we found that would refinance us is our current mortgage company, and at first we thought we’d get a great deal, until all of the fees and other costs like lumping in the taxes, we found out that we’d be paying about the same.

So, I guess I have to rants. One against banks and other lending organizations that don’t discriminate between trailers which obviously are just that, and manufactured homes which are very similar to site built homes (yeah, technically they may be the same thing, but there’s a world of difference to me) and myself, for spending money I assumed I get, only not to get it and now I’m stuck with a useless credit card that’ll take for ever to pay down :smack:

2

As someone who has lived in 20-30 year old trailers most of his life, I gotta agree. Manufactured homes have come a long way; and with many of the new ones, you’d have to be told it was manufactured to tell the difference.

–Tentacle Monster, who remembers seeing his first double-wide and being impressed.

3

You need to cheer up some. Maybe listen to some good music.

How about some Mel McDaniel?

If that doesn’t get your toe tapping, try some Sammy Kershaw.

4

Tentacle Monster, thanks. Yeah, here in Oregon, where I live, we passed a ballot measure that no longer classifies manufactured homes as vehicles. When we first bought this place, we had to register with the DMV and we litterally had a licence plate. At least Oregon is taking a step in the right direction

Mr. Moto, :smiley: thanks, but I hate country music.

5

What the hell are you doing living in a manufactured home then?

Just kidding.

6

Sheeeeet, boy. I loves me my double-wide! :smiley:

Just because it isn’t made of brick, doesn’t mean it ain’t a home.

7

Could be worse . . .

8

Aren’t the interest rates alot higher for manufactured homes compared to conventional homes too, like 12% vs 6%?

9

No, not really. We have about 7% or so.

10

Nice. I want to get a manufactured home someday but the info I read says that they are considered ‘personal recreational’ loans instead of ‘home’ loans by banks so you end up with 12-15% interest rates.

Maybe your lower loan has something to do with oregon not considering them to be personal vehicles anymore.

11

I suppose you kind of jumped the gun by charging up the wazoo before you got approved for the loan. :frowning:

12

No, we got our loan before that.

13

Yes, except take out the words “kind of”…

14

Warning: Annoying MIDI that scared the shit out of me because I had my volume turned up.

15

Our first house was manufactured. It was, if anything, slightly better constructed than the equivilant house built onsite, because it had to survive transport and installation. But it was in all other ways a conventional house, with 2x6 framing, insulation, plumbing, etc., and the bank, the insurance company, and the town never considered it in any way different.

16

You guys are lucky because I kept coming across info that says manufactured home purchases are treated as personal luxury purchases instead of ‘homes’ by banks and as a result the interest rates are 5-8% higher. Maybe i’m just being misled.

http://www.executivedreams.net/67558FRONT.JPG

http://www.umh.com/umhtrll.gif

We are talking about homes like this right?

17

Misled by the internet articles that is. If a manufactured home increases in value and I can get a 6-8% loan its a great deal since around here the homes build in the 1990s only cost about 50-70k for a 3-4 bedroom.

18

Those pictures are still obviously trailers and look nothing like Master Control’s home which, if I had not known better the first time I saw it, would have assumed it was a normal house.

19

Thank you.

20

I’ve read several articles recently about the rise of prefab homes (which are actually the norm in Sweden and Japan), and this type of loan dilemma has never even been hinted at…