They vary considerably by location, one of the advantages of the United States’ peculiar system of local, state, and national governments. Homes built in south Florida, and particularly the Florida Keys, are typically built to withstand hurricane-force winds. California has consistently increased requirements for new housing to be built to survive earthquakes.
Compare photos of California after an earthquake or Florida after a hurricane to Mexico and the differences are startling.
Even in the Midwest, most single family houses either have basements or some other protection against tornados.
Not too many folks buy and live in one house until death these days. So you buy a house with a lot of square footage in a popular subdivision, hope it appreciates, and move on to the next one when you land a higher paying job. Spending extra money on better building materials ends up costing money when you sell. Or the square footage is less for a similarly priced house, not too many folks would be interested.
Shit, in Spain we consider that a small van. Micro, but a van. I’ve got a ground-floor space which in theory is large enough to use as a garage: when I got the floor finished and the doors changed, one of the first questions was if I would indeed use it as a garage. “Heck no, first because my car is short but not narrow and second because my neighbors would kill me; making that spot a garage would remove three street parking spots.” “All right! Lots more options for that door then.” A Smart would not fit any better: like my C1, it’s short but not narrow.
Here it’s only a van if you have the model with no back windows, in which case the insurance is way higher and some places like town dumps might restrict access even though it’s otherwise identical to the car model. I nearly bought one before finding that out.
Rules is different and sometimes daft.
You can say that again; they look like a big blockhouse stuck in front.
There was a housing development in Bend, Oregon called The Shire. It was about six acres with about a dozen individual homes and a like number of attached townhouses. That it had a Tolkien-inspired theme was intriguing enough – even the sheds for keeping the landscaper’s tools were designed to look like hobbit holes – but what I liked was that the homes’ fronts faced each other across a greenspace while the road to the garage was in the back.
I don’t know if you could call it middle class. The detached houses were $650 to $900k while the town houses were about $500k. In any event, it’s a moot point. Started in 2006, only two homes had been built by 2008 when the recession hit and it went bust, to the point of one of the two partners committing suicide. It was bought for a quarter of the original outlay and renamed Forest Creek. Most of the lots are still vacant.
It does not snow that much in the UK, unless you live in the Scottish Highlands, but the winter temperatures are usually around 10-15C (50-60F) and humid with it. Meaning that it feels cold. Many British houses are over a century old, modern ones tend to be built cheaply. Either way they lack insulation, and you notice it. Very modern houses are better.
My parents’ house (vintage 1904) was rebuilt after a fire and better insulation plus double glazing made a big difference. Modern construction tends to use various sort of blocks that provide better insulation. A rebuild of my house in continental Europe, using blocks (not breeze blocks) and an external layer of rock wool keeps the winter and the summer out. In short, generally buildings are masonry, except for high-rises.
Regarding the comments about OSB, engineered woods have various advantages. They are used in prefabricated houses, which are becoming more popular. Quick to put up, fewer glitches, generally cheaper. By and large, wooden houses are expensive in Europe - OK, maybe not in Sweden or Finland. True, modifying a house later is much more difficult with masonry.
Those who want expandable houses should try the areas that have tufa and where there are underground houses. They seem to be built on the side of a cliff of tufa, so you walk in instead of climbing down. Fresh tufa is very soft, but hardens on exposure to air. You want a bigger room or another room? Jes’ git diggin’.
Here’s a photo posted today of firefighters battling a fire in ahouse in Ridgecrest, California. The fire was probably caused by electrical or gas problems, which were unrelated to the construction of the house itself.
I’m not so sure about that, because my sister lives in what might look like a mobile home, but is actually “modular” construction and is anchored to a foundation. The “skirt” around the base of the home covers a crawl space.
And even if that is a mobile home, I think everyone here would agree that a mobile home has to be built worse than any of the types of houses we’ve been discussing.
Yeah, that’s a trailer home. Even if they caught it right when the fire started, it’s a total loss. Unlike, dare I say, actual homes, their value depreciates at an astonishing rate.
If you have any type of fire in a trailer home, you’re not recuperating anything.
I don’t agree with that. There are certainly well built mobile homes out there that are as safe as most site-built homes when they are properly anchored. To be fair though, there is a much larger number of mobile homes that will collapse from a blunt remark. You like wheels under your house? You takes your chances.
Modular homes are a different animal in that once moved into their position and placed on a foundation, they’re never expected to move again. That’s not what I’m talking about. Mobile homes that are still sitting on their axles and could potentially be moved to a new site are what I’m talking about. There are some good examples out in the wild that when properly anchored (stout cables running from the frame down to concrete piers) are perfectly safe. I’m not saing they would be my first choice as a tornado shelter but they’re also not going to fare dramatically worse than a conventionally constructed home.
There may be exceptions, I’ll say that up front. But ‘mobile homes’, as the term is most commonly understood, denotes an incredibly inferior set of building techniques, as is required by the price point.
Throw all the cables you want over it, I’m sure they’re very sturdy and will still be there keeping company with the foundation after a tornado.
Throw in 2x3, or even 2x2 stud framing, on 16" centers if you’re lucky (if you’re not, it’s 24"), the accordingly low R-value, the thinnist sheathing possible, the cheapest siding fastened with the fewest fasteners possible, almost no roof structure…you see where I’m going with this?
Nobody buys a mobile home because it’s a good home. People buy them because they’re cheap, and they’re cheap for a reason.
And I’m not judging that, I considered it at one time. But when you buy one (again, there may be rare exceptions), you’re not buying a “home”. You’re buying a place to live for a while until it falls apart and the rest of us drive by the moldering ruins.
I’m not going to argue with your perceptions, but honestly, those temps any time between November and March qualifies as a heat wave around here - we got down to -30 C last winter, now THAT is cold! We go weeks with it never getting above 0 C. Our definition of “cold” is a bit different than yours. We also get hotter than you in the summer. Probably have higher winds, too. And more tornadoes for sure.
And that’s what my sister lives in. I haven’t asked her about construction, but she’s been through earthquakes, Chinook winds and fires nearby, and except for some minor damage from the last fire, she hasn’t suffered much damage. She said something about having roof shingles replaced, but nothing burned through.
I live in Missouri. I’ve seen what makes even well-tethered mobile homes come apart.
