I keep looking into modular housing and I keep being disappointed by what’s out there. Theoretically, modular housing is a great idea and really nice, interesting houses should be available. In practice, all of the hundreds and hundreds of plans I’ve seen are for boring suburban crap, most of which are built to shoddy specs.

You tend to get 2×8 joists, 2×3 interior framing, uninsulated PVC blackwater drain pipes running right through the living room wall for your listening pleasure, etc. Plastic or vinyl everything. Either cheap windows with no shutters or no windows at all on the sides of the house (as if nobody ever looks at the house from an angle).

Can I get a modular craftsman-style bungalow? Nope. How about a thoughtful Sarah Susanka not-so-big type deal? Nope. A traditional farmhouse with a 10 in 12 metal roof and no extraneous gables nestled into each other like those stupid Russian dolls? No way. It’s either boring crap or some hideous glass and metal modernist monstrosity.

Contrast this dearth of quality designs with the world of structural insulated panels. Like modular housing, SIPs allow you to dry-in a house within a week. But the difference is that almost any architects plans can be built with SIPs. You don’t need an entire factory assembly line devoted to it, so you aren’t hemmed in by bad taste dictated by the economy of scale. SIPs also give you ridiculously high R values, contrasted to the pitiful R-13 offered in the walls of most modular homes. SIP homes built by experienced crews cost about the same as a stick-built house.

If you want a ‘housing unit’ that functions as collateral for the loan and you’re not planning to spend the rest of your life there, then fine, build a modular home. Let’s all just clutter up the landscape with one more soul-less hunk of vinyl as we march from one ’starter-house’ to the next ‘investment’ without ever really arriving home.

Someday, I’m sure that the potential for modular housing will be met by a company and a flexible assembly line that allows for quality and taste. Until then, I ain’t going near it.

Posted by Jack on 6 March 02006 @ 4pm

There is some exciting modern modular housing coming on to the market designed by young-ish architects. I certainly won’t claim to be knowledgable about the market (having just poked around the net a bit), but I’ve seen some interesting items on the modern design blog http://www.mocoloco.com/ and the site http://www.fabprefab.com.

True, I haven’t seen any craftsman-style or Susanka-style modular houses, but that may be because both those styles seem (to my eye at least) to feature a good deal of high quality finish carpentry (which modular houses seem to eschew for cost savings). What’s exciting about some of the architect-designed ones I’ve seen is that the architects seem commited to affordable housing, trying to aim for finished costs of $175-250/square foot while not skimping on quality materials.

Some sites worth checking out:
- http://www.fabprefab.com/fabfiles/home.htm, as mentioned above.
- The Glide House, http://www.mkd-arc.com/whatwedo/glidehouse/index.cfm
- Susnset Breeze House, http://www.mkd-arc.com/whatwedo/breezehouse/index.cfm, same designer as above & Sunset magazine built the home as a model.
- FlatPak House, http://www.flatpakhouse.com/flatpak.htm, designed by one of the co-founders of Blu Dot Furniture.

Posted by Kevin M. on 8 March 02006 @ 7pm

Kevin,

$175-250 per square foot? You call *that* affordable housing? At that bottom end of that price range, a simple 1,200 sq ft. cottage would cost $210,000, not including land, well, septic, sitework or driveway. If you think that is affordable housing, you need to take a careful look at typical American incomes.

Every time the NY Times does an article on designer modular housing, they wave prices like these around to show how marvelously democratic modular housing is. This is hopelessly out of touch. Besides the price issue, the number of people who want to live in a Mies van der Rohe knock-off is really fairly limited. It amazes me that this stuff is still passed off as either cutting edge or modern. Architects have been pretending that people are comfortable living in glass and steel boxes for the last 60 years or so. Platform shoes, a dozen Presidential administrations and electroclash have all come and gone since then.

What’s missing from the modular housing market is simple, tasteful and traditional houses built to quality specs at a prices below $100 per sq. ft (I’m basing this on the central Virginia market). By ‘traditional’ I don’t mean ’suburban.’ There has been a bizarre confusion between those terms in the housing industry during the last few decades. I’m talking about clapboard or hardi-plank siding instead of vinyl. Generous roof overhangs with returns instead of anemic little things that poke out by less than an inch on the gable ends. Covered, screened porches instead of decks (which only exist to put money in carpenters’ pockets). Useful attic space created by square-center trusses instead of 2×4 mazes. Actual shutters on every window on all 4 sides of the house. You don’t need extensive high-end trim carpentry to build tasteful, comfortable modular homes that don’t feel disposable.

There’s a huge, unserved market out there of people who want the type of features that I’ve cited. The trouble is that you really need to get a custom builder in order to have these features that have only recently (relatively speaking) been purged from American middle-class construction. People with more money to spend than a regular modular home costs, but not enough for the custom builders who often have $500k minimums. When the modular industry wakes up to this fact, I’ll be standing there with a check for them.

Posted by ATA on 13 March 02006 @ 4pm

Waldo,

If you can find the right modular home manufacturer, and have a site which has a decent access road, you can get what you want in a shorter time than with an on-site, stick-built home.

I wonder where Jack is looking for modular house data? From his description, it sounds like he is confusing manufactured houses with modular homes.

Modular homes are built to the same building codes as homes built on-site. Of course, if he lives in an area where the building codes are crappy, that’s what he will probably get.

SIP and modular homes offer different features to different folks. We considered every option until we found our builder. This home is the best-designed and tightest home I have ever owned. I know, because I was able to watch the house being built in the factory and the house, once installed, worked extremely well.

Jack’s statement, “Someday, I’m sure that the potential for modular housing will be met by a company and a flexible assembly line that allows for quality and taste….” is an accomplished fact in Rocky Mount, Virginia. I am sure that there are other firms that do as well.

All you have to do is to read my weblog and look in the category, Moving to Floyd. You will find all of the information you need.

As for costs, I am sure they vary by area. Our cost for a turnkey installation would have been about $125/square foot. Buying the house “wholesale” cost about $70/square foot. Wholesale means the buyer prepares the site and foundation and the company places the modular home and bolts it together and puts the roof on it.

In the next few years, modular homes will rise to 25% of new construction in some areas. Talk to your mortgage people and see what they are experiencing.

If anyone has questions after reading my posts on the four month effort of creating a home from scratch in the middle of a forest, please send me an email.

David St Lawrence

Posted by David St Lawrence on 17 March 02006 @ 3pm

If you can find the right modular home manufacturer, and have a site which has a decent access road, you can get what you want in a shorter time than with an on-site, stick-built home.

Unfortunately, there’s no danger of us having a decent access road. :)

Posted by Waldo Jaquith on 17 March 02006 @ 3pm