Hi, I'm recently separated and trying to find a place to live. I've been in the manufactured home market. I've bought some land nearby for around $26k. I have a semi-large family (3 kids) so I'm trying to find a place decently big to accommodate everyone at least half of the time. I started looking at smaller single-wide trailers that were around 40k new (3br/2ba), which then jumped up to 18ft single-wide trailers that were 4br/2ba in the mid 50's and now somehow, someway i've talked myself (or been talked into) getting large pretty nice double wide trailer 5br/3ba for around 100-110k. It will be made into a modular house, which should help keep its value and help with the land improvements cost compared to a regular trailer. I just don't know if i'm doing the right thing. All in all it will still be cheaper than renting anything. At first the trailer was just going to be a regular trailer (non-modular) 4br/3ba for around 70k. The dealer had some pull/bonus discounts with the manufacturer which saved around 10k on the price. The catch is they wouldn't do a FHA or rural development loan and would do a chattel only loan with a horrible rate (8.75-9%). I've found the same trailer at 2 other places and they will make it the way i want and all (even add another 8 feet to the length and add a 5th bedroom). But of course it cost more. Both places are around the 100-105k mark. That seems to be a lot. Granted the added cost of making it modular (10-15k) is included compared to the first dealer. Making it modular from all i've heard seems to be a really good idea. I'm not an expert. This is my first time in the mobile home market. Over the summer there was a really bad flood in my area and the housing market is really inflated now for homes that didnt flood. Around 30% markup as far as i can tell. One thing that hasn't gone up is land and manufactured housing. All in all, I can get a really large place to live for around 130-140k (including the land) at a 4.3% interest rate rural development loan. I could just go back down to a cheaper trailer... but i don't know. I'm trying to get something nice really for the kids while they go through the divorce which is going to hit them pretty hard.
Any advice will be appreciated. Thanks
March 13, 2017 at 04:29PM
