manufacturedhomelivingnews.com Manufactured Home Living News
Every good article or report should directly relate to and deliver on its headline. Numbers of publishers have turned to what’s known as “click bait.” Click bait is a catchy headline that leads someone to click on it, but such items are often little more than thinly disguised marketing of some product, idea, organization or person.
With that backdrop, when someone is looking at a high rise building in the United States, Canada or many “western” countries – plus Japan, Taiwan, South Korea or other nations – they are gazing at a building that required engineering. That structure is designed to withstand certain tolerances tailored to soil conditions, weather, wind, safety, durability, energy usage and other factors. Building codes, often supported by local or state laws, routinely apply.
Smaller structures than high-rises are often “engineered” too. The reason an apartment, townhouses, condos or like buildings stand upright and provide shelter is because thoughtfully proven design elements went into its construction.
There are impressions that millions of Americans or in other lands have about manufactured homes. Regrettably, those impressions are often based upon mistaken notions; but why? The reasons are many, but it could be boiled down in numerous instances to problems within the manufactured housing industry. More on that further below.
The term “green” is used in construction to convey the idea of being more environmentally sound than a non-green design or building methodology.
Not to knock on-site construction, because for centuries that’s how people around the world built housing. But building on site is subject to weather, theft of construction materials, and a variety of factors that building indoors often avoids.
Automobiles are built indoors on assembly lines. That’s faster, a better use of labor, involves less wasted materials, and results in an overall better value than someone might achieve if they gathered all the parts that go into making a car, truck or SUV and try to assemble it outside on a driveway. You also don’t build a computer or electronic gear outdoors do you? Much of what you wear or use came from some indoor production center.
That illustration or comparison often quickly paints a useful image for what follows.
The first video below is an interview with an engineer.
That engineer owns a specific brand of manufactured home. But in the U.S., all federally regulated or “HUD Code” manufactured housing must meet certain design and engineering criteria. That’s the law, and it is one of several things that sets a manufactured home apart from the mobile homes that have not been built in the United States since June 15, 1976. That’s the date that the first federally regulated “manufactured homes” were built or “were born” in production centers across the country.
Different manufactured homes are built to different design standards. But all of them that carry the red HUD label had to meet durability, climate zone, wind zone, roof or “snow loads,” and other regionally established engineered specifications. The interview with engineer Skip Van Zandt will shed more light on the topic of comparing conventional housing to manufactured homes. The video should be viewed through the lens of an engineer’s insights.
On the MHLivingNews website we rely on facts, evidence and applied common sense. One principle used in investigations is the principle employed by journalists and law enforcement alike: “follow the money.” Things that at first may make little or no sense can be clarified when the financial incentives and the money trail are established.
There have been literally decades of third party research that demonstrates the value of manufactured homes.
A shocking-to-some pull-quote from a National Association of Realtors Certified Business Economist (CBE), Scholastica “Gay” Cororaton below illustrates the point that manufactured homes are different than the trailers houses and mobile homes built decades before, just as cars built today have evolved over the decades too.
Yet there is persistent misinformation and misunderstanding about manufactured housing. As Dr. Lisa Tyler, Ph.D. said in her peer reviewed and approved doctoral dissertation that the pull quote below illustrates.
Indeed there are literally reams of such research by federal, state, university or nonprofit groups that have no direct incentive to say other than what their search found. The documents organized in the report linked below makes that clear.
To sum up several of these points at a glance is this infographic.
To dramatize the point about one of the most misunderstood elements of manufactured housing is this next video. Note that it uses mainstream news footage, video from third-party researchers that included an engineer, and other sources, but it is laced together with commentary from this writer. You will won’t see me, because the focus will be on the subject of manufactured homes and tornado safety. But will learn what my voice sounds like.
Let’s sum up and rephrase. Engineered homes or eGreen Homes are terms that could, perhaps should, be used to describe a manufactured home. There is no competition, no technical tension between those terms. But the common nomenclature is “manufactured home.”
So why is there so much misunderstanding or misinformation about the manufactured housing industry today?
To understand the answer to that question, look at the reports linked below the byline and notices. When you do open your mind – and, don’t forget – follow the money trail.
By exposing what is wrong and focusing on what is right the evolution of the solution could achieve its ultimate success. “We Provide, You Decide.” © (Affordable housing, manufactured homes, lifestyle news, reports, fact-checks, analysis, and commentary. Third-party images or content are provided under fair use guidelines for media.)
(See Related Reports, further below. Text/image boxes often are hot-linked to other reports that can be access by clicking on them.)
By L.A. “Tony” Kovach – for MHLivingNews.com.
Tony earned a journalism scholarship and earned numerous awards in history and in manufactured housing. For example, he earned the prestigious Lottinville Award in history from the University of Oklahoma, where he studied history and business management. He’s a managing member and co-founder of LifeStyle Factory Homes, LLC, the parent company to MHProNews, and MHLivingNews.com. This article reflects the LLC’s and/or the writer’s position, and may or may not reflect the views of sponsors or supporters.
Connect on LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/latonykovach
Related References:
The text/image boxes below are linked to other reports, which can be accessed by clicking on them.
