Blog Posting # 796, Copyright 7 June 2024. EducateMHC
Know this! HUD-Code manufactured housing (‘MH’) is federally-regulated, performance-based, affordable-attainable factory-built housing (a.k.a. offsite construction). And land lease communities (a.k.a. manufactured home communities & ‘mobile home parks’) comprise the commercial real estate (‘CRE’) component of MH! EducateMHC is the online advocate, official historian, trade term & trend tracker, as well as information resource for both business models, and to some extent, for the recreational vehicle (‘RV’) industry as well. Access EducateMHC via (317) 881-3815; email: gfa7156@aol.com, & via www.educatemhc.com to purchase Community Management in the Manufactured Housing Industry, and SWAN SONG, a history of land lease communities & official record of annual MH production totals since 1955. And my autobiography, From SmittyAlphaSix to MHMaven, describes personal combat adventures in Vietnam as a USMC lieutenant, a 45 year entrepreneur business career in MH & community ownership, as well as prolific non-fiction author and popular freelance consultant.
George Allen, CPM®Emeritus, MHM®Master, is the only emeritus member of the Manufactured Housing Institute (‘MHI’), a founding board member of MHI’s National Communities Council (‘NCC’) division, an RV/MH Hall of Fam enshrinee, MHInsider magazine columnist and editor at large. He’s a Vietnam combat veteran and retired lieutenant colonel of U.S. Marines, and author/editor of 30 books & chapbooks on MH, communities, business management & prayer.
Stats from ‘Whole US Housing Story’ for April 2024
Here’re key statistics from the second-ever ‘Whole US Housing Story’, for April 2024, researched by EducateMHC.
8971 new HUD-Code manufactured housing units were produced during April 2024
+1718 modular & panelized (i.e. ‘prefab’) housing units estimated during April 2024
+453 Park Model recreational vehicles (‘RVs’) were produced during April 2024
= 11,142 composite subtotal of the three previous offsite housing production totals
+ 97,058 estimated number of single-family site-built housing units started during April 2024
= 108,200 grand total of US housing starts during April 2024
Bottom line? Above composite total (lines # 1, 2, &3) = estimated volume of offsite construction units produced/shipped/sited in US during April 2024; or 11.5 percent of all new housing starts.
Visit www.educatemhc.com and/or respond to this unique research via gfa7156@aol.com
Tidbits @ ‘MHSHipment Volume & Stock Market Report
HUD-Code manufactured housing shipments, year to date – April 2024, are at 33,248 units, compared to 27,850 units during the same period year 2023. Mathematical extrapolation suggests 27,850 units YTD 2023 = 89,169 total new HUD-Code homes that year; so 33,248 units YTD 2024 might predict more than 106,000 new HUD-Code homes produced during year 2024.
What’s the overall economic impact of new HUD-Code homes produced during the month of April 2024? Wish we knew! All we can calculate is the ‘production value’ of the 8971 new homes produced, to be maybe $387 million – and this based on MHI-sponsored research more than a decade ago, i.e. $43,126 = production value of one new HUD-Code home. Production value YTD is at $1.433 billion. Yes, this factor needs updating & we need total economic impact!
Only comment on the stock market portion of this monthly report, tracking stock prices of all ten public companies (i.e. five @ MH firms & 5 @ public land lease community portfolio firms), is that the Composite Stock Index (‘CSI’) @ 4 June 2024 = $778; down from $829 in May, but well above base of $790.07 established during January 2022.
MH = Answer to U.S. Affordable Housing Crisis in Three Key Steps!
Recent email correspondence circulated among MHARR, MHPro News, MH2X Project organizers, and owners/operators of land lease communities got me to thinking:
Just What Would It Take for Manufactured Housing to Become Recognized as The Answer to the U.S. Affordable Housing Crisis?
First off, in my opinion, we need – as an industry and realty asset class, to research, document, and blatantly advertise our collective economic impact! In other words, ‘prove our worth’, once and for all, as a major housing producer and lifestyle provider. Who will lead that timely effort? MHARR, MHI, or someone else?
Next, finally craft and launch a top-down coordinated national promotion and advertising effort in behalf of HUD-Code manufactured housing! And this time around, enlist the express – not tacit, support of our industry’s major manufacturers. No more of this, ‘We won’t donate and participate in a program that might (will) benefit our smaller competitors around the country.’
And finally, but just as important as the first two steps, use the emerging MH2X Project to encourage the face-lifting of land lease communities nationwide, and fill vacant rental homesites with new HUD-Code homes financed with ‘home only’ loans and or the lease option alternative.
Does all this read too simplistic to you? Perhaps it is, but until we – and legislative/regulatory decision-makers, clearly know the significant economic impact of our new homes, and leasehold communities into which 50 percent of them go, we’re ‘dead in the water’ – like we’ve been since 1998 (i.e. when we produced 372,943 new HUD-Code homes)! And there’s no need to even talk about a coordinated national promotion and advertising effort until the Big 3-C HUD-Code housing manufacturers are truly on board and willing to finance and lead said effort, without worrying about the little guy! Oh, and the land lease community folk. We already know, that with the exception of most ‘over 55’ communities, we’re pretty much at the low end of the housing provider line. But that does not excuse any of us from applying peer pressure – on ourselves and others, to clean up, fix up, and fill up our income-producing properties nationwide!
So, there you have it ‘The Answer to the U.S. Affordable Housing Crisis in Three Key Steps!’
Are you on board? I sure hope so. And if you are, nothing is stopping you from expressing your thoughts on this tripartite matter to our elected and salaried leaders at MHARR & MHI – including the National Communities Council division. If you do so, send me a copy (via gfa7156@aol.com) so I can write of your support in a future blog or communique. In the meantime, watch for further word from the MH2X Project folk as to their upcoming training programs, etc., at the fall SECO conference in Atlanta, and elsewhere.
George Allen