Of course they do, right? Compared to standard homes, modular homes are stronger, higher in quality and have stricter inspection standards, so it only makes sense that they’d have better warranties.

Truth is, many custom homes only come with the minimum warranty, which in most states lasts one year and covers all features. Modular manufacturers, on the other hand, go above and beyond with extended warranties (some at no cost) that cover workmanship, plumbing, electrical and other features. Best of all, many of these warranties include coverage for up to 15 years against structural defects. And yes, if you sell the home, these warranties are transferrable.

Another month, another book. This one is written by Rich Binsacca, a journalist who’s written several books on homes. “Kit Homes” takes a look at, well, kit homes. Modular homes are sometimes called kit homes, though most traditional kit homes are typically smaller one-story homes, whereas modular homes can be sprawling, two-story mansions.

According to the book’s back cover, Rich’s latest effort “introduces you to the full range of kit home choices. This hands-on and accessible guide offers advice and guidance, provides essential tools, suggests additional resources, and walks you through the process of planning for and purchasing a kit home. Kit homes include houses derived from catalogs as well as modular, manufactured, and factory-built homes. These houses can provide greater design flexibility, cost and time efficiencies, and, often, a higher-quality finished product.”

What we like most about this book (besides the stellar photography) is the rich history it uncovers when it comes to kit and modular homes. All of chapter one is dedicated to history, while chapter two covers steps to take before you build your home, including “financing options” and “finding and developing land.” Later chapters are dedicated entirely to “homes in a catalog” and “homes in a factory.”

Either way, this book is a valuable resource for anyone considering the purchase of a kit or modular home or anyone who’s simply a fan of housing history!

We posted this entry a while back here on Modular Musings, but we felt it was worth a second look. It’s really indicative of how far the modular home industry has come over the years and how more people are embracing modular construction and its many benefits.

For various reasons, modular homes are popular in New England (more than 10 percent of all new homes in the northeast U.S. are modular). Even new homeowners in upscale areas like Martha’s Vineyard are taking notice of the benefits of modular construction.

Martha’s Vineyard Magazine did a feature on the rise of modular homes in the island community for its spring/summer 2008 issue. The modules for the home at the center of the story were pulled across Vineyard Haven’s harbor on a barge and transported by police-escorted flatbed trucks to their final destination.

The article discusses the many benefits of modular construction, including the financial perks that have led so many Vineyarders to go modular:

What makes the Vineyard a hungrier modular market than most? Follow the money: Certainly, modular customers everywhere benefit from the economies of scale realized by big factories that purchase basic materials, from drywall to grout, in bulk. For Islanders, the resounding cost differential is labor. “Sixty dollars an hour is what I have to charge for labor here versus fifteen to twenty dollars off-Island,” says builder Ray Maciel, one of several Vineyard contractors whose business today is all modular all the time. After adding the expense of shipping boxes across land and water, and renting a crane to move them into place, Vineyard homeowners report shaving a quarter to nearly a half off the budget for an equivalent stick-built home.

It’s a long article, but one of the best we’ve seen about the modular housing boom. Check it out on the Martha’s Vineyard Magazine website and don’t miss the mention of Excel Homes/Avis America and the helpful how-to section at the end.

We posted this entry a while back here on Modular Musings, but we felt it was worth a second look. It’s really indicative of how far the modular home industry has come over the years and how more people are embracing modular construction and its many benefits.

For various reasons, modular homes are popular in New England (more than 10 percent of all new homes in the northeast U.S. are modular). Even new homeowners in upscale areas like Martha’s Vineyard are taking notice of the benefits of modular construction.

Martha’s Vineyard Magazine did a feature on the rise of modular homes in the island community for its spring/summer 2008 issue. The modules for the home at the center of the story were pulled across Vineyard Haven’s harbor on a barge and transported by police-escorted flatbed trucks to their final destination.

The article discusses the many benefits of modular construction, including the financial perks that have led so many Vineyarders to go modular:

What makes the Vineyard a hungrier modular market than most? Follow the money: Certainly, modular customers everywhere benefit from the economies of scale realized by big factories that purchase basic materials, from drywall to grout, in bulk. For Islanders, the resounding cost differential is labor. “Sixty dollars an hour is what I have to charge for labor here versus fifteen to twenty dollars off-Island,” says builder Ray Maciel, one of several Vineyard contractors whose business today is all modular all the time. After adding the expense of shipping boxes across land and water, and renting a crane to move them into place, Vineyard homeowners report shaving a quarter to nearly a half off the budget for an equivalent stick-built home.

It’s a long article, but one of the best we’ve seen about the modular housing boom. Check it out on the Martha’s Vineyard Magazine website and don’t miss the mention of Excel Homes/Avis America and the helpful how-to section at the end.

We already know that modular construction is faster, more affordable and more energy efficient which makes modular homes better for the environment, but did you also know that modular homes are also stronger and higher in quality than site-built homes?

There are two main reasons why modular homes are stronger and higher in quality: the materials they’re made from and the inspection standards they are subjected to. As we’ve reported previously on Modular Musings, modular homes typically use 20 to 30 percent more materials (and are therefore even stronger than site-built homes) in order to ensure a safe trip to their final location. FEMA studies conducted after Hurricane Andrew have confirmed that modular homes are indeed stronger than manufactured or site-built homes.

Modular homes are also held to much higher inspection standards. These checks begin with quality and strength inspections in the factory (Excel uses independent, third-party inspectors in our plants) and are conducted again by local inspectors on-site to make sure the homes meet state and local building requirements.

Both factors add up to a home that not only feels stronger, but one that actually is stronger. As for the lifespan of a modular home, 100 years from now, the homes Excel is building today should still be standing.

Though it may seem as though modular homes exploded onto the scene in just the past decade or two, the art of modular construction has actually been around in the U.S. for more than 100 years. Of course, the predecessors to today’s modular homes, which are identical in appearance to site-built ones, are a bit simpler than modern attempts.

The first mainstream use of modular building methods began in the early 20th century when Sears Roebuck began selling pre-fabricated houses. Between 1910 and 1940, Sears sold more than 70,000 modular homes through Sears’ mail order catalogues, which featured more than 400 designs ranging from $450 to $4,500. The Elsmore model pictured below sold for $1,945 in the company’s 1921 catalogue. An optional mantel on the fireplace cost $39. (This website features modern day photos of some of the many Sears mail order homes still in use.)

Later, when soldiers returned home after World War II, the demand for new housing reached an all time high, which forced builders to once again consider the benefits (faster construction times and more affordable housing) to keep up with the post-war demand.

Today’s custom homes are very different from those earlier attempts, as improvements in the assembly line process have helped to create larger, stronger homes and put modular construction on the same playing field as site-built houses. The ability to customize your modular home has also helped to separate the new versions from their cookie-cutter cousins.

Jack Gizienski joined the Excel Homes team in October 2007 as our vice president of operations and immediately began making plans to build his modular dream home for himself and his wife. It took a little while for Jack to finalize the specific plans for the home – the initial concepts were designed by Jack on a napkin! – but last month, his dream became a reality in the form of a 3,300 square foot ranch style home in Mechanicsburg, PA.

The home has four bedrooms, three full bathrooms and a three-car garage. Although modular homes are typically more energy efficient than stick-built homes, Jack designed his house to be even more efficient through the use of advanced insulation methods, geothermal heating and air conditioning, ENERGY STAR rated appliances and thermal pane, Low E windows.

The seven modules that make up Jack’s house were delivered to the site and lowered into place by a crane and a team of workers known as the “set crew.” The first module was set into place just after 9 a.m. and the last module (one of two that would make up Jack’s three-car garage) was set at 6:10 p.m. Not bad for one day’s work! While the modules were being built in our AvisAmerica facility in Avis, PA, construction was underway on the foundation and basement of Jack’s house.

Jack (in the red shirt) was on hand throughout the day to oversee the construction of his new home. Like most new modular homeowners, he was understandably excited about the process. Here, he goes over some details of the home’s plans. Since he designed the home himself over the course of a year, he pretty much knew every square inch like the back of his hand.

Here, the first module is lowered onto the foundation. The entire process of backing a module in front of the crane, hooking up the crane’s cables to the module, lifting it into the air, lowering it into place and securing it onto the foundation takes about one hour.

Module number three, which makes up the front portion of the house, is lifted off of the flat bed it arrived on (the metal platform in front of the two workers) and onto the foundation. As the module is slowly moved into place, the member of the set crew (in orange) holds a rope to prevent the module from swaying or bumping into the other modules.

After each module is set on the foundation, the set crew makes sure the edges are perfectly aligned with the foundation. Here, a member of the set crew makes some minor adjustments (with the help of the crane) to the smaller module on the back of the house.

The day after the modules were installed, the crane lifted the roof into place. After that, the crew from CB Homes took over, connecting the utilities and putting the finishing touches on the exterior and interior of the home. That process took about 10 weeks to complete and the Gizienskis were in their new home for Thanksgiving dinner.

A full set of photos from the day can be seen here. We also videotaped the installation of all seven modules and, through the miracles of time-lapse editing, have boiled the nine-hour process down to three minutes. We’ll post that video here on Modular Musings in the near future!

The home buying process requires a lot of homework and is full of questions. That’s why we’ve created this recurring “Ask the Experts” feature here on the Excel Homes blog. It features real questions with simple answers from Excel’s team of experts. Click on the “Ask the Experts” link on the right to ask one of our listed experts a question of your own.

WE’RE INTERESTED IN BUILDING A MODULAR HOME AND WE KNOW THAT WE CAN CHOOSE FROM A CATALOGUE OF OPTIONS, BUT I’VE GOT SOME IDEAS OF MY OWN FOR OUR HOUSE. CAN I DESIGN MY OWN MODULAR HOME?

Absolutely! Excel’s own vice president of operations, Jack Gizienski, designed his dream home, which he then turned over to Excel’s architects to bring it to life.

You can meet with a builder or architect to design your own home from the ground up, but what most modular homeowners prefer to do is choose one of our existing modular home designs and then customize as little or as much as they’d like.

Hope this helps!

Harry Odum
General Manager
Excel Homes, Liverpool plant

If you’ve got a question for our modular home experts about any step of the modular home building or buying process, feel free to ask us using the “Ask the Experts” feature in the sidebar.

Paul M. asks: “How long does it take to build a modular home?”

Good question, Paul. It’s well known that a modular home can be built in about half the time it takes to build a standard home.

Compared to site-built homes, a modular home can be built, installed on a foundation and made ready for move-in only five or six weeks after the homeowner has secured financing and the building permit. This is, of course, the “fast end” of the modular home building scale. Larger, more customized modular options can take up to 20 weeks to complete, but this is still several months faster than it would be to erect a comparable site-built home.

The reasons for this efficiency are simple. First, the modular construction process is refined and streamlined thanks to a highly trained, specialized crew and advanced manufacturing processes. Second, while the modular crew is busy building the home, work on the site and foundation – a process that can take four weeks or more by itself – can occur simultaneously. Finally, because the modules are built indoors, there are no weather delays and workers can work more efficiently.  

I hope this answers your question!

Harry Odum
General Manager
Excel Homes Liverpool, PA plant

Not long ago, one of AvisAmerica’s modular homes was built in the small coastal town of Owl’s Head, Maine. The home, a 2,200-square-foot, six-room, two-story, cape/chalet combo, was built by Bay Point Homes of Rockland, Maine.

Maine and the rest of New England is a very active modular market, and one in which we expect to see growth. That’s one reason Excel Homes announced its intention to purchase modular home manufacturer Oxford Homes in Oxford, Maine earlier this year. The deal includes a 40,000-square-foot manufacturing facility capable of producing single-family, multi-family, and commercial building modules.

Here, we see half of the Owl’s Head home on its foundation and the roof raised. The roof is attached at the Excel plant by hinges, which allow it to lay flat during the transportation process before being raised and locked into place on-site. (A photo of the hinges can be seen here.)

In this photo, both halves of the home are in place as members of the builder’s crew put some finishing touches on the roof. This particular home will be even more energy efficient than most modular homes through its use of oil, propane and passive solar energy for heat.

The couple who will move into the home played a key role in customizing its environmentally-friendly features, including choosing superinsulated windows. They also make a few aesthetic changes to the original cape design, customizing their new home with a cathedral ceiling and a 36-foot farmer’s porch.