Manfactured home now stick-bult? with addition-I hate these!

[Debra]

Hello!

I've had a few of these lately...

The one that I'm going to thursday has supposedly been totally redone inside except for the cabinets and have a stick built addition on the back part of which has a basement with 2 rooms. They said that the outside wood has been replaced with vinyl and the composition roof replaced. The original home was built in 1986 and the changes and additions made since then. If I get there and it is more like a stick built home now...should I still make some kind of adjustment for the low roof line and because it was originally a double-wide? Thanks! Debra :?

 

[Tim Hicks (Texas)]

It is what it is. It is a manufactured home with an add-on. Your comps should be manufactured homes with add-ons. Otherwise, I would use only MH sales and adjust for the add on. Don't try to paint a picture that it is anything other than its base construction. Consider it the same as a garage conversion appraisal, or an appraisal with an add-on sun room or other "below-grade" improvement.

 

[Debra]

Hello!

So...even though the inside is sheetrock now and regular house doors and everything is now like a stick built home except the cabinets and roof line I should still compare it to other manufactured homes and make an adjustment on a seperate line for the additions? That's what you are saying right...that no matter how much they change a manufactured home and add onto it that it's still needs to be compared to manufactured homes...correct? Thanks! :?

 

[Jo Ann Meyer Stratton]

Once a manufactured home--always a manufactured home because the bone structure, undercarriage, framing for the walls, trusses for the roof (items inside the skin) were built to HUD buidling code, not to a site built building code like CABO or UBC, etc. Find other manufactured homes and report the livable area for the manufactured homes built to HUD code on the GLA line. Any site buit structures list on another line so that apples are compared to apples and oranges compared to oranges. If your subject has had extensive renovation on the interior and exterior then you might have a condition adjustment if the other manufactured homes are similar in original year of construction and they have not be renovated. You also might consider a more recently constructed manufactured home with dry wall interior, vaulted ceilings, oak cabinets, etc, etc to compare to the subject with a minimal adjustment for age or condition. Find if possible other manufactured homes with site built additions and compare their additions to the subject's additions. This could end up be a very "messy" report with adjustments on almost every line. But just provide lots of explanation of what you did and why you did do it that way. Also lots of explanation about the subject and each comparable and your market for manufactured homes versu site built homes versus manufactured homes with site built additions.

By the way have you read my article on the naifa.com web site? Look for the Appraisal E Gram, past issues, October, 2002 issue.

 

[Tim Hicks (Texas)]

Debra,

We have numerous MH's here with add-ons, remodeled interiors, etc. I appraise them all the time. It is still proper to compare it to MH sales and adjust for improvements and updates. It will never be equal to a site built home unless it is burnt to the ground and re-built with site built materials. You do what you want, but...hello, it is a manufactured home no matter how you slice it.

 

[Tim Hicks (Texas)]

Let me play Don Corleone,

This is how it is going to happen. If you appraise the home comparing it to stick built homes you may come out with an inflated value. It may or may not make it through underwriting. If it does it is pure luck. In the meantime, your name will spread like wildfire through MH lending community. They have found an appraiser that will use stick built homes to make the deal work. You will be overloaded with work. You will have higher and higher values to hit. You will become their slave. Eventually you will come under investigation and you will receive all the prosecution and possibly lose your license. The lenders and MH dealers will prance off into the night with much more money than you made and find their new protege to keep them afloat.

This is not really what will happen, but you need to be aware of all the regulatory issues involved with appraising manufactured homes. Many a decent appraiser has fallen into the hypnosis of MH dealers and MH land developers. It does not take long for them to find easy prey in appraisers who will fall under their spell with temporary monetary gain.

I know this has little to do with your present situation, but it is amazing how making a little transgression on one appraisal (especially MH) will send you directly into the grasp of lenders who don't care about your ethics, only their profits.

 

[Debra]

:lol: :lol: :lol: :roll: :wink:

I love the straight talk! and it has helped. One time I was told that a property was a brick home...well....I got there and it was 2 single wide mh's put together with an addition in the middle. It was a HUGE MESS! I didn't finish that one.

Actually it is Home Owners that have tried to get me to use stick built homes to compare their redone mh's with additions. This has happened to me twice in the last few months and they say that other appraisers did this...so...I started wondering if other appraisers really did. These ho's were from different counties and didn't know each other or anything. I've never done it but maybe somebody in this area does...Debra

 

[Mountain Man]

I started wondering if other appraisers really did

Ohhhh, YES they do :!: I have seen many while digging up bones for the field review process. The advise above is correct. Once a manufactured home, always a manufactured home.

P.S. If the HUD tag is covered over, or removed, that home will not be eligible for FHA financing. As a courtesy, I let the new owners know to never remove or cover those HUD tags. :wink:

 

[Richard Carlsen]

ONCE A MOBILE, ALWAYS A MOBILE !

Need I say more?

 

[Jo Ann Meyer Stratton]

M Leggett:
The National HOC Referance Guide changed that policy. If the HUD tag is removed or can't be observed because it is covered up with junk or siding or furniture or built in cupboards, complete the appraisal, tell the lender verbally before submitting, write about it in the appraisal, and then the lender has the responsibility pf verifying that the home was constructed to HUD building code. See section 9 of the referance guide. The lender will need the information from the data plate AKA the Certificate of Compliance, a letter sized piece of paper with a map of the usa, found in a closet, cupboard or by the electrical panel. Can't find the data plate, then the lender will need the serial number from what ever ownership documents they have for the unit. The lender can provide the serial number to the office in Washington DC and get back the HUD number and verification that the home was built to HUD code. The HUD number should (be not always) also be printed or written on the data plate. So take a photo and write down everything you can find on the data plate. Both for FHA and conventional loans.