Matthew Silver

Following a 25-year career operating a custom hardwood furnishing business and occasional writing, Matthew Silver has been writing professionally for over a dozen years, six of those for the factory-built housing industry. Otherwise, he may be found performing folk music in the Indianapolis area.

Home Ownership is Still the Ticket

The Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University says the echo boomers, those born between the late 70’s and early 90’s, while many live with parents, are no less interested in owning their own homes than past generations, and will drive the housing market in the near future. Numbering …

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Most Tracked Housing Stocks Rise Along with Indexes

In addition to Atlanta’s Federal Reserve Bank’s president suggesting stimulus may be coming, JPMorgan Chase’s announcement of a stronger-than-expected earnings report sent all three indexes up well over one percent at week’s end. CNNMoney tells us the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 203.82 points, +1.48 percent, to close at 12,777.09. …

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MHARR to HUD: You’re Not Hitting the Nail on the Head

In its Washington Update, the Manufactured Housing Association for Regulatory Reform (MHARR) is seeking federal support for public and private chattel lending to expand capital, liquidity, and number of lenders for the low to moderate income manufactured home buying market. Noting it is not likely for any major policy change …

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Modular Builder Receives Certification

Lotwenterprise reports that modular builder Wincrief Homes of Kenora, Ontario, Canada received its certification from the Canadian Standards Association to supply municipalities and First Nation peoples with modular homes. Unlike the company’s ready-to-move (RTM) homes, modular homes are eligible for financing through banks. A subsidiary of Wincrief Forestry Products, the …

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Arizona: Slight Improvement in Housing Market

Arizona Daily Star says the median rice of homes in Tucson rose 11 percent from last June to $140,000, but was unchanged from May, according to the Tuscon Association of Realtors Multiple Listing Service. The number of days a house is on the market fell to 68 in June from …

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MHC License Returns, but Residents Remain Skeptical

Following up on a story we began covering Sept. 2011 that we last covered June 28, 2012, the Edgeway Mobile Home Park in Middleboro, Massachusetts, will be licensed for the first time since 2004, as SouthCoastToday tells MHProNews.com. The MHC was never completed according to the plan submitted to the …

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Buffett Hedges his Bets

Benzinga reports Warren Buffett has changed his tune from a year ago when he noted most everything in the economy was improving except residential housing, for which he now sees a demand in the rental market. He says although Europe is in worse shape now than six weeks ago he …

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Foreclosures Remain a Threat to Stabilizing Prices

NationalMortgageNews reports RealtyTrac says foreclosure activity dropped eight percent in Q2 2012 from a year ago. 608,235 foreclosure filings—default notice, auction sale notice, or bank repossession—were reported on U.S. properties Q2 2011, as compared to 558,310 for this year’s filing. MHProNews.com has learned while banks repossessed 40,000 fewer properties in …

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Most Tracked Housing Stocks Gain, While Indexes Fall

Investors remained worried that the European summit last month will not produce a rescue plan for the euro currency union amid concerns about corporate returns in this country, as all three indexes lost a little more ground. CNNMoney reports the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped -31.26 points, -0.25%, to close …

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MH Developer Persists

Following a story we last published Sept. 19,2001 concerning the five year battle over a proposed development of two MHCs in Oxford, Connecticut, Garden Homes Management has resubmitted plans for the property, this time proposing 126 manufactured homes, reports the oxford-ctpatch. Opposition has come from the neighborhood and the Oxford …

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MHI Testifies at Dodd-Frank Hearing

Speaking for the Manufactured Housing Institute (MHI) at a hearing on the impact of Dodd-Frank mortgage requirements before the House Financial Services subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit Wed. July 11, Tom Hodges, General Counsel for Clayton Homes, suggested Congress create a secondary market for manufactured home buyers so …

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BMO Dims Sun

Benzinga reports Wed. July 11 BMO Capital Markets downgraded Sun Communities, Inc. to market perform from outperform and repeated its $45.00 target. Benzinga compliments Sun on its balance sheet metrics, dividend coverage, and net operating income (NOI), and notes its affordable housing option continues to thrive. Sun (NYSE: SUI) closed …

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JPChase: Chasing Bulls?

Standard & Poor’s Case-Shiller Index showed slowing declines in home prices earlier in the year, and Zillow‘s survey of economists are expecting an 0.4% decline through this year, but JPChase analysts say the 4.8 million homes in the shadow inventory will drag prices down another two percent this year as …

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Council Denies Rezoning for MH Placement

Following up on a story we posted yesterday, July 10, yourdailyjournal reports the Rockingham (North Carolina) City Council denied a request from Charles Seago to rezone land from business to residential so he could site four additional manufactured homes on the property on which he already has five MH. Although …

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Multifamily Project gets Green Light

Harking back to a story we published June 8, 2012, the Milford, Connecticut Planning and Zoning Board approved plans for a 36-unit multifamily development after receiving a report from the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP), as well as the city’s health department, that development of the site posed …

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Dow Nudges Down, Patrick and Cavco Gain

U.S. stocks dropped after the minutes of the Federal Reserve Board disclosed nothing about a possible stimulus package to fire up the sluggish economy. CNNMoney tells us the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped -48.59 points, -0.38%, to close at 12,604.53. The Nasdaq fell -0.49 percent to 2,887.98, while the S&P …

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Ohio Preparing for Influx of Workers

As energy workers are lured to eastern Ohio to take advantage of the jobs becoming available in the oil and gas fields of the Utica Shale formation, RVBusiness says the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and the Ohio Department of Health have issued a 12-page set of regulations governing water. The …

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Texas Oil Fields Need Housing

MySanAntonio tells us the western edge of the Eagle Ford Shale near Interstate 35 south of San Antonio is drawing workers to the drilling fields where an additional 7,900 workers will be needed by 2025, but housing remains a problem. Banks are generally reluctant to lend money for rural housing …

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Prefab Began in New Albany

LousivilleCourier-Journal states Bob Lane, executive director of the New Albany (Indiana) Historical Society says the first prefabricated house in the country came out of the Gunnison Housing Corporation in New Albany in 1936. Foster Gunnison, a lighting director from New York who was involved with the construction of Radio City …

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Housing Recovery: Are the Trades Ready?

HousingWire says a report by the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) reveals 40 percent of single-family homebuilders plan on hiring skilled workers within the next year, but 62 percent fear a shortage because so many have left the trades because of a lack of jobs. One study reports shortages …

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