While modular housing is picking up steam on Long Island, especially in the wake of Hurricane Sandy as people realize construction time savings, it is causing more steam among the building trades as modules arrive with electric, heating and plumbing systems already built in. Plumbers see their jobs limited to hooking up water and sewer systems, relatively minor work, according to libn.com. Mario Mattera, business agent for a plumbers union says, “For a regular 3,000-square foot-home, let’s say it was a $10,000 plumbing job. Now it would be cut down to about $2,000. All you’re going to be doing is 20 percent of the job.” Mattera adds that many of the modular homes being added to areas devastated by Sandy are built out of state, further damaging the local economy, as MHProNews.com has learned. ##

(Photo credit: newsday.com–Westchester Modular Homes, Long Beach, NY)