Noting that manufactured housing can provide affordable housing to many low and moderate income families, especially in non-metro areas, several nonprofits are working to reverse the negative image of factory-made homes and their occupants by establishing programs to replace the dilapidated homes with new, high efficiency models. According to Matthew Furman, an Edward M. Gramlich Fellow in Economic and Community Development at Harvard University, there are more than 25 manufactured housing replacement programs in fifteen states that have replaced between 500 and 750 units in the last decade. Writing in dailyyonder.com, he says there are hundreds of thousands of dilapidated manufactured homes that dot the national landscape, many constructed since the federal government established strict guidelines in June, 1976.

Furman says there needs to be sustainable subsidies, such as tax increment financing and revolving-door loan funds to help residents purchase new factory-built homes. Additionally, in order to improve the housing stock via a manufactured housing replacement program, housing professionals need to find creative solutions to problems that will come up, “because clear best practices have not yet emerged in this policy area,” he says. On Wed., Oct 15, Furman and NeighborWorks America’s Rural Initiative will lead a webinar on programs to replace substandard manufactured housing. MHProNews covered a New York project Dec. 12, 2011 that replaced dilapidated MH. ##

(Photo credit: Riley Transport–new manufactured home en route)