Bob LeClair, executive director of the Maine Manufactured Housing Board, in anticipation of the weekend’s model show for factory-built homes at the Civic Center in Augusta, noting the resurgent interest in off-site built homes, says, “Back in 2006, before we had the big drop in the market, modular homes and manufactured homes were 41 percent of all single family housing starts in the state of Maine.” Tinamarie Smith, who operates her family’s State Manufactured Homes in Scarborough, says there are more potential customers than there are banks willing to provide financing since Dodd-Frank went into effect. “We went from having five banks that would finance chattel property down to two,” she adds. Still, according to what mpbn.net tells MHProNews.com, longtime Vassalboro ME dealer Dick Bradstreet says, manufactured housing sales in the state rose 13 percent in 2013 over 2012 and he anticipates this year’s sales will be even better.
