MHMSM.com presents Factory Built Housing Industry News at Noon with Erin Patla.
We begin with these stories:
FORMER EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT for Law and Policy at Fannie Mae Thomas Donilon [DON-ih-lun] appears to be on the short list to replace White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel. According to CNBC, Donilon served at the mortgage giant during investigations into accounting irregularities and was accused in a scathing government report of overseeing a lobbying campaign against those investigations. Donilon left Fannie Mae in 2005, before the release of the report and well before the conservatorship.
BOB JONES, chairman of the National Association of Home Builders, this week called on the Senate to move immediately to pass legislation approved by the House that would allow construction loans to be eligible for the new small business lending fund signed into law earlier this week. The $30 billion lending fund established under this new law to help small businesses does not allow for construction loans to be made to small builders.
ALSO FROM THE NAHB, new research reveals that the benefits of housing-related tax deductions, such as the mortgage interest deduction, generally decline in value as individuals age. Using Internal Revenue Service Statistics of Income data, the builders were able to report for the first time how various tax deductions are used by different age groups. NAHB says the analysis demonstrates that the biggest beneficiaries are younger households, who typically have large mortgages, small amounts of equity in their homes and growing families.
WEDNESDAY the Mortgage Bankers Association released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey, which indicated loan application volume decreased 0.8 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 1.0 percent compared with the previous week. The decrease is despite record low interest rates. The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased in the same period to 4.38 percent from 4.44 percent.
Manufactured housing in the news…
FROM LAWRENCEVILLE, GEORGIA, the Gwinnett Post reports that a handful of factory-built-home communities got a reprieve this year on a lump sum payment for Gwinnett’s new trash plans, which were due for homeowners with tax bills. County officials there say a small number of parcels would have faced bills of more than $24,000, but did not have the trash service on its tax bills. Commissioners recently agreed to a payment plan for the money, a monthly charge of $17.86.
FROM THE NEWS AND SENTINEL in Parkersburg, West Virginia, planners have the go-ahead to review and provide recommendations for changes in current land use regulations to include rental properties. As it stands, Wood County has no ordinances addressing development of apartments, condos, homes or manufactured homes offered for rent rather than sale. Officials noted the number of rental properties is growing in light of current economic conditions.
THE LAW BLOG recently posted a feature on the definition of a manufactured home. The article says the definition given by the HUD for manufactured homes is now accepted as the appropriate definition of a mobile or trailer home and it is used as the correct term to describe such a property. HUD defines a Manufactured Home as “a structure that is transportable in one or more sections. In traveling mode, the home is eight feet or more in width and forty feet or more in length. [It] is designed and constructed to the Federal Manufactured Construction and Safety Standards and is so labeled. When erected on site, the home is at least 400 square feet, built and remains on a permanent chassis, is designed to be used as a dwelling with a permanent foundation built to FHA criteria. And the structure must be designed for occupancy as a principal residence by a single family.”
“More Manufactured Housing in the News continues…”
But first, this podcast of News at Noon is sponsored in part by:
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Now, back to our stories.
FROM MASSACHUSETTS, the Lowell Sun reports that residents of Lakeside Mobile Home Court met with opposition from town officials concerning their increased water and sewer rates. Park residents argued that the method the town uses to bill the park is unfair. The town bills the park as one unit, as opposed to 230 individual customers, therefore billing the park at the highest rate. The recent increase will cost each resident about $73 per home per year for sewer and about $20 per year for water.
FROM ILLINOIS, the Madison Record reports that a St. Clair County circuit court judge has ordered three factory-built homes be taken from a residential community as collateral. The order was issued in the case of Boulevard Bank v. Chad M. Duke, et al. On Sept. 14, Judge C. John Baricevic appointed Randy Whittaker to act as the receiver of the homes at Stoneybrook Manufactured Home Community in Dupo. Whitaker is authorized to take possession of the homes as collateral on behalf of Boulevard Bank.
Modular housing in the news…
FROM BNET.COM comes a story by Michael A. Natbony [NAT-bun-ee], CEO of New World Home, in Atlanta, Georgia, discussing how his company is excelling in what he calls the worst housing market since the great depression. His strategy? Market aggressively, and use an innovative production technique to build their green homes fast. First, Natbony says, in an oversaturated housing market, marketing would be crucial to distinguish New World Home’s products from everything else out there. One-third of startup capital is being spent on marketing and PR. So far that’s worked—the company landed a 10-page spread in Country Living magazine. New World Home is also the manufacturer of the modular home recently placed in New York City. In just two weeks, nearly 10,000 people toured the home and Natbony says from that, the phones started ringing. The second component, he says, is modular construction. Now only homes that have buyers are built.
In Market News…
MANUFACTURED HOUSING STOCKS outperformed the larger markets today with the manufactured housing composite value adding 1.3 percent. Big gainers include All American Group, up 15 percent or 3 cents a share; Drew Industries, up $1.08 or a little more then five percent; Skyline Corp., up 4.9 percent or 80 cents a share and Palm Harbor Homes, up three cents or 2.2 percent. Cavco and Sun Communities closed down Wednesday.
SEPTEMBER 30th also marks the end of the third quarter, and several manufactured home related stocks are showing gains for the year. Those include TJT Inc, up more than 16 percent; Barnes Group, up four and a half percent; Deer Valley Corp., up more than eight percent; Equity Lifestyle Properties, up nearly eight percent; Skyline Corp, up almost eleven percent, UMH Properties, up 27 percent and Sun Communities, up 53 percent.
“On behalf of Production and IT Manager Bob Stovall, Editor L.A. ‘Tony’ Kovach, Associate Editor Catherine Frenzel, INdustry in Focus reporter Eric Miller, and the entire MHMSM.com writing and support team, this is Erin Patla. G’day!”