I'm going to try to link to another post...wish me luck:)

Be careful and do your homework. The quality of ALL types of homes vary greatly. You can get a nice home or a piece of carp. Good luck!

Here is a link that might be useful: This might help...

The terminology is indeed correct.

But what are you looking for? A modular home is exactly like a site built home in every way. Now you can get a low priced home with few amenities, or you can get a very nice lake house with all the bells and whistles.

The ONLY advantage a modular home has over a site built home is TIME. The costs are pretty much the same. Lot clearing, cellar, furnace, well, septic, driveway, etc are all equal on both. Add in the price of the house itself, and the total cost is pretty much the same as a site built house. And once they are set, they aren't meant to be moved.
A manufactured home is, however less expensive for the most part. And the styles are improving every day. But they will always be classified as a manufactured home. If the home is sited on a permanent foundation on a private lot, a normal initial mortgage is obtainable. But some lenders will shun them down the road when it comes to equity loans or refis.

Well, there are mobile home(manufactured home) dealers and modular home dealers, you have to be careful when choosing. Some modular homes are just better quality manufactured homes built by manufactured home builders and called modular cause they meet the building code, but all in all are not very nice. Then there are modular home builders that build just modular homes and you would not believe the quality of these homes. When comparing, a true modular home will cost just as much as a stickbuilt home but will save some time. A manufactured builder modular home will cost significantly less than it's equal stick built counterpart and may not save you any time at all. I've seen these "modulars take 1 year to finish because of poor organization among dealers and poor quality that takes months to correct. You really have to reseacrh this a lot in your area to make a wise decision. I think your most profitable option would be the one you gave: buy a used mobile home for now and build a house yourself later, then you can oversee the quality and save some serious $ if your careful. I just finished a 2700sq.ft. house for $50sq.ft. less than the going rate. It's not first class top of the line, but a very nice modest home. A lot of work but well worth it. We started with a doublewide, sold it at a loss but made back over $100,000 in equity(if we sold house now) on everything we have ever spent on this piece of property. If this house were on the lake around here, it would be valued at over $500,000 easy, with really custom homes going for 1.5-3 million.

quote" But what are you looking for? "quote
I wish I knew, LOL!!!!!

Actually, after starting this thread I surfed a lot of modular home Mfg's from links provided in threads by members. I've determined that it won't be my avenue because I can construct for much less than their pricing.
My reasoning behind considering a mobile was because of the permanent living quarters aspect of it. At the moment we simply take our travel trailer there and set up with a generator. There's no permanence to it and no interior room within it if it's raining.
I think the avenue I'm going to pursue is an interlocking log home placed on a monolithic concrete foundation.
I believe that with a few laborers I can use one of my excavators as a crane to erect the shell, place trusses, dry it in, and secure the improvement in a quick timeline.
The money I would have spent on a mobile can be spent towards the foundation and myself and my hands can stay in the trailer while we get the shell dried in.
During build out if the weather goes sour we can enjoy space inside it
I've found some direct sales available from mills that can provide the logs very affordably. taking this route I'm looking to not have a mortgaged home. Rather I'm looking for buck-a-board construction. You get a buck, you buy a board, and pay as you go!!! With the improvement in place, dried in, finished exterior, and secured with windows and doors I can meet the minimum requirements for homeowners insurance.

The more I surf log homes the more I like the look of them!!!

Thanks for your replies.

Happy Holidays,
Kelly

Modular. Here are some examples.

Here is a link that might be useful: Nationwide

"...The more I surf log homes the more I like the look of them!!!..."

Just be sure to do as much research as you can! The exterior can go up very quickly, but the interior walls must be engineered to allow for the settlement or compression of the logs over time. A pine log home can "shrink" as much as 4 inches. So interior walls must be attached to the logs in such a way as to allow for the downward vertical movement of the logs. If you fail to do this your interior walls will not crack, but will break.
The last community I lived in there were 7 log homes. 6 were built by professionals and one was done by the homeowner. Guess which one didn't allow for settlement?

Currently right next foor (500 feet away) is a 4,000 sq ft log home. And when I first went inside I asked about how much the house settled. They said it shrunk almost 7 inches since 1987! She said the house weighs so much as it's 3 stories, they had to allow extra for settlment. But the interior walls are constructed so well you can't even see the engineering.

So get as much info as you can.

Chris,
Thanks for the heads up on settling.
It's kind of funny. I've read that 1/8 to 3/8" per log is to be expected.
If I move forward with interlocking logs for my exterior I'm going to utilize wood adhesive between each row. After placement I'll use place some delimbed trees across the short span of the homes' walls. These green trees will have some good weight to promote rapid settling.
I've already sketched my first design, it's a 70x40 single story rectangle. Using roof trusses and a standing seam metal roof I can keep the loading weight against my interior and exterior walls to a minimum. With low load bearing interior walls I can cut down the size of the concrete beams beneath them to save on redi-mix.
This design is painfully square, but it should be very affordably constructed with the exception of the metal roof. I contemplated starting a log home construction company to make myself able to purchase directly from the mills for a better price than I'd get as a standard buyer.
If my industry is any indicator you'll always get a really sweet initial deal to sign up as an installer.

It's really a shame that there isn't a log home forum here at THS/Gardenweb. The ones I've found elsewhere were pretty lame.

See ya,
Kelly

I know of a number of manufacturers that will work with you if you wish to become a dealer. With your construction background, you can be very involved in the construction and therefore be a knowledgeable dealer. Kuhns Bros homes has a program where you can go to the factory and get a complete lesson on construction.

I know a guy locally that became a log home salesman/dealer. He built what has to be a $500,000 log home for about $250,000.

"
It's really a shame that there isn't a log home forum here at THS/Gardenweb. The ones I've found elsewhere were pretty lame."

If you're looking for info on log homes (almost 12,000 posts, 1,000 members, been active since 1995) try Log Homes on the Internet

Here is a link that might be useful: Log Homes on the Internet