First of all not everyone can have a basement period. If you live in an area that is at sea level or below then there's no way you can have a basement or anything under ground. Which is why cemeteries have above ground tombs or crematoriums or mausoleum in areas where the sea level is at or near ground level.

There are really beautiful mobile and manufactured homes today. It may be the best option for some families.

In many of these areas you definitely don't want any shelter that is below ground! The new trend is concrete safe rooms in or near the home which will not flood and debris will not bury you under making escape from the shelter impossible.

Water tables are also a concern in areas that aren't near sea level. So are thick layers of rock. It was basically $50K to dig a hole for a pool in my last neighborhood. .

Trailer houses are often called manufactured homes. They are a more affordable option with privacy and amenities for people who possibly can't afford a traditional house. In places where land is less expensive, you don't need to be in a trailer park unless that is all you want or can afford. I have a lot of respect for many of the people I've known who have owned trailer houses. They live within their means and that is more than I can say for a lot of people.

Not sure what the 1% has to do with this discussion. 99% of the people can't be that based on math alone. We all are born with a certain amount of looks, brains, talent, and other qualities. It's up to everyone to best use what they have to their advantage. I'm not going to blame the 1% for anything when I've seen too many people throw away opportunities that would have given them a better life. Too many people didn't their manage money, lives or opportunity and now they suffer for it.

Chisue.....you need to get out more, lol.

Anyway, regarding the basement issue....my coastal SC homes had no basements...no one did. The soil is pure sand in some locations. Homes built in the flood plain are on stilts.......even the huge mansions. No basements there!

I don't have a basement here, either......it's pure rock a few feet down.

The more the 1% is in charge, the lower the income of the 99%, and the higher the price of houses. It was true sarcasm!

;)

I don't think there's been any increase in mobile homes or trailer parks in my area (where housing costs are very high). They tend to be tucked away and not all that visible. Following rob's quote, people whose income is half the national average can't expect to live in average cost housing. You do what you can afford and that's that.

I think the negative cache of mobile home parks, including the accompanying moniker "trailer trash", discourages many from going that route. Whether that's reasonable or not is probably besides the point.

Houses built post-WWII in California rarely have basements. Although,
it's a new trend, especially in some upscale towns where they want to
limit the height of houses. In such places, basements have become
popular for new construction and remodels as a way to add more square
footage without raising the roof.

Ok. I get it now. Sarcasm. I thought you were serious.

Some family members just bought one nearby. They can't afford the $700k it costs for a single family home here so they bought the $150k mobile home. It was really nice and a lovely community. Lots of pools and other amenities.

We don't have basements in our area. Those that do are generally wet.

I do know that basements are not common or even possible in some locations. However, if people must live in a tornado-prone area in a home that will go flying off its slab, shouldn't such a community be required to build a storm shelter? If 'cheap' is all a family can afford, what can they afford after their home has become 'mobile' and been wrecked? The investment just doesn't make sense. I'd rather an old house that has weathered the storms. Is 'modern' part of the choice?

Thanks, Rob. Those are exactly the things I wanted to know!

If a tornado hits a home, it doesn't matter if it's a mobile home or a site built home, it's not going to be there afterwards! I like the idea of building a storm shelter for everyone in the neighborhood. Seems like a good idea to me. At least in the tornado prone areas anyway.

We had a 'manufactured home' in California, in the 80's and the "building code" (don't know if county or state) required that it was placed on a foundation and had steel 'straps' to keep it attached to the foundation. (axels and wheels removed) Could have been an earthquake precaution and it had a number of lbs. weight snow roof. (Sierra, lots of snow). I would imagine that other areas would have "codes" for the placement of those kinds of homes.... meaning that you pretty much can't tow them onto a site and live in it. For us it was a lengthy and costly procedure, located on our own lot in a subdivision of other mfg. homes. (Not all of them(actually none) were attached as our was; others were still 'trailers' and licensed as such, while ours was property and was taxed as a home and land.)

I was surprised when I decided to remove a short wall and put in a door to the outside.... I found the construction was of 1 1/2" X 3" ...2x4's. Allegedly "stick built with stucco exterior" and the stucco was some kind of plastic stuff....not at all what it appeared to be. It's still alive and well in the Sierra Foothills and we spent many $$$$ before we could sell it. It was cute!

We have found some RV travel parks that have storm shelters when we have traveled in those storm prone areas.

You make a very good point that no matter what kind of house people have, they should make provisions for the bad that comes with location. Tornado shelters, earthquake barrels, fire shutters, hurricane battens and diverters, etc. I have sympathy for people in mobile homes (i.e., the ones that have wheels under the skirting). They are rarely rich. They live where they can. Same as I have sympathy for the poor folk who live in floor plains because it's all they can afford. I don't have much sympathy for rich folk who insist on building multi-million dollar houses in canyons where emergency vehicles have little access, but where fire, flood and mudslides are common occurrences. If they want to live that way, fine, but don't ask me or my tax and insurance dollars to subsidize it!

Definitions: A manufactured home is any house that is created in a factory and transported to its final site, possibly needing onsite assembly. This includes mobile homes (trailer homes of the "single wide" and "double wide" varietie), but also cabins, two stories, lodges, containers, some "tiny houses" (wood built house on a utility trailer) and million dollar houses with custom materials, glass walls and river rock masonry. Some are hardier than others.

In our area, there is a distinction between trailer houses and per-built or manufactured houses. A trailer house is just that: A building built on a trailer and towed to the site. There are some that are "double-wides". These are two trailer buildings that are placed together on site and provide twice the square footage of a single-wide.

The main assemblies of a manufactured (pre-built) house are made in a factory. Dimensional control is very good. The walls are complete with wiring. Electrical and plumbing connections between sections are made on site during construction. A conventional foundation or basement is prepared before bringing the house onsite. Sewer, water and underground utilities are laid and then the house is brought in. One was built adjoining my property. After the crane and house arrived, it took only 3 days to put it up, and it is a two story. You can not tell it from a conventional carpenter built house unless you examine its details.

Another reason that a couple or family might buy a trailer home was financing. I do not know the situation these days as i have lost contact, but 35 years ago, people with limited income had trouble getting a conventional bank loan for a house. However, a $10,000 trailer house (1970 dollars) could be financed with an automotive loan. Some did that for a starter house.

The days of the "trailer home" are long gone. They no longer come with taillights and a license plate bracket.

Today's modern manufactured housing is light years from just a few decades ago. There is still the basic housing that meets the HUD minimums, but those are pretty rare. Most are custom built and can come with just about anything a site built home has. 2x6 exterior walls, 8 ft ceilings, Andersen doors and windows, even log siding. Once these homes are set on a permanent foundation, nobody can tell they're manufactured homes.

Then there are modular homes. These must meet minimum FHA standards and also state building codes. They don't have a metal frame and once they are on site they are craned onto the foundation. These are permanent homes and are assessed just like a site built home. They can be literally anything the customer wants.

A few years back a home in a neighboring town was destroyed by fire. Now all the houses on that particular street were built in the late 1800s, and to replace this home with something contemporary would not fit. So they went modular and found a company that had just what they needed. After it was completed in less than 5 months it fits right in and looks just like it was built when the others were.

Chisue, do you think that there might be enough sturdy older homes for the ever growing population?

I live in a tornado zone. Some people have their own shelters, while others utilize community shelters. Most have what is referred to as a safe room in their home. Ours is a walk in closet under a centrally located stairwell.

I didn't mean to sound 'preachy'. I kept seeing tornado footage with older homes damaged, but still standing, and many trailer-type manufactured homes demolished. I wondered if there could be better safety measures for attaching the homes to their slabs and requirements for storm shelters where there are many people living in trailer homes.

Christopher -- I'm not talking about the sort of manufactured home that is factory built and then assembled -- presumably *to code* -- on location.

Jem -- Interesting information about the financing and mortgage angles! This is probably where some safety requirements could be in place. (And insurance.) You don't want to mortgage or insure a fly-away property. Ah, but then would we be removing the only affordable shelter for some families?

Tough *economic* questions made concrete (no pun intended).

My husband worked for a mobile home manufacturer in the late 60s and said they were very poorly built. Skip ahead some 30 years and we had moved from CA to MO to a farm with an old farm house, very small and not well made but we made do for 15 years and it was getting too bad to even live in, roof leaking and water running into the back porch when it rained.

I was adamant that we had to do something but knew there was no way we could finance to build, husband trying to keep a farm going and selling a few beef cattle yearly. I worked as a RN, but the wages were half of what I made in CA. DD and her DH took us to look at some double wides on a lot near where they lived. DH was reluctant but went and he was impressed at how much better they were built these days.

We bought one and had it delivered to the farm, it's just on blocks with skirting around. It is tied down with 'hurricane straps' and has been through several 'straight line' wind storms and possible tornado with no damage. We had a back deck built and had a metal roof and the wind from that one storm tore the roof off and tossed it over the mobile into the front yard but no other damage.

We have been in it for 20 years now and I paid it off over 10 years ago by making double payments. We went without a lot of things the past 30 years but the farm and house are paid for!! Now, I can enjoy spending some money for things I want when I couldn't before.

There have been several tornadoes in this area since we moved here but thankfully we have been okay, but you never know. We just take it one day at a time. There is a root cellar/storm cellar out front but we have never used it, full of water when it rains and probably full of spiders and all kinds of vermin, plus the electric to it was destroyed years ago. We're too old to try and renovate it.

Many people live in travel trailers as well as permanently placed mobile or manufactured homes. In our RV travels we have found it hard to find a site sometimes because there are so many permanent residents. A lot of parks do provide buildings where you can take shelter. We thought about buying a manufactured home when we were going to FL but decided to move to TX instead. Some of the manufactured homes are very nice, well built and very expensive.

It's rare you find basements in TX...

Donna -- Thanks for the first-hand report. I'm impressed that the hurricane straps have worked for you. I wonder if that shouldn't be a *requirement* -- but how would it be enforced? Local government? An insurer? Mortgage company?

I see that average household income in the US is now about $52K/yr. Robb's stats say the owners of these trailer-type manufactured homes have incomes of half that. I wonder how many are mortgaged/insured.

If 23% of current owners are retirees, might there be a lot more families living in these homes in the near future? We have this big swath of Boomers retiring -- reportedly many having saved *nothing*. It may be timely to get some safely restrictions in place.

I guess it's impossible to know how many people are occupying trailer homes built before stricter standards. (Maybe those are the ones I'm seeing in the TV storm footage?)

Sorry if I'm boring you. This is a segment of real estate about which I know nothing.

I just thought of something after reading about storm damage that donna wrote about. When IKE hit Texas (where all my relatives live), my niece lived in a double wide that she just hated because she hated living in a "trailer" as she put it. It was a really cute home though. Well let me tell ya, their house got no damage whatsoever but her mother's $300,000 new site built custom home get a section of the roof torn off and all the windows leaked. So there ya go.

arkansas, that's what insurance is for. If the ability to withstand a rare storm were the criterion people gave priority to in choosing living quarters, everyone would be in underground bunkers. And/or, no one would live within 5 miles of any coastline.

As others have mentioned, I think this is a choice driven by economics and affordability. Everyone does the best they can with the resources they have.

The days of trailer homes and trailer parks aren't long gone, not by any means. There was an article in today's paper about the last remaining mobile home park in Palo Alto, Ca, in the shadow of Stanford University. Around 4 acres worth $29 million, they're trying to figure out what to do with it.

Mobile home park in Palo Alto

(Edit to say - Palo Alto is a very upscale area. Yes, this is the last trailer park in the town limits, but there are plenty of others in surrounding lower rent areas. This one has particularly dingy and run down looking old trailers, as you'll note from the photos)

There are very strict laws governing tie downs and tornado straps and even earthquake measures for them.

Some states are more stringent than others of course due to the types of weather they normally have.

My best friend lived in a neighborhood of new nice expensive homes on the South Side of Oklahoma City, when the big tornado hit Moore and the South Side her entire neighborhood was wiped away. I mean literally gone from the earth. Just a pile of rubble here and there and every tree that survived was just a bare stick and of course died. So with the power of that kind of storm it does not matter what you live in that kind of storm will take it out. As Gary England, long time weather man in OKC said about that storm when he was broadcasting live during the storm, If you are not underground for this one you will not make it. My friend and her family had enough warning time to get in the car and go to his place of business which is a solid concrete building with a pit where cars drive over it to have their oil changed etc I am sure you have seen those. They got in the pit. They were not able to go back home for many days because the damage was so bad. Gas lines and electric lines damaged. Living in Oklahoma was great I loved it and have wonderful friends there but I have to admit I am glad not to be in the path as much as I was. We still have them here but not nearly as much as there. I watched one go right over my house, hit my big tree and take the top out of it, jump over my neighbors house go across the street and drop down and proceed to destroy everything in it's path for a few miles. Just sheer luck that we were skipped over. I personally today would not live there again with out a solid concrete reinforced safe room in my home. I really wish we had one here! There are dangers everywhere! Different dangers for different locations.