I don't have any personal experience with this but I think in your situation I would want to have an inspection by a certified inspector. I would want to know the basic structural integrity of the home and the major systems (plumbing, electrical, etc). I think the cost of the inspection would be well worth it rather than discovering something in the middle of your remodel. Here is a link to the American Society of Home Inspectors webpage. Their advanced search engine allows you to search by specialty including manufactured homes, so hopefully you can find someone experienced in your area.

Thanks! Desertsteph, you make a good point about finding someone with mobile home experience. Omelet, thanks for the link! Yes, I would much rather hear all the bad news up front than find something out mid-remodel! :-)

Thought about this for awhile before answering. I would think if it is in the budget it would be very good to have an impartial opinion of condition or issues with your new to you house. I think it would make me more comfortable knowing the issues and being able to prioritize projects.

Around here (southern New Hampshire) a home inspector would cost something like $300 - $400. They mostly work for realtors, and despite the 'certification' I haven't found them to be particularly useful-- essentially they are there to bless the purchase, maybe come up with a couple of small issues. But if they were real 'deal killers,' picky over every little thing, they would not get much work from the realtors in the first place. So in a sense it's all about lowering the cost of the realtors' errors and omissions insurance. If they are working with you directly, they may be willing to be more forthcoming, but since the report is in writing, there will still be a lot of CYA. Just the nature of the business.

However, I would get the gas company out there to check the fittings, if you have that. Also an electrician. Preventing fire is the single most important thing you can do.

Other than that, I'd inspect the thing myself-- a lot of problems are very obvious if you really take notice. After that, it's a matter of securing the most important things first, like the roof, any leaks, and possibly jacking the foundation so it's square. After that comes electrical and plumbing. The fun stuff comes last, sad to say. Expect to burn through a lot of cash fixing things that you were not expecting to fix.

That the place cost about $2000 gives me pause. Not to rain on your parade or anything, but these things have a finite life span, and at that price, the first thing that popped into my head is, it may not be worth fixing. OTOH, I get that owning this thing, presumably free and clear, is a huge advantage budget wise, as your housing costs are not going to rise very much, except for ground rent.

This sounds kind of dramatic, but I would take out insurance on all my stuff, and make sure any work stuff was backed up to disk and stored off site. All your important documents, like birth certificate, should be in a bank safe deposit. And make sure you have a quick escape route plan.

I had a home inspection for a manufactured home prior to buying the house in Dec 2015. They told me the house is OK, just small things. After moving in the gas co told me the hot water heater was not venting because the venting pipe was pushed down and the door did not have an outside vent. Gave me a notice to fix it. Then gas co told me the indoor furnace did not have enough intake air and gave me another notice to fix it. On the roof, we discovered the swamp cooler had a crack in it and could not be used. The vent for the cooler had not been capped or insulated so taht the water ( in the big rain storms ) has been going down the walls creating mold. When I went to paint the built in credenza I found mold behind the mirrors and the credenza had to be destroyed. When I tried to install the washing machine, it could not be stabilized because the floor had not been installed properly in the laundry room. I could go on, but the bottom line is, the home inspection, in my case anyway, did not find the most expensive things that need to be repaired or replaced.....I regret spending the money for the inspection.

they so often don't!

Wow, Mary, I'm so sorry that happened to you! I think I read about your problems over on the manufactured homes forum, or was that someone else? My ex and I bought a stick built house in 1988 in Sacramento. A home inspection was, of course, required. A couple of weeks after we moved in, I happened to be in the backyard while hubby was showering. I looked over and saw water just gushing from the window sill and coming down the exterior of the house like a waterfall. It cost a little over $10,000 to fix, and was only that little because our new neighbor loved fixing things and had every power tool known to humankind, lol. It took a month of weekends for hubby and neighbor to fix it. We sued the home inspector and recouped all our costs plus punitive damages, which we split with neighbor guy. Good thing ex is an attorney! :-)

Thanks for the advice, Chris. It looks like ~$300 is the going price, and in the grand scheme of things, I think it's worth it if, as Steph recommends, I find someone with experience in manufactured homes.

In this case, the inspector doesn't have to please any realtors, sellers, or buyers. Since I've already bought the house, lived in it as a houseguest with my friends for the entire month of September, and know everything my friends know about the house, I can be very specific about what I want her to look for. As Chris said, it will be helpful for prioritizing.

I'm hoping to refurbish the entire house top to bottom. I have an eight to ten year plan. I love a good ten year project! I started going back to college in 2007 and hope to graduate with my PhD in 2017--a ten year project, haha! (I'll have had 13 years of higher education! You'd think I'd know something by now, haha!)

I have a list of what I think are priorities, and rough estimates of what everything will cost. My first project, next September, will be an asphalt driveway and carport. Because of my mobility disability and the necessity of using a walker, and because I can't get soaking wet entering/exiting my home and car, a dry, smooth surface and dry carport is a necessity before next winter.

I'm going to replace all the electrical wiring and plumbing regardless of current condition, only because they're original to the house and will need upgrading at some point anyway. I'm also redoing all the floors because they're hideous, lol, so while I'm at it, I'll do all new floor insulation. There are no leaks, and I had the roof snow coated in October, which is guaranteed for ten years. So a new roof is down lower on the priority list, but still in the ten year plan. I'll blow insulation into the "attic" when I do the roof. The siding and skirting are much newer than the house and are in beautiful condition, so replacing them would be almost last on the list. The gut remodel of the kitchen/living room, major remodel of both bathrooms, and closet systems and cosmetic touch ups of the bedrooms will be in the middle, somewhere after electrical, plumbing, and floors, but before roof and siding. It's a ten year project because I'm paying as I go, in cash, as money becomes available.

That's MY plan. I want the home inspector to tell me if my priorities are right or if I need to do something sooner rather than later.

The yard will be an ongoing project. I've figured out how to do an aesthetically pleasing yard using various kinds of rocks, drought resistant plants, and ornamental grasses, for very, very little money and very low maintenance.

Debbie it sounds like you have a good plan going. Unless inspector finds some thing totally unknown. I so agree on the wiring. Many years ago we looked at a manufactured home in a park. Several but this one older model was amazing. The people did many upgrades over the years and the interior was a dream. The only thing that stopped us from buying the place was because it was in a park and Joe wanted a nice big shop. It is just amazing what can be done to improve the older models.

Our across the fence neighbors are coming back any day now and I really hope to get her coming in here. They have a really old mobile home. It is 10 by 30. And they have done some really nice changes inside. On the cheep doing all the work themselves. But he has to go back to Washington to go to work until he was 62 then stayed another year. He is very arthritic. He does great work though.

Mary I missed your post How awful so many things were over looked by your inspector. We have never had inspection other then the appraiser for the buyers when we sold our last house. He looked it over with a fine toothed comb. Even looked in all my cupboards and drawers. I was happy I had purged and cleaned everything prior to him coming. This house was brand new. Even so I believe there have been issues we have had to deal with over the 8 years we have lived here.

Chris, you are so right. People have done AMAZING things with older mobile homes. Usually, the point isn't to recoup the money by selling, rather often it's an affordable way to get a very nice home, totally to your own specifications, at a fraction of the cost. I cannot afford a new manufactured home. But I can take ten years to refurbish this one, if I live long enough, Lord willing. When I'm done, the only thing original to the house will be the chassis, lol!

Scone911, I truly do appreciate your concern, but I knew what I was getting into when I bought this house. I'm literally going to replace everything: electrical, plumbing, insulation, roof, flooring, walls, siding/skirting, all appliances and fixtures, etc. It's going to be a great project for daughter Joy and me. And when we're done, this house will last at least another 50 years. No, I'll never be able to sell it for what I put into it, but I plan to age in place and then leave it to Joy. It's going to be very beautiful and we're very excited about it!

AND--I have no mortgage, no debt with this house. Refurbishing will be pay-as-we-go, no loans, no interest to pay back. Nice!

Have a great day! :-)

Debbie - while you have skirting off have someone check underneath to be sure everything is air tight. with rewiring and plumbing things will get disturbed. of course, age does a lot of that too.

I think it is a great idea to remodel the older Mobile Homes. We did buy new because we had 60 days from closing to get out of the house we sold. We really wanted to build what we call a shop house but hubby was worried some thing would happen to him and the house would never get done and we certainly would not get it done to move in condition in 60 days. AND they will not give occupancy permit with out it being to a certain point. Which is almost finished.

In your case you are remodeling and a whole different thing. Also in our area there is specified roof load issues and many of the older manufactured homed did not meet this requirement and have shed or pole barn like roofs built over the tip of them to carry the snow load. So we really had no choice but to get new and this way for us it was good to be able to add some custom features just for us.

Mortgage free is always good. We paid for this place too and the shop building and land so we are all free and clear. And even though we made decisions on what we thought we wanted there is always the one or two things we wished we had done differently. So living in your house for awhile is so good to feel how it flows for you.

The hoarding thing ugh. It would drive me insane. Nothing was ever done for my Mom after the welfare check. I am shocked because I saw the pictures taken 9 months ago and have heard about the disgusting smells. I did have hoarding tendencies but never a dirty hoarder. Everything was tucked away and boy I could pack a cupboard like nobodies business. No more of that for me. Sending you strength to hang in there until it is gone.

Steph, thanks for the advice to have someone look under the house. I certainly will do that!

Chris, I'm sorry nothing has been done to help your mother who is stuck inside a home with a hoarder. Today Joy and I worked for EIGHT solid hours (16 work hours) cleaning and organizing while my friend and her hubby were away at a church retreat.

The LR, K, and main bath, while FAR from being de- cluttered, are at least livable and sanitary. Luckily, my friend doesn't hoard icky things like trash, or have mold covered pizza boxes lying around. Nevertheless, we took out three big bags of trash, did three fully packed loads of dishes, two big loads of laundry, etc.

In the bathroom, there were TONS of products and appliances (curling irons, blow dryers, etc.) and towels just in a heap on the counter. So I got three boxes and labeled them "appliances," "hair products," and "non-hair products," (soaps, lotions, facial products, etc.). I put the many, many bath towels in a stack at the far end of the counter, and a box holding all the hand towels and wash cloths next to it. Now we have about 24" of useable counter space!

In the kitchen we rearranged some cupboards and ended up with about 24" of prep space.

Joy did the living room and she was amazing! There were books, laptops, papers, and God knows what EVERYWHERE! Joy got it all organized somehow and it is MUCH improved.

If someone walked in off the street today, they would say it looked way over-cluttered and like a hoarder lived there, but if someone had walked in YESTERDAY and then came back TODAY, they would say it doesn't even look like the same house!

But we had great fun doing it together. My friend and her husband have been very, very kind and generous to us over the years, and we consider it an honor and a privilege to be able to do this for them. They are just wonderfully kind, loving people who happen to have a problem with hoarding and an aversion to housework.

But if I called them at 3:00 AM because I was stuck somewhere, they wouldn't hesitate to jump in the car and come get me. They have showed up at my door several times with groceries when they knew I was low on food. And I will never, ever forget how they kept an eye out for Joy while I was in Africa for a year. So putting in some elbow grease and helping them get organized doesn't even BEGIN to repay my debt of gratitude.

I just wish I had the authority to go through all their stuff and throw things out, haha! I'd get rid of about 60% of what they have in the house and 100% of what they have in their TWO large storage units!! They're thinking of moving to a smaller place and saying they would need ANOTHER storage unit, or a house/apartment that comes with a garage! If they got rid of their two existing storage units, they'd have another $300 a month to spend on rent!

Oh well, as you know, it's not a problem I can solve. But Joy and I have made a pact to keep up the LR, eat-in K, BA, and laundry areas for as long as they still live here. Maybe we can lead by example.

Have a great day! :-)

Debbie I just happened upon this article about Breaker boxes in the older versions Mobiles. Might check it out.

Older Breaker panels