Moving the site of a maunfactured home

[jenn]

Hello,
My husband and I are in the process of buying a home, and we would like to buy property and then place a used manufactured home on it. I can't seem to find manufactured homes for sale that can be moved. Where should I be looking?
Thanks

[Therese]

Go to a dealer that sells repossessed mobile homes. the dealerships I've been to refurbish their repos so they look very good but are substantially cheaper. I don't know what kind of warranty is included, though. However, most of the houses are no more than 2 years old.

[aikanae]

i think it depends on the area your in and what they are selling for. there are a few dealers (az) that sell pre-owned homes and they were pretty bad. the floors were roller coaster, indoor/outdoor carpeting used in kitchen and baths, ancient hvac's or cheapest available. i was appauled. the prices came in more than new - but, they had their own financing! no down, only end up paying $95k on a 10yr old home worth less than $10k. a lot of the homes i was looking at, i discovered came in from out of state - i thought that was odd.

None of the other dealers that sold used or repos had experience with moving homes. most of the parks (55+) required approval of the tenent before purchasing. i'm not 55+ and they weren't keen on the idea of moving a home out (silly). just 'wasn't done'. it was a good education in what homes stood up in a few yrs time (pressboard floors don't). it was pretty obvious which manufacturers retained retail value and which ones didn't.

repo lists here go out to 'subscribers' and were expensive to get. i was told that dealers and investors buy up anything, sight unseen, if they are 20% or more undervalue. dealers weren't very interested in going through repo lists because there just wasn't any money in it for them. had several tell me "they weren't going to do it". whatever.

from what i've heard, many areas aren't as tight as this market tends to be - probably makes a difference what type of 'controls' your state has on mh's dealers, etc.

do triple check any dealers referances, incl. getting outside refferals, complaint logs (if they will release them) and try and get someone that does set-up out to give you a sight inspection (hard to do until you find a home - but i needed one before i found a home).

good luck.