I bought a property upon which to live with my new husband. It is two half acre plots of land on one adjoining tract, so I have .01 more than one full acre, and it came with a trashed double-wide modular (trailer) home on it, complete with well and installed septic/drainfield. We can do the absolutely necessary repairs and upgrades, and live in it for hopefully less than three years while we pay off the tiny little mortgage, and build the new house we would like to have on the acre – and then we can sell the newly upgraded modular home to someone else to move it off the property – give it to my dad for an escape cabin, OR let the local fire department practice on it, and burn it to the ground…whatever it takes.
I totally understand that a modular home is all that many people will be able to afford in their lifetimes. I am not a housing snob. OK, maybe I am. What I have learned in the process of getting my hands dirty in the gutting of this place (putting a new roof on it and redoing the rotten flooring, ripping out grossly nasty cabinets and redoing bathrooms, painting and caulking, and building new cabinets and ……well, you get the idea……) is that modular housing construction in the United States of America is pretty darn shoddy.
What I have discovered is that it will cost far more than I wanted to spend to put this trashy, temporary, poorly built house to rights to be able to live in it for two-three years, even if I can eventually use the things I am purchasing in the new house, which, thankfully, I can do.
In the meantime, I am reading the books I asked for on interlibrary loan on straw bale construction, which is the house I’d like to build: super insulated, virtually totally fire-retardant, pest-proof, sound insulated, sized and priced for us and exactly what we would like to have for the rest of our lives. Finally.
I am drooling over house plans: www.balewatch.com
and reading up on construction details in a free e-course: http://strawbale.com/store/free-16-day-e-course/
and I really like what I am learning about building with straw bales in order to create my forever home. More resources:
http://www.yourhome.gov.au/materials/straw-bale
http://www.shtfpreparedness.com/lots-free-straw-bale-house-plans/
Dirtdaubber Wasp 