Manufactured Housing Well Positioned to Provide Quality Affordable Homeownership

Washington, DC, January 22 – The Manufactured Housing Institute (MHI), today, released its National Policy Agenda for 2008. Gail Cardwell, President of MHI said, “Manufactured and modular housing are the right answer, at the right time for consumers looking for quality housing options. It is critical that we move our policy agenda forward to better serve consumers who want to share in the American dream of homeownership and who are impacted by the current housing market slump. “

To ensure that consumers will continue to be able to look to manufactured housing as an alternative to site-built homes and rental units, MHI will focus on improving the flow of capital to manufactured housing by modernizing FHA’s
Title I and Title II programs and creating a duty to serve manufactured housing for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

MHI has been working with Congress to raise the loan limits on FHA’s Title I insurance program, establishing annual indexing of the loan limits, mandate loan-by-loan insurance and increase the Title I up-front insurance. In addition, MHI supports FHA’s Title II program to provide more borrowers with access to fair and affordable housing. MHI called on Congress to make FHA loans available for manufactured housing condominiums and to enable FHA to serve more borrowers living in manufactured housing and in land-lease communities.

“This Administration strongly believes in the value of manufactured homes as a source of affordable housing. As part of our overall legislative effort to modernize the Federal Housing Administration, I am very much in favor of modernizing FHA’s Title I and Title II programs. The legislation would improve the lending environment for manufactured housing by increasing the flow of capital to buyers of manufactured homes,” said FHA Commissioner Brian Montgomery.

MHI also supports legislative proposals creating an enforceable duty for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to serve the manufactured housing market through product development – including acquisition of manufactured housing personal property loans – and more flexible underwriting.

“For this industry to thrive and grow, our members also feel strongly that the HUD Code be empowered to function as a dynamic standard that supports innovation, consumer safety and quality,” said Cardwell.

Representative Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.) also participated in the press briefing. Rep. Donnelly, who sits on the House Financial Services Committee which has jurisdiction over housing matters, including manufactured housing, discussed the importance of the industry to his congressional district in northern Indiana. Rep. Donnelly also discussed the need for improved lending programs for manufactured housing.

MHI works to promote fair laws and regulations, increase and improve financing options, provide technical analysis and research, remove zoning barriers and educate external audiences about the benefits of manufactured and modular housing.