All Forum Posts by: Nick Coonis

@Nick G. sorry for some reason I didn't get a notification. It appraised at $450,000 and we spent a total of $287,000. Also the appraisal was in 2015, and it was before any of the other land improvements we've done. So I'm thinking it's much higher now, but who knows. We don't plan on selling anytime soon anyway. 

@Karen Margrave hi Karen, that's a great idea! I have looked at US Modular a lot. They do a lot of custom modulars from what I understand. I'm thinking of trying them on my spec build. 

I posted a ton of pics of my first home on a diary post https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/522/topics/28...

I will definitely start a new one for my new projects on the new forum you mentioned.

@Samuel Cervantez Yes I'm living in it with my family. It's going great. We've been slowing landscaping, building fences, trying to get a farm area up and running. I actually just started a second modular home with another guy (in the middle of getting permits now) and I'm right in the middle of making a third deal happen to build one for spec, with a 50/50 profit split. I've never sold one, so hopefully all goes well, but the ones we're building for spec we are spending a little bit more money on to make sure they don't look like a manufactured home. Something along these lines...

@Cecilia Britton @Manolo D. 

Thanks Manolo, you are exactly right. I'm building another one right now, and just acquired a new deal for an empty lot to start my third.

@Ronda R. with PAC Valley, included in their price was the construction of the house itself including appliances, paint, flooring, mounding, etc. basically everything to get to a finished home. They also included delivery, setup (unloading from the truck and setting on the foundation) and close up of the home which is attaching the module as, finishing the siding, all the interior finish work, patching cracked drywall, installing carpet, etc. They did not include any site work like the foundation, utilities, grading, etc. 

@Eric Teran @Sid Leibowitz it happened to me in Los Angeles county as well. They had never dealt with it before and tried to treat it as a manufactured home at first, wanting to issue a 433. I had to go through the state laws with them, with help from the manufacturer, to get it done correctly.

@Eric Teran that's awesome Eric, congrats on your project. I agree with everything you said. I guess my cons were just referring to set floor plans that the sales office offers on their websites, but I know you can get pretty creative if you're designing your own. I'm planning on doing more of these as investments and they will also be custom, as I don't want the end buyer to have any concerns that they're not regular homes.

@Sid Leibowitz here is Los Angles county, anywhere that is zoned for a site built home you can also build a modular home, aside from sites that are restricted due to access as @Eric Teran pointed at. They are considered the same as site built homes, so the zoning is also the same.

@Sergey Perevalov It was not perfect. They mainly sell manufactured homes, but offered modular as well. They made a lot of mistakes throughout the process and I ended up getting the salesman to admit that mine was their first modular they've ever sold. 

But I'm using them again for this second home, because now I know the process so I'm not relying on them for answers, they still have good pricing, and I've built a relationship with the salesman. There's another company that has really good reviews called Cutting Edge Homes, and they strictly do modulars only. There prices were higher though, and they do not include setup of the home like Pacific Valley, so you need to hire your own setup crew to accept the delivery and set the home on the foundation, and close it all up. They basically just sell you the home and their responsibilities end there. Maybe a better option for more custom homes though, they do two story homes, multi section more custom stuff it seems.

There also another one called US Modular that I get emails from all the time, but I've never used them. I think they're up by Ventura.

@Sergey Perevalov the company I used was Pacific Valley Homes out of Perris CA. That's the retailer, the builder is Golden West Homes.

The time savings is a big deal though, especially when you're trying to hold the same housing market that you based your original final sales price estimate on. The cool thing is, while you and your contractor are building the foundation and installing utilities onsite, the factory is building your house at the same time. When I did my first house, the site was ready almost the exact same time the house was done. About a week later it was delivered, and took about another few days to close it all up and start finishing the inside. Had I been doing this for profit, I could have put the house on the market at that point, a week and a half after the foundation was built, and let the end buyer choose their own paint and flooring, etc. and called it a custom home in the MLS ad. If it was a site built, it would probably be another 3 or 4 months or more after the foundation was built before the house was at the marketing point. At least that's my theory, again I haven't no done this for a profit yet. I