Is the Home Real or Personal Property?

The easiest way to determine if your manufactured home is real or personal property is figuring out where your home is registered with and who taxes it. If it is still registered as personal property, tax is levied by the Department of Motor Vehicles. If it is considered real property, your county assessor will have an assessor's  parcel number (APN) and will incur annual property taxes. 

If it has not been converted to real property and still is considered personal property, it is also important to know that the land and the home could have different title and legal descriptions.  There are many instances where the manufactured home is still personal property, is listed with the DMV, but the land is considered real property and the owner is receiving the property tax bill for just the land. Often, many people think the home is considered real property when it's just the land. It's often a good idea to call the county tax assessor if you are unsure.

What type of home is it?

Some of the conversion is that a few of the terms like manufactured home and mobile home have been interchangeably used for a long time. For your home loan, there are some important differences:

Modular Home - homes that are built offsite in a controlled facility. They are typically built in sections and then transported to the building site and assembled, while meeting the same building codes as site-built homes. Meaning they meet applicable state and local building codes. They are permanently attached to the land.

Manufactured Home - Manufactured homes are also built inside a climate-controlled building facility that meets HUD code. They tend to be built in three sizes, single section, double section or triple section. The biggest difference with manufactured to modular is that manufactured are built to the National HUD code. They are assembled on site on a permanent foundation

Mobile Home - Most were built in factories before June 15, 1976 due to demand for affordable housing. Most of the structures were similar to modern day camper or trailer, except built on steel i-beams with exposed trailer coupler and wheels making it easily movable. Homes built after 1976 are often times called mobile, but typically meet HUD standards and are actually manufactured homes. 

Personal Property But Manufactured Home

There are a lot of reasons homeowners are told they cannot obtain good and affordable home loan options. Many lenders do not want to do manufactured home loans because there are a few extra steps, like a foundation certification. Also, most lenders do not make as much money on loans for manufactured homes as a single family residence. There is also the possibility that the manufactured home has not been converted to real property yet and it requires knowing what is required by state and local laws as well as a title company that fully understand the process of converting it during the loan closing. For those reason, many lenders avoid doing manufactured home loans or they do not do them well. There are lenders that specialize in them, price them fairly and provide a great experience during the loan process. Don't settle for anyone but a lender and loan officer that does these all the time.

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