When you’re looking at buying homes to fill your vacant lots, the first question is “do I go with metal or vinyl?” In this Mobile Home Park Mastery podcast we’re going to review the good and bad aspects of both options.
Episode 458: The Battle of Vinyl Vs. Metal Transcript
If you're looking at buying a new or used mobile home to fill a vacant lot, you have one initial very basic question that many people get confused over. Do I want to buy a home that's metal on metal, or do I want to buy a home that's vinyl and shingled? This is Frank Rolfe with the Mobile Home Park Mastery podcast. We're gonna talk about the good and bad aspects to both design styles. Now, metal on metal is one of the oldest types of home constructions. You typically find all of your old homes, pre-HUD homes, most of the stuff throughout the '70s and even into the '80s, most everything was done in metal on metal. And that simply means metal walls and a metal roof. And then by the '90s, this new sheriff came to town, Mr. Vinyl-sided shingled-roofed, they brought this online because they thought that it looked to most consumers a more modern style home, something they could definitely get more excited about. And that's when the vinyl shingle debate actually began. But which is better?
Well, let's just start with metal on metal. Now, here's some of the good attributes of a metal on metal home. Number one, they're typically the least expensive home to buy. And that's true both new and used. Because a lot of the metal on metal used homes you buy will be older, therefore cheaper. And on the new category, clearly, it's a lot less expensive to build a metal on metal home than a vinyl and shingled home. So from just a cost perspective, metal on metal would be your least expensive option. And also, metal on metal is the least expensive type of home to maintain. Sealing the roof on a metal-roofed mobile home is very, very simple and inexpensive. And that's a big difference between a shingled roof and a metal roof. Metal roof, all you do is you simply patch the hole if there was one with a sheet of metal, and then you put a rubberized compound all over the roof, a sealant that basically seals the roof with rubber such that water does not penetrate it. But on a shingled roof, obviously, you have to go in just like you do on your own single-family home, and it's a much more expensive issue.
Also, metal on metal homes are very hardy in extreme weather events. For example, there have been many cases in Texas, and Texas is prone to have very large hail, same with Louisiana, where there's been big hail, quarter-sized, golf ball-sized, even softball-sized. And the metal on metal homes fare pretty well. You may get some dents in them, but nothing that's gonna be really impacting the home much. But that vinyl shingled roof variety of mobile home, they're virtually shredded. I've seen pictures of mobile homes that after heavy hailstorms down in Texas and Louisiana, the entire side of the home is basically just nothing but hundreds of holes. Now, what about on the bad side of metal on metal? What are some of the negatives on that? Well, it looks a lot less attractive than vinyl shingle. I don't know anyone who would vote differently. If you had a beauty pageant of a metal home and a vinyl shingled home, yeah, the vinyl shingle will probably win. So, that is a given. And of course, also having a lot of metal homes can make a park look a lot older than when you have vinyl and shingled, because vinyl and shingled are newer. And so when we see lots and lots of metal homes, our brain tells us, well, this park was built in years gone by, has older inventory, must be an older park.
But now, what about vinyl shingled homes? What's the good part of that? Well, they tend to look classier. And because they look classier, they tend to often attract a more affluent customer. And we all know this is a very important thing in the industry right now because mobile home parks are segueing from the bastion of fast food workers to people who are up a notch in employment. And it's necessary because as lot rents go up and home prices go up and interest rates have gone up on those mortgages, people need more money to qualify. So in many mobile home parks today, particularly if you're gonna bring in new homes, you're looking at a combined lot and mortgage cost of well over $1,000 a month. And based on standard units of measure for someone to qualify, you're needing customers today in many mobile home parks that make 60, 70, even $80,000 a year. And these customers are much more demanding than the old style. And having a home that's vinyl and shingled may make the difference. It may make it more attractive to that type of consumer who can actually qualify to buy it. And that's a big deal.
Also, vinyl shingled homes are state of the art. So when you see a vinyl shingled home, you know you're getting a lot more insulation, particularly in the roof, and as a result has lower operating costs. And they just tend for most customers to suggest, whether right or wrong, that they're newer and therefore better built. And again, when we're trying to attract more affluent customers into the business, having them have more faith in the product is a definitely good thing. Now, what are the bad elements of vinyl and shingled homes? Well, we just talked about the big one is they're not good in big weather events. For example, let's just say it's not a hailstorm, but a high windstorm. I have seen with my own eyes homes coming out of high wind cases where part of the vinyl siding blows off. I've seen part of the shingles on the roof fly off. You don't see that on metal on metal. Metal on metal is much stronger in those weather events, so that's a biggie. It's also a whole lot harder to repair a vinyl and shingled home, particularly on the roof. Again, metal roofs are easy to seal, easy to fix, but the shingled variety are just like the one on your house, much more difficult, much more expensive.
Also, when you buy vinyl and shingled homes, particularly to move to your park to fill a vacant lot, so you already bought the home and now you're responsible for what happens during the move, well, often the homes have problems in the move simply from damage. Now, it's normally nothing horrific, but a metal on metal home pretty much always arrives in the same condition as when it left. But many times vinyl and shingled homes, when they get there, some of the siding may have blown off or been bent back. Some of the shingles may have come off. I was driving down the highway not recently behind a mobile home being shipped. It wasn't going very fast. And as I approached the front of the home, I look over at the home and in fact, part of the siding had already blown off. So those are kind of the negatives. None of those are really terrible, right? So then let's just boil it all down. Then what should you go with? Should you go with metal on metal or vinyl shingled? Well, I would say you gotta make your choice based on what the application is of this home. So if you're trying to fill some vacant lots to elevate the looks of the property, if you're trying to make the property look more valuable to get a higher appraisal, if you've got some lots right at the entrance where homes and viewers and prospective customers first come in and get their initial impression, then I would probably want to go with vinyl shingled over metal on metal. It will elevate the look of the property. So that would be a good application.
But let's say that I've got a lot towards the back of the park, vacant lot, and I know my customers are a little more strapped and need the most affordable option, then the metal on metal may be the way to go. But there's another part to it as well, and that is on the used home side, what is available. Now, we like to buy a lot of our used home inventory from repossessions. All of your lenders have repo lists, and on repo lists, typically most of those homes date from the 1990s to newer. So a whole lot of that inventory is vinyl and shingled. We also work with a lot of home wholesalers. They also get a lot of that '90s inventory, but they also sometimes get stuff a little older. But sometimes what's available dictates if you should go metal on metal or vinyl and shingled. And of course, price is a big part of it. As lot rents have gone up, you have to look not only at the cost of your lot rent, but if you're bringing in homes to fill vacant lots, what's the total cost of the lot rent plus the expected home mortgage on that home, and can your customers truly afford it?
So from affordability, that may be the driver to whether you go with vinyl and shingled or metal on metal. But the key item is we don't really have an extreme preference between the two. We've owned hundreds of mobile home parks, we've filled thousands of vacant lots, and in no case have we ever later regretted, "Oh, gosh, we shouldn't have bought that metal on metal home." Nor have we said to ourselves, "Oh, that vinyl and shingled home, that was a mistake." Because typically... We're kind of ambivalent between the two. There's good aspects to both and there's bad aspects to both, but you gotta look at the overall picture. You have to look at the big picture when you go to fill these vacant lots is what kind of home is correct based on that individual park, that individual lot, and your individual needs to make that park successful. This is Frank Rolfe with the Mobile Home Park Mastery podcast. Hope you enjoyed this. Talk to you again soon.