HOUSING

FINALLY, A REPUBLICAN AFFORDABLE HOUSING IDEA:  


SET PRE-FABRICATED HOMES ONTO NEW FOUNDATIONS ON VACANT LOTS, AND THEN SELL THEM (AT NO COST TO TAXPAYERS) AS AFFORDABLE HOUSING


By Eric Martindale October 7, 2018 

The Welcome Movement www.thewelcomemovement.com


Other affordable housing ideas

DEMOCRATS always create affordable housing at major cost to the taxpayer. Typically new or rehabilitated units cost the taxpayers $200,000 or more each. And then they are usually rented, not sold, so the occupants really aren’t empowered and lifted up. Many units don’t pay a dime in property taxes.


Other Democrats have talked about securing bank-owned homes, renovating them, and selling them as affordable housing. I am a contractor, and I express grave concerns over hidden oversight and construction management costs for this program. In addition, rehabilitation costs and timetables will also be complicated by lead paint, asbestos, termites, framing problems, deteriorated roofs and porches etc. In most cases, the numbers won’t work unless there is a massive government subsidy. 

REPUBLICANS can create affordable housing at no cost to government. This is the centerpiece proposal of The Welcome Movement. The elements of my plan are as follows:
  1. Secure vacant lots and abandoned bank-owned homes in urban centers, including Newark. Many are 2-family and 3-family houses between 70 and 130 years old, and sitting on narrow lots. The density is unacceptable.
  2. Other vacant lands can be secured for this program, including surplus portions of military properties
  3. Demolish the houses, clear the lot
  4. Secure a masonry contractor to build a foundation and a sidewalk. 
  5. Order the single-family pre-fabricated house
  6. Permanently secure the pre-fabricated house to the foundation
  7. Hook-up water, sewer, electricity, and gas
  8. Sell the house as affordable housing with a 50-year affordability clause
  9. Mortgage and taxes will be way less than a comparable sized rental, in some cases only half. Families locked out of the housing market will have a real shot at the American Dream. 
  10. They will pay property taxes as standard single-famiiy houses on individual lots, not as “mobile homes”. They are not mobile homes.
This is a work in progress. Estimated costs, not including acquisition:

COSTS FOR “THE CLEARFIELD” FITS ON A 25-FOOT WIDE LOT

$20,000 = Demolition costs. Evidently $6 - $15 per square foot 
$20,000 = hookup all utilities
$12,000 = foundation 
$4,000 = Attach prefabricated house to the foundation 
$34,292 = “Clearfield” prefabricated house, 2-bedroom 
$90,292

COSTS FOR “THE CALDWELL” FITS ON 35-FOOT WIDE LOT

$20,000 = Demolition costs. Evidently $6 - $15 per square foot 
$20,000 = hookup all utilities
$15,000 = foundation 
$5,000 = Attach prefabricated house to the foundation 
$66,989 = “Caldwell” prefabricated house, 4-bedroom 
$126,989

Costs can be even lower if the US Army Corps of Engineers are brought in to clear lots, pour foundations, and hook up utilities. In this case, the soldiers will also be learning career skills with hands-on experience. Sorry labor unions, nothing for you.
CAN YOU BELIEVE THE FOLLOWING PICTURES ARE PRE-FABRICATED HOUSES? THEY ARE BEAUTIFUL. THIS IS AMAZING. 
WE ARE GOING TO SHOW AMERICA HOW REPUBLICANS CAN CREATE AFFORDABLE HOUSING, AND AT NO COST TO THE TAXPAYERS.

These units available through www.pennsylvaniafactorydirect.com

A floor plan of a micro 1 bed 1 bath house
A floor plan for allentown ii 1 bed 1 bath
A floor plan for a house with 2 beds and 1 bath
A floor plan of a riverdale 1 3 beds 2 baths 1158 sq ft
A floor plan of a house that is for sale
There is one more unit, the Caitlyn, not shown. It’s only 3 bedrooms, but much more luxurious than the Caldwell. It’s over $90,000

Prefabricated homes have come a long way. There are some large and beautiful units, and they can be bought for less than one would ever imagine.
There is an enormous potential here, and this could dovetail with the idea of a Community Land Trust. 
Units could be sold to tenants, who would become homeowners. I’ve already done the math. This is a very economical way to build housing.
We’re not talking about junky old trailer homes, packed like sardines. Don’t even use the word “trailer home” or “mobile home”.  

Although pre-fabricated homes can and have been ordered and delivered to mobile home parks, at a mobile home park they sit loose, sometimes on cinderblocks. They are not permanently secured to a foundation. We don’t want that standard. And we don’t want housing units paying very little taxes to the host city because they are “mobile”. 

These are prefabricated houses will be permanently secured to the foundation. They will not be “mobile” and cannot be called “mobile homes”. As a result of being permanently secured to a foundation, they will be taxed just like any house. This has to work economically for the host community, meaning that full property taxes are being paid. These houses will be mixed in with the existing housing stock. They will not stand out in any way in urban areas, except that they will be one-story, often in areas with much taller and larger houses. Reducing the density also creates a better quality of life.
Some of the benefits for the urban center:
  1. Create opportunities for home ownership, especially for tenants who want to purchase
  2. New construction improves the housing stock more than the rehabilitation of old houses. A rehab’d old house is still an old house in many regards.
  3. These are single-family homes; we need more single-family houses that will be owner-occupied. Owner-occupancy stabilizes neighborhoods
  4. As single-family houses in neighborhoods dominated by denser land uses, these will reduce the urban density and they will impact less upon the problem of street parking being hard to find.
  5. The side yards will be greater than most of the existing neighborhood.
  6. There will be more light and air between houses because these are one-story dwellings, with wider side yards
  7. We are eliminating vacant lots, burned houses, abandoned houses, and deteriorated houses with this program
  8. Two of the smaller versions are 13’4” wide. They will easily fit on 25-foot wide lots, with side yards nearly 6 feet wide. That’s too dense for a 3-story house, but a decent setback for a one-story pre-fab house
We can really rock the housing market with very nice pre-fabricated homes.  
 
And it’s going to have a political impact when folks see that Republicans are creating affordable housing, empowering residents, and doing it at little or no cost to the taxpayers.

These could be part of a multi-prong approach. This plan has relevance nationwide. A city such as Newark would be a great pilot program. Surely Detroit, St. Louis, Cleveland, Camden, Baltimore, and other cities would be perfect for this program.