Modular Home Construction vs. Traditional Home Construction

Advances in technology and building processes have opened up a world of endless possibilities for modular home construction, providing strong competition with traditional home building. Highly controlled factory warehouses, similar to automobile factories provide a safe environment for modular home construction. Weather conditions are not a detriment to the materials, and quality control is located at each station for providing adherence to some of the highest standards for home construction in the business. Compare the benefits of modular home construction over traditionally built homes. What are the differences between modular home construction and traditional home construction?

With modular home construction, materials are purchased in bulk directly from the supplier often at great savings, eliminating the middleman. Contractors using traditional construction purchase site-specific materials through building supply stores, increasing the cost of materials due to overhead and transportation.

Modular construction takes place primarily indoors, increasing efficiency and savings to the customer. Weather, theft and vandalism affect a stick-built construction site, plaguing customers with weather damaged materials and loss with traditional home construction.

Lot preparation can occur simultaneously with modular home construction, reducing the overall amount of time and money needed for completion. With traditional home construction, lot preparation takes place first, before any building can begin. Weather and contractor scheduling affect the duration of this process, thus extending the cost of material replacement and labor.

In modular home construction, strength and quality of the home exceeds on-site stick-built homes due to the requirement of moving the home from the factory to the home site. Traditional home construction uses 25% to 30% less lumber and nails/glue, along with less overall insulation than modular home construction.

Modular homes undergo rigorous inspection, following not only state and local codes, but also careful quality control at each stage of construction in the factory with modular home construction. Stick-built construction follows state and local building codes only. Inspectors are not on-site throughout the building process.

Modular
A modular home is constructed in a factory, under controlled conditions by trained personnel employed by the company. The company can draw custom plans and specifications, or a plan with standard specifications can be chosen from plan books. Prices are usually "quotes" and are firm throughout the building process.
Homes are built to the same codes as a custom site built home. Dickinson Homes builds to the International

Residential Code (IRC), which was newly adopted by the state of Michigan in July of 2001. Homes delivered to the state of Wisconsin are built to their state code. Each home design is certified by the respective state department or a third party agency representing the state.
Unlike manufactured homes, modular homes do not have wheels for delivery, but instead are delivered on trailers and lifted onto a permanent foundation and anchored in place.