i have read horror stories of costs involved.. if we take EVERYTHING out ourselves and move JUST the double wide what is the cost / its a 18yr old doublewide..

twinkiedooter

I worked for a manufactured home dealer. If the home is not on a permanent foundation it can be moved. If the home is on a permanent foundation such as a basement it cannot be moved without a steel frame being leased or bought as the home on a permanent foundation has no steel frame attached to it. That would be a modular home, not a mobile home. True modulars do not have an attached steel frame. The frame goes back to the factory after the home is delivered. On the other hand a HUD home has the steel frame attached and stays attached and can be placed either on a basement or cement blocks and skirting used around the open bottom area.

Older doublewides are indeed a horror nightmare story. First you take everything out, of course. Then you need to hire a crew that takes double wides apart for a living. It is NOT as simple as it may seem. They have to properly take the roof ridge apart, then each end of the house apart. Then they must carefully take apart the inside walls where they meet the "marriage line". Then the home must be wrapped with heavy weight black plastic and properly shielded from the elements with 1"X2"'s. But before any of this happens the home must be properly disconnected from the electric, gas, water and sewer lines. This is what the tear down crew is paid for as well.

Then the home is transported to the new site for the home. Has the new site been properly prepared for the home with the proper poured cement pilars in the ground to properly withstand the load of the house in the correct positions? This must be done properly as if not done properly the house will worse than shift, it will collapse!

All in all, if you hire other people to do this work for you, you are looking at at least a $10,000 job to tear down, transport, and prepare the new site and then put the house back together again. Then the reconnection of the electric, gas, water and sewer lines may be extra.

The oldest double wide we moved was about 10 years old and that cost in the neighborhood of $10,000 start to finish and that included the permits for the home to be moved and the final inspection by the Manufactured Homes Commission of Ohio. Depending if the home is going to another county in the same state, the county will want their taxes paid in full before they release the house to a different county. The tax assessor's office should be able to help you there to see if any back taxes are owed on the home. Then you will be able to purchase a permit which the house must have in order to be transported on the highway by a transport company.

Generally double wide mobile homes that are over 15 years old are not a good idea to tear down and move as they are almost impossible to put back together properly even with a professional crew doing the work. I used to talk to the tear down crews and learned this from the horses mouth so to speak. It seems the older homes were not built as well as the homes that are 10 years old or newer. The crews did tell me of a few homes that they tore down and moved and tried to put back together but the move ended up being a nightmare and the home was never the same.

I, for one, would not recommend moving an older home like that even if you got the home for free!!

twinkiedooter

If you have any specific questions on this topic, please ask away. I probably know the answer.