Maybe you have seen a portion of a pre-built house moving — hopefully slowly — along a highway to a site that a family will one day call home. It likely was part of a modular home, which offers builders and home buyers advantages about which you should know.

For years, modular homes have been confused with U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development code homes, also known as “manufactured housing.” Unlike HUD code homes, which have a permanent chassis to allow towing to the home site, modular homes usually comprise several sections assembled on the home site. And like a site-built home, modular homes must meet local code requirements.modular house

A product of systems building, modular homes are constructed on an assembly line in a climate-controlled factory setting. Despite a lingering misperception of factory-built housing as inferior, these homes account for a growing percentage of new construction.

According to a recent study by The Freedonia Group, a Cleveland-based industrial market research firm, the amount of factory- or systems-built housing will grow 1.2% annually through 2005.

Modular homes account for one of every 10 homes built in the Northeast, according to the NAHB’s Building Systems Council. That region ac-counted for 29% of the nation’s modular activity in 2001. The South Atlantic region was a close second with 26%, and the Great Lakes region ranked third at 24%.mobile house for sale:www.yukehouse.com