Don’t you just love it when a plan comes together? While listening to the Dave Cooper Live discussion of sustainable housing today, it struck me that what we need is a Federal Building Code(s) for all Offsite Construction.
This would allow Federally authorized third-party inspection services to certify homes that are volumetric and designed for human habitation before they leave the factory and without recourse from state or local code review.
We already have a Federal code for manufactured homes (HUD) and because it’s the same in every state with less red tape than local and state governments love piling on, the manufactured home companies have a lot more factories than modular, tiny house, and ADU factories combined.
We should have a Federal Modular (MUD) code, one designed to be the same in every state. The same independent third-party inspection services could certify them without every state having to review them again. Local building codes would have no way to override them.
Want more affordable housing? Let’s push a MUD code for modular housing.
And let’s not forget Tiny Houses and ADUs, which the non-Federal code people tend to sweep into those dark corners of housing. CA welcomes ADUs and Tiny Houses as a solution to affordable housing and is pushing for more of them to be built. So, why not pattern a Federal code for ADUs and Tiny Houses using CA’s building requirements? We can call this one THUD.
Photo of Tumbleweed Tiny House production line
That would give the Federal government control of Manufactured, Modular, ADU, and Tiny House construction.
Apparently, it works quite well for the manufactured housing industry as they produce about 10% of all new homes in the US every year. Can you imagine the amount of new affordable houses the modular factories could produce if they played by the rules the Federal HUD imposes on states? There would be growth in modular home factories as we’ve never seen before.
I mentioned something like this to a well-known industry expert a while back and he said, “do you really want the Federal government dictating what we can build?” Looking back at that today, I say, “Hell YES!”
It sounds better than 50 states and countless local governments interpreting existing building codes to fine-tune them for their NIMBYs.
Gary Fleisher, Contributing Editor
