The Landing at Pearland, the first project by a Houston company now developing a luxury manufactured homes community in Southeast San Antonio.
Katherine Feser/Houston Chronicle
San Antonio Express-News
Madison Iszler, Staff writer
“There’s a lot of folks that have just been priced out of the market and are looking not to have to rent an apartment for their whole life, so we’re a good go-between,” said Dustin Mason, vice president of sales.
Higdon Oaks will include a pool with a splash pad, clubhouse, dog park, event space, playground, fitness center and sports court, as well as fenced-in yards and off-street parking options. Mason said those amenities and the quality of its homes differentiate Higdon Oaks from other options — and from the typical mobile home community.
Lots range from 5,000 to 6,000 square feet, with two- to five-bedroom units from 800 to 2,200 square feet and priced from $80,000 to $130,000. Residents will own the homes but lease the land underneath at rents of about $600 a month.
The company expects to open the development this fall and to reach capacity in two or three years.
Live Lone Star debuted its first manufactured home community last month — The Landing at Pearland, which has 420 lots near Pearland Regional Airport — and plans to develop four others in the Houston and Corpus Christi areas at costs of $30 million to $40 million each. Mason said he expects the communities to draw first-time buyers, families with young children and retirees seeking to downsize and avoid maintaining a large house.
“You get the affordability of an apartment, you get to own a home and you’re getting all the amenities,” he said.
The number of manufactured homes shipped nationally plunged during the early 2000s recession and the 2008 financial crisis but has since risen.
Shipments totaled 105,772 in 2021 — surpassing 100,000 for the first time since 2006 — and 112,882 in 2022, according to the Census Bureau. The biggest share of homes shipped both years, about 17 percent, went to Texas.
Manufactured homes have long been a major source of affordable housing, and demand for lower-cost options has swelled as rents and prices of traditional homes and apartments have climbed.
The median sales price of an existing home nationally was $386,300 last year, up 10.2 percent from 2021, the National Association of Realtors said. In the San Antonio area, the median sales price jumped 13 percent to $320,000 during the same period, according to data from the San Antonio Board of Realtors.
Housing supply has not kept pace with demand, burdening families with modest incomes in particular. About 49 percent of low-rent units in Texas — defined as those with contract rents less than $600 a month — were lost between 2011 and 2019, according to an analysis by the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies.
The Biden administration has cited production of and easier financing for manufactured homes as a means of addressing the national shortage of affordable housing. And several bills in the current legislative session aim at increasing housing supply.
But prices of manufactured homes are rising, too, and more investors are purchasing communities and raising rents. The average sales price of manufactured homes nationally climbed just over 24 percent from 2020 to 2021, increasing from $87,000 to $108,100, according to the most recent available annual census data.
Live Lone Star isn’t the only company debuting more upscale options. For example, Phoenix-based Inspire Communities is working on a 170-acre community with 700 manufactured homes near Lake Conroe, with amenities such as pools, courts, a playground, fire pits, walking trails, lakes and a dog park.
madison.iszler@express-news.net