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A couple of points here. One, I currently live in Alabama, and I can attest to the fact that you can't spit down here without hitting the side of a single-wide. Both of my brothers-in-law live in double-wides (and one of them owns the trailer park they're parked on). Ain't for me - I'm a log home or stone castle kind of guy. But, I agree that the industry has come a long way in the last 15 or 20 years. I've seen some top-end manufactured and modular homes at prices you couldn't touch if it was a stick-built home. In fact, my buddy up in NoVA bought a modular home - built on a basement foundation - and 1.5 wooded acres with a stream, for $125K about 20 years ago. It's now worth triple that. And when he told me it was a modular unit a few years ago, I almost crapped myself. There is no way of telling it wasn't put up one stick at a time. The woman he bought it from had invested almost the initial value of the house in upgrades, and sold it after she and her husband finally divorced. The wife and I have been planning, designing, and scheming to build a log home for several years now, and I'm honestly considering going the modular route. You dig the foundation, build out the stone walls, drop the pre-built main structure in place, and have the finishing crew come in. Let 'em do the heavy lifting at the construction yard.

That’s okay Viking, the article is to slam us in the South, no biggie. It’s been going on for a long time. I remember my dear Mississippi born and bred Mom speaking in disgust about Hollywood’s phony Southern accents in movies, we’re talking those from the 20s and 30s on.

“Trailers” (single, double-wide and manufactured homes) are what some folks can afford and I happen to know a lot of those folks, wouldn’t take for their LOYAL friendship; they can set trotlines, hunt, trap, make something out of nothing, self-reliant. Ready and willing to help at the drop of a hat—and they know their neighbors too.