Reverse in Fire-Safety Trend Reported

One of the ever-present horrors in daily living is fire in the home. There has been an opinion that manufactured homes were more vulnerable to that threat than conventionally built houses but recent information seems to show the opposite.

A report by Foremost Insurance Co. of Grand Rapids, Mich., asserts that, although the opposite may have been true up to a decade ago, today site-built homes are more than twice as likely to experience a fire than manufactured homes. (Foremost is probably the largest insurer of manufactured housing in the nation.)

Nationally, the study shows an annual average of 17 fires per 1,000 site-built homes and 8 per 1,000 manufactured homes.

Richard Wettergreen, Foremost assistant vice president of marketing communications and research, said one reason is the strict construction standards in manufactured housing, explaining:

“Manufactured homes are the only homes with a national building code. The fire study indicates that HUD (Department of Housing and Urban Development) standards, adopted in 1976, have a positive effect on fire safety in manufactured housing. When construciton methods and standards are considered, it appears to be a distinct and safe advantage to live in a factory-built home.”

Two other discoveries were made in the study. One is that there is a much higher fire frequency in all types of homes--conventional and manufactured--in the 12 south/southeastern states of Kentucky, West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana and Oklahoma.

But in those states, the incidence of fires in manufactured homes was a great deal less than in conventional housing. Site-built home fires there average nearly 28 per 1,000 annually but fires in manufactured houses average just over 10 per 1,000. In the rest of the country, the figure for site-built home fires was about 15 per 1,000 and about seven per 1,000 in manufactured homes.

The other finding was that, when a fire does occur, the dollar loss in a manufactured home is higher than in one that is site-built. Wettergren laid this to the fact that manufactured houses require more expensive, specialized repair.

The territorial difference showed again: In the above-named states, the dollar loss in a manufactured home is $1,270 more than in a conventional one, while in the rest of the country it is about $380 more.

In another announcement on the same day, Foremost said it has raised its reward for information leading to the conviction of any manufactured home arsonist in the United States from $2,000 to $3,000. The reward will be paid, Foremost said, whether the home that was a victim of arson is insured by Foremost or any other insurance company.

Foremost’s assistant vice president and claim counsel, Jack Farrell, said the offer is an attempt to reduce manufactured home arson and hold insurance premium increases to a minimum.