Vermont is boosting new homes that can cut energy use in half

Vermont just got its biggest delivery of superefficient manufactured homes — the latest example of how a pioneering state program can lower energy bills for residents of this type of affordable housing.

The all-electric, heat-pump-equipped homes slash energy use by more than half compared with new conventional manufactured homes. To achieve that feat, each meets the exacting specifications under the Advanced Manufactured Home program, which was created by the state’s energy-efficiency utility Efficiency Vermont in 2024.

The standards aren’t mandatory; it’s up to the federal government to regulate the efficiency of manufactured homes. Instead, Vermont’s initiative certifies best-in-class options that will help the state meet its housing and climate goals — and offers a $3,000-per-unit incentive for the builders who opt in.

This month, manufacturer Titan Homes has been installing 18 of these prefabricated buildings at the largest manufactured-home park in Vermont, Tri-Park Cooperative Housing in Brattleboro. Residents who live in the floodplain and have suffered home damage in past storms will become the new occupants.

Including this latest batch, Titan Homes, based in New York, and Clayton Lewistown in Pennsylvania, have together built more than 30 units that have been installed around the state. Any Vermonter can purchase an Advanced Manufactured Home and work with Efficiency Vermont to get one.

When residents move in, they’ll enjoy much lower utility bills. Older manufactured homes are notoriously inefficient, and those of any vintage are difficult to weatherize after leaving the factory. In Vermont, the structures are typically heated with costly and polluting fuel oil or propane, driving average energy bills to about $4,000 annually, according to Efficiency Vermont.

Though they cost more up front, certified Advanced homes can save residents about $2,700 per year on energy bills over existing manufactured homes on average, and more than $1,300 over new manufactured homes built to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s current standards, according to Peter Schneider, principal engineering consultant at Vermont Energy Investment Corp., the nonprofit that operates Efficiency Vermont.

That’s a significant difference. While the median income for occupants of site-built single-family homes is $85,000, it’s $40,000 for manufactured home dwellers, said Mark Kresowik, senior policy director at the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, a nonprofit research organization.

“These families are facing some of the most acute stresses and pain of making decisions about whether to pay their energy bill or their home loan or put food on the table or buy medicine,” he said. ​“Their energy bills shouldn’t put them back in the streets or back into a rental.”

Vermont’s Advanced homes ​“are setting a benchmark for the rest of the country,” Kresowik said. 

The utility’s program pushes some of the most energy-efficient manufactured homes in the country, going beyond a comparable definition set at the federal level.

Once called mobile or trailer homes, manufactured homes make up 7% of new housing. On average, they sell for about a third of the price of site-built homes, or $123,000, according to federal data.

Under the Biden administration, the Department of Energy developed standards to certify what it called ​“Zero Energy Ready Homes,” including one for manufactured homes. (The program under the Trump DOE is now called ​“Efficient New Homes.”) This rubric requires a slew of efficiency measures, but also allows for gas furnaces and water heaters, which take two to four times the energy required by their heat-pump counterparts. Homes that meet or exceed these standards allowed the builder to qualify for the up to $5,000-per-unit New Energy Efficient Home Credit, or 45L, although that incentive expires tomorrow.

Kresowik isn’t aware of any other standard outside of Efficiency Vermont’s that outdoes the DOE’s, he said.

Soon, however, the entire nation may have stricter requirements for manufactured homes — if not as stringent as those in Vermont.

Last week, U.S. lawmakers passed a sweeping bipartisan housing bill that President Donald Trump then abruptly announced he wouldn’t sign until the passage of a voting reform bill. As of Monday, the legislation remained in limbo.

If the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act becomes law, it will change regulations around manufactured homes in two big ways. First, by ditching a requirement that they be built on a permanent steel chassis, a 10- to 12-inch-deep metal frame that’s used for transport. And second, by making them more energy efficient. The bill would require HUD to set a new efficiency standard within a year of the bill being signed into law, and at least every three years thereafter. The agency set the current standard more than three decades ago.

The secret sauce to superefficient manufactured homes

Efficiency Vermont’s Advanced homes come with a smorgasbord of efficiency improvements over conventional options: more insulation in the floors, the walls, and ceiling; ultraefficient windows and doors; programmable thermostats; tighter air seals and ductwork under the floors in the structure’s belly; Energy Star appliances; a cold-climate ducted heat-pump system that heats, cools, and dehumidifies; a heat-pump water heater; a solar-ready roof; and continuous fresh air via an energy recovery ventilator.

These features add up to a residence that dramatically reduces indoor air pollution and is more comfortable and resilient than those with fossil fuel heating, Schneider points out.

Manufactured homes meeting the standard do cost more, though: about $21,000 over an average new HUD-baseline unit. Still, assuming a 6% interest rate on a 30-year mortgage and including utility bills, the total cost of owning an Advanced home is about the same as owning a much less efficient one that relies on fossil fuels, Schneider calculates.

Moreover, ​“that’s at today’s energy costs,” he said. Schneider expects fossil fuel prices to continue to grow at a much faster pace than electricity prices, enabling the energy savings in an Advanced home to further offset the higher monthly mortgage payments.

Plus, most of today’s premium stems from the fact that manufacturers are installing the heat pumps and energy recovery ventilators on-site rather than at the factory. ​“As the market transforms and in-factory heat pump installation becomes more common, that will significantly lower the cost of an all-electric manufactured home,” Schneider said.

Like much of the country, Vermont is in a housing crunch. The Green Mountain State is likely to need roughly 30,000 new homes by 2029. Meanwhile, the pace of construction has been slow and the costs high.

Manufactured homes could help relieve some of the pent-up pressure for new housing. To give them a boost, the state has several programs, such as the Rapid Response Mobile Home Infill Program and the new initiative Move-In Vermont.

“We’re seeing investments in affordable housing funding going to manufactured housing programs more than we ever have,” said Schneider, who’s working with administrators to incorporate the Advanced Manufactured Homes standard. ​“I feel like that’s just going to grow.”

With the federal 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, HUD has a chance to make the same opportunity available across the country.

“The question is simply: Is HUD going to do that? Are [HUD’s new] standards going to ensure that people moving into these homes can actually afford their energy bills?” said Kresowik with the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy. ​“Vermont is showing it can be done.”