December 2018 Shipment Report

Manufactured home shipments for November fell -14.3% from the previous month to 1,365 total homes. Single-section and multi-section homes fell -14% and -14.7% respectively. We’ve seen a recurring oscillation of shipments going up and down from month’s with and without holidays since July, but November and December will mark two holiday months in a row, and December is historically a low month, so I don’t expect to see shipments ticking up in the last month of the year.

November of 2017 was the second highest month for shipments last year, so the -15.2% decline in shipments from this November over last year isn’t too surprising. With the surge in FEMA unit demands at this point last year manufacturers from in and out of Texas shipped over 1,100 single-sections in the state. The 690 single-section homes shipped in 2018 marked a -37.7% decline from last year, but multi-section homes were up 34.2% over November 2017 with 639 homes shipped.

December of 2017 saw elevated shipments from FEMA single-section homes as well, so I expect 2018’s year-over-year growth to come down from the +10.7% that it’s at with November’s shipment data included. If December tracks similarly to the other two months of Q4, that would still put us somewhere between +8.5% to +9.5% year-over-year growth.

View the Annual Manufacturer Shipment Report.