Texas Manufactured Home Shipments in October 2023
October Shipments
Manufactured home shipments to Texas retailers expanded once again in October moving up a seasonally-adjusted +2% from the previous month. The increase continues to push the seasonally adjusted total to the highest level thus far on the year, now for the seventh straight month.
October marks the first month where shipments in 2023 were higher for a month than they were in 2022 coming in +1.4% above October of last year.
On the demand side placements should outpace shipments through September, but October marks the first month where shipments are expected to be higher than retail sales.
The 12-month moving average for shipments moved up in October ending the 12-month decline. The moving retail sales average is expected to continue to move higher from July through October.
| Shipments | Singles | Multis | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total for October: | 630 | 709 | 1,339 |
| Change from September (Raw %): | 5.2% | 10.1% | 7.7% |
| Change from September (Raw Units): | 31 | 65 | 96 |
| Change from September (SA %): | 1.4% | 0.8% | 2% |
| Change from October of 2022 (%): | -8.3% | 12% | 1.4% |
| Change from October of 2022 (Units): | -57 | 76 | 19 |
October Production
Texas manufactured housing plant production once again expanded more in October than shipments did, beating the forecast by +164 homes and the seasonally-adjusted total moving up +2.5% from the previous month. In comparison to October of 2022 the raw total of homes was up +2.3%.
Shipments to out of state locations moved down sequentially but were up 9.5% from 2022.
| Texas Plant Production | Total | Shipped Out of TX | Min Floors |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total for October: | 1,851 | 565 | 2,535 |
| Change from September (Raw %): | 5.6% | -2.4% | 6.5% |
| Change from September (Raw Units): | 98 | -14 | 155 |
| Change from September (SA %): | 2.5% | NA | 2.3% |
| Change from October of 2022 (%): | 2.3% | 9.5% | 4.5% |
| Change from October of 2022 (Units): | 42 | 49 | 109 |
November Outlook
The forecasting models have November shipments at 1,229 (+/- 228) and Texas factory production at 1,645 (+/- 283) homes. The Texas Manufactured Housing Survey (TMHS) for November signaled a further increase in run rates but it’s hard to know the number of production days with the Thanksgiving holidays, so I’d put both overs down as coin flips.
View the Texas Manufactured Home Survey Results for November.
Annual Totals
The year-to-date annual shipment total is now down -27.8% from 2022 and the Texas plant production total is down -27.4%.
The forecast for annual Texas shipments in 2023 moved down just one home to 14,397 (+/- 384) while forecasted Texas plant production moved down to 19,160 (+/- 476). The forecasted totals put 2023 shipments just above 2014 and annual production just under 2019.
| Shipments | Singles | Multis | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total for 2023 YTD: | 5,718 | 6,371 | 12,089 |
| Change from 2022 (%): | -32.7% | -22.8% | -27.8% |
| Change from 2022 (Units): | -2,777 | -1,882 | -4,659 |
| Texas Plant Production | Total | Shipped Out of TX | Min Floors |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total for 2023 YTD: | 16,026 | 4,534 | 22,012 |
| Change from 2022 (%): | -27.4% | -23.1% | -26.8% |
| Change from 2022 (Units): | -6,055 | -1,362 | -8,062 |
Charts
In this chart you can see that when the shipment moving-average crosses the retail sales moving-average a turn in shipments usually follows. The last downward cross occurred in June of 2019 and it’s not too hard to see that shipments were headed back up for the upward cross in March of 2020, right when COVID-19 hit and strangled production for several months. It is that unprecedented stretch of retail sales above shipments from June of 2019 through August of 2021 that I think best explains the huge expansion in shipments we see after that point that peaked in August and September of 2022.