Texas Manufactured Housing Sales in April 2021 and the May Early Read

May Preliminary Data

New manufactured home sales in May are slightly above where they were running in 2019, and well above 2020 when Texas was just beginning to reopen from the pandemic induced lockdown.

Single-section home sales have accelerated from April and came in above declining multi-section sales.

New home sales in May typically finish up over April, but the fourth of July holiday likely slows down the flow of title processing, so at this point the 929 homes sold marks a seasonally adjusted increase of 6.4% over the previous month.

The forecast for new home sales in May based on sales titled to date is 1,392 (+/- 182).

New SalesSinglesMultisTotal
Total for May: 491 438 929
Change from April (Raw %): 2.1% -13.8% -6.1%
Change from April (Raw Units): 10 -70 -60
Change from April (SA %): 9.9% -4.6% 3.4%
Change from May of 2020 (%): 22.1% 11.5% 16.9%
Change from May of 2020 (Units): 89 45 134
Used SalesSinglesMultisTotal
Total for May: 157 58 215
Change from April (Raw %): -4.8% -18.3% -8.9%
Change from April (Raw Units): -8 -13 -21
Change from April (SA %): 12.3% -15.1% -1.1%
Change from May of 2020 (%): -46% 18.4% -36.8%
Change from May of 2020 (Units): -134 9 -125

April Data

New manufactured home sales in April are up a seasonally adjusted 3.1% over March.

Single-section sales temporarily pulled back in April after outselling multi-section homes in March and outselling them in May for sales titled to date as outlined above.

You can see in the first chart below that sales for the month are behind 2019 by -3.8%.

The updated forecast for total new homes sold in April is 1,477 (+/- 94).

New SalesSinglesMultisTotal
Total for April: 572 635 1,207
Change from March (Raw %): -11.3% 4.4% -3.7%
Change from March (Raw Units): -73 27 -46
Change from March (SA %): 4.4% 4.7% 3.1%
Change from April of 2020 (%): 25.4% 27.3% 26.4%
Change from April of 2020 (Units): 116 136 252

The time interval between when a home was constructed and when it was sold continues to shrink.

New Home Characteristics for AprilSinglesMultisTotal
Median Age of Home (Days): 92.5 90 91
Average Square Feet: 1,104 1,783 1,461

Liberty County remains the hottest market for new manufactured home sales in the state.

Top Five Counties for New InstallsTotalChange (MoM%)
Liberty 59 -6.3%
Harris 50 0%
Montgomery 49 -14%
Travis 41 -24.1%
Bexar 34 -24.4%
Used SalesSinglesMultisTotal
Total for April: 217 99 316
Change from March (Raw %): 4.8% -10% -0.3%
Change from March (Raw Units): 10 -11 -1
Change from March (SA %): 16% 17.9% 28.7%
Change from April of 2020 (%): 57.2% 62.3% 58.8%
Change from April of 2020 (Units): 79 38 117

Annual Totals

The annual total for new home sales in 2021 is pulling away from the pandemic depressed low levels of 2020, but the Uri disruption in February and slower sales in April have put the year -3.4% behind 2019.

May of 2020 was when retail sales began to pick up last year and they remained at very high levels through November, ultimately the year finished above 2019.

I don’t expect 2021 to keep pace with 2020 through that entire Q2 through Q4 stretch, but the current forecast for new home sales on the year stands at 15,542 (+/- 1,068), and with consumer search interest in homes for sale remaining above last year’s unprecedented levels, I’d take the over.

New SalesSinglesMultisTotal
Total for 2021 titled to date: 2,761 2,828 5,589
Change from 2020 (%): 13.1% 6.2% 9.5%
Change from 2020 (Units): 319 164 483

New Home Characteristics for 2021SinglesMultisTotal
Median Age of Home (Days): 98 94 96
Average Square Feet: 1,102 1,785 1,448

Top Five Counties for New InstallsTotalChange (YoY%)
Liberty 280 34.6%
Travis 269 44.6%
Montgomery 243 4.3%
Harris 216 2.4%
Bexar 183 45.2%
Used SalesSinglesMultisTotal
Total for 2021 titled to date: 1,020 488 1,508
Change from 2020 (%): -3.3% 39.4% 7.3%
Change from 2020 (Units): -35 138 103

Because titles continue to come in for past sales months, here are all prior months for the year and what their current sales totals are at this report release.

New Sales MonthSinglesMultisTotal
January 447 528 975
February 428 423 851
March 681 653 1,334
Used Sales MonthSinglesMultisTotal
January 204 106 310
February 158 84 242
March 238 116 354

Note: These calculations are based on titles processed by TDHCA through 2021-07-15. Late submissions will impact these figures going forward.

Charts

This first chart shows what monthly sales totals look like for each year in the series for titles processed through 7-15.

Note: These calculations are based on titles processed by TDHCA through 2021-07-15. Late submissions will impact these figures going forward.


The second chart shows monthly totals at the official release date for each month. All of these totals have moved up since release, and the most recent totals can be seen in the chart below this one.

Note: These calculations are based on titles processed by TDHCA through 2021-07-15. Late submissions will impact these figures going forward.


The third chart is all sales data in the series to date with single-section and multi-section home totals plotted.

Note: These calculations are based on titles processed by TDHCA through 2021-07-15. Late submissions will impact these figures going forward.


This chart tracks the difference between shipments and sales each month. Because late title work pushes recent sales totals up, I’m including data through the previous officially released sales month.

Note: These calculations are based on titles processed by TDHCA through 2021-07-15. Late submissions will impact these figures going forward.


The fifth chart is the annual median for the number of days between a homes date of sale and it’s date of manufacture. Prior to 2/22/21 this chart included sales from manufacturers to communities, it now only includes sales from licensed retailers.

Note: These calculations are based on titles processed by TDHCA through 2021-07-15. Late submissions will impact these figures going forward.


The final chart is for all used monthly retail sales data. The outliers are typically the result of community purchases were titles move from the previous to the new MHC owner.

Note: These calculations are based on titles processed by TDHCA through 2021-07-15. Late submissions will impact these figures going forward.