How To Get Insurance for a Mobile Home

Mobile home insurance is a type of homeowners insurance specifically designed for mobile, manufactured and modular homes. Coverage is available through multiple major insurance carriers as well as smaller insurers that specialize in covering mobile homes.

Read below to learn what kind of homeowners insurance policy you need to cover a manufactured home and what factors are likely to impact the amount you have to pay for your policy.

Key Takeaways Mobile homes are covered by HO-7 policies rather than standard HO-3 policies, although the two types of homeowners insurance provide similar coverage. HO-7 insurance typically includes six main coverage types: dwelling, other structures, personal property, loss of use, personal liability and medical payments coverage. Your mobile home insurance policy will likely exclude coverage for various perils including wear and tear, floods, earthquakes and damage incurred while your mobile home is in transit. Manufactured home insurance premiums often range from $300 to $1,000 per year but prices depend on several factors like your location, policy details and claims history.

What Is Mobile Home Insurance?

Manufactured and mobile homes require a special type of home insurance policy known as HO-7 insurance. Although it is classified differently, HO-7 insurance is similar to HO-3 insurance, which is the type of home insurance that 78.16% of covered homeowners have as of 2021.^[1]

What Does Mobile Home Insurance Cover?

Homeowners insurance for mobile homes generally includes the same core coverage types as a traditional HO-3 policy.^[2] Continue reading for an overview of the six types of coverage you can expect to find in your HO-7 policy.

Dwelling

Dwelling coverage insures the physical structure of your mobile home along with any structures directly connected to it such as a porch or awning. HO-7 policies generally cover your home on an open peril basis, meaning all sources of damage are covered by your policy except for those that are specifically named as exclusions in the policy.^[2]

For example, if a heat wave causes all of your windows to crack, then your insurance company will help you cover the costs of repairing or replacing those windows up to your dwelling coverage limit as long as your policy doesn’t list heat waves as an excluded peril. The coverage limit for your dwelling insurance is usually set at the cost of replacing your entire home.

Other Structures

In a similar way, other structures coverage protects structures on your property that are not attached to your home including sheds, fences and standalone accessory dwelling units (ADUs). While many homeowners insurance policies set your other structures coverage limit at a percentage of your dwelling coverage limit, some mobile home policies insure your other structures at their replacement cost value (RCV).^[2]

Personal Property

Personal property insurance covers your possessions including clothes, furniture, electronics and more. HO-7 policies insure your belongings on a named peril basis, which means the only perils that are covered are those that are listed in the policy.^[2] In general, named perils policies cover damage caused by the following 16 perils:

Fire or lightning	Theft
Windstorm or hail	Volcanic eruptions
Explosion	Falling objects
Riot or civil commotion	Weight of ice, sleet or snow
Damage by aircraft	Water/steam discharge from home systems and appliances
Damage by vehicle	Sudden/accidental tearing, cracking, burning or bulging of home systems
Smoke	Freezing of home systems
Vandalism or malicious mischief	Sudden/accidental power surges

Homeowners policies often insure your belongings at their actual cash value (ACV), which takes into account how they have depreciated in value over time. However, you may be able to get homeowners insurance on a mobile home that provides RCV coverage for your personal property.^[2]

Loss of Use

Loss of use coverage kicks in when your home is left uninhabitable due to damage caused by a covered peril and helps you pay for additional living expenses (ALE) so you can temporarily move somewhere else. For example, your ALE coverage could pay for you to spend a week in a hotel and order takeout from nearby restaurants if your hotel room doesn’t have a kitchen. Even if your modular home has not been severely damaged, your loss of use coverage may still take effect if a government order or physical obstruction prevents you from returning home.

Personal Liability

Personal liability coverage takes care of medical expenses or property repairs if you are held responsible for injuring someone else or damaging their property. It can also cover legal fees if you are sued on account of a bodily injury or property damage incident.

For example, your personal liability insurance may step in if a guest falls through your front porch and gets hurt after a wooden board gives way or if you accidentally run over your neighbor’s mailbox with your riding lawn mower.

Medical Payments

Medical payments coverage can cover someone else’s hospital bills if they are injured on your property regardless of who is at fault for the injury. Unlike personal liability coverage, it doesn’t cover legal expenses and is instead intended to deter legal action on account of relatively minor injuries.

What Isn’t Covered by Mobile Home Insurance?

Unless you purchase extra coverage, your mobile home insurance policy likely won’t cover damage to the structure of your home or your belongings while your mobile home is in transit.^[3] In addition, a basic HO-7 policy will likely exclude coverage for the following perils:^[2]

Ordinance or law	Vandalism after your home has been vacant for an extended period of time
Earth movements such as earthquakes, landslides and sinkholes	Mold, fungus or rot
Water damage from external sources such as flooding and sewer backups	Wear and tear
Power failure	Mechanical breakdowns
Neglect or poor maintenance	Smog, rust or corrosion
War	Industrial smoke and agricultural smudging
Nuclear hazards	Pollutants
Intentional losses	Settling, shrinking, bulging or expanding of structural components like your foundation
Government confiscation or condemnation of property	Infestations of birds, rodents, insects and other vermin
Theft while your home is under construction	Damaged caused by your pets

How Much Does Mobile Home Insurance Cost?

Mobile home insurance prices can vary significantly depending on factors like where you live, whether your region is prone to natural disasters, how old your home is, what your deductible is and how many claims you have filed in the past. For example, mobile homeowners in Central Texas generally have to pay between $300 and $1,000 per year for home insurance, according to Eric Bramlett, a realtor and the owner of Bramlett Residential.

“Unsurprisingly, newer manufactured housing constructed to modern building codes receives preferred pricing,” Bramlett said in a message to SmartFinancial. “We’re talking 10-15% lower than average. However, homes 15+ years really start to see rates increase — sometimes 30-40% above average or more.”

It’s worth noting that some insurers offer discounts specifically designed to help you save money on mobile home insurance. For example, GEICO offers a discount to manufactured homeowners whose homes are tied down and fully skirted.^[4] Meanwhile, Foremost Insurance Group offers lower rates to homeowners who live in an approved mobile home park.^[5]

When Is Mobile Home Insurance Required?

Homeowners insurance isn’t required by law in any state regardless of what kind of home you live in but your mortgage lender may require you to maintain home insurance if you need to finance the purchase of your mobile home.

Are Specific Types of Insurance Required for Older Mobile Homes?

Older mobile homes generally don’t require any type of coverage besides an HO-7 policy but insurance companies may be more likely to deny you coverage if you have an older home since it may be considered a high-risk property. Mobile homes can already be more likely to be labeled as high-risk since they may lack strong foundations like traditional homes and are often more susceptible to wind and fire damage, which are issues that are typically more prominent the older your home is.^[6]

Which Companies Carry Mobile Home Insurance?

You may be able to purchase homeowners insurance from a company that specializes in covering mobile homes such as Manufactured Housing Insurance Services. In addition, mobile home coverage is available through major insurance carriers like the following:

• Allstate
• American Family
• Farmers
• GEICO
• Liberty Mutual
• State Farm
• USAA

However, you should be aware that the availability of modular home insurance from some insurers may depend on your location. For example, Kin Insurance currently only sells mobile home policies in Florida, Louisiana and Texas.^[2]

How To Get Mobile Home Insurance

In order to find the best and most affordable policy for your mobile home, you’ll likely need to sift through quotes from at least three to five homeowners insurance companies. As you request quotes, you should be prepared to provide information like your address, the age of your home, the condition of your roof and the number of people living in your home. Of course, individually contacting insurers to give them this information can be a long and boring process.

Fortunately, the process is much quicker and easier when you compare quotes through SmartFinancial. Simply answer a few questions about your coverage needs and budget and we’ll do the legwork of finding quotes for policies that are likely to work for you. To get started on comparing quotes for free, click here now.