MARYVILLE, Tenn., Dec. 28, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Clayton, one of America's leading builders of prefabricated homes, has released a new video featuring the story of a family whose Clayton Built® home survived the devastating Category Four Hurricane Michael.
Clayton Built® homeowners share their post-Hurricane Michael story.
Hurricane Michael was the first Category 4 storm on record to make landfall in the Florida Panhandle.
Terry and Darla purchased their prefab home in 2016 from Clayton Homes of Panama City.
Terry and Darla chose to purchase a modular home after touring a home building facility and witnessing the quality of materials and offsite construction process.
Hurricane Michael's 155 mph winds and 9ft storm surges only left the Clayton Built home with minimal damage.
Darla, a retired florist, and Terry a retired engineer, moved to Florida to be close to the beach.
When the hurricane made landfall Oct.10, Darla and Terry's Clayton Built® home was along its path. The two moved to Mexico Beach, Fla. from Alabama after retirement to be closer to the beach. They originally planned to build a site built home on their newly purchased property, but after learning more about Clayton and touring the company's Clayton SE Homes home building facility in Addison, Ala., the couple opted to purchase a Clayton Built® home from Clayton Homes of Panama City instead.
"We chose Clayton because of the designs, the better selection, to meet our needs of more of what we wanted," explained Clayton Built® homeowner, Terry Wise. "To meet the requirements for here, the roof had to be approved, had to be designed to meet the Florida codes, the shingles had to meet regulations."
As Hurricane Michael approached Mexico Beach, Darla and Terry prepared by securing storm shutters on all windows and helped neighbors secure their homes. The two evacuated, along with their neighbors, while Mexico Beach sustained significant damage as the storm passed through.
Upon their return, Darla and Terry found many of the homes in the area had been destroyed – but to their relief, their Clayton Built® modular home had suffered minimal damage. With some missing shingles and siding, minor leaking and damage to the home's underpinning, the home was found to have sustained only minor damages compared to the surrounding homes in the wake of Hurricane Michael.
Clayton takes pride in the quality, durability and craftsmanship of each Clayton Built® home. Designed and built in climate-controlled environments of 40 home building facilities across the United States, prefab homes are not exposed to elements like wind, rain and climate changes during the building process, that are common with onsite construction. While manufactured homes are built to the HUD code, modular homes are built to the state, local and/or regional codes where the home will be placed. In addition, each modular home is built with certain weather and environment conditions in mind for the site location.
"The quality of the construction, the quality of the workmanship, the quality of the engineering that went into the manufacturing of the home—says it all," said Wise. "From the corner of our driveway is a straight shot to the water. I don't know how fast the winds were coming up, and our house stood. That says, all you need to say."
To watch a video of the Clayton homeowners' interview and learn more about Clayton's quality home building process, please visit our website at www.claytonhomes.com.
About Clayton:
Founded in 1956, Clayton is committed to opening doors to a better life and building happyness® through homeownership. As a diverse builder committed to quality and durability, Clayton offers traditional site-built homes and prefabricated housing, including modular homes, manufactured homes, tiny homes, college dormitories, military barracks and apartments. In 2017, Clayton delivered over 48,000 homes to families across America. Clayton is a Berkshire Hathaway company. For more information, visit claytonhomes.com.
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