- Owners of fire-damaged houses must make a lot of difficult decisions. For example, one of the biggest decisions you’ll have to make is whether you should you repair your house’s fire damage … or try to sell a fire-damaged house and move on? Another critical decision involves considering whether to replace a fire-damaged house with a new construction or a prefab home. This choice can significantly impact your financial recovery and how quickly you can return to normalcy.
If the house is severely damaged you may have to decide between trying to salvage what you can and then rebuild the current home to its former glory … or replace the fire-damaged house altogether.
If you do decide to replace the house there are a wide variety of styles to choose from – even pre-fabricated metal houses.
Do metal houses offer any advantages?
Manufacturers highlight a major advantage of this house type: it can be largely constructed off-site in a facility that protects workers from extreme weather.
Consequently, metal prefabricated homes can be built faster and to higher quality standards than traditional on-site homes.
Owners won’t have to worry about weather delays slowing construction or impacting home quality.
Many metal home builders are now able to prefabricate up to 90% of a home at a facility – that leaves just 10% of the work (mainly connecting the structure to the foundation and joining modules together) to be done on-site.
Therefore, this housing type is the quickest solution to replace a fire-damaged house and provide families with essential lodging and protection when needed fast.
Here are 7 additional reasons owners of fire-damaged houses may want to consider metal housing:
1-Cost
While the cost of wood has risen lately, the price of steel has remained steady, which means the cost of a metal home is now comparable to the cost of a wood home. Plus, steel offers a consistent high level of quality, it is abundant, and it is fully recyclable. This is in fact one of the reasons why many homeowners prefer rebuilding their home rather than selling a fire-damaged house.
2-Steel is much stronger than wood
Did you know that steel possesses the highest strength to weight ratio of any building material available today? Well, it does. That’s why steel serves as the primary building material in 80% of all commercial buildings.
In addition, steel better resists corrosion and decay compared to other building materials, which means metal frame homes offer longer use and greater value. Also, don’t forget metal homes are more resistant to fires, hurricanes, floods, earthquakes and other natural disasters.
The bottom line is that you can expect metal homes to last longer and require fewer costly repairs than other building materials.
3-Metal frame homes stay straight and true
Unlike wood frames which can warp or crack or settle, steel stays straight and true, which means no costly air leaks or energy loss in your metal home.
With a metal home you also won’t have to worry about expensive damage caused by termites or dry rot.
4-You can finish your metal home with a traditional look
That’s right, you can finish the exterior of a metal home with the same materials as you would a wood home, including stucco or brick or siding, which means the metal home doesn’t have to look any different than any of the other houses in the neighborhood.
5-Metal homes offer greater energy savings
In fact, metal frame homes offer as much as 40 percent more energy efficiency when compared to wood-framed homes. The reason? Metal homes offer more space for insulation – including enough room for 9-inch (R-30) insulation in the walls and roof.
Most wood homes use much thinner R-11 to R-19 rated insulation.
In addition to lowering your energy bills, your metal home could also be quieter due the increased insulation and your metal home’s thicker walls.
6-Construction flexibility
A prefab metal home can range in size from 500 to over 12,000 square feet. You can decide to build a one-story home or a two or three story home. You can also build your metal home on a slab, over a basement or on a pier or beam.
Also, with most metal frame homes, the steel frame fully supports the structure so no space eating, inconvenient columns or support beams are required – this means you can, if you so desire, have clear span interiors that range up to 30 feet wide or more!
7-Construction speed and convenience
Another major benefit of metal homes is that metal house kits allow you to quickly and easily build the home by yourself.
Manufacturers create prefab metal homes offsite to your exact specifications and then ship them directly to you. Due to precise manufacturing processes, you don’t have to worry about having expensive excess material and construction delays. You simply follow the instructions and assemble the perfectly synchronized parts. There’s no having to compensate for wood’s imperfections.
Here’s one more advantage – steel is environmentally friendly.
A metal house kit can include recycled steel and no excess waste material. Also, since steel is much more durable than wood, you won’t have to make as many energy and resource depleting repairs and replacements over the course of your home’s life as you would with a wood home.
And if your home ever outlives its usefulness you can simply recycle it instead of having to tear it down and transport the old building materials to the local landfill.
Metal homes have come a long way
A variety of models and designs are now available in house kits, moving beyond the limited options and cheap constructions previously offered.
Metal building homes feature all the same amenities as traditional homes but can be constructed more quickly and affordably with the materials mentioned above.
Since you can finish a metal home’s exterior with the same materials as a wood-frame house, distinguishing between metal and wood-framed homes becomes virtually impossible.
Prefer to sell your fire-damaged house instead of repairing or replacing it?
We Buy Fire Damaged Houses pays all cash and buys burned homes in as is condition. That means you’ll get your money fast and can quickly buy a new house for your family to create exciting memories in.
To learn more about We Buy Fire Damaged Houses and to see if your burned house qualifies for a free quote, fill out the short form below.