Manufactured and Mobile Home Insurance (2023)

If you live in a mobile home, you need mobile home insurance to help protect your home and personal belongings. Mobile home insurance resembles homeowners insurance designed to suit the needs of a mobile home.^[1] The cost of mobile home insurance depends on a few different factors and can range from a few hundred dollars to more than $1,000 per year.

What is mobile home insurance?

Mobile home insurance policies, sometimes referred to as manufactured home insurance, offer two main types of insurance coverage — physical damage coverage for the mobile home and your belongings, and personal liability coverage. 

Mark Friedlander, director of corporate communications at the Insurance Information Institute, explains that these coverage options are generally available for the following types of mobile homes:

• Mobile homes located in a park or on private property

• Commercial mobile homes

• Seasonally used mobile homes

• Rental mobile homes

Why do you need mobile home insurance?

It’s important to have mobile home insurance in order to financially protect both the structure of your mobile home and your personal property. Mobile home insurance isn’t required by law, but if you have a mortgage loan on the mobile home, the lender will likely require you to have insurance.

“Just like any other property insurance policy,” Friedlander says, “mobile home insurance should be purchased to financially protect you and your family from catastrophic losses.”

Not having mobile home insurance can leave you on the hook for an expensive bill if your home is damaged or completely destroyed. Even if you aren’t required to have it from a mortgage lender, you stand to benefit financially from insuring your mobile home.

What does mobile home insurance cover?

Mobile home coverage typically provides two basic forms of protection: physical damage and personal liability coverage. Here’s what to know about these two types of coverage. 

• Physical damage coverage: This type of coverage will pay for any accidental damage that occurs to your belongings, the actual mobile home, or other structures related to the mobile home like an attached deck or a storage shed. Eligible perils include theft, wind, hail, fire, falling objects, and vandalism.

• Personal liability coverage: If someone is injured on your property and files a claim or lawsuit against you, personal liability coverage can help pay for costs like medical expenses and lost wages. This coverage can also apply to property damage you cause to other people’s property.

See More: Guide to Personal Liability and Home Insurance

What does mobile home insurance not cover?

Just like homeowners insurance, mobile home insurance doesn’t cover everything that could happen to your home. Generally, mobile home insurance excludes:

• Flood damage: You typically need to buy separate flood insurance to help protect against flood damage, which can be quite expensive. It’s a good idea to buy separate coverage through the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) if you live in an area prone to flooding.^[3] 

• Earthquake damage: You can usually buy earthquake coverage as an add-on benefit to your mobile home insurance policy. If you live somewhere prone to earthquakes, this type of coverage can potentially save you a lot of money. Like flood insurance, earthquake coverage is usually excluded from homeowners insurance policies due to the expensive damage earthquakes cause.^[4]

• Miscellaneous events: Many different issues can arise with a mobile home that mobile home insurance doesn’t cover, including wear and tear, rust, mold, wet or dry rot, vermin, rodents, water damage from sewers, and drain back ups. Mobile home insurance is designed to protect against accidental damage, so it excludes issues that relate to how someone maintains their mobile home.

Read More: Flood Insurance (The Ultimate Guide for Homeowners)

How much does mobile home insurance cost?

Many different insurance companies offer mobile home insurance, including large providers like Allstate, GEICO, and Progressive. All insurance providers charge unique rates, and the cost of mobile home insurance can range from just a couple hundred dollars a year to more than $1,000 per year. Multiple factors can influence how much someone will spend on mobile home insurance, such as:

• The age of the mobile home

• The home’s condition

• Security and safety features of the home

• The home’s value

• Location

• Coverage limits

• Claims history, for both the policyholder and the property

• Deductibles

• The value of your personal property

• Whether you own or rent the lot your mobile home is on

Best mobile home insurance companies

Here are some of the best mobile home insurance companies.

Allstate

Allstate earned a J.D. Power customer satisfaction score of 815 out of 1,000, which indicates an overall good customer experience.^[5] The company’s manufactured home insurance policy provides coverage for liability, injury claims made against you, and property damage. 

On the downside, Allstate’s policy doesn’t cover any damage caused by continuous or repeated seepage or leakage of water or steam. Damage caused by underground water is also excluded.

American Family

American Family received the second-highest score of 842 in J.D. Power’s 2022 U.S. Home Insurance Study, which means the company has the second-highest rate of customer satisfaction out of all companies compared. In addition to standard mobile home insurance coverage, American Family also offers a variety of add-ons that make it possible to customize your coverage, like coverage for hidden water damage and trip collision coverage. Notably, this company also lowers your deductible each year you continue to stay enrolled with it.

However, American Family’s mobile home insurance products are only available in 19 states, and you have to purchase additional coverage for other structures.

Farmers

Available in 43 states, Farmers also has a high J.D. Power customer satisfaction rating of 792. But Farmers’ website isn’t easy to navigate, and it doesn’t provide many details on its mobile home insurance offerings 

Still, Farmers does offer a wide variety of discounts for homeowner insurance policies, including mobile and manufactured insurance, such as a bundling discount and a non-smoking discount. 

Methodology

To choose the best insurance companies for mobile home insurance, we looked at companies’ overall industry ratings, publicly available customer satisfaction information, policy offerings, and financial stability.

Mobile home vs. manufactured home

A manufactured home must be built to U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) code standards, receive a red certification label, and be constructed in a factory and transported on a permanent chassis. This also describes a mobile home, but manufactured home is the more common term used to refer to this type of structure.

The type of coverage a manufactured home requires depends on the amount of insurance you need to protect your assets, including your mobile home and your personal property. When you buy coverage, it’s important to have both physical damage and personal liability coverage. 

Mobile home vs. modular home

Though mobile and modular homes vary significantly, it’s easy to confuse the two. Modular homes are not mobile homes, according to HUD. Modular homes are built to the same standards as site-built mobile homes, but are built offsite, transported to their final destination, and placed on a fixed foundation.^[6] Modular homes require homeowners insurance coverage, not mobile home insurance.

What’s the difference between mobile home insurance and homeowners insurance?

Homeowners insurance works very similarly to a mobile home insurance policy, but it protects homes on permanent foundations. A homeowners insurance policy provides coverage for structures and personal belongings and comes with liability coverage. 

Homeowners insurance also offers additional living expenses (ALE) coverage that pays for expenses incurred when you can’t live in your home during repairs. Mobile home insurance doesn’t typically include this type of coverage.^[7] 

Homeowners insurance and mobile home “coverages are very similar,” Friedman says. “The biggest difference is not all home insurers offer mobile home coverage. It is best to work with a local insurance agent to learn about what carriers offer this coverage in your area. You can then begin the shopping process by obtaining quotes.”

Learn More: Is Homeowners Insurance Required?

How to cut your mobile home insurance costs

Here are some options you have for cutting costs when buying mobile home insurance.

• Compare multiple quotes. Take your time shopping for the right insurance fit. Once you know how much coverage you need, you can request quotes for that amount of coverage from multiple different insurance providers to see which can provide the best rates. Using a reliable quote-comparison site allows you to easily compare these quotes all at once.

• Research customer experiences. When choosing mobile home insurance, read reviews relating to customer satisfaction to ensure the company is responsive and helpful with claims. Avoid making a decision based on price alone and consider companies that are well-known for home insurance.

• Ask for discounts. Always ask for discounts and special coverages that you may qualify for, like price breaks for paying in advance or installing safety devices.

How to compare mobile home insurance quotes

To compare mobile home insurance quotes, Friedmand recommends obtaining multiple quotes from a mix of national and regional insurers. From there, you can compare costs and coverage. “If you purchase your mobile home insurance from the same company that provides your auto insurance, you could qualify for a bundling discount, which will generate reduced premiums on both policies,” Friedman says. “Adjusting your deductible is also a great way to save, but be prepared to pay more out of pocket when suffering a covered loss.”

To make your research easier, you can turn to reliable quote-comparison sites for help. You’ll just need to enter your ZIP code, as well as some information about yourself and your home, to get custom quotes in minutes.

Mobile home insurance FAQs