The precursor to today’s modular home building may have been the Sears, Roebuck and Company mail-order Modern Homes program, through which more than 100,000 homes were sold between 1908 and 1940. The designs offered varied from elegant multi-story homes to simple ‘cottages’ with no plumbing.

A certain amount of ‘customizing’ was also encouraged, with many different material options and color schemes offered. A kit might include upwards of 30,000 numbered pieces of pre-cut, pre-fitted materials, like a jigsaw ready for the brave to assemble. It would typically be delivered to the nearest railroad station.

Sears attempted to incorporate materials and methodologies - such as drywall, asphalt shingles, and balloon style framing - to decrease the difficulty and building time for inexperienced purchasers. Many of these homes still stand in neighborhoods all across the country.

The Modern Homes program ran into difficulty during the Great Depression because Sears also held mortgages on many homes and foreclosing on defaulters just was not the business they had hoped to be in.

www.searsarchives.com/homes

 

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