[00:00:00] Wade Lyall: It's around the house, right? So we're just taking the core of the house, manufacturing it in a very efficient, quality environment. Yeah. Most cost effective way to build, bring it to the job site and then let's make it fit the environment. Yeah. And why would, why would officials not want that in their area?

[00:00:22] Eric Goranson: And it's a healthier home. A hundred percent healthy, a

[00:00:24] Wade Lyall: hundred percent green. Yeah.

[00:00:26] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Well, great, great example. I mean, everybody out there in our audience is driven by a job site. They see the, you know, neighborhoods. going up down the street and every four days you see the dumpster getting picked up and hauled off half full of wood building materials whatever you know all that waste that goes out of there and that's what's so efficient about the way you guys build because you get materials in the right bank and it's so optimized that i'm like when it

[00:00:49] Wade Lyall: comes to remodeling and renovating your home there is a lot to know but we've got you covered this is around the house

[00:00:58] Mike Tweden: Welcome to

[00:00:58] Eric Goranson: the round the house show.

[00:00:59] Eric Goranson: This is where [00:01:00] we hope you get the most out of your home through information and education. Thanks for joining us today. We are here at design and construction weeks, the international building show. And I am sitting in a beautiful house right now with champion homes, and this place is amazing guys. Let's get some introductions going so we can start talking about these beautiful homes you guys are building.

[00:01:21] Eric Goranson: Perfect.

[00:01:22] Wade Lyall: Well, I'm Wade Lyle, executive vice president for Champion Homes. I work with our business development team across the United States representing our 47 factories between Canada and the United States and have alongside of me, Mike Tweeden.

[00:01:35] Mike Tweden: Thanks Mike. Hello there. Mike Tweeden, vice president of sales and business development and just excited to be here at IBS this week.

[00:01:41] Mike Tweden: It's a lot

[00:01:41] Eric Goranson: of energy. A lot of energy. Guys, I came in here a little bit ago, just kind of checking it out and it was standing room only. Apparently this place

[00:01:49] Wade Lyall: was packed. I think I heard, uh, this morning, there's already been over a hundred thousand people, um, that have actually checked in to the show. And I know yesterday we had [00:02:00] over 7, 000 people that came through the display.

[00:02:02] Wade Lyall: So it's nonstop. It's crazy.

[00:02:06] Eric Goranson: Well, you guys are building some great homes and, you know, earlier on in the year, I was talking to you guys, of course, Brent from my local area, You guys are such an opportunity out there for people out there that need something that's beautiful and affordable because we have an affordable housing issue in the U S right now.

[00:02:25] Wade Lyall: It's not an issue. It's a crisis. Absolutely. Yeah. So we obviously in our build methods, we represent affordable housing, right? Yeah. Some people like to call it attainable. It's attainable. It's affordable. We try to hit the price points for the working class people that have a monthly payment target that they have to hit.

[00:02:42] Wade Lyall: And so all of our designs, when we come up with the design, we think about who the buyer is, what the affordable cost factor is, and how do we back into that number? But more importantly, through our efficient production process. We can drive labor costs down. We, we maximize the scale of the size. You know, when you're doing over 27, [00:03:00] 000 homes a year, we can really leverage our spin to get really cost effective products.

[00:03:04] Wade Lyall: And we focus on that depending on the part of the country. We're under 300, 000, right? Yeah. I mean, this house we're sitting in today, a homeowner could buy this for 234, 000, right? And this has square feet. And this has a

[00:03:16] Eric Goranson: This kitchen is twice as big as my home. Oh, yeah. This island is stunning. I mean, it's what?

[00:03:20] Eric Goranson: Nine, ten feet? Twelve. There we go. See? It's crazy. Right. And this is something that people walk in and it was funny watching people walk in and go,

[00:03:29] Wade Lyall: Whoa,

[00:03:30] Eric Goranson: wow. This is crazy. I mean, it's stunning.

[00:03:35] Wade Lyall: So, so Eric, you just said the wild word and we do we do home demonstrations nationally. Seems like every month Mike's putting on a show somewhere in a venue and we're constantly trying to get the product out in front of.

[00:03:47] Wade Lyall: You know, local officials that make zoning decisions, because 1 of the challenges we have as an industry is to build a HUD code manufactured home. There's there's parts of the country that they're not approved to go in and that's where we have the affordable housing crisis. Right? [00:04:00] And every time we get a local zoning official walk in 1 of our houses, you know what they say?

[00:04:04] Wade Lyall: Oh, wow. Yeah. Right. This is not what I expected. And when you think about the evolution of our build methods and some of the technology and some of the automation things we're doing, we're really putting quality as the focus. Right? Yeah. And when you can get a mortgage on this, that goes out to 30 years.

[00:04:20] Wade Lyall: It's telling you that these are last lasting

[00:04:22] Eric Goranson: a lifetime. No question. And what's cool about this is you guys are building a better home than these spec guys are on no fence. Do you spec builders out there to check, checking it out right now, but you're not building this home inside a controlled area. I mean, I can't tell you how many job sites I've been out to.

[00:04:37] Eric Goranson: It's sheathed up. There's two inches of water sitting on the floor. It's been raining all day. Well, the guys are doing some interior framing. They haven't got the roof on it. And half the panels in there are colored black because of the rain and stuff that's been hitting it. And it's a big moldy mess. Not in your house.

[00:04:51] Mike Tweden: You, you hit it, uh, factory built housing to me. It's just a smarter way to build when you look at climate control, material control. [00:05:00] You have artisans in the in our factories that they become specialists in that and they come in every day and they're able to own their skills in that area instead of having to switch.

[00:05:09] Mike Tweden: Jobs out of work for a while with the weather. It just, it really is a smart way to build.

[00:05:14] Eric Goranson: It really is. Cause for instance, your molding guys, your molding guy, right? They're the ones doing it. They're not the plumber yesterday. They're not the drywall of the day before they do what they do. And they do it all day long.

[00:05:26] Wade Lyall: Yeah. So we, we have, you know, pretty close to 9, 000 employees across our, our spectrum. And when you think about in a factory, 200 skilled workers in the factory, they do the same job every day. And so to your point of molders, a motor, right? They learn how to make good, clean miter cuts, right? When you get a wall frame or they understand what they have to do around the doors and the windows to ensure that that's quality product.

[00:05:49] Wade Lyall: And they do it repetitive day in and day out. And it ends up being a good quality product. Yeah.

[00:05:54] Eric Goranson: Well, that's the one thing in a regular job site, right? The one person's done and they're out. Well, if the framers not doing their [00:06:00] job and you're building the drywall guys coming over, going Mikey. Get it straight.

[00:06:04] Eric Goranson: You're making one job harder. That's exactly right. Those two trades don't talk on the

[00:06:07] Wade Lyall: job site usually. That's correct. And And we talk every day. So we absolutely, we go through a thorough quality inspection process. It is regulated by the government, by the head code. Sure. And so we have a third party doing quality inspections, but when we go from line roll to to line roll from station to station, we have a buy off process.

[00:06:23] Wade Lyall: Yeah. So when one department finishes and moves to another. They get inspected before it's accepted. And so it ensures that we're constantly working out the deep, the bugs and the defects. Correct. And that's

[00:06:32] Eric Goranson: the one thing about building code in the U S building code is for health, safety, and welfare. You can build it absolutely horribly built house out there that there's not a wall that's straight.

[00:06:42] Eric Goranson: There's not a wall. That's plum. There's nothing going on, right. But a past the building inspector. You guys have a whole level of actual quality that you're going through and making sure and I've been to the factory. See what goes on. It is amazing to watch that. It's like a symphony and they're going on as far as just everybody working [00:07:00] together and all of a sudden there's like, wow, there goes that wall panel, but it's it's studs.

[00:07:04] Eric Goranson: It's sheet rock. It's it's all the stuff that you want to see in your home, but just build

[00:07:08] Wade Lyall: better. Well, when you think about the bones of a house. It's the floors, it's the walls, it's the roof really end up determining whether you have a good quality product in all of those processes in our factories are in a permanent fixture, a jig that's made perfectly square, right?

[00:07:23] Wade Lyall: So, when we install this, it's laid flat. It's easy for our people to work to work and fasten the fasteners into the studs. So we know we have a perfectly square product when it goes from 1 station to the next versus on site. You may be on a ladder trying to get something square level, right? All of those bones of our products are always in a jig.

[00:07:41] Eric Goranson: Yeah, and it's just awesome because on the job site, there's somebody later on trying to fix it. Right? That's correct Yeah, and to

[00:07:47] Mike Tweden: play on something both of you said you talked about but it passed the inspector And you commented about station to station, but we also have a third party inspection company that checks every single house and they can walk in any house at any [00:08:00] time, anywhere in the production line to assure that we're meeting those code

[00:08:03] Eric Goranson: requirements.

[00:08:04] Eric Goranson: Absolutely. And you know, think about worker safety, right? That's a big deal. And that's one thing that I love about your factory as well is because, you know, so many times the roofers jumping up on there and it's icy or the framers up there and it's a wet rainy day. Sort of controlled environment. So that person that's gotten on the roof, it's still 70 degrees and they're getting up on

[00:08:22] Wade Lyall: the roof.

[00:08:23] Wade Lyall: Yeah. So we, we actually have in 1 of our operating principles. It's, it's, we, we want our employees to go home in better condition than they came in. Right? So we really focus on safety and into the thing about somebody falling. We have fall protection inspections, right? We are constantly training and working on what was the near miss we had that week or that day.

[00:08:41] Wade Lyall: Okay. And how do we prevent it from happening? And since it is very repetitive process, we can put in the safety precautions and we really focus on that for our people.

[00:08:49] Eric Goranson: Yeah, it's great. And, you know, again, there's not a job site out there that I see that has safety people walking around and you have a few of them in the building.

[00:08:56] Eric Goranson: It's not like there's one person floating around. I, when I was walking through, [00:09:00] I'm like, wow, there's a bunch of safety people around here. And that's super cool to see because. That means that person showing up to work the next day and they're not having to lose time. You're not paying for that.

[00:09:09] Eric Goranson: Everybody wins because five o'clock when they go home, it's a good day for them. That's

[00:09:13] Wade Lyall: a fact. And we do, we work with OSHA, right? And since we do have the 47 factors, if we identify a potential safety concern from one, we share it to the others immediately. We go do an internal inspection to make sure we check that off and get it

[00:09:25] Eric Goranson: fixed.

[00:09:25] Eric Goranson: That's great. Let's go back to affordable housing because this again is such a like you said it's a crisis across the country and there's such a misconception with state federal even local governments On zoning and they could fix this relatively easy and quickly if they just identified some of these issues, because building codes are zoning in areas where does that were designed for grandma's 1976 single wide that it's been decades since that was built.

[00:09:57] Eric Goranson: Right? Yeah.

[00:09:58] Wade Lyall: So that's the biggest issue. It [00:10:00] is literally the image, right? It's the vision that these officials have in their head. And hence the reason we try to get out to them and demonstrate products to them constantly. We focus heavily on innovation and really trying to make attractive products.

[00:10:13] Wade Lyall: Right. It is one of the things with our Genesis brand, which is part of the champion family, really targeting these builder developers that have some trades and skills on site, but they're not. That when we get the house to the site and it's 90 percent complete, they can put some extra amenities on it.

[00:10:26] Wade Lyall: And, and it looks like the house next door. Right. So we're just taking the core of the house, manufacturing it in a very efficient quality environment. Yeah. Most cost effective way to build. Bring it to the job site and then let's make it fit the environment. Yeah. And why would, why would officials not want that in their area?

[00:10:44] Wade Lyall: And it's a healthier home. A hundred percent healthy, a hundred percent green. Yeah. Yeah. Well, great,

[00:10:49] Eric Goranson: great example. I mean, everybody out there in our audience is driven by a job site. They see the, you know, neighbor's house going up down the street and every four days they see the dumpster getting picked up and hauled off half full of wood, [00:11:00] building materials, whatever, you know, all that waste that goes out of there.

[00:11:04] Eric Goranson: And that's, what's so efficient about the way you guys build, because you get materials in the right length and it's so optimized that I'm like, you would think that as much as each one of your factories, you'd have a row of dumpsters lined up outside. That's not the case.

[00:11:18] Mike Tweden: Well, you said you toured the factory.

[00:11:20] Mike Tweden: You saw if you, if you walked around, you see a few trash cans here and there for sawdust and a little bit of debris, but an average house can't produce more than a couple of trash cans of.

[00:11:30] Yeah,

[00:11:30] Eric Goranson: where you have probably four dumpsters for the same one being built. Right. And

[00:11:34] Mike Tweden: that goes back to your, to the point of people are doing the job that they're trained to do.

[00:11:39] Mike Tweden: Materials are coming in cut to length. And so you really have a very efficient process going, going through the

[00:11:44] Eric Goranson: building. Which is great for the environment, but it's also great for the person that's buying it. Because if you're going out and buying this house, for instance, you're not paying for all that material that one you paid for to get brought in.

[00:11:55] Eric Goranson: Yeah. And then two, you paid for to haul off and get rid of,

[00:11:58] Wade Lyall: so you've paid for it twice. [00:12:00] Yeah. So we even down to the design, right? So when we design a home, we look at how many cuts we're going to have to make on a piece of sheetrock. And if we do one cut, can we take that piece and use it somewhere else?

[00:12:10] Wade Lyall: Right. So we actually design all of the walls, interior and exterior thinking about maximizing the material use and eliminating all the waste. And then we can go work kind of going back to the size and scale when we have these vendors and we're producing 27, 000 homes a year. They'll actually design products for us to fit the sizes we want and it eliminates

[00:12:29] Eric Goranson: waste.

[00:12:30] Eric Goranson: Yeah. And I mean, we're talking two by six wall construction. You have all the normal stuff that you see today. The one thing I want to talk about is the beauty, right? Right. That's the part that it's hard to talk about on the radio, but as an interior designer of 30 years, I walk in and go cool beams, exposed painted cabinets.

[00:12:47] Eric Goranson: composite countertops. I mean, let's, let's start getting into it. You know,

[00:12:52] Wade Lyall: it's sexy. It's absolutely gorgeous, right? I mean, the materials we're using in our products is no different than any other home built, right? [00:13:00] To your point, two by fours, two by sixes, wood cabinet doors painted, right? We have, we have, if we, if we use molding dependent on the market, some may, may not may do finish drywall to the ceiling, et cetera.

[00:13:10] Wade Lyall: We absolutely focus on what's trending, right? We have, we have our own design department nationally. They come to these shows while we're here presenting our product. They're looking at what's trending inside the hall in there and we'll come back and we'll continue to update and refresh. And based on the volume we run at.

[00:13:27] Wade Lyall: We can, we can switch on a dime, right? If blacks in we're going to black, right? If it's gold, we're going to gold. So we stay very focused on that and making sure that, that it's very appealing to the people that are shopping. Yeah. And,

[00:13:38] Eric Goranson: and an affordable price point too. I mean, I'm sitting here looking at stainless steel appliances.

[00:13:43] Eric Goranson: You got a beautiful smeg fridge sitting over there. That thing's pretty cool, you know? And it's just. You know, built in microwaves. It's just all the right stuff for somebody. And again, let's get back to affordability. You go get this and you go build this house someplace else. It's easy. Twice as much more.

[00:13:59] Wade Lyall: [00:14:00] It is. And even more importantly, the speed at what we can build it. So if you're a builder, right? And we talked about these small spec home builders, Yeah. We, we, we want to partner with them. We want to help them be more efficient and deliver a better quality product for that end consumer. Looking for that affordable house, the speed at what we can do this while we're building this in a factory.

[00:14:18] Wade Lyall: And depending on the factory, it's going to be five to seven working days. It's literally online and offline during that time. The builder can be getting the site prepped and ready. And within two weeks, we can have the house set, assembled, finished, and you're talking about a 30 to 45 day realistic cycle time.

[00:14:35] Wade Lyall: That's utilizing your capital very wisely and it saves the end consumer a tremendous amount of money.

[00:14:40] Eric Goranson: Well, and it's going into a community that looks like any other community out there because I've seen you guys build stuff where the home shows up and you're putting a garage on the front of it. And then it just looks like every other little suburbia place.

[00:14:51] Eric Goranson: Nobody has any idea what that house is,

[00:14:54] Mike Tweden: or to your point, you talked about in the city and where there's such a demand for housing. Look at all the empty lots [00:15:00] sitting around that the city county municipality owns and give us the opportunity to go and put a house in there. It fits the surrounding environment.

[00:15:08] Mike Tweden: And the city goes from a costing lot to a satisfied homeowner. Some of the housing situations resolved and they have a property tax generating piece of property. And that person is spending money in their community. So that sales tax has gone through. So there's a home buyer that wins the city and municipality wins yet.

[00:15:26] Mike Tweden: We struggle to get them to buy in that it's a acceptable style of housing.

[00:15:31] Eric Goranson: Yeah, that's the part. And, and, and coming from Oregon, that's one of the biggest problems we have out there. It's just, and you guys know, it's one of those problems that, that plenty of states have is that there are people that just have not changed how they think about this stuff.

[00:15:45] Eric Goranson: And there's so many easy options for affordable housing out here. This is one that's been made for generations. And there's still some places that just haven't, haven't updated things. They're still thinking it's 1977,

[00:15:58] Wade Lyall: right? And it's not, and [00:16:00] even the new communities we're doing today, right? We're, we're developed developing them for the lifestyle of the person that's going to live there.

[00:16:06] Wade Lyall: If you know, if you're a person that's getting into retirement age, you need certain amenities in a community. So the communities are being developed for that lifestyle. We're designing the product that fits that lifestyle. Most people that are getting to retirement age are looking to downsize a little bit.

[00:16:19] Wade Lyall: You know, our sweet spot, 1600 to 1800 square feet, three bedroom, two bath. And it's perfect for that type of buyer.

[00:16:25] Eric Goranson: It is. And if I was a developer out there, this is the easy button. I mean, you go in and get your job, your, your site prep for a small community. Maybe it's a few acres, someplace that hasn't been developed, or it was, you know, a little type, it was a little old house that was on there and it was a former farm down the road and it's been sitting there just abandoned and not used, come in there, put your utilities, your, your, your street down the middle of it and drop in six homes.

[00:16:50] Eric Goranson: And in a few months you're out of there.

[00:16:51] Wade Lyall: Very quickly, right?

[00:16:53] Eric Goranson: 30, 60 days. That's what I mean. Yeah. You can spend more time getting the landscaping knocked out than anything else. And that's the crazy part. I [00:17:00] mean, the house

[00:17:00] Mike Tweden: shows up 80 percent complete. So you piece together, you finish out. I mean, the house you're sitting in right now was not here week

[00:17:07] Eric Goranson: ago.

[00:17:07] Eric Goranson: Exactly. And you guys came in, like it was any other project came in here, knocked it out. I mean, we're in the middle of a parking lot here and you got a house.

[00:17:15] Wade Lyall: Very true. In seven days.

[00:17:17] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Yeah. And you could tell people to walk in this door, go, Oh, where's the split in this house? Nobody

[00:17:21] Wade Lyall: has any idea. No.

[00:17:23] Wade Lyall: And that's all part of the design, right? We've got to make a more pill and we've got to make sure that we utilize it. And look, it's even saving us money on site. By, by figuring out better ways to make the transitions.

[00:17:33] Eric Goranson: Well, I noticed one thing in your construction, at least up at the skyline plant by my house about how you guys use those main beams down the middle.

[00:17:41] Eric Goranson: That is a strong house.

[00:17:42] Wade Lyall: Well, it kind of goes back to what I said about the bones of the house being the most important, right? So when you put a ridge beam across that, that center section, it just makes that house as strong as a sidewall. Right. And so that is, it is for the quality. Right. To make sure we get the house to the site, we get it set and it minimizes cracks and it's perfect.

[00:17:59] Eric Goranson: Yeah. [00:18:00] And then, but I noticed too, that you guys do such a great job of hiding things like in doorways and things like that, that you just don't know where, where things are. This looks like a normal walkway. Absolutely. And that's great. Yeah. So let's talk about, I mean, you guys make a lot of different homes and I guess, you know, it's different in each part of the country, right?

[00:18:17] Eric Goranson: Cause you guys really regionalize things. So it looks like it fits, you know, something that's going to fit maybe in the. Pacific Northwest, where I am is not what's going to work as well in the Southeast or down in Texas or SoCal or up on the East coast. But you guys have a lot of different styles for different people in different homes.

[00:18:33] Eric Goranson: There,

[00:18:34] Mike Tweden: there are regional differences you hit, but if you take your typical site built bill or they take a piece of dirt and they scrape it and cookie cut the lots and they come in with four or five models. A large portion of our businesses to the individual homeowner that wants a certain look or landowner that they want a certain look a certain lay on the property.

[00:18:53] Mike Tweden: So we end up with a lot of different designs to be able to meet lot size needs demands. [00:19:00] And then you go in, we have city infill where the whole design changes the look there because you're fitting lot width and setbacks. And then to your point, geographically, there's desirable differences. Wood cabinets versus painted cabinets, ceiling heights, materials in the houses, exterior components.

[00:19:16] Mike Tweden: It's, it really is a unique situation and you can see it change as you work coast to coast.

[00:19:22] Eric Goranson: Yeah, absolutely. Let's talk a little bit to that person out there that has that piece of land that they're like, all right, I bought this 10 years ago. We're going to build a house on one day. But they've been pricing out the housing prices and like, I don't have 500 grand to go drop into onto my 200, 000 piece of property that I bought 10 years ago.

[00:19:40] Eric Goranson: Yeah, I

[00:19:41] Wade Lyall: would actually tell you that these are the, the customers that I think we can really, really perform to exactly because the assembly of whether it's in a subdivision or a scattered lot is the same for us. Right? Yeah. 90 percent is built in the factory. It ships to a site. So we're actually more cost.

[00:19:57] Wade Lyall: Advantaged when you get to a scattered lot. So [00:20:00] picture a site builder having to drive 30 miles out of town versus having a subdivision going site to site. So we get 90 percent of it finished, right? We send our crews out to do the onsite finishes, have the foundation done, but that process is so quick.

[00:20:12] Wade Lyall: They're not having to drive for months on end to try to get completion. It's one truck in, it's a truck out and we're finished.

[00:20:18] Eric Goranson: Cause those things get so expensive when that. Contractor has to commute that 30 miles to get out of town, right? That's correct. They sit there and go, okay, well, that's, that's an hour lost each day, but I got to pay my guy an hour.

[00:20:28] Eric Goranson: That's correct. So now all of a sudden you got 10 or 15 percent easily just on that. But then all the vendors, the lumber company goes, ah, well, I got to charge her for that delivery out there. That's not my free delivery. That's 300 bucks to send the truck out there times. How many loads? Right. That's right.

[00:20:45] Wade Lyall: Yeah. It's, it's big. So, you know, to that point, when you think Our materials come to the factory, right? And most of our factories are in locations. We have easy access to get in and out with the big supplies of trucks and whatnot. And then we're selling that and then we just have one delivery to the site.

[00:20:59] Wade Lyall: So it makes [00:21:00]

[00:21:00] Eric Goranson: it simple. Yeah. And, and cost effective for everybody and they get a better house. We

[00:21:04] Wade Lyall: definitely believe so. Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:21:07] Eric Goranson: Let's talk energy efficiency. Cause that's a big thing too. These days. I mean, nobody's utility rates are going down right now. Not happen. I don't care where you're at. I'm not seeing that happening.

[00:21:15] Eric Goranson: You guys are building a really efficient green home. So

[00:21:20] Wade Lyall: energy is a major priority for us. The good thing about our production process, manufacturing process, you know, my kid on it with the inspections and the national code that we built to. We're regulated even tighter than a traditional site builder, right?

[00:21:33] Wade Lyall: With your inspection process. So, so being green using materials that that are very focused around energy efficiency and when you think about the envelope that we build and the way we, we do it with precision. The, the air leakage, you know, it's, it's covered through our real rigid construction process.

[00:21:50] Wade Lyall: You know, two by six walls to get the heavy installation, but being to the national code, you know, energy star is regulated, right? And you go to the energy star and it's [00:22:00] inspected inside the factory during the process. Right. And so we focus on the energy codes. We've got a new energy code coming up here.

[00:22:06] Wade Lyall: We're going to be complying to in a couple of years. Then we're already working on those techniques today. We're already starting to present some of that stuff to the product. So. We're very focused on energy efficient because it is a cost of living, right? No question. And if we're going to be the affordable housing solution, then we've got to make sure that it's affordable through the lifestyle of the

[00:22:21] Eric Goranson: home.

[00:22:22] Eric Goranson: You know, you look at an entry level house, the drywall goes in there, there, you know, there's so many holes in the ceilings. They've got all these things are coming around. It's so cool watching you guys lift that drywalled ceiling over and place it on a house. And you've got this pre finished ceiling, basically flying on over the top.

[00:22:41] Eric Goranson: And you don't have to worry about all the things that got missed that you would typically see in a side build home and that makes for a tighter house.

[00:22:50] Wade Lyall: Oh, 100%. And it's kind of back to the point. You know, I'd love to watch our ceiling process because our sheet rocks laid flat in a jig. When we put the trusses in [00:23:00] their square, we've got, you know, points on our system that ensures that we get them to the right dimension.

[00:23:05] Wade Lyall: Right? Yeah. And then, you know, we're typically using a phone process for the application. So it does eliminate screws and some other drywall things that you could have. And so we know when we pick that proof up, it's 100 percent square, 100 percent plum. We're putting it on 100 percent square and plum.

[00:23:20] Wade Lyall: Floor system with walls already on it. And because of the way we do the process and having the catwalks, we can do it from a safety perspective, but it's all waist high. It's easy for our, our, our employees to work on. Well, that's the

[00:23:31] Eric Goranson: cool thing. I love seeing you guys use adhesives. Cause it's one of my pet peeves.

[00:23:34] Eric Goranson: I've been talking to a bunch of firefighters we've had on the show in the past, and they're saying with the new lightweight drywalls we have, you've got to put twice as many screws in and they want you to be using glue because what happens is, is I've seen them, they've done fire testing and they're like, all of a sudden You know, like UL listing guys were doing this testing.

[00:23:51] Eric Goranson: They're like, wow, why it's seven minutes was a ceiling falling in where last year, you know, two years ago, it lasted twice as long and they went, oh, lightweight drywalls to put more air in [00:24:00] the drywall. Then you have a fire, right? Yeah. So that adhesive is something we should be doing on every home, but you guys have been doing it for a long time.

[00:24:07] Eric Goranson: Yeah,

[00:24:08] Wade Lyall: we, we do it started out because it was, it was very efficient and very functional, right? Yeah. And it did the, the application made it really seamless. And it is a better product. And so it just makes sense to keep using that. And we, we use it from wall or ceilings going down to the walls and just continuing to try to

[00:24:23] Eric Goranson: improve that.

[00:24:24] Eric Goranson: Yeah. It makes it a lot easier. And like you said, there's no more pops cause there's not a mechanical fastener in there. That's not doing that great a job of holding anyway. That's correct. That's why you have so many screws and a piece of drywall just to hold it up there. That's right. That makes sense.

[00:24:36] Eric Goranson: So style wise, I mean, we're seeing a lot of cool styles these days and I know that's regional, but I know. How many people, what do you guys do on the interior design process? We talked about a little bit earlier, but it seems that you guys are just on point on the trends. It, do you have a regional group that does this or is it one big group that just kind of keeps, because as you know, interior design is so different in the, on the West coast, the East coast, North versus [00:25:00] South.

[00:25:00] Eric Goranson: It's so different, but every time I see, or I'm in a different area, it seems like you guys have got. You know, that market covered on the style trend, we

[00:25:08] Mike Tweden: actually have a small design team, but they cover the country and they come to events like this. They stay engaged in seminars, conferences, shows to, to stay on front of the trend and, and they know their geographic differences.

[00:25:21] Mike Tweden: So they go out and they walk, see what's going on in, in the industry. Type of area that the housing market, so they can bring those into into the houses we're producing. No, but it is a small team, but we do have a design studio where we have a lot of the different materials to test and pair up together.

[00:25:39] Mike Tweden: And so we try and take a lot of that, the guesswork out of the equation for

[00:25:43] Eric Goranson: people. Nice. Let's talk about the, the brands under your umbrella. Cause you guys have a lot of different people out there, right? Yes. Yes. You know, I mean, we have a brand in my, in my area, you guys have, you know, I mean, there's, you guys have a lot of hands in a lot of places.

[00:25:58] Eric Goranson: Yeah.

[00:25:58] Wade Lyall: So, so champion [00:26:00] in general, you know, grew through a lot of different acquisitions looking for manufacturers that have the same principles that we have in geographies where we needed distribution. And so, so we did kind of grow through some acquisition. But, but there, we have many brands like our skyline brand that you're familiar with, uh, in Oregon, right?

[00:26:16] Wade Lyall: Skyline's got one of the best reputations in the industry for quality and taking care of homeowners. And so they were a good fit. So we, we focus on skyline, obviously champion being the parent brand, you know, champion has been around for 60 plus years, so, you know, we've got a, a lot of legacy to hold there.

[00:26:30] Wade Lyall: You know, our, our Genesis brands, one we're really proud of, which, which really, I think I'd mentioned it earlier, kind of focused toward these builder developers that are maybe struggling. With with trades today, and so we really want to try to develop products in a process. To help them expedite their build process with the better quality product and ultimately getting the most affordable price to the end consumer.

[00:26:53] Wade Lyall: And so, so Genesis is designed around. Helping a builder developer, identify the opportunity in the land [00:27:00] they have, and then work with us on the designs and Mike touched a little bit about how we work on the designs regionally and whatnot. To fit that property. The best part is once we get the builder's property identified, we work on the design as they're working on the job site.

[00:27:15] Wade Lyall: We're working on the production and the engineering and what needs to happen. And when they're finished, we're coming together to have that little seamless process, expediting speed, which is very important because it drives out costs and that's all a benefit to the end consumer.

[00:27:28] Eric Goranson: Absolutely. Cause you're just not paying.

[00:27:29] Eric Goranson: I mean, think about that. And that's one of the biggest things I think, again, with building today, that's one of our biggest challenges outside of the zoning and other issues is, you know, the trade skills gap we have out there. You know, you guys have that ability though, which is cool to take somebody in under your wing as a new hire employee and work them through the system.

[00:27:48] Eric Goranson: So now all of a sudden they didn't know anything about construction. They wanted to be in construction, but now you've worked through them that you can hold their hand through the process, train them and get them there. While, you know, why didn't the roofer [00:28:00] show up yesterday? Well, truck broke down. You know what I mean?

[00:28:02] Eric Goranson: That kind of stuff. And And consumer pays for that. Cause that's just another day. That house is sitting there with

[00:28:08] Wade Lyall: nothing happening. Yeah. Very inefficient, you know, Eric, not that we don't have our challenges, you know, of course, but to your point, it is easier for us in our belief to bring someone into a factory environment and say, okay, look, we're going to start you out in this job function.

[00:28:23] Wade Lyall: Get you comfortable with the way we operate, get them comfortable with our culture, help train and lead them through learning a skill and what we've identified, you know, for doing this for many years is. A lot of these people come in and they get really good at a skill and they want to grow. Right? I mean, we're, we're constantly wanting people to grow and develop and take on leadership roles.

[00:28:42] Wade Lyall: And when you've got 200 people in a factory, you know, we need many leaders. Right? Yeah. So we like to grow them internally and we'll go from department to department, let them learn different skills and figure out what they're best at. And then we put them over a group of 10 or 12 people and they just organically grow as leaders.

[00:28:57] Wade Lyall: And. We've got individuals that are running [00:29:00] multimillion dollar factories that started out framing a wall in a factory. Yeah. Right. So there's a great career opportunities for these individuals. Well,

[00:29:07] Eric Goranson: and, and then if you want to get into the trades, do you want to be working outside in the rain and the snow and the wind and the heat or whatever?

[00:29:13] Eric Goranson: Or do you want to be inside where you're in a controlled environment where you're coming in, clocking in, clocking out, doing the same work, but it is still healthier, safer, and easier environment to

[00:29:22] Mike Tweden: work in. Well, you hit it. It's consistent. And so they. They know they're going to be working the paychecks going to be there exactly livelihoods there and you aren't you aren't a victim of the weather or how far away the next project is.

[00:29:37] Mike Tweden: I mean, fuel cost for somebody to drive from job site to job site is a labor and they come to the same place each day. It's really become a becomes a family form because they've worked around these people for years and they help each other and encourage each other and. And, and that, that shows in the quality of work

[00:29:54] Eric Goranson: they do.

[00:29:54] Eric Goranson: No question. No question. And I think that's just one of those things. I'm sure that's one of your biggest battles too, out there is [00:30:00] just getting quality people in the door, because that's been one of the biggest challenges is just trying to track down people for the trades, but you have that unique opportunity for somebody that's, you know, maybe getting out of college right now or thinking about going to college and they're not sure, Hey, go swing a hammer for a little bit, even though you guys aren't walking around with hammers in there anymore, you know, there's a lot of great equipment out there.

[00:30:19] Wade Lyall: Yeah, I mean, my kid on it earlier, it's, it's a smarter way to build, right? That's what we really focus on is how can we make the job easier, better quality, better, you know, for the employee doing the work. And so, you know, we're constantly looking and investing in new automated equipment that, you know, maybe somebody comes out of school and they want to be a little bit techie.

[00:30:38] Wade Lyall: They can come around 1 of the machines for us. Right? It's still a production job. But yet you're not swinging a hammer to your point, right? So, so we're constantly trying to figure out the smarter way to build, which at the end of the day is going to drive out the cost and be a more affordable solution for the

[00:30:54] Eric Goranson: end consumer.

[00:30:54] Eric Goranson: Yeah. I got up on the catwalk at the skyline plant was up there when they were getting ready to do the roofing and stuff up there. I'm [00:31:00] like. Man, this is the easy button for getting up on the place because you had full access to it. You're just walking right along the edge of the roof, right? That's the safest environment I've ever seen for a roof.

[00:31:08] Eric Goranson: Cause it's usually not easy up there, you know, and you're inside, you've got a catwalk. It's well lit, you know, everything is kind of dialed in and that makes for just a better project because you're not struggling with the ladder moving around. It's just not that stuff that you typically see. And you don't have to worry about carrying that roofing up there, like off the ladder and getting it dropped up there.

[00:31:29] Eric Goranson: So, yeah, I mean, we always

[00:31:31] Wade Lyall: have all your stuff. What's the, what's the easiest, smoothest, safest way to get the material to the workstation? Yeah. Right. Less steps for the employee, right? It benefits everybody involved right down to the end buyer, to your point of not having to pay extra labor. Right. So we try to, we try to make the entire process from buying the materials.

[00:31:48] Wade Lyall: To handling the materials to getting them to the workstation to where the people that are actually doing the work, you're just grabbing and placing and fastening. Right? Yeah. And so be a very efficient. So

[00:31:57] Eric Goranson: let's talk now about I want to ask you guys about the process. [00:32:00] So if you if there's a developer out there, a builder out there, that's like, man, I got.

[00:32:04] Eric Goranson: Six or eight homes or, or I got a bunch of infill lots. Let's say, what's the process for them to start going down this road? Well,

[00:32:11] Mike Tweden: we start by identifying size of the home that'll fit on the lot, what their wants and needs are, where the price point needs to be. And then we work with, with an appropriate factory to come up with a A few different floor plan designs for them to choose from work with, we start working through the amenities they want in the home and and then we, you know, we have to help them with some cases.

[00:32:34] Mike Tweden: We help them with set up crews, things of that sort financing. But lots of times they have those, those trades in place. And so it's really working with the build. Where is the handoff to the set to a certificate of occupancy?

[00:32:50] Eric Goranson: That goes pretty quick then at that point. It really

[00:32:52] Mike Tweden: does. If you, if it's ready, Wade may have hit on it earlier.

[00:32:56] Mike Tweden: I think you said five to seven days on average to a factory and [00:33:00] give it a couple more weeks for a set on site to pull the house, finish it out, connect utilities, landscaping inspections and things of that sort. You really could conceivably be turned in a 30 day, 30 to Wow's day window. Yeah. And if you think about the time value of money to somebody with how.

[00:33:18] Mike Tweden: Construction loan costs are these days and everything else. It, it, it adds up fast.

[00:33:23] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Cause you're seeing, you know, six, eight months for a lot of times for these typical stick bolt homes or the time they get going out there. Cause for the time they start going and it just, there's days that nobody's nothing's happening out there.

[00:33:34] Eric Goranson: There's all those different delays that happened throughout the process. So that's a whole different project through that. Let's talk a little bit about here to the, that homeowner now that, that That's that's okay. I got that piece of land and I want to, I want to do some, or they're like, Hey, I'm going to be, this is my retirement place.

[00:33:50] Eric Goranson: I got that place out by the lake. I got to do something with that. I'm not going to move into that place, but I want to put a place up there by the lake. You guys are perfect for that as well. What's the [00:34:00] process for that more retail consumer?

[00:34:02] Wade Lyall: So the first process would be to go to championhomes. com, genesishomes.

[00:34:05] Wade Lyall: com, skylinehomes. com to go to one of our websites, you know, look at the, look at the designs and the, and the models we have and get some concept of what you like. And then based on where you're at, we can link you directly to one of our distributors because we do serve nationally, right? So you would have a selection of a couple of different builder partners, retailers to be able to talk to.

[00:34:26] Wade Lyall: And then we would get them connected to the retailer and talk through their process because every job site is different, right? And in our local distributor and build our partners, we'll go out to the job site and determine, okay, here's what we're going to have to do to get your foundation or driveway or whatever.

[00:34:39] Wade Lyall: So, so we have those partners, we have over 2000 distributors that distribute and build our products. So we would, uh, get them connected with them and then pick one of the designs and we've got many hundreds of designs to choose from. So we can just about. Just about have a design for any property that they have and then then we go through that build process.

[00:34:58] Wade Lyall: Right? So they would, they would [00:35:00] work with that retailer that distributor to make the home order. We would build it at the factory and then we would ship it and have it assembled and go right through that 30 to 60 day process. Mike was talking about. And

[00:35:10] Eric Goranson: boy, they got to get after site prep because you guys are building that house and it's coming out quick.

[00:35:13] Wade Lyall: Yeah. And we do, we do work with those builders on their schedule, right? Sure. So if they think it's going to take them three months to get the job site ready because of their backlog or certain things that have to go on, then we get the house scheduled to be ready for when their site's ready. Yeah. Um, so we won't start production until they're like, go, we're going to need this house in 30 days.

[00:35:29] Wade Lyall: Whatever.

[00:35:29] Eric Goranson: Especially. Yeah. Cause if you guys are kicking that thing into the production line. Yeah. It's coming up the other end pretty quick. Yeah, absolutely. Like end of the week. Most

[00:35:36] Wade Lyall: weeks. Most weeks. But you know

[00:35:38] Eric Goranson: what I mean? It's fast. It's fast. And that's what's cool is about that. And, and, and guys, if you want to see a video and I'll put this, it's, I think it's actually up on my website that when I went through, did a nice walkthrough with skyline homes on that, you can kind of get an idea of what I'm talking about here.

[00:35:51] Eric Goranson: So head over to around the house online. com to my website. You could take a look at it there, but definitely want to hit your guys's, but really shows kind of what happens in the [00:36:00] facility. To be able to see that because this is something until you see it, you go, Oh my gosh, this is how we should be building houses

[00:36:07] Wade Lyall: out there.

[00:36:08] Wade Lyall: Yeah, I would also encourage to go to Genesis homes. com. We actually have a lot of content, a lot of video content that literally shows the onsite process and what you have to do to get the foundation ready. Now, as a homeowner, That's typically not your responsibility. Your builder that you're working with is going to do it, but it gives you an idea of what that onsite process looks like.

[00:36:26] Wade Lyall: Plus we have factory videos as well. That shows what's going on in the factory while the foundation is getting ready. Then we even show right up to the, to the transportation of the unit, come into the site and do a set and finish. So it's a great educational piece to give you confidence of what you're looking at.

[00:36:40] Wade Lyall: And

[00:36:40] Eric Goranson: that's something I think as a homeowner or even as builder, whoever you should be doing that, because that way you can understand the process. It really answers a lot of those questions. If you understand. Start to finish kind of what's going on in the recipe here, right? So

[00:36:52] Wade Lyall: we spent, we put a lot of energy on that because it is nice.

[00:36:54] Wade Lyall: Look, buying a home is the largest purchase purchase an individual makes. Yeah. Right. So we want [00:37:00] to make sure we give them as clear of an education of what that process looks like. You know, answer all their questions. So when we go through this process, they're excited to get their own ready.

[00:37:08] Eric Goranson: Well, it's a big investment and with a quality build like this, you end up something that's going to last you a lifetime.

[00:37:13] Eric Goranson: Yeah. It's a lifetime home. This is not something that I'm going to go rebuild this. And you know, we used to see that like people would come in and back, let's say in the eighties, right back a whole different world to go as far as this stuff, you'd see people and they're like, ah, 15 years, I'm going to upgrade and get another one.

[00:37:30] Eric Goranson: It's not that way anymore. This is built. There's no need. You can remodel this like a regular house down the road if you wanted to. If you're like, hey, my styles have changed. My needs changed. Do you can remodel this like any other home? Yeah. And we

[00:37:41] Wade Lyall: actually put into our designs flexibility for, you know, bonus rooms, right?

[00:37:46] Wade Lyall: Yeah. So you may need an office for a period. And then if you're not working from home anymore, you can turn that into a bedroom or a craft room. And so we put flexibility in the designs that you can expand and grow as a family. Maybe the, the, it's a three bedroom [00:38:00] with a den or office, and then you need a four bedroom.

[00:38:02] Wade Lyall: You can convert that. Right. So we think about that in our designs as well. Yeah,

[00:38:06] Eric Goranson: that

[00:38:06] Mike Tweden: is great stuff. And the materials are readily available. It allows a home depot, all that type of stuff.

[00:38:12] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Yeah. Let's, I want to hit on that because there's such a misconception out there because anybody that has been around, let's say they're over 40 years old.

[00:38:20] Eric Goranson: They think about helping working at the, their uncle's house or grandma's house, even the house they were in. And this is something that was like an old manufactured home in the 80s, 70s, 60s. Those things were not typically built. You know, the, the, the doors were thinner, the plumbing was different. And you guys have name brand stuff in here.

[00:38:38] Eric Goranson: And that's, what's cool about that, that those days are long behind us. And that's, that's one of the things that I want to make sure that people understand out there in my audience out there, all you guys listening is I want to make sure that you understand that this is in my opinion, and I'm going to endorse this personally, this is a better build home than most of the other spec builders you see out there because [00:39:00] of just the quality and the health and wellness inside these homes, because they're built in such complete controlled

[00:39:07] Wade Lyall: situations.

[00:39:08] Wade Lyall: So, to the point, we, we have a 1 year warranty on the structure of the product. So if you're a home buyer and you're concerned about, you know, the, the structure and to your point, you know, the, the thickness of the walls, whatnot, and how well the house is going to perform, we, we got to the point having to warrant this for a year, we eliminated all the things that, that became issues 80, you know, back in the eighties and seventies.

[00:39:30] Wade Lyall: Right. So, so we focus on products that are durable, that are going to be a lifespan for the product. And then we're going to come out more and if there are any issues with the structure, then we can fix it. It's lumber, right? So we can fix

[00:39:41] Eric Goranson: those components. Yeah, it's just normal stuff that you see in any

[00:39:44] Mike Tweden: other home.

[00:39:44] Mike Tweden: Well, and then along that. The lines of what Wade just said is there are also the manufacturer's warranty. So the shingles come with the typical 2030 year warranty, whatever the appliances as well. So those. Supplier or manufacturer warranties come into play as well on top of our [00:40:00] one year.

[00:40:00] Eric Goranson: Yeah. And before we head out of here, I want to talk a little bit about choices inside.

[00:40:04] Eric Goranson: Cause we didn't really talk about it as far as design choices. Like, I mean, we've got this beautiful Wilson art countertop here. It looks like, yeah, this is stunning. Yeah.

[00:40:13] Wade Lyall: So we do have a variety of products of some of them should say maybe too many, but we want to make sure we give enough choices to our homeowners.

[00:40:19] Wade Lyall: So yeah, you know, Wilson out countertops, most of our factories, you're going to have five or six. Different color choices. So if you have a darker palette, you want grays and blacks. We have that. You want to go lighter with whites or tans. We have those choices. And with our design team that Mike reference, and I'll give out a shout to Tammy Davidson, the best in the industry, you know, Tammy and her team really focused on putting these pallets together.

[00:40:40] Wade Lyall: Yeah. So, when you look at this house, we've got great cabinets. We've got black countertops, dark gray backsplashes. She has two or three other pallets. If you want to go lighter or you want to get a little more rustic, you know, she has those pallets designed. We, we don't let our factories make those decisions.

[00:40:56] Wade Lyall: A lot of those guys are workers. So we do have a design team that gives us all those varieties [00:41:00] and, and down to the paint colors down to the appliances, white, black, you know, stainless steel, cabinet pools. We've got black, we've got stainless, we can go gold, depending on what your flare is.

[00:41:10] Eric Goranson: We have those choices.

[00:41:11] Eric Goranson: And your bathrooms look like they're out of an HD show at the end. I mean, you've got tile, you've got tubs, you got whatever you want on those things. Yeah. And

[00:41:20] Wade Lyall: we really focus on that to be part of the lifestyle, right? Everybody spends time in the bathroom and it should be a great experience and you should really love going in there because it's got good character.

[00:41:29] Wade Lyall: And so we focus hard on kitchens and baths and then the functionality of designs, right? Making sure that people can live and grow and expand in their life.

[00:41:36] Eric Goranson: I mean, we're sitting here on the kitchen island right now and you're four feet away from me. You're four feet away and we're sitting here having a good time and there's seating for four or five more people here if we wanted to make it and jam in.

[00:41:48] Eric Goranson: So, and that's just around the kitchen island.

[00:41:50] Wade Lyall: Yeah. But that's where people live. Right? Yeah. So we got to make sure we give them the lifestyle we're looking for. They want to live and entertain and be able to work in the kitchen and see the TV and talk to the kids in the living room. And [00:42:00] so we have those designs.

[00:42:01] Wade Lyall: We also have them. If you want to shut the kids in another week, flexibility, right? Absolutely.

[00:42:06] Eric Goranson: Yeah. All right, guys. Well, thanks for coming on today. Let's get the websites one more time for everybody. So that way people know where to go. If they're out looking around and shopping, let's, let's make sure that we can send

[00:42:16] Wade Lyall: people champion homes.

[00:42:18] Wade Lyall: com. Okay. It can lead you to all of our other sites. It's our parasite, but skyline homes. com, right? And then Genesis homes. com. And I'd really emphasize Genesis. If you're a builder developer out there looking for a better way to build, go to Genesis homes. com, reach out to us, give us a chance to talk about the process and see if we can help.

[00:42:34] Eric Goranson: Yeah, we got a lot of builder contractors out there and guys, you're making it hard. Let's make it easy. You got to

[00:42:40] Wade Lyall: check these guys out. Seriously. We may use that slogan. Thanks for coming

[00:42:43] Eric Goranson: on today, guys. I really appreciate it. And man, there's so much to be learned for people out there. Take a deep dive into this stuff.

[00:42:50] Eric Goranson: This is, I think the best affordable housing solution we have out there. And we just need to steer our, our governments around us to make sure that, that we're doing [00:43:00] the right stuff. Because. The answers are here. We just have to make the right choices

[00:43:04] Wade Lyall: to fix it. Couldn't have said it better. And Eric, we appreciate you and your belief in our products and really helping push that.

[00:43:09] Wade Lyall: So we thank you for it. Thanks

[00:43:11] Eric Goranson: guys. All right. I'm Eric G and you've been listening to Around the House.