Northeastern University
loan, and it’s basically like a car loan. It’s not deductible the way a mortgage is and you pay sales tax, but not excise tax, or you pay excise tax but not real estate taxes, that sort of thing. KJ – So some of the success of the mobile home industry is based on this kind of not very economically helpful loan structure. ML – Exactly, and I think, and I’m probably speaking beyond my knowledge level, but I have a hunch that part of the decline of the industry had to do with the proliferation of loans to people who probably shouldn’t have gotten real home loans. KJ – Yeah, that’s the case. PC – I find it interesting though how this blossoming of the skirting industry is somehow a sort of formal allegory to this problem if you will. It’s quite interesting that there is actually a sort of formal trace of this as well. IR – I think that’s an interesting point; again it goes back to Karrie’s idea of this competition, that aesthetics are actually generated by the particular technological but also social and cultural conditions. PC – Yeah, it’s also, it’s important to think about, to creating that tension between what is acceptable and what is progressive. There is a certain point where that tension is healthy to create, to engage public interest, to engage public debate such as this, and there’s a certain point where it actually becomes unproductive and finding that sort of fine line is really tricky. Manufacturers only want to be pushed so far and architects only want so much push back. KJ – Well I guess the fact that the prefab movement is being driven by architects is kind of a problem. I mean architects are very smart and very creative, but they tend to be idealists and what a genuine manufactured housing industry, not one that Matthew was speaking about, but
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