ALTADENA, CALIF. — Jason and Colleen Warnesky are among dozens of families in Altadena, California, who have opted to rebuild with manufactured homes following the January 2025 Eaton Fire. The couple purchased a prefabricated home package designed for wildland-urban interface environments, constructed with glass, steel, and concrete materials.

The Eaton Fire struck more than three miles from the Warnesky home in January 2025. The couple told NPR they were partially motivated to choose a prefabricated home by safety concerns.

The decision followed years of close encounters with wildfires in the area. In 2009, the Station Fire roared through the Angeles National Forest, and the Warneskys could see it from the front porch of their Altadena home. Eleven years later, in 2020, the family witnessed the Bobcat Fire from the same spot as it became one of the largest fires in Los Angeles County history. Their house remained standing after both blazes.

Fifteen months after the January 2025 Eaton Fire, the Warnesky lot had been cleared of all toxins. As of April 2026, the lot was fenced in and awaiting city approval for drainage permits before construction workers could pour the foundation.

Wildland-urban interface environments are areas where real estate developments and infrastructure butt up against wildland vegetation. Homebuyers seeking to rebuild in disaster-prone regions are choosing prefabricated homes made with fire-resistant materials designed to withstand extreme weather. Many companies are designing prefabricated houses that can withstand category 5 hurricane winds of up to 250 mph, earthquakes, hail storms, massive snowfall, and fire.

Prefabricated home prices vary from below $100 per square foot to over $500 per square foot, excluding land. Some prefabricated home prices fall below traditional on-site building costs in many parts of the country. Consumer prices for manufactured homes have remained largely unchanged over the past three years.

As of 2024, nearly 21 million people in the United States live in manufactured or mobile homes, and manufactured homes accounted for more than 9% of new home starts in the U.S. that year. Three U.S.-based companies account for about 83% of the manufactured housing market share. Most manufactured home sales occur in Texas, Florida, and California, states with nearly annual flooding, hurricane, or wildfire disasters.

MDLR Brands offers manufactured kit homes and custom-designed projects built using composite structural insulated panels. The company has built single-family prefabricated homes, apartment buildings, and commercial structures in the Bahamas following Hurricane Dorian in 2019, and in California, Tennessee, and North Carolina. Bevy House, a California-based company, designed an almost 8,000-square-foot Malibu home as a partial rebuild after the home was damaged in the 2018 Woolsey Fire. The Malibu project was one of the first homes to receive occupancy after that fire. city-LAB UCLA, a center founded by the University of California, Los Angeles' Architecture and Urban Design Department, launched a local program showcasing six prefabricated housing options and providing a guide to help secure financing.