Retrofit Services and Foundation Repairs

OnTheLevel offers retrofit services and consulting to homeowners, lenders and insurance companies for one or more of the following reasons:

1. To meet conditions of the lender or underwriter in a loan or sales transaction for a Cal-Vet, VA, or FHA-insured loan (often required after a determination by an engineer).
2. To meet the requirements of an insurance underwriter for an earthquake policy.
3. To upgrade the home to meet or exceed the home's wind and seismic safety standards to give the homeowner peace of mind.

What are Foundation Repairs and Retrofits?

Foundation repairs or retrofits are generally a pre-manufactured and "beefier" support system designed to provide addition vertical and horizontal resistance in wind, snow, and seismic zones. The manufactured home's existing supports are still necessary for the load displacement and for leveling adjustability, but the retrofit is generally required to meet loan or insurance specifications for "permanent" attachment, wind resistance, snow loads or seismic resistance. The retrofit systems are generally proprietary in nature, meaning that the design and installation criteria have been pre-approved and stamped by an engineer. Having been registered as an approved plan with the state, a proprietary system has already demonstrated through testing data that it meets or exceeds certain requirements. When utilizing a proprietary Standard Plan Approval (SPA), plan check fees at the building department can usually be avoided.

The individual requirements for the different systems are better detailed in the following links.

Retrofit services fall in the following 3 categories:

• Engineered tie-down systems.
• Retrofit Foundation System (PERMANENT FOUNDATION GUIDE FOR MANUFACTURED HOMES, dated September 1996)
• Earthquake Resistant Bracing Systems (ERBS)