Mobile Home Siding Replacement in Oregon: Rules & Materials

Yes, a mobile or manufactured home can be re-sided, but in Oregon the job runs on a different rulebook from a site-built house. State rules call the work an alteration, the new siding has to keep the home in line with the code it was built to, and in a park the rental agreement and park rules have a say. Here is how each piece works around Salem.

These homes are common here. The Census Bureau’s 2020-2024 estimates count about 3,200 mobile or manufactured homes in Salem (4.5 percent of its homes) and about 9,700 across Marion County (7.4 percent), and roughly a quarter of all homes in Aumsville. What follows is general information; the permit office and Oregon’s Building Codes Division have the final word.

Mobile home, manufactured home or residential trailer?

Oregon sorts these homes by build date, and the date decides which code a re-side is held to. ORS chapter 446 calls all three “manufactured dwellings”:

Built	What Oregon law calls it	What it was built to
Before January 1, 1962	Residential trailer	No construction standard named in the definition
January 1, 1962 to June 15, 1976	Mobile home	Oregon’s mobile home law in effect at the time
From June 15, 1976	Manufactured home	The federal HUD code (24 CFR Part 3280) in effect when it was built

The data plate inside, which HUD says is kept near the electrical panel, in a kitchen cabinet or in a bedroom closet, gives the maker, serial number, date of manufacture and design wind and roof load zones; Oregon is in HUD’s standard Zone I. A HUD certification label, a small metal plate on the outside of each section, marks a home built to the federal code.

Does re-siding a manufactured home need a permit in Oregon?

The rules leave it open, so ask before any siding comes off. OAR 918-500-0580 says alterations include any change, addition, repair, replacement, refurbishing or removal of any part of the home or its equipment, which describes a re-side on its face. It exempts four kinds of work from permits, though not from the rules: small repairs with approved parts, converting a listed fuel-burning appliance as its listing allows, adjusting and maintaining equipment, and like-for-like replacement of equipment or accessories. Siding is in none of them. The statute counts building materials as “equipment” (ORS 446.003), so whether a matching patch of siding is an in-kind replacement is a fair question for the permit office; the rule does not answer it. A site-built house is different: Oregon’s residential code exempts most siding work, as Salem’s siding permit rules explain.

After a home’s first sale, the rule lets an alteration meet any one of these:

1. The code in effect when the home was built.
2. The equivalent provisions of the Oregon Residential Specialty Code.
3. For homes built before June 1976, the 1972 edition of the ANSI A119.1 mobile home standard and the 1971 National Electrical Code.
4. Substantially equivalent methods or materials the city or county accepts, where the build date is unknown or strict compliance is impractical. Engineering may be required where structural parts are altered or replaced.

Whichever applies, the work may not take the home out of compliance with 24 CFR Part 3280 or Oregon’s Manufactured Dwelling Installation Specialty Code, and where the manufactured dwelling rules are silent, a companion rule points to the residential code.

Who issues the permit, from Salem to Aumsville?

Under ORS 446.250 the state issues manufactured dwelling alteration permits unless a city or county has taken that work on, so the answer changes by town:

Where the home is	Where to ask	What the source says
Salem, including West Salem	City of Salem	Marion County’s permit table: the city administers all permits and inspections; the city’s online permit portal takes manufactured home applications
Keizer, Stayton, Turner, Aumsville	The city, with Marion County inspecting	Marion County’s table: location, foundation and alteration permits at the city, setup inspection at the county
Silverton	City of Silverton	Marion County’s table: the city administers all permits
Rural Marion County	Marion County Building Inspection	The county issues all permits outside city limits
Dallas, Monmouth, Independence	The city’s building office	Polk County handles manufactured structure permits only outside city limits and in Falls City
Rural Polk County	Polk County Building Division	Its page describes placement permits; ask how it treats an alteration

If an office says no permit is needed, get that in writing, or note the name and the date.

What the HUD code asks of the walls

Because no alteration may take a HUD-code home out of compliance with 24 CFR Part 3280, its wall rules are the yardstick for any re-side:

• Coverings and joints. Section 3280.307 calls for moisture- and weather-resistant coverings on corrosion-resistant fasteners, metal coverings that resist corrosion, joints built to keep out air and water, and a compatible sealant where different materials meet and around window and door frames.
• A water-resistive barrier. Paragraph (f), added by a 2024 rule that took effect on September 15, 2025 after one postponement, requires a barrier behind the cladding and a way to drain water that gets past it. HUD’s analysis said barriers had been common in large manufactured homes and less common in small ones, so an older home, a smaller one especially, may have none. HUD’s reason for requiring them was protection from moisture damage and less air leakage; whether an older home’s re-side must add one is a question for the permit office.
• Vinyl and polypropylene. The same rule added section 3280.309: vinyl must meet ASTM D3679 and be certified or listed and labeled to it, polypropylene must meet ASTM D7254, and vinyl goes on to the maker’s instructions and ASTM D4756.

Section 3280.504 also makes each home’s walls manage water vapor one of a few ways: a vapor barrier of 1 perm or less on the room side, a ventilated cavity, or an unventilated cavity whose outer covering and sheathing together pass at least 5 perms. Formed siding applied in sections, with unsealed joints, does not count as restricting vapor. On a home built the last way, foam board or a low-permeance wrap under new siding could take the wall below 5 perms, so ask which method the home uses before adding layers.

Keep the HUD label on the house

The certification label is an aluminum plate, roughly 2 by 4 inches, riveted or screwed to the outside of each transportable section, normally at the taillight end about a foot up from the floor and a foot in from the road side. Every board around it comes off in a re-side, and losing it is a real problem: HUD does not reissue labels. Its contractor, the Institute for Building Technology and Safety, can issue a Letter of Label Verification when it finds the home’s records, and Oregon’s Building Codes Division tells buyers of homes built on or after June 15, 1976 to check for the insignia. Photograph each label and the data plate, record the label numbers, and write into the contract that the labels stay in place, uncovered and undamaged.

HUD’s procedural rules define an alteration as work done after the manufacturer sells a home to a retailer and before the first retail sale. For work by a later owner, Oregon’s rule above is the one to follow.

What to check once the old siding is off

A tear-off shows how the home was actually built, and the federal code behind these homes has changed over the decades. Before new siding goes up, answer these:

• Is there a barrier, and is it whole? Look for wrap or felt behind the old cladding, and for tears and gaps at openings and corners.
• What will the new siding fasten to? Studs alone, or sheathing over them, decides which products fit. James Hardie’s best practice guide, for one, wants braced wood or steel studs no more than 24 inches apart, or 7/16-inch OSB or equivalent sheathing.
• Is the framing wet or soft? As on any house, look hardest at the bottoms of walls, around windows and doors, and under roof edges, and repair soft wood before anything covers it.
• Could the old siding contain asbestos? Oregon’s Department of Environmental Quality counts a mobile home as a residential building under its asbestos rules, so the pre-2004 survey rule for houses applies here too. Asbestos siding rules in Oregon covers the survey, removal and disposal.
• Is there old paint? Federal lead rules cover housing built before 1978. In Oregon the line is 20 square feet of disturbed exterior paint: at or above it, the contractor needs the Construction Contractors Board’s lead-based paint renovation (LBPR) license and has to work lead-safe. Owners working on their own home are exempt.
• Is the old siding hardboard? A 1997 Forest Products Laboratory report, written as guidance for HUD, notes that Congress had directed HUD to develop an acceptance standard for hardboard siding on manufactured housing, and that where hardboard siding has failed, irreversible thickness swell has been a common failure mode. The swelling concentrates at board edges and does not go back; see swelling hardboard or OSB siding.

Which siding can go on a manufactured home?

No rule read for this guide limits a manufactured home to one cladding, but each choice has to keep the home within the code it is held to, and each has its maker’s requirements:

• Vinyl. The current federal code requires certified vinyl, installed to ASTM D4756, on new HUD-code homes, and Oregon’s residential code asks for certified vinyl on houses. It has to hang loosely; the vinyl siding page covers fastening gaps and why panels warp.
• Polypropylene, when it meets ASTM D7254.
• Metal. The federal code expects metal coverings to resist corrosion or be protected against it, so metal siding is not out of step on its own. Swapping it for another material is a change worth clearing with the permit office.
• Fiber cement. James Hardie’s framing requirement above applies. Oregon’s rule lets the city or county ask for engineering where structural parts are altered or replaced, so if the switch means new sheathing or framing changes, settle it before ordering.
• Engineered wood or hardboard, installed to the maker’s instructions; matching a few old boards depends on finding a profile that fits.

Local zoning can add its own line. Turner’s development code requires Class A and Class B manufactured homes to have exterior materials similar to those used on site-built houses.

Re-siding a home in a manufactured home park

On a rented space, the park is a third party to the job. Oregon’s Construction Contractors Board advises reading your space rental agreement first, because some agreements require park approval for exterior work. State law sets limits on both sides:

• Rules must be written and reasonable. Under ORS 90.510 a rule binds a tenant only if it promotes tenants’ convenience, safety or welfare, protects the landlord’s property from abusive use or shares facilities fairly, is reasonably related to that purpose and reasonably applied, and is explicit enough to follow.
• What counts as deterioration. ORS 90.505 includes falling siding or skirting, and paint peeling or faded enough to threaten the siding’s life, but not aesthetic or cosmetic concerns.
• Notice and a chance to fix it. Under ORS 90.632, a landlord who wants a home removed over the condition of its exterior must give at least 60 days’ written notice (30 for a risk of imminent and serious harm) describing the problem and, where known, the repairs needed. A tenant who makes the repair in time avoids termination.
• Not because of age or original material. The same statute bars treating a home as deteriorated because of its age, size, style or original construction material.
• More time when weather blocks the work. Outside imminent-harm cases, if the fix involves exterior painting or similar work and weather prevents it for much of the 60 days, the period stretches by at least 60 more days when the tenant asks in writing. With roughly six to seven inches of rain in each of November, December and January in Salem, that clause matters.

Unless the rental agreement says otherwise, ORS 90.740 also makes the tenant responsible for installing and maintaining storm-water drains on the home’s roof, which matters to the walls below them.

Who is allowed to do the work?

• A CCB-licensed contractor. Oregon’s contractor law counts a manufactured dwelling as a residential structure, the Construction Contractors Board lists siding among work that needs a license, and its brochure on manufactured home repairs says businesses doing repairs or remodeling on these homes must be licensed. Check the CCB license search before signing.
• A BCD-licensed installer, for set-up work. OAR 918-515-0150 limits an installer’s licensed work to setting a home up, from the site and stand, supports and tie-downs to skirting, temporary steps and utility connections. Siding is not on that list, though the Building Codes Division’s one-page guide for owners says contractors who install and repair manufactured dwellings need both a CCB license and an installer license, apart from a few trades. If the job touches skirting, supports or tie-downs, it is installer work; for the siding itself, ask the permit office which licenses it expects.
• The owner. The CCB’s brochure says owners may do their own work with the permits it needs, and unpaid friends or relatives may help on the same terms.

What does re-siding a manufactured home cost?

This site has no dependable published figure for re-siding a manufactured home around Salem, and it does not print a number it cannot source. The figures it does publish, national ranges for siding repair and old-siding removal and regional replacement averages for site-built houses, are on the siding cost page with their sources and dates. What moves a manufactured home quote:

• Wall area. Measure it; a size class such as 16x80 is not a wall area. HUD measures length in the traveling mode, counting projections that hold living space but not the hitch, and says nothing about wall height. Multiply each wall’s length by its height and subtract windows and doors.
• The permit, and any engineering the office asks for.
• What the tear-off finds: no barrier, rot, an asbestos survey on a pre-2004 home, lead-safe work on a pre-1978 one.
• Trim, skirting and labels: new trim, skirting off and back on, and care around the HUD labels.

A quote worth signing answers these questions in writing:

1. Is a permit needed, from which office, who applies, and which code will the work follow?
2. How will the HUD labels and the data plate be protected?
3. Is a water-resistive barrier in the price, and what goes under the siding, given the wall’s vapor method?
4. Has the siding been tested for asbestos, and on a pre-1978 home, does the contractor hold the LBPR license?
5. What are the CCB license number and, if skirting or supports are involved, the installer’s BCD license?
6. In a park, has the park approved the work in writing?

When you are ready for a price, request a siding quote, say the home is manufactured, give the year on its data plate and mention whether it sits in a park. We will follow up about the quote.

This page is general information, not professional advice about your specific situation. Have it assessed by a qualified professional before making decisions.