A Broken Arrow woman felt called to do something about the affordable housing crisis so she stepped out of her comfort zone and launched a business building modular housing.
Amanda Thompson is new to the building industry. A year ago, she was working in nursing and says that’s where she saw the impact of the affordable housing crisis.
“I dealt with a lot of people in the elderly population, a lot of veterans, a lot of people on a fixed income who were finding it hard to pay a rent,” said Amanda.
It hit close to home when her own mother was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s and needed expensive care, then when the oldest of her eight children graduated college and couldn’t afford $1,500 a month rent.
Last year, she and her husband took the leap and launched Prime Craftsman Homes.
She says modular housing is the answer and showed FOX23 around the old John Zink Plant in Skiatook, where Prime Craftsman Homes has around 30 employees building modular housing every day, regardless of the weather.
“They can do this in no time. This group of framers right here is who does it and they’re super quick. Our homes are not only built to code they’re built even better. Our studs are closer together, sometimes double studs. We affix them to a permanent foundation. It’s hard for people in rural areas to get housing and these are built in a way that they can be driven down the road and then built together on site,” said Amanda.
She says she’s getting calls from all over the Midwest and would love to have a model home on display, but they sell as quickly as her team can build them.
Amanda has talked with leaders in Barnsdall, Fairfax, Pawhuska, the Osage Nation and her own tribe, the Cherokee Nation.
“We need housing right here in our own backyard but already we’ve had three other states reach out that see what we’re doing and it just makes sense,” said Amanda.
She says the mortgage on a 250 square foot one bed, one bath tiny home would be just $200 a month, but they can also do a 11,000 square foot two bed, two bath home with a rooftop patio.
“If someone wanted to build a 10,000 square foot house they could because this is modular housing. We can theoretically put as many boxes together as someone wants to, but we make it beautiful too,” said Amanda.
You’ll see Prime Craftsman Homes inside Eden Village, the Tulsa gated community for individuals struggling with chronic homelessness. Prime also partners with Hope Center Ministries, employing men in recovery.
Amanda says they’re already quickly outgrowing their massive space. They have pumped out around 100 homes in year one and she thinks they could be producing 1,000 homes a year, in the next couple of years.