The short version: before any home goes live under our listing, we hire and pay for a licensed electrician to inspect its electrical system against Canadian Electrical Code and CSA electrical safety standards. No one asks us to do this — we do it because manufactured homes carry a much wider range of electrical age and condition than a typical stick-built house, and we'd rather know exactly what we're selling than get a surprise call mid-contract.
Why this matters more for manufactured homes specifically
A manufactured home built in the 1970s or 80s can still be on its original panel and wiring. One built in the 2000s might have had an owner-done addition or a DIY panel swap along the way. A buyer's own inspector is going to look closely at the electrical either way — that's normal, and expected. The question is just when that gets found: before the home is priced and marketed, or during a live deal with a financing deadline attached to it.
We'd rather it be before. So we send a licensed electrician in ahead of listing, on our own dime, every time.
This is not the same thing as a CSA compliance plate
It's worth being precise here, because the terms sound similar and get confused constantly. Your home likely has a CSA Z240 or CSA A277 compliance plate, usually near the electrical panel — that plate confirms the home was built to a recognized manufactured or modular construction standard at the factory, at the time it was built. It's a real and important document, especially for financing (see our financing guide for why lenders care about it).
But that plate can't tell anyone whether 30- or 40-year-old wiring is still in good condition today, whether a breaker panel has been safely maintained, or whether an addition was wired to code. That's a condition question, not a construction-standard question — and it's exactly what our electrician's inspection is actually checking. The two are complementary, not the same thing, and we never present one as a substitute for the other.
What the electrician actually checks
- The main electrical panel and breakers — age, condition, and whether capacity matches the home's actual load
- Grounding and bonding
- Visible wiring condition, including aluminum branch wiring where present in older homes
- Any owner-done additions, renovations, or aftermarket electrical work
- Obvious fire-risk hazards — exposed wiring, overloaded circuits, deteriorated connections
This is a visual and functional safety inspection by a licensed electrician, not a full code-compliance audit of every wall in the home — but it catches the things that actually matter to a buyer, a lender, and an insurer.
What happens with what they find
If the home comes back clean, that report becomes something we can show buyers up front — a real point of confidence in a category of home that too often gets written off sight-unseen as "an old mobile." If the electrician flags something, we talk it through with you before the home is ever listed. Sometimes that's a straightforward fix. Sometimes it's something we disclose clearly in the listing instead. Either way, you're hearing about it from us, in private, with time to make a decision — not from a buyer's inspector three weeks into a conditional offer.
Who pays: we do. It's built into what you get from listing your home with Mark Jontz & Associates — not an add-on fee to the seller, and not something we charge back out of your proceeds at closing.
This page describes our own listing practice and is general information only, not an electrical, legal, or financial guarantee for any specific home. Every home is different — talk to us directly about what this looks like for yours.