Charlotte’s first modern modular home to be delivered this week — with 10 townhomes for sale coming soon

Modular homes can have a reputation for being cheap and flimsy. That’s one of the reasons why you don’t really see them anywhere in Charlotte.

Frederick Laury plans to change that. This week, he’ll introduce the city’s first “modern” modular home project.

Nearly the entire house is built in a factory. It will be delivered to the homesite Wednesday about 85 percent completed — with cabinetry, windows, doors, tile work and plumbing done ahead of time.

Then it will be lifted by crane onto its foundation and completed.

Laury runs an engineering firm in Charlotte that works heavily with Duke Energy. As he started looking for a new house of his own, he started wondering why nobody was creating modular projects locally.

“It’s cost-effective, it’s more sustainable, it’s more green, it’s more efficient,” he said. “I could not find one con to it. Unfortunately, in this part of the country, we just haven’t embraced it.”

Not seeing anything on the market, he launched MOD-CLT to build some himself.

MOD-CLT’s first project will be his personal home.

Laury has a lot in the Seversville neighborhood, just a few steps from Blue Blaze Brewing. It’s currently vacant.

There are plenty of homebuilders active in the area. But Laury wanted something different.

“With all the building going on in Charlotte, I just thought it was time to introduce a new way of doing things,” he said.

It was also much faster. He got the permits March 8, and will be substantially completed this week. It will be fully ready by July.

Coming soon: 10 townhomes priced in the mid-$300,000s.

Laury will be using his personal home to jumpstart a full modular townhome community.

The location isn’t 100 percent finalized, but Laury said it will be within walking distance of a NoDa light rail station. Each home will be about 2,000 square feet.

Laury says interested buyers will be able to check out his home and see what they’ll be getting. He plans to pre-sell a few of the homes, and build out the rest and sell them as they’re completed.

Should MOD-CLT’s first community be successful, Laury has his eyes on more modular homes around Uptown.