Find mobile home's VIN to get best insurance rates

Owners of mobile homes looking for insurance to cover their home need a vital piece of information they might normally associate with a car, and that’s the vehicle identification number (VIN).

The VIN reveals information about your mobile home, making it more than a simple registration number. The manufacturer’s ID starts off the VIN and is usually three letters, Kin Insurance said in a website blog. The state where it was built are the next two letters, followed by the serial number from the manufacturer. That A or B following the serial number signifies whether it is double-wide or triple-wide.

The VIN needs to match what was listed on the ownership title. With a mobile home that has more than one section you might have a VIN and title for each section.

Now that you know what it is, how do you find your VIN? It’s likely that it will be either on the data plate inside the home, or it has been stamped on the steel frame of each section of the home.

So what is a data plate, and where is it found? The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) requires that data plate, often found near the HVAC system, under the kitchen sink or in the master bedroom’s closet wall, the Kin blog said.

The data plate includes manufacturer’s information, serial number and model designation, and manufacturing date. Factory installed equipment should be listed in addition to certification labels.

But the VIN could be on the home’s exterior. With a skirt around it, finding the steel chassis gets tough. The letters and numbers will be at least three-eighths of an inch tall. A steel beam that runs parallel with the front of the mobile home might be the VIN location, the Kin blog said. The triangular tongue beam used for transporting your trailer was attached to this beam. If you haven’t put up skirting yet, find your VIN first.