Tie-downs loose, rusted, or missing: how to check and what it costs

Anchoring is the part of a manufactured home nobody looks at, sitting in the dirt under a home whose skirting hides it. It is also the part that matters most when monsoon outflow arrives.

The three-minute check

With a torch, from an access panel or an open corner of the skirting:

1. Is the strap tight? You should not be able to move it much by hand. A strap you can wobble is doing very little. Slack straps are the most common finding, and they come from the home settling: as the geometry changes, straps loosen.

2. Is the metal sound where it enters the ground? This is where they fail. A strap that looks perfect at the frame can be substantially corroded at the soil line, where moisture and oxygen meet. Same for the anchor head. Poke it.

3. Is there a strap near each end of the home? The federal standard wants one within about two feet of each end, and a missing end tie is a common omission on older installs.

Then count what is there and compare it with the tie-downs and anchors service, which works out roughly what a home your size should have under the federal installation standard.

Why this matters in Pinal County

Arizona sits entirely in HUD Wind Zone I, the lowest of the three federal zones, and people take that to mean anchors are optional here. They are not. The Arizona Department of Housing’s installation FAQ states that all mobile homes and all new and used manufactured homes must be anchored with an approved anchoring system. The wind that tests them is monsoon outflow: the National Weather Service warns at 60 mph, notes the strongest straight-line gusts can exceed 100 mph, and on August 19, 2026, an outflow boundary produced 55 to 65 mph gusts across the Phoenix metro.

The homes that concern us most here are the older park stock, set decades ago. Plenty of them are still on their original anchoring, many have never had it inspected, and under some of them the survey finds no anchors at all.

What goes wrong, in order

The connection to levelling

These two problems arrive together and for the same reason. A pier settles, the home moves, and as it settles the straps slacken. So a home that needs releveling frequently also has anchoring that has lost tension, and a home with slack straps is usually telling you it has moved.

Which is why the cheapest moment to deal with anchoring is during a relevel, when the crew is already underneath and the skirting is already off. Strap re-tensioning is often bundled at little or no extra cost, and replacing individual anchors while everything is open is far cheaper than a dedicated trip.

If you are running the settling self-check anyway, this is the other half of the same inspection.

What it costs

Published on the pricing page.

Licensing, which is not optional here

Arizona defines installation to include providing or repairing a home’s ground anchoring (A.R.S. 41-4001), the Department of Housing’s I-10C general installer classification specifically covers ground anchors and tie-downs, and doing that work without an installer license is unlawful under A.R.S. 41-4047. Ask for the license number in writing, verify it is current with the Arizona Department of Housing, and ask separately for the insurance certificate. The pricing page covers how to check and what else to ask.

This is one of the areas where the licence matters most in practice, because anchoring is invisible once the skirting goes back on. You will not be able to tell good work from bad by looking, which means you are relying entirely on who did it.

What to expect on the call

Photos from underneath if you can get them, roughly how many straps you counted, whether they are tight, what the metal looks like at the ground, the home’s size, and roughly when it was set. If you do not know how to get underneath, say so; part of the free level check is looking at exactly this.

Anchor checks are covered in Apache Junction, Gold Canyon, Queen Valley, San Tan Valley, Florence, and Mesa.