FIRST MODULAR HOMES OFF ASSEMBLY LINE AT SIKESTON'S HERITAGE HOMES PLANT

SIKESTON -- Two modular homes came off the Heritage American Homes assembly line last week.

"We're looking at one-a-day now," said Antonio (Tony) Jr., vice president and Chief Operating Officer of Heritage American Homes, a new company which has its Southeast Missouri factory at Sikeston.

The first home to come out of the Sikeston plant is currently on display at Montgomery Homes, 621 S. Kingshighway in Cape Girardeau. The second home off the line went to Poplar Bluff.

The first homes were three-bedroom, 28 x 70-foot structures, each with a kitchen and a 16 x 11 living room.

The homes, with slanted roofs, include 10-inch floors, 6-inch walls and 8-foot ceilings.

"The modular homes are constructed to be set on concrete foundations or over basements," said Antonio (Chip) Caruso III, zone sales manager. The utility room of the home can be utilized to install steps to the basement.

With more than 125 employees at the new Sikeston facility, Heritage expects to be producing two homes a day in the near future. The company eventually plans to be producing a dozen homes daily.

Heritage American Homes is a new company, a result of a joint venture between Dallas-based Holigan Homes and Patriot Homes Inc. of Elkhart, Ind.

The planning for the new facility at Sikeston started more than a year ago, when Harold Holigan called Sikeston Department of Economic Development Director Bill Green, to discuss space available in a vacated building at Sikeston.

The old Malik Brass Mill (MBM) building at Sikeston included 28 acres of land, with a 110,000-square-foot building, which will be expanded.

Holigan, a Puxico native, and president of Holigan Family Investments Inc., a land-development and home-building organization headquartered in Dallas, announced in February that his company would commit more than $75 million in transactions in Southeast Missouri, including the manufactured-home plant at Sikeston.

The total Holigan package included the purchase of four subdivisions -- two in Cape Girardeau and one each in Jackson and Fruitland -- a construction company and the Sikeston factory.

The homes made at Sikeston will be marketed in Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, Tennessee, Missouri, Illinois, Georgia and Michigan.

Only recently, the Heritage American Homes partnership was established with Patriot Homes.

Patriot will be the managing partner of Heritage.

Initially, Heritage will be producing homes from plants in Sikeston and McGregor, Texas.

The Sikeston plant is being expanded. The McGregor plant will be a new building with construction to start later this year."

Patriot and Holigan officials, along with Missouri state executives, were at the official groundbreaking in Sikeston last month.

The new Heritage company will produce drywall sectional HUD homes and BOCA modular homes, including ranch, Cape Cod, and two-story models, ranging in size from 1,000 to 2,000 square feet, and in price from $45,000 to $70,000.