Millennials have some fresh ideas about housing, and one of their desires is to have “social amenities”. In this Mobile Home Park Mastery podcast we’re going to explore the concept of “social amenities” and offer some recommendations on how to bring this concept to your community.
Episode 393: Creating "Social Amenities" Transcript
I am a baby boomer, and being a baby boomer used to have a lot of clout because we were the largest segment of the US population. Today, we're not. Millennials are a bigger bracket of age than baby boomers. And millennials, Generation Z, Generation X, all share one thing in common regarding housing. They're very much into what are called social amenities. This is Frank Rolfe with the Mobile Home Park Mastering Podcast. We're going to talk about what social amenities are and how you can add those to your mobile home park to attract and retain your customers. Now, my first exposure to social amenities, this concept, came when I toured an apartment building in Chicago that someone gave me a tour of this project, the developer, and they were very excited about it. And what you had is you had a giant building with all kinds of tiny little apartments, little micro-apartments, roughly 300 square feet. But what held the whole thing together, despite all of the apartments being bleak and dreary, was that you had this giant lobby area filled with people playing pool, ping pong, all kinds of games, sitting in sofas, playing video games with each other, just hanging out, having drinks.
And that's what made that community work, that giant apartment complex; the glue that held it all together was the fact it had so much fun stuff to do with your friends. And then later I was touring down in Las Vegas, the mobile home park that was pioneered by a guy named Tony Hsieh. He was the founder of Zappos, sold it to, I've forgotten who, for about $800 million. And he lived in a penthouse in Las Vegas, and he was very, very lonely. So he decided he would create his own property, his own special living arrangement. So he bought an old mobile home park in Las Vegas, and he called this thing Airstream Village. He got rid of all the existing homes, he cleaned the whole thing out. He imported in a bunch of Airstream trailers and tiny homes. And if you lived in Airstream Village, the concept would be you wouldn't go back to your Airstream or your tiny home except to go to sleep. When you were awake, he wanted everyone together, all hanging out. And to further this cause, he had everybody who lived in Airstream Village; they had to donate their time into one of many functions to keep that social amenity going.
Some people volunteered to be cooks, some people volunteered to be entertainers. He had a giant stage in the middle, and he would try and have a play or some kind of performance every night. And Tony loved it. So did the other residents, so it seemed to work. So again, I was like, okay, well, that's an interesting concept there. Because as a boomer, we're really not that sociable like that. We don't normally congregate together and do things. But I realized at the time, you know, this is probably a good thing to start thinking about is how you bring the concept of social amenity to the good old American mobile home park. Well, here are some concepts that you can utilize to try to introduce this to your property. The first is any amenity that brings people together. And in most mobile home parks, the most successful thing you can do if you want to bring residents together to hang out, forge bonds, network, is picnic tables and charcoal grills. It was an RV park study done years ago that found the number one activity that people look forward to with their RV in choosing an RV park to stay at was outdoor cooking.
It was far, far ahead of all other options. That was definitely the number one. And RV park customers are very similar to mobile home park customers. In fact, I don't know of any American who does not like outdoor cooking. I love eating outdoor cooking. I have no ability to do it myself. I'm not a good chef. But if I see someone cooking up hot dogs or hamburgers or steaks or anything in an open flame, definitely count me in. And your residents are no different. Adding picnic tables and charcoal grills to any mobile home park does not require a lot of space, and it's hugely successful. If you have the space and the money, you can also add a small playground for kids to play on so the adults can sit at the picnic tables eating while the kids run around and play on the playground. And again, it's a great way for people to meet each other and to socialize. Another amenity we like to send that kind of social amenity fabric into the park are called blessing boxes. These start off just as little cases, look like bookcases, that stand either on one pole or two.
They can be made out of metal. They can be made out of wood. And the community itself then decides what goes in the blessing box. They normally come in two varieties. Number one, food products. People will put cans of food, boxes of spaghetti noodles, those types of things in the blessing box because they have a surplus. And then those who need it, because they're having some kind of problem at the time, they can go down. They always know food is available in that blessing box. If someone got laid off from their job, their new job hasn't started yet. They've got kids they need to feed dinner that night. They can go down and they can get a box of spaghetti noodles and a can of spaghetti sauce and make a delicious meal. And it furthers the concept that the residents are out supporting each other. In a lot of your more senior communities, that blessing box instead becomes filled with books. People will read books, put a book in there, take a book out, repeat. It's like a private library for your mobile home park. And again, it sends a definite message, a clear signal to all residents that they support each other.
It helps build that very, very important social amenity of support. Now, another thing you can do to build that social amenity is the spring cleanup event. Now, a spring cleanup event is something that you should do typically in the spring of each year. You announce a date, always on a Saturday, and you bring in a roll-off dumpster. You have the residents come out and starting at one end of the mobile home park, just do what they can to clean it up for the season. Also, let a lot of nonprofits know; they love to participate in those. And also, you probably want to bring in at least one person who can use a hammer and a saw. I would not let the residents touch anything like that. All they're allowed to do is to pick up litter and to paint. You should supply them with eye protection, with gloves, and make sure that everyone simply is in the right spirit, which is let's try and do our best to make this the best property it can be. And you have a communal lunch. It can be barbecue, hamburgers, hot dogs, Mexican food, whatever you prefer.
And it's a great way for the residents to not only meet each other and forge bonds, but to also get in the spirit of improving the property. It's another great social amenity, which is not very expensive. Probably perhaps though the best thing you can do if you really want to build a social amenity in your mobile home park is the correct choice of a manager. Because your manager in many ways is your mayor, and they set the tone of whether your residents are happy or unhappy. Back in the olden days, and by olden days I mean the '90s, people selected managers not based on their people skills, but simply based upon their bookkeeping and accounting. Because back then we didn't have software, so the manager was responsible to record checks coming in and do other odds and ends like that that made the business function. And that seemed to be more important to owners than getting along with the tenants. Today, of course, it's not true. Today, we're all using some form of software. We use Rent Manager, and we don't need a manager who's got any great accounting bookkeeping skills. That's no longer required. Instead, what I need is somebody who gets along well with all of the residents, who has a happy attitude, a positive outlook.
I would much rather have someone with absolutely no real estate experience whatsoever, but a positive frame of mind as the manager, than someone who's sour and dour but has 30 years of multifamily or mobile home park experience. Because the manager is what helps people feel good about living in your property, and they either are the conduit that makes people want to get out of their homes and hang around and say hi to the manager and be happy in what they're doing, or those that hide from the manager or don't go to the playground because they're always afraid that the manager will come out and yell at them. I've been in properties that are managed by a manager who believes the only way to make that property work is through endless 24/7 discipline and shaming. That does not work in the modern world. That doesn't work for boomers as well as millennials, Generation Z, or Generation X. The bottom line to it is, if you want to get your mobile home park in the right position for the future, for the younger generations, you really need to look at your property and say, do I offer enough in terms of social amenities?
And if the answer is no, you might take a few of these tips to make your property a better place to live. This is Frank Rolfe with Mobile Home Park Mastery Podcast. Hope you enjoyed this. Talk to you again soon.