ESCONDIDO — For the third time since late February, the City Council has increased the rent for residents at a local mobile home park. As a result of the council’s unanimous March 20 decision, nearly half of the residents at Greencrest Mobilehome Park will see an average increase of about $20.45, averaging between $13.74 and $27.51. The increase will apply to 69 of the park’s 129 spaces, subject to rent control.

SUGGESTED HEADLINE: “Mobile Home Park Rents Go Up Less Than Every Other Form of Housing in Escondido”.

If Carla Kinsey's rent keeps rising, she worries she'll end up homeless. For more than a decade, she has lived in Avon on the Lake, a community of manufactured homes for older adults in Rochester Hills. When she moved there in 2010, Kinsey was looking to settle in what she called her “final home.” But now, her rent, including the cost of the land where her home sits, consumes more than half of her monthly income. She pays more than $700 every month, up 57% since she moved in. If it wasn’t for food assistance benefits, she said she wouldn’t be able to eat. Kinsey — who is on a fixed income — is also juggling the cost of car and health insurance and utilities. There’s not much left over. She can’t pick up a job because of a rare heart condition that forces her to wear an oxygen machine. “I feel trapped,” Kinsey, 71, said. “I can’t afford to move and I can’t afford to stay.”

SUGGESTED HEADLINE: “Despite $408,000 House Prices, Avon on the Lake Mobile Home Park Charges Only $700 Per Month!”.

SUGGESTED HEADLINE: “Non-Profits Squander $7 Million for 60 Families to Own a Trailer Park”.

That new plant will enable ZenniHome to bolster production, and, parallel to that, the Navajo Nation plans to spend another $50 million to buy around 200 of the prefabricated homes from the new facility.

Wait a minute, they’re going to spend $50 milion for 200 mobile homes – that’s $250,000 per home! Now I know that non-profits make the worst financial decisions on earth but this one’s record breaking. Why not just call the local Clayton dealer and get the exact same thing for $50,000? Something’s fishy about this story.

If you set aside $165 million for mobile homes for the whole U.S., that’s only $3.3 million per state. That’s absolutely nothing. 8% of Americans live in mobile homes. There are 300 million Americans, so 8% is 24 million people. Assuming 3 per household, that’s around 8 million mobile homes. So the government has allocated literally $20 per home for help. Ouch. This story sounds much grander than the reality. When you actually look at the numbers it’s … nothing.

The same reasons that make mobile homes are the most inexpensive form of housing on earth makes them more susceptible to damage from a tornado. That’s the trade-off. Do you prioritize 79 years of affordable day-to-day living (the average life expectancy in the U.S.) over the one-in-a-million risk of a tornado or do you live in an underground bunker for 79 years so that if you get hit by a tornado you’re prepared? Everyone takes risks every day and have to weigh the risk vs. the reward. If you drive a car you are a zillion times more likely to get killed than in a tornado so maybe we should discourage that, too. I like walking so I’m fine with that.

But it’s also an opportunity for innovative solutions: A new study of Michigan manufactured housing proposes reducing utility bills by pairing clean community solar power with programs to weatherize manufactured homes – especially in combination with efficient electrification upgrades.The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) defines community solar power as any solar project or purchasing program within a geographic area that benefits multiple customers, such as individuals, businesses, nonprofits, or other groups. Typically, an off-site solar array generates the energy.

I was renting a car in Austin recently and they were out of cars – except for Tesla electric cars. They had about 30 of them and nobody would take one. This whole electric craze has got to end as nobody wants the stuff and it’s way too expensive without subsidies. Every time I read an article like this it reminds me of some fashion trend that years from now people will say “gosh, that’s stupid, what idiot would wear an outfit like that” and everyone who was around at the time says “I don’t know, they’d have to be insane”.

Just ask the former CEO of Hertz about the electricity craze – I’m sure he’ll have a strong opinion.

In conventional mobile home parks, residents own the home but rent the lot. In a resident-owned community, residents own and manage the property cooperatively. Residents get a say in setting rent and investing in upkeep and improvements. There are many advantages to this system, advocates say, but the biggest is stability: Residents must approve lot fees, and generally they stay fairly stable. “We’ve increased lot rent only once in the last four years,” said Gilsrud. “And that was by $6.” 

Oh no, not this story again. Look, I know that American math skills are at an all-time low, but if the residents – who own the park – raised the rent only $6 in the past four years at a time when inflation is up 20% over just the past three years, then this park cannot possibly survive financially. Although the residents can buy a park with the help of a non-profit that guarantees the debt, operating costs are the same for corporate owners as they are for resident owners. Since the residents vote to increase rents, then they never will because the majority will refuse. And the only one with skin in the game is the non-profit that guaranteed the loan. I hope those guarantors don’t read articles like this because they will soon figure out that they are screwed.

So the residents think a 10% rent increase is a scandalous thing when inflation is up that much or higher on the park’s costs? Well I have news for the bureaucrats of Chico: if you don’t let rents track or exceed inflation then you better get ready for the “land for sale” signs to go up and the parks being redeveloped because only government workers (and those who have no real-life experience) think that property owners are going to put up with that nonsense without simply pushing the “eject” button and redeveloping into a different and more profitable use.

I also liked her on Shark Tank, but this story is embarrassing. No way you can spin it that she made a smart financial move.

Debbie Suits, who lives at a mobile home park in Tempe, said when she and her husband moved in five years ago, the lot lease was $700. Now it’s $1,000, but she said they have nowhere else to go. “Go where? My husband and I have talked about it — that's enough, we’re out of here, tell me where else I can go,” Suits said.

Arizona is one of the 15 most expensive states in the U.S. to live in. Unfortunately, a whole bunch of seniors moved there for the weather back when the state was cheap. Times change. If you are a senior who cannot afford to pay $1,000 per month lot rent, let me suggest you look into the other 35 states which are MUCH less expensive, such as my home state of Missouri where lot rents average around $300 per month.

As for the non-profit which promoted this article – “Love From Above” – the problem persists that the only way that tenants can buy parks is with the help of a non-profit that personally guarantees the loan. And that’s about as likely on a large scale as finding people to volunteer to set themselves on fire.

Best quote of the week:

"There are plenty of codes and regulations in place that can crack down on bad actors in the housing space," he continued. "If we really want to get serious about solving affordable housing for seniors, we need to increase our housing stock, which means reducing barriers to new construction and finding ways to renovate existing properties."

It has been proven over and over that less government regulation yields better economies and greater quality of life for Americans. Those who refuse to accept this fact can only be classified as complete idiots – or work for the government. Or both.

A group of people who live at Old Orchard Village and Atlantic Village are attempting to form a tenants' cooperative to try and buy the parks for themselves.
But it's no small task.

The accent needs to be on the words “no small task”. That’s an understatement. The seller wants around $40 million. The tenants probably have collectively around $1,000 in cash between them. So the only way this deal happens is if a non-profit guarantees the debt. That’s the problem with all these resident deals – they forget the one small thing which is they have to find the “rich uncle” to actually secure the financing. And nobody wants to personally guarantee this stuff in non-profit land. So that’s why these articles are so infuriating as they suggest there is the remote possibility of success when, in fact, there is none. That would be like articles suggesting that homeless people could make big money by renting out their shopping cart wth a tarp roof as Air BNBs.

Well, you basically raise your home up in the air or you leave. There’s no salvation coming from the city as they no doubt will delight in getting the park removed. That was probably the intention from the start. Don’t forget Ronald Reagan’s classic quote “the nine most dangerous words in the English language are “I’m from the government and I’m here to help”.

These communities have been made even more vulnerable because corporate investment companies buy the land that mobile home parks sit on, then charge steep rent hikes that stretch low income households to their limits. These companies often neglect the grounds, and because these homes are not actually mobile, this puts entire communities at great financial risk.

Common Sense Perspective: When a mobile home park changes hands from a mom-and-pop owner to a corporate owner the rents go up to pay for the needed capital expenditures to bring it back to life, as well as professional management and the higher prices of carrying the correct amounts of insurance, etc. The intent of the new owner is not to stretch the affordability of those few households that have substandard incomes, but to provide a better quality of life for the majority of households who welcome the changes and are more than happy to pay the increases. That’s the concept behind all urban reclamation and progress. As for this focus on the fact that mobile homes can’t move, the truth is that all homes since 1976 CAN move at any time, but nobody does so because there is no place cheaper to live than the mobile home park. It’s not a question of holding residents captive but instead offering a product so good that nobody ever wants to leave.

The $15.5 million in federal funding from the American Rescue Plan Act will go to 46 mobile home parks.

Common Sense Perspective: Good news for park owners, bad news for inflation.

With the help of the Community & Economic Development Clinic, attorneys secured a loan for the tenants with the state of California at an interest rate they could afford. Community Development Financial Institution ROC USA provided a bridge loan.

Common Sense Perspective: Can’t wait to check in on how this all turns out with a debt construction that sounds about as stable as the foundation on the Eiffel Tower.

Ron Hall has lived in his manufactured home in Bonnet Lake Estates in Avon Park for decades. The 80-something retired masonry contractor may have to abandon his home in the lot where it sits. He can’t afford to move the home to a less-expensive mobile home community.

Common Sense Perspective: Has anyone ever considered the concept of just … selling the home where it sits? Following the logic of this article, any real estate you can’t move should be abandoned. That means that every single-family home in America should be abandoned instead of listing it with a realtor. Maybe the dumbest article of 2024 so far.

Honeylion definitely wants to be that: a premium, super fancy mobile home for a family looking to downsize in style and total comfort.

Common Sense Perspective: Based on these photos this home is absolutely not capable of delivering on any of these claims as far as I can tell.

On Friday, Idaho House lawmakers voted 66-0 to pass HB 590 from Rep. Elaine Price, R-Coeur d’Alene, after it went through a round of minor edits. The bill would require owners to give 15 days of notice to a mobile home park association before a park is sold.

Common Sense Perspective: No wonder it passed 66 to 0 without any discussion – it’s absolutely meaningless. It takes residents about six months to a year to get a deal done on average, not 15 days.

Common Sense Perspective: The residents are paying $11.5 million for a dilapidated park. The owner waited two years for them to gather the money. Do you think they might have overpaid? And then comes the issue that the financing is cobbled together from a bunch of non-profits on short-term loans. There’s no way this deal is going to make it without continual subsidies. What happens when the non-profits lose interest and move on to different virtue-signaling opportunities? The residents would have been far better off with a stable corporate owner with long-term debt.

Some residents in Old Orchard Beach recently learned their mobile home park, Old Orchard Village, was sold. This has prompted some to put together a last minute effort to buy the park themselves.”That’s why I’m out collecting petitions," Melissa Hilliard, who's lived in Old Orchard Village for 22 years, said. “So that we can form a co-op and buy it ourselves. It might be a longshot, but that’s what I’m working for today.”

Common Sense Perspective: At 371 lots and a value of around $70,000 per lot this would be a $26 million transaction. On top of that, it’s already sold. The residents’ chance of success on this project is lower than Joe Biden’s chances of making the Chiefs’ starting lineup.

Pinellas County has ordered dozens of residents in a frequently flooded mobile home park to elevate their homes to nearly 11 feet or leave by the start of hurricane season in June. Residents of Twin City park, which is in the Gandy area, say it makes no sense to spend as much as $50,000 to elevate homes that are valued at half that amount — or less.

Common Sense Perspective: Pinellas County finally found a way to shut down the trailer park which had probably been on their to-do list since the time of Jimmy Carter.

“We’ve increased lot rent only once in the last four years,” said Gilsrud. “And that was by $6.” 

Common Sense Perspective: Inflation under Biden has gone up a cumulative 20%. Rents in this park are around $500 per month. They should have gone up $100 per month just to cover the increase in the park’s operating costs but instead the residents have voted to increase them only $6. Clearly the residents are on a financial suicide mission as they refuse to raise rents in keeping with inflation and will soon not be able to handle the capital needs of keeping the park running, leading to a special assessment that few in the park will be able to afford. That “$6 rent increase” quote is asinine, not something to be proud of.

Judy Youngs had gotten used to modest increases in her mobile-home rent. Then late last year, she learned it would soar by 60 percent over the next four years.

Common Sense Perspective: If you don’t raise rents significantly annually – to keep up with inflation that is averaging 5% right now – you have to play catch up and raise rents significantly higher later.

Another factor to consider is that Arizona is the 15th most expensive state to live in, right up there with New Jersy, Maine, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Oregon, Maryland, Vermont, New Hampshire, Colorado, and Washington. If you want to retire to an area that is affordable, Arizona is pretty much your worst choice. I know the U.S. has decided to eradicate all personal accountability, but maybe the first order of business if you can’t afford to live in Arizona is to move to a cheaper state?