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Mobile Home Park News Briefing

SFGATE: American Canyon: Retransmission: Rent Hikes And More Rules: Residents Face Upheaval At Mobile Home Park

Preview:

Two hundred households in an American Canyon mobile home park face whopping rent increases in September -- in many cases close to $300 a month, a boost of more than 40% for most.

As a result, some residents say they may have no choice but to move.

Built in the 1960s, Napa Olympia Mobilodge is a 201-unit mobile park on American Canyon Road near the Vallejo border. In a lot of ways, it's a time capsule: kids bike down the middle of streets with no traffic signs, and '70s Fleetwood double-wides line up in neat, colorful rows. It's also highly diverse, with people speaking Tagalog, Spanish, Vietnamese and Arabic, among other languages.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

With the change came a proposed rent hike of around $280 a month for each homeowner and rules including a limit of 10 potted plants per resident. 

Same crazy story as last week, in which the residents are as concerned about a new rule limiting shrubbery to no more than 10 potted plants as they are a $280 per month lot rent increase. Only in California, right?

Cherokee Tribune: Mobile home park operators say they're in talks with residents ahead of potential sale

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The management of a mobile home park near Woodstock city limits says it is communicating with residents as a developer is considering buying the property to build a new neighborhood there.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

The management of a mobile home park near Woodstock city limits says it is communicating with residents as a developer is considering buying the property to build a new neighborhood there. Weekley Homes, LLC is seeking to annex about 31.47 acres at 200 Dupree Road and 681 Stone Bridge Parkway, just west of Interstate 575, into the city of Woodstock to build 220 detached single-family residential homes. The proposed density is seven units per acre.

It’s a no-brainer that, if Weekley Homes wants to buy this tract, the park residents have absolutely no shot at matching their offer. Assuming that a standard single-family home lot is $80,000, Weekley will value this land around $17 million – far in excess of the value of the park. There’s really nothing anyone can do to stop the wheels of progress due to the fact that a mobile home park is a very poor use of land economically. That’s why much higher lot rents are essential for more parks not to be redeveloped. It’s the free market at work.

The Morning Call: As Lehigh Valley manufactured home owners pay more, reforms are stalled in Harrisburg

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Melissa Schroeder sits in her living room with her neighbors wondering how much longer she can afford to remain in her manufactured home, and if help will ever come.

Like many in the Red Maple Acres community — which has more than 200 lots on the border of Lower Macungie and Upper Macungie townships near Wescosville — Schroeder has had to deal with steep prices on the land she rents from the owner, GSP Management Co.

While she owns her house, she rents the lot from GSP, which recently bought the 18-acre property from ARX Communities for $30.5 million. There are also utilities and property taxes. Simply picking up and moving somewhere less...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Sorry all you communists out there, but Pennsylvania is not a trifecta blue state and, as a result, rent control is not on the table. End of story.

the cool down: Montana mobile home tenants ask county for help after 50% rent hike, silence from new owner

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A new owner at a Missoula County mobile home park in Montana is drawing complaints from residents who say steep lot-rent increases and little communication are making it harder for families to remain there.

As concerns pile up over costs, maintenance, and safety, tenants are asking county officials to help push for answers.

What's happening?

At Target Range Mobile Home Park, residents recently organized a tenants union as lot rents climbed after Admiral Communities became the new owner, according to the Missoula Current.

Park resident Lisa Coon said her costs show how dramatic the change has been: What was once $475 in lot rent is now a...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Sorry again, all you communists, but Montana is a trifecta red state and rent control is not now, nor will it ever be, on the table.

Mid Valley Times: Sanger mobile home residents return for rent control

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Sanger mobile home residents, specifically from the Vista Del Monte Mobile Home Park, returned to the Sanger City Council to ask for rent control regulations amid escalating financial pressures and fears of steep space-rent increases.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

City Attorney Shannon Chaffin, City Manager Nathan Olson and Councilmember Michael Montelongo expressed concerns that pursuing a rent control ordinance … would result in the eviction of all residents if the new property owners decided to use the land for other purposes if they were displeased with the rent control.

At least the City Attorney is not an idiot.

Missoulian: Out-of-state landlord raises rents by $250 a month at Target Range trailer park

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The website for Admiral Communities, a Tennessee-based company that owns manufactured home communities across the United States, says that residents can expect "service-first property management, unmatched customer service, operational excellence" and that they are "always improving and always accountable."

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Montana has no rent control and, as a result, the owner is allowed to set whatever rent level they like. It’s called the “free market”. Whoever wrote this article has been watching too much Mamdani on television. That communist stuff only gets traction in trifecta blue states. Montana is trifecta red.

KWTX: ‘I’m too old to start over’: Temple mobile home park residents face uncertain future after city purchases property

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TEMPLE, Texas (KWTX) - Residents of Santa Fe Trails mobile home park in Temple said they were told in February that the city purchased the property, and they would need to either move their trailers or find a new place to live by the end of August.

According to the City of Temple, the property was purchased after the owner offered to sell it, having decided that expanding was not an option. Now residents are being asked to relocate, and some are finding that harder than expected.

Julie Prince-Goodwin, who lives at the park on a fixed income, said she has been unable to find a new home.

“I just don’t know what I’m going to do. I have no...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust – at the hands of a city which is enthusiastic about getting rid of its “trailer park”.

KTVQ: Billings mobile home residents alarmed by sharp lot rent increase at Golden Meadows

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BILLINGS — Residents at Golden Meadows Mobile Home Park say a steep increase in monthly lot rent could make it difficult for many of their neighbors, particularly seniors and people living on fixed incomes, to remain in the community.

Watch the story below:

Residents recently received letters at the end of June notifying them that monthly lot rent will increase on Aug. 1 from $530 to $705, a $175 monthly increase that amounts to about 33% and an additional $2,100 per year. The increase applies to the park's roughly 520 lots, with some newer renters seeing larger increases.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

"Residents recently received letters at the end of June notifying them that monthly lot rent will increase on Aug. 1 from $530 to $705"

I think the bigger question is not "is $705 lot rent too high?" but rather "how did this park survive at a $530 lot rent?". Here are the actual market housing stats for Billings, Montana:

  • Median single-family house is $369,900
  • Average three-bedroom apartment is $1,560 per month

Since you can stack those $1,560 per month apartments three levels high on the same real estate as one $705 lot rent, it’s a miracle the park still exists even at the new rent.

Press Democrat: Petaluma mobile home park could serve as a test case for cities and residents fighting closures and conversions

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Petaluma has served as a proving ground for tightened mobile home park regulations and is poised to do so again as the owners of Little Woods Mobile Villa seek to push forward with shuttering the 78-space park off Lakeville Highway.

The city has been a ground zero of sorts as a group of park owners have launched a flurry of lawsuits over new rules passed to limit rent increases on mobile home spaces and bolster resident protections as part of a wave of tighter regulations regionally and at the state level.

In June 2024, Little Woods owners notified the city of their intent to close, setting off a lengthy, complex and not often used...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust.

Press Herald: Standish mobile home park residents demand rent control ordinance

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Mobile home park residents of Pine Tree Estates in Standish packed the Standish Town Council meeting on Tuesday to ask for a rent stabilization ordinance.

Residents told the council that their lot rents have been raised by hundreds of dollars since RHP Properties, the largest private owner of manufactured home communities in the United States, bought the park in 2019. Many of the residents are older than 55, on fixed incomes and struggling to make ends meet as the cost of living in Maine rises.

“(Our neighbors) are scared that after spending decades building their lives here in Standish, that they may no longer be able to afford to stay,”...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

A group of Pine Tree Estates residents proposed a rent stabilization ordinance to the Town Council on Tuesday. They’re collecting signatures to get the ordinance on the November ballot.

Expect to see hundreds of these articles going forward, as the inmates are now running the prison known as Maine. What a bunch of whacko idiots.

Courier & Press: Taxes, EWSU bills still unpaid at troubled Evansville mobile home park

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EVANSVILLE — The city set aside $15,000 to help residents in a neglected mobile home park move out, but as of July 13, no tenants have reached out about the money.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And soon, another park bites the dust.

Local News Matters: Steep rent increases threaten to displace American Canyon mobile home residents

Preview:

TWO HUNDRED HOUSEHOLDS in an American Canyon mobile home park face whopping rent increases in September — in many cases close to $300 a month, a boost of more than 40 percent for most.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

…including a limit of 10 potted plants per resident…

OK, higher lot rent is one thing, but when you threaten to reduce the number of potted plants, them there’s fighting words!

Look, I know that something like 40% of Americans now identify as communist. But I guarantee you that if you got a copy of their receipts on everything they spend in a month, the increase in lot rent in the mobile home park is the least of their worries. Research shows that healthcare, childcare, and transportation all take a bigger bite out of their paycheck than housing and the new price of filling up their cars per month, since oil spiked, is more than this park’s lot rent increases every time they go to the pump.

WFTV9: Orange County highlights past efforts to shut down troubled mobile home park

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[Video] Orange County highlights past efforts to shut down troubled mobile home park

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust.

LAist: Tackling affordability and extreme heat in LA's mobile home parks

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Maria Franco has lived in the Park Royale Mobile Home Community for 25 years, in the Van Nuys neighborhood in north Los Angeles. The community has just under 150 rectangular homes, lined up neatly on a large field of mostly asphalt, with fruit trees popping up here and there.

Two years ago, Franco faced a string of bad luck. The 65-year-old lost her long-time job packing orders at a distribution company when it abruptly moved to another county, a commute too far for her to make.

Then her hot water heater clonked out, so she hauled warm water from her stovetop to her bathroom, scooping it over her head for a shower.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

“It’s a public health thing. It’s an equity thing,”

OK, the article lost me when it started talking about “an equity thing”. Basically, the communists have now included air-conditioning in their demands from society. But are they aware that 40% of HUD Section 8 housing has no air-conditioning? Not sure who’s going to pick up that tab.

Times Union: Appeal halts eviction of Saratoga Lakeview Mobile Home Park residents

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SARATOGA — An appeal has temporarily halted the eviction of three residents of the Saratoga Lakeview Mobile Home Park, delaying plans to demolish their homes and redevelop the property.

The latest legal twist extends a yearslong fight over the mobile home park on state Route 9P, a prime Saratoga Lake property that owner Michael Giovanone wants to convert into a boat and RV storage facility.

Giovanone bought the 3.2-acre park in 2021 with plans to expand his adjoining Boat N RV Condos business. Under the purchase agreement, however, he was required to wait five years before changing the property’s use and was expected to pay each homeowner...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

An appeal has temporarily halted the eviction of three residents of the Saratoga Lakeview Mobile Home Park, delaying plans to demolish their homes and redevelop the property.

So they found a liberal nutcase judge (is there any other type these days) to temporarily block the removal of the final three residents from this park. And, yes, their attorney will claim this is the greatest victory since O.J. Simpson. But then, a couple weeks from now, the order will be lifted and, once again … another park bites the dust.

Daily Camera: https://www.dailycamera.com/2026/07/13/san-lazaro-donation-campaign-buy-mobile-home-park/

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San Lazaro Mobile Home Park residents have started a donation campaign as they continue their effort to raise money to buy the park in unincorporated Boulder County from a private owner.

San Lazaro Park Properties bought the community, which was built in the 1960s, in 1983 and recently sent a notice of a plan to sell. State law gives residents the first right of refusal to buy the park, allowing them 120 days to organize, raise money and make a competitive offer. Based on the residents’ interpretation, if an outside offer is made, they would also have an additional 120 days to make a counteroffer.

Park owners have said the price residents...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

"It's exciting stuff," Bellos said.  "We are well on our way to getting something put together."

That’s kind of like the captain of the Titanic saying, “we are excited by this challenge of the iceberg”. There’s no way they’re going to raise $27.5 million in cash to buy this park. Absolute idiocy. Yet the media is pandering to them and saying, “you can do it”. A total waste of time and energy.

NHPR: Albany residents buy their manufactured home community

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A manufactured home community in Albany is now owned by the people who live there. In June the residents of Albany Acres bought the property from former owner Patrick Houghton of Ranger Properties LLC.

To buy the property, residents formed a cooperative and will now run the community as a not-for-profit corporation.

“They purchase the land and infrastructure underneath their homes, and they run it as a democratic business in perpetuity afterwards,” Sarah Marchant said.

She is the chief operating officer and senior vice president of the resident-owned communities program at the New Hampshire Community Loan Fund, which provided financing...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Armstrong said rent, which was $455 under Houghton, will go up to $600 to pay for the improvements…

OK, time out. You’re telling me that the residents – via a non-profit – bought their mobile home park to stop the big, bad landlord from buying it and raising the rent … and then they raised the rent on themselves, day one, up $145 per month? That’s the dumbest story ever. A professional landlord would have only raised it probably $50 a pop for three years to get to that same level. Morons.

KWTX: ‘I’m too old to start over’: Temple mobile home park residents face uncertain future after city purchases property

Preview:

TEMPLE, Texas (KWTX) - Residents of Santa Fe Trails mobile home park in Temple said they were told in February that the city purchased the property, and they would need to either move their trailers or find a new place to live by the end of August.

According to the City of Temple, the property was purchased after the owner offered to sell it, having decided that expanding was not an option. Now residents are being asked to relocate, and some are finding that harder than expected.

Julie Prince-Goodwin, who lives at the park on a fixed income, said she has been unable to find a new home.

“I just don’t know what I’m going to do. I have no...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust.

Spectrum News: Saco considers capping rents at mobile home parks

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SACO –– Saco may soon join other communities in capping rent increases at mobile home parks.

City Council is reviewing a proposal preventing landlords from raising rents more than once a year, and renters must get 90 days' notice.

The ordinance caps increases at either 5% or equal to the most recent Consumer Price Index annual percentage change, plus 1%, whichever is lower. The CPI tracks changes in the prices of goods and services nationwide.

The draft’s introductory language states: “Residents of those parks should expect to be protected from unnecessary, excessive cost increases because they may be put at risk of severe housing...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

“Residents of those parks should expect to be protected from unnecessary, excessive cost increases because they may be put at risk of severe housing insecurity.”

Would you expect anything less than full communism coming out of Maine these days? I wouldn’t. But when it comes to Maine, it’s important to point out the great success of their communist initiatives:

  • Their Democratic nominee for Senate had to drop out for raping a woman.
  • They are ranked #43 out of 50 states in business development.
  • They are ranked #40 out of 50 states for education.

I guess they really need communism because they just can’t cut it on a level playing field…

The Post and Courier: Residents worried as new owners of Beaufort mobile home park say rents will double

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BEAUFORT — Tenants at a local mobile home park are scrambling for options after new management announced rent will double starting July 1.

Hilanda Mobile Home Park residents were notified in late May, via notices tucked into their screen doors, that their lot fees would jump on average from $350 to $700 a month.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Hilanda Mobile Home Park residents were notified in late May, via notices tucked into their screen doors, that their lot fees would jump on average from $350 to $700 a month. According to several tenants, new owners Hilanda MHP offered no explanation for the steep spike.“They did not provide us with any justification for the increase,” said Jovana Armstrong

First of all, here are the housing stats for Beaufort, SC, which is where this park is located:

Median single-family home: $344,300

Average 2-bedroom apartment rent is $1,330

So I think we’re all in agreement that a lot rent of $350 per month is ridiculously low in this market. So what should the lot rent actually be? Based on the old-timer algorithm that lot rent should be ½ of 2-bedroom apartment rent, then the lot rent should be around $700 per month … which is exactly what the new owner is raising the lot rent to.

But here’s the problem. America is based on a free-market system in which businesses set their prices based on their best guess, and consumers respond with their pocketbooks and the price adjusts from there based on supply and demand. The author of this article is trying to sell the viewer on socialism, which is based on the government setting prices.

While we try to hold our rent increases to a maximum of $50 or so, in this case that would take 7 years just to get to market. The rent is simply too low. And I have no doubt that the price the buyer paid necessitates a much higher lot rent to cover the mortgage.

But clearly this article is really geared to try and start a movement for rent control in South Carolina. So here’s the bad news for all you South Carolina socialists out there: South Carolina is NOT trifecta blue. Not even close. In fact, it’s a RED trifecta. So rent control is off the table and, as a result, this article is absolutely irrelevant.

Miami Herald: Little Havana residents beg for a lifeline as development plans push them out

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A drummer beat an empty water jug, and the voices cried out: “Raquel, escucha,” for they were in “la lucha.” So chanted nearly two dozen residents of Little Havana’s Silver Court trailer park and their supporters outside the office of Miami-Dade County Commissioner Raquel Regalado on Wednesday afternoon as they called on their District 7 commissioner for help.

In March, the 200-plus families living in Silver Court learned the park would be closing and that they had six months to vacate. The park’s owner, 1989 Sunny Court LLC — which is owned by California-based real estate firm Marquis Property Company — has said it wants to develop the...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust.

Capital B: Georgia Family Says Raw Sewage Left Them Sick and Facing Eviction

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The putrid smell of human waste has permeated Tatyana Boykin’s trailer home for months, forcing her, her sister, their disabled mother and brother, to spend most of the year living out of their car.

The family has photographs of a disconnected pipe beneath their three-bedroom trailer at Hunter Ridge Mobile Home Park that they say has pumped raw sewage into the crawl space beneath their home and caused water with excrement to back flow into their drains, toilet and bathtub.

That hasn’t stopped the property management team at Hunter Ridge — a massive, eviction-plagued trailer park on Tara Road near Jonesboro — from charging Boykin, the only...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

If you EVER think renting mobile homes might be a good idea, then read this article. People who rent mobile homes are in a league of their own, and I’m not talking the ivy league. Nothing drives a sane park owner crazier than rental park-owned homes.

Aspen Journalism: Residents of Cavern Springs under contract to buy their mobile home park

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A resident-led cooperative formed by the 98 households in Cavern Springs Mobile Home Park — located between Carbondale and Glenwood Springs — went under contract this week to buy the property for $23 million.

Their offer, submitted in early June, was accepted this week by the park’s corporate owner, Maryland-based Horizon Land Management.

“Todavía se me enchina la piel, y muy esperanzada de haber logrado esto,” said Maria Judith Alvarez, a resident of Cavern Springs. “Más de un año [hemos] trabajado en esto, así que me siento muy esperanzada, no solo por nuestras familias, sino por lo que pueda pasar en este valle.”

(“I still get...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Not sure why this is newsworthy, as all park owners have no problem selling to tenants, and the lot rent will rise to the same level whether the tenants buy it or not. The only reason this is in the news is that socialists believe this is some type of huge victory over “capitalism”. It’s not.

Flathead Beacon: Nonprofits Partner to Preserve 55 Households in Kalispell Mobile Home Park

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In a partnership with the Whitefish Community Foundation, NeighborWorks Montana is in the process of adding a fourth mobile home park to its roster of resident-owned communities (ROC) in Flathead County, which will preserve 55 households and prevent tenant displacement.

As part of a multimillion-dollar acquisition and preservation effort, the nonprofit organization is purchasing Twin Willows, which was formerly Twin Acres and Willow Glen mobile home parks, in south Kalispell.

Twin Willows is slated to become the fourth community-owned mobile home park in Flathead County, joining the Hideaway Community in Columbia Falls and the Morning...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

“We have to do a lot of creative financing because of interest rates and property prices right now,” NeighborWorks Montana Cooperative Housing Director Danielle Bundrock said. “On average, we’re having to do multi-hundred-dollar rent increases to give the residents the opportunity to purchase, and that can be intimidating.”

That pretty much sums up the problem with the whole “tenant owned” fantasy: 1) the lot rent goes up just as much as if a regular business bought the park and 2) the financing is so sketchy that it mostly falls apart within 5 years or so and the park goes back on the market to be sold to a regular business. So who really benefits from these deals? That’s simple: 1) the facilitators of these deals that gets paid giant fees and 2) the non-profits that get the glory of “beating the evil landlords” for their five minutes of fame – and use that for fundraising.

Do the tenants gain anything? Nope. Nothing at all.

FOX6: Mobile home park rent increases; Union Grove woman's effort to cap them

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Effort to cap rent increases

The backstory:

Kathy Emmendorfer moved into the Harvest View Community in Union Grove for two reasons. The first: it's peaceful.

"I like mowing my own lawn, having my backyard," said Emmendorfer. "I can sit out here every day and just chill until I go to work."

The second reason: the cost.

"The reason we moved here is because we could afford it and still actually have a life," Emmendorfer told Contact 6.

Emmendorfer says she's lived in the manufactured home community for nearly eight years. Lately the rent has gotten less affordable.

"The (ownership is) like, "we've got to raise it to keep up with the...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Bad news for socialists in Wisconsin: the state is NOT trifecta blue. Not even close. The only thing blue is the governor. As a result, there is zero chance of rent control in Wisconsin. Note that in over 100 years not a single state has EVER enacted rent control that was not trifecta blue. End of story.