You’ve got to love it when the media and residents consider the park owner merely a punching bag. Well, when you punch the park owner repeatedly they tend to hit back with either redeveloping the park into another use or raising the rent to market levels to pay for all of the items residents are complaining about. Not sure that the residents have thought through this very carefully. Homes of America is the new owner with the goal of bringing this old, failing property back to life. They have risked their capital buying it and arranged for financing to make it possible. Instead of complaining and threatening, the residents should be asking the new owner “what more can we do to help in this process?” That’s the smart approach that’s a win/win for all involved.

Wow is this article stupid. First it makes the admission: “in 1984, California passed a law to help remedy this: a loan program, paid into by the residents themselves, to buy and in later iterations, fix their parks. But that solution, for the last 10 years, has helped only one of California’s 4,500 mobile home parks.” OK, that seems pretty bad. But then the reason given for the program’s failure was the “lack of demand”. Then the author explains that resident-owned mobile home parks are the solution to the condition of dilapidated properties because the residents care more about making repairs than third-party owners. What’s missing? That’s right THE CAPITAL TO MAKE THE REPAIRS. You can’t fix water, sewer and street systems with a happy attitude – it takes cold hard cash. And a lot of it. The very things that residents don’t have. So if the guy who wrote this would simply read his own article he’d realize that tenants buying parks is not going to happen because even the State of California won’t co-sign a guaranteed failing loan (only one deal has ever been approved) and only third-party owners have the capital and desire needed to bring old parks back to life. The solution? Obviously, GIVE THE $100 MILLION IN THE ACCOUNT ALREADY TO THE THIRD-PARTY OWNERS IN THE FORM OF GRANTS TO FOSTER MORE PARKS FROM BEING TORN DOWN. But, of course, they can’t take that obvious step because it ruins the narrative that all landlords are evil.

This is a great idea and we have been trying to educate our own residents on cheap ways to make a big impact on energy efficiency – things as simple as weatherstripping doors and installing thermal switch plates. If you look at the net impact of programs like this as far as dollars saved by residents as well as the number of those helped, this is exactly what states need to be working on instead of spending millions in grants for a few tenant groups to buy their parks.

This is like watching the advent of the big screen TV. The technology blows you away, but doesn’t take root until the price goes down 80% and becomes a mass-market product. These 3-D printed houses look much better than any mobile home ever will, but the price is only 20% less than a regular house. That’s not nearly enough to get people to embrace a new technology. Once this gets down to 50% off or so, then things might happen. But you still have to navigate a permit process that won’t allow these in a mobile home park without a HUD seal, or a subdivision without meeting the UBC. But it's going to happen some day (although it may be 10 or 20 years out).

This article states that “there are steps that mobile home communities can take to better withstand storms. Researchers recommend having concrete foundations, anchor bolts and hurricane ties to secure structures, and adding tornado shelters or safe rooms.” Nobody can argue with the fact that mobile homes have a lower survival rate than brick houses when a 170 mph tornado comes through, but let’s get realistic here. These suggestions cost about $10,000 each per home. Who is going to pay for that? The tenants? It’s their home and that bill will fall on them. Mandate these type of items (like the government is already discussing on mobile home energy efficiency) and you will end up with more homeless people.

Havenpark is a great owner/operator and this is a great article that more politicians need to read.

Have you ever been to Houston, Texas? Houston didn’t have zoning until recent times. The concept was that zoning was evil and you should build anything anywhere you want. There are topless bars next door to mansions and gas stations next to churches. Everyone hates it. And now Colorado wants to follow in Houston’s foot steps?

At least this person gets it: “I think they're going to hear very overwhelmingly, that this is a massive overreach by the state, and one that's completely unnecessary and a terrible precedent. You know, if the state can start legislating away, you know, local authority to ensure livability of neighborhoods and communities... where does it stop?”

Best article of the week. A must read.

The author loses me immediately when he states:

“As the income gap between the very wealthy and the very poor grows, even more people are exposed to the effects of natural disasters, he says. What we’ve learned is that when you think about disasters, they’re really societal at heart (and) people don’t like to hear that.”

So now we’re going to claim that those who are killed in tornados are the victims of class warfare.

I’m not sure if the writer of this article has any clue on science, but 1) no structure can withstand a 170 mph wind and 2) the southeast does not get more tornados because wealthy people arranged it that way.

In a society that is obsessed with everyone being a victim, I guess this is another shot at victimhood. I’m sure I’ll see late night TV ads offering to sue Mother Nature as soon as Camp Lejeune gets worn out.

This is one of those cases where local officials need to step in and help these people. There’s no way that anybody can predict a sinkhole and nobody did anything wrong. However, I’m sure that insurance does not cover this in any way and there’s no way these residents can live in a hotel for the months or years needed before California approves them to go back inside their homes (if they are ever let in again). If the state can allocate $100,000 per household just to move a mobile home (see the articles from prior weeks) you would think they could write a couple checks to help these people out.

Well written article that tells the facts without political spinning. Essentially, the tenants wanted the city council to block their park from being redeveloped and the “city legal staff told the council the zoning change would violate a state law that protects private property owners.”

You know you have a problem with elected officials when they take their talking points from a news channel. Next they will be posing with the TV anchor while wearing promotional T-shirts and receiving free key chains.

Leisure Manor is located in Auburn, Washington, where the average single-family home price is $568,50 and the average three-bedroom apartment rent is over $2,600 per month. The park owner raised the rent from $485 per month to $635 per month. At the new “high” rent that’s $2,000 per month less than the apartments in town. These type of article infuriate me. Keep on bashing the owner and I guarantee they’ll wind up tearing the park down and building apartments.

Thank havens that the city council has not gone insane and, when attempted to be bullied into breaking the law and vote to block a piece of land from being developed simply because the residents didn’t like it, instead voted in favor of the redevelopment stating “most councilmembers who opposed the zoning overlay and moratorium said they voted against it over concerns about whether the policy was legal.” When you ignore property laws you usher in the end of private property ownership and you are on a crash-course with the same socialism reflected in the article above.

A recent poll showed that 70% of Millennials would vote for a socialist presidential candidate. And it’s apparent in this story as Nevada’s “Senate Bill 275, brought forth by Democratic state Sen. Skip Daly, would prevent landlords of manufactured home parks from raising rents higher than the maximum annual rent increase percentage calculated by the (Nevada) Housing Division.” After that they should set a commission to control pricing of all products – from cars to milk – and then all you need is a commission to set how much of each product should be produced. Here’s the Wikipedia definition of socialism “a political and economic theory of social organization which advocates that the means of production, distribution and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole”. Am I missing something here, comrade?

Very nice article that is well written. If only giant non-profits could learn from people like this.

Refreshing to see a journalist not grab the low-hanging fruit and title this “mobile homes” instead of “starter homes”.

I’m kind of lost on how this is any different than the city simply co-signing on a traditional mortgage. But the bigger question is “who is going to pay for this?” Most cities, states (and the U.S. government ) are completely broke and can’t possibly actually afford to do any of these initiatives, which cost in the millions of dollars. So who is actually writing the checks on programs like this?

A $200,000 house is NOT affordable housing. Not even close. And a 1,200 sq. ft. house for $200,000 is NOT reason for celebration. Good thing that non-profits like Habitat for Humanity are staffed with people with zero business skills so they can celebrate wasting money at this level. You could have bought a standard 1,200 sq. ft. mobile home for $70,000 installed – and that’s almost 70% less. So you could have installed three homes for the price of one. Crazy.

Give me a break. The park increased rents just $27 per month and people are saying that they can’t buy food, medicine or the necessities of life because of that increase. This park is in California. A hamburger costs $10 at McDonalds there. When will people acknowledge that some states are incredibly expensive to live in (like California) and are not appropriate for those on limited incomes, who should instead move to states that are more affordable? I can already tell you when we will see this park in the news again: when they tear it down to make room for a better use that does not have pushback like this on a $27 per month price increase. This article is ridiculous.

This is NOT a “manufactured home community” – at least when you read this announcement “Rockrose Ranch has prices starting in the $110,000s to $220,000s”. In last week’s articles a developer called his mobile home park a “cottage community” so that it had no negative stigma. This owner needs to come up with a different name, too, because it’s not fair to call this concept basically a “mobile home park” as it has absolutely nothing to do with that concept other than residents paying lot rent as opposed to owning the land.

Unblievable -- an actually fair and balanced article that looks at the issue from both sides. I recommend reading this one.

The successful mobile home park of the future has rents that make the park capable of investing in infrastructure and giving sufficient profit not to redevelop into a better use and mitigates liability by banning trampolines and any item that causes significant risk of personal injury. New owners are bringing old parks back to life nationwide and that’s just the way it’s going to be from here on out. Those residents that want to live in an environment with no rules and ridiculously low rents will need to gather together at the old dirt-road park down the street until it gets hit by the wrecking ball.

Can recreational vehicles and mobile homes mix?

That’s the question at issue in a Baldwin County land use debate that’s gone to Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall’s desk.

Last week, the Baldwin County Commission authorized a request for an opinion from the attorney general’s office on whether the county can legally prohibit RV park sites in a mobile home park, a rule in its subdivision regulations.

The question comes down to whether the rule is a matter of zoning or a matter of health and safety.

According to the request sent to the AG’s office, an unnamed owner of a mobile home park wanted to add RV sites to his park, which is forbidden by Baldwin County’s subdivision regulations.

Around 40 out of 4,500 mobile home parks in CA fail their inspection by the state. That’s less than 1%. But using just the example of this one property, the journalist demands that they ramp up the park inspection intensity in CA, which will result in more park owners simply throwing in the towel and putting their property up for sale as a land development opportunity. The better story was  completely missed by the reporter when he wrote regarding a state review of mobile home park permits:

The report goes on to say that “many mobile home park owners are financially unable to rehabilitate their parks.” 

You are not going to be able to maintain the affordable housing supply in California by forcing park owners out of business. Instead, the state should consider coming up with grants to help park owners who are financially strapped to re-build aging, failing infrastructure. What if the owner of this park had received a grant to fix the failing sewer system and make basic upgrades and then all of the folks in the story would not be displaced. It’s a whole lot cheaper to fix old infrastructure than to try to find alternative housing for people living in failing mobile home parks.