Big investors are buying mobile home parks — and upending the lives of residents
All across the country, investors are buying mobile home parks like the one in Revere, upending the lives of residents who have lived there, often for decades. In some parks, the new owners have cleared mobile homes to make way for new development. In others, they have jacked up rents.
“We’ve had a lot of predatory owners coming in, seeing value in the land,” said Sandy Overlock of the Manufactured Home Federation of Massachusetts, which represents the interests of mobile home residents in the state. “All they see is money.”
Wbur.org
Dec. 8, 2022
Massie Mobile Home Park in Montgomery County was purchased by a company linked to the hedge fund Alden Global Capital. Shortly after, many residents, many of whom receive HUD aid, found “notices to quit” on their doors telling them to pay about $700 on top of their regular rent or be evicted.
Cardinal News
Nov. 2, 2022
Residents of closing mobile home park protest, speak at Puyallup City Council meeting
Meridian Estates residents must leave the mobile home park by October. Timberlane Partners purchased the property last year and plans to build apartments there, The News Tribune reported. Many residents own their mobile homes, but not the land those homes sit on. The mobile home park started with 42 families — as of Aug. 1, 31 families were still living there.
The News Tribune
August 29, 2022
From floods to slime: Mobile home residents say landlords make millions, neglect them
“I thought I was moving to paradise – you know, beautiful weather and being able to fish 12 months a year.”
Residents say there have been other problems beyond the broken drainage system– electrical wiring issues, potholes, and bad lighting that’s caused people to trip and get hurt on the park’s dark roads at night.
A group of residents have now organized and filed a lawsuit detailing all these problems against the park’s owner, a company called Equity Lifestyle Partners, or ELS. The group alleges that ELS has ignored their complaints over the years, and failed to fix the broken stormwater drainage system. ELS denies wrongdoing.
What these residents say they are dealing with may be part of a bigger problem that goes far beyond any one park or landlord.
NPR LAist
August 21, 2022
Residents Protest Grand Canyon University’s Plan to Evict Trailer Park
“Save our homes!” one sign read. “Grand Canyon University is leaving families homeless,” was another.
Phoenix New Times
June 10, 2022
Judge allows embattled Trails End Mobile Home Park to be sold over protests of some residents
FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) — A disappointed crowd of Trails End residents and supporters left the Fresno County Superior Courthouse Tuesday afternoon after a judge allowed for the sale of their mobile home park to Harmony Communities.
ABC 30 Action News
May 10, 2022
The couple are living off Social Security and a 34 year old pension which hasn’t increased over time and are now worried about the rent shooting up $225 over three years.
“The increases that we are going to be sustaining won’t be able to be met, by not only myself but by others in here,” Robert said about the expected rent increases in an interview earlier this month at the park.
Voice of OC
Feb 22, 2022
Residents of Mobile Home Parks in Northern California Protest Large Rent Hikes
Mobile Home Park Prevails in Court: Residents Won’t See Huge Rent Increase – Watsonville, Ca.- Residents of the Pinto Lake Mobile Estates were victorious in a Santa Cruz County Superior Court case revolving around a large rent increase that dates back to 2017.
Manufactured Homes.com
Nov. 2, 2021
Four corporate owners generate a quarter of complaints from Colorado’s mobile home residents
Complaints against mobile home park owners continue to stream into the state’s oversight program — and they’re disproportionately centered on a few large corporations, like Kingsley, that own hundreds of parks around the country.
The Denver Post
Sept. 23, 2021
But issues at parks owned by RV Horizons-Impact Communities extend far beyond Colorado’s borders.
Residents of an Austin mobile home park sued RV Horizons in 2015 over what they called illegal evictions. Those residents ultimately bought the park from Rolfe and Reynolds after years of legal action, protests and organizing efforts.
When Rolfe was met by protesters in 2017 at an Austin hotel during a Mobile Home University summit, he said the disrupters were “just like locusts,” calling the goal of stopping rent increases impossible, according to the Austin American-Statesman.
The Denver Post
Sept. 14, 2021
Orangevale mobile home park residents protest rent increases
The Heritage Oak Glen Mobile Home Park Homeowners Association says Storz Management Company has increased space rent by 230% since 2011
ABC 10
June 9, 2021
The Evictions Surprised Trailer Park Residents. The Protest Stunned Officials.
An uproar in the hills of eastern Kentucky has raised questions about what a city owes to those dislodged by its growth — and how to govern in an age of social media and protest.
May 20, 2021 at 4:15 p.m.
The New York Times
Morehead mobile home park tenants worry about being displaced
ROWAN CO., Ky. (WKYT) – People living in North Fork Mobile Home Park are worried they could be homeless within months.
The possible sale of the property has been brought up in city council meetings. People living in the park said they’ve heard next to nothing about the plans.
WYKT
Jan 22, 2021
Mobile Home Residents Protest Negligent Management
Tenants struggle with disrupted gas and trash services
The Austin Chronicle
August 30, 2019
Mobile home park residents in Willits to organize protests
Representatives from Wagon Wheel and Valley Oaks mobile parks traveled approximately 200 miles round-trip to Petaluma on Saturday where they met with residents of other mobile parks facing rent control issues throughout Mendocino County in an effort to begin development of a statewide strategy for dealing with what they call “predatory park owners.”
The Willits News
August 24, 2018
Seniors, Refugees Protest Closure of Westminster Mobile Home Park
Residents of the Green Lantern Village in Westminster are fighting back against plans by the property owner to close the 130-space mobile home park, which they say would displace more than one hundred families in a county where affordable housing is increasingly scarce.
WAMC Northeast Public Radio
March 7, 2018
America’s trailer parks: the residents may be poor but the owners are getting rich
It’s an unusual but potentially lucrative investment: billionaire Warren Buffett is heavily invested, and his and others’ success is prompting ordinary people to attend Mobile Home University, a ‘boot camp’ in trailer park ownership
The Guardian
May 1, 2015
‘The truth is they’re vulnerable’: inside America’s mobile home crisis
The maddening documentary A Decent Home highlights a cross-section of mobile home-owners and the system that aims to ruin them
—
A Decent Home was inspired by a 2015 Guardian article detailing how investment firms were coming after trailer parks, one of the nation’s last remaining reliable sources of affordable housing.
The Guardian
Oct. 25, 2022
About the Film (A Decent Home)
When housing on the lowest rung of the American Dream is being devoured by the wealthiest of the wealthy, whose dream are we serving?
—
https://www.adecenthomefilm.com
2022
Mobile home park residents feel powerless against ‘predatory’ investor groups
Jessica Reese had a yearly lease at Fairchild Lake. Now it’s a monthly lease and her rent has gone from $1,100 a month to $1,575.78. Plus, instead of paying $24 for water and $23 for sewage, she’s now paying $78 and $62.
Fairchild Lake Community is one of several mobile home parks that were purchased by YES! Communities. One of the nation’s largest owners and operators of mobile home communities, YES!, owned by Stockbridge Capital Group LLC., a San Francisco-based global institutional investment group, has 60 mobile home parks in Michigan.
Neither responded to requests for comment.
Residents, about half of whom are seniors or disabled people on fixed incomes, put up with the first two increases. They hoped the latest owner, Cook Properties, would address the bourbon-colored drinking water, sewage bubbling into their bathtubs and the pothole-filled roads.
When that didn’t happen and a new lease with a 6% increase was imposed this year, they formed an association. About half the residents launched a rent strike in May, prompting Cook Properties to send out about 30 eviction notices.
Macomb Daily
August 29, 2022
Rents spike as deep-pocketed investors buy mobile home parks
That changed in 2018 when corporate owners took over the 65-year-old park located amid farmland and down the road from a fast food joint and grocery store about 30 miles northeast of Buffalo.
Residents, about half of whom are seniors or disabled people on fixed incomes, put up with the first two increases. They hoped the latest owner, Cook Properties, would address the bourbon-colored drinking water, sewage bubbling into their bathtubs and the pothole-filled roads.
When that didn’t happen and a new lease with a 6% increase was imposed this year, they formed an association. About half the residents launched a rent strike in May, prompting Cook Properties to send out about 30 eviction notices.
New York Post
July 26, 2022
Huntington Beach mobile home residents ask for relief as conglomerates buy up parks
Mobile home dwellers face circumstances different from those of apartment renters. In most cases, they own their houses and and lease only the land beneath.
“We’re kind of trapped in our little homes,” said Allison Plum, 72. “We cannot just pick up and leave.”
Orange County Register
June 18, 2022
Phoenix mobile homeowners protest GCU expansion
Residents of the park fear they’ll be left homeless because of the lack of affordable housing around the Valley.
Arizona’s Family
June 7, 2022
‘Sitting on a time bomb’: Mobile home residents at risk in red-hot housing market
His park was purchased by an investment company, Walkart Inc., that residents say is trying to change the county zoning laws to close down a community that’s been home to 60 manufactured homes since 1957. Walkart, which could not be reached for comment, wants to build luxury apartments in its stead, according to Zang and a report in the Daily Local News.
“They just want this property to expand their stranglehold on the rental communities of West Chester,” said Zang, who pays $550 a month for his lot compared to an average rent in the area of $1,700 monthly for a one-bedroom apartment.
Wisconsin Examiner
April 18,2022
OC seniors push for protections amid mobile home park rent hikes
But Rohr now spends up to 12 hours a day working to get rent stabilization for mobile home parks on the city’s November ballot — reading city handbooks, canvassing the neighborhood, and meeting with City Council members. She’s become the president of the homeowners association at Skandia Mobile Country Club where she lives.
“I had no clue when I stepped up for this, that it was going to be what it was going to be,” Rohr says.
KCRW
March 01, 2022
Mobile Home Park Owner Responds To Allegations Of Harassment
Kaufman, who alleges the sale between Giavanone and her previous landlord takes advantage of a loophole in state law that avoids giving right of first refusal to tenants, believes she is being pressured into leaving.
WAMC Northeast Public Radio
Sept. 23, 2021
Carson mobile home park closures put owners, residents at odds, with city in the middle
“I’ll be out on the street. That’s what they are offering me,” Holtzman said. “The city is not standing up for us. They are standing up for the owners of the park.”
Daily Breeze
July 28, 2021
Sunnyvale Mobile Home Park Residents Protest Skyrocketing Rents — Every Saturday
“I was just fed up with the $2,000+ [rents],” he said. “That’s higher than any other local park. On May 1st I sat down with six signs.” Now, 50 to 100 people come out every Saturday morning on Lawrence, Tasman and Vienna Drive protesting the rent increases.
The Silicon Valley Voice
POSTED 01:18 PM, June 22, 2021 | UPDATED AT 10:43 AM, June 24, 2021
Residents of the Sunnyvale mobile home park say lot rent increases for new residents have made their homes unsellable
The Mercury News
May 8, 2021
Column: A city known for its corruption scandal ibs now in a fight over mobile home parks
Los Angeles Times
May 4, 2021
Developer speaks on protest against trailer park closure
Randy Harper has lived in the park for the past 20 years. She says there were rumors going around for more than a year about the potential sale of the property but claims the owner didn’t say anything about it until last month.
ABC36
April 13, 2021
Mobile park residents stage first of bimonthly protests
Representatives from BoaVida Communities did not return emails seeking questions posed by residents regarding issues relating to park management at BoaVida and Valley Oaks.
The Willits News
PUBLISHED: April 12, 2018 at 12:00 a.m. | UPDATED: August 24, 2018 at 12:00 a.m.
