All Forum Posts by: Jim Johnson

So here is a park owners perspective. I am renting a space much like I rent apartments. I require a resident to be fully approved prior to residing in my community. While I allow some limited rentals in my parks, the tenants of the landlords still must be approved. There are many reasons for this. The biggest things are- can they pay, do they understand the rules and regulations and will they comply, the rental history etc. I happen to be very investor friendly. If you own a home in my park and are renting it- I will require my manager to show it for you. If you are actively marketing it, or working on it, I do not charge you (investor) space rent. If it is just sitting there- well- you pay. This way you know I am motivated to get someone in the property- we share the upside when it is rented- I get my space rent and you get your rent... and we share the downside when you have picked a poor tenant and I have approved a poor tenant.  Anyway- that is how I do it- many park owners do not follow this model, but I do.

This is a very wide open question, as the return depends on so many factors.

All property like this will depend on how much you put down, and upside you might create through operations changes. A stable property should return about 15% of your investment in cash, and then you will also have tax benefits for deprecation.  The parks I buy, have much better returns but I look for some sort of upside as part of my entrance strategy. I might look for something more like 30 - 50% cash on cash return at the 18 month mark. If the park is a flip, I might forgo cash on cash and seek equity (value) upside. So I might see a $400,000 park be worth 1mm plus after a few years. Everyone strikes out at this from a different angle, so returns will vary.

I am not in town very often, but I own a mobile home park int he area and visit every few months. My park is close to Ft Worth, near Arlington. I am very investor friendly- fyi... 

So here is how my email would look... 

Andrew,

Jim Johnson here. I am a active mobile home park investor, with communities in 4 states. I am seeking parks with at least 35 sites, and few to zero RV pads. I like public water and sewer, but I will look at private systems. Parks needing TLC are great to send, and I have crews to renovate homes and infrastructure. I cap out at about 200 pad sites. I am not needing to 1031 to complete a purchase. I have access to mobilehomeparkstore.com inventory, and also to Loopnet. I am most interested in local listings and any pocket listings you might discover. I am willing to protect you on any listings you send, that I have not been sent by another source. 

Feel free to contact me if you find a park that fits my needs.

Best

Jim Johnson

(insert contact info here)

I use loopnet, mobile home park store (dot com), craigslist as well- but I have recently had the best luck using Realtor's. Here is how I do it. I contact 2 agents in each town / metro area. So I look at a state- say Kansas. I then Identify every town with a population of at least 500. Then I sort the list into continuous metro areas- with some towns being their own metro area. I contact 2 agents in each area- one commercial and one residential. I ask each to search for a mobile home park within the specs I am looking for. In a State like Kansas I will identify about 400 contacts with agents. This is a email process. If I blast out 400 emails I will get about 20 parks- of which maybe 1 or 2 are of interest. I blast out no more than 1000 emails a week so I can review and track the leads. If you do this- you will find a park in short order. Agents seem to know people, that know people and they root out the deals that are not listed, or listed locally and not nationally. 

I tell the agents in the email I am looking for local listings, not ones off the sources I have access too and search anyway. I track the list of agents in spreadsheets for each state. 

there are web sites that will break down each city in a state by population, then if you search for each city, you can group it by region. When searching for agents you can use key words like- "mobile home park" to filter up agents that might have some experience in the field your looking in. 

Marc,

Interesting you tube spot. I can see why you, or anyone, would be frustrated by what Sun Communities is doing. They are clearly not following what I believe are the rules of a first right. 

If I had a first right, once presented with a contract I match the offer at the contract price in one business day- say if the offer was presented to me on a Friday- we would pull the trigger in cash by Monday evening or mid day Tuesday. What they are doing is not a first right, they are acting like they can set the price, set the time, and decide who the owners can sell too. I do not think this is representative of what a first right is. 

I can see why your very upset- they are not playing in good faith and your right, in this case the sellers are being harmed. 

There is probably a big class action suite for residents of Sun.

Also- for the record- They have tried to bully me by threatening to 'target' one of my parks. They were very ugly to people I know... very ugly...

Wells Fargo does not want the home moved without its consent, so the 'cloud' the title with a document that says unless Wells gives a blessing, the home can not 'legally' move. So unless the debt is settled, or Wells signs off on the home moving to land or another park, you can not put wheels under it and haul it anywhere... 

your answer depends on the state your in- post up the location details and you will get an answer quicker...

I use a leas option very similar to the way cars are done. We truly lease a home for several years- could be 3-5 years, then the renter can choose a buyout on the home. If they have made stellar payments, we would finance the final purchase. At that point, we would use a  promissory note that was not tied to the home, just a personal note and no security agreement. The home would also be transferred into the name of the new buyer and no lien would be placed on the home. 

Now my situation is not the same as most, where I own the mobile home parks I am selling homes in- so my risk is not anywhere near the same as someone financing homes in a strangers park. I also do not give away the home at the end of the lease- the home has value and we ask a fair price for the home. I would say our buyout price is right in line with what a home from a tenant would sell for if they sold it individually to a buyer for cash.  

Walter,

If you are going to self fund the deals and write the financing paper yourself, you will need to be a registered lender to even offer lending services. Once you have that- compliance comes with just following the lending guidelines. The lending education will inform you what needs to be done to comply with the Safe Act and the lending guidelines and requirements for offering financing to home buyers.