All Forum Posts by: Roger D Jones

This is terrible and not legal in any way but it was pre Covid and the rules were a little less restrictive. Had a tenant fall couple months behind and stopped taking my calls. I paid a local tow truck driver $100 to stop in front of their trailer with his truck and start measuring his trailer while they were at home watching and then knock on the door and ask if tongue and axles were under the trailer.

They paid that afternoon and never a problem since.

Terrible I know but it did send the message I suppose.

3 Votes

Quote from @Dave Rav:

@Avery Robertson great post. I too will be in the same boat here soon. The only difference is goal of my prospective park is for it to be in my home state. I just feel much more comfortable with it being proximal enough to make a quick trip, say once a quarter as needed.

Caution with the statement: "acquiring a park is hard, management is easy."

The only way management is burden is eased is in scenario of all-TOH parks. Generally speaking though, this asset class can be argued to be one other most management-intensive.

At any rate, Avery I'm curious to see what you come up with and the forum's input. Feel free to send me a private message as well.

Dave,

I was not trying to be flippant regarding the 'management is easy'... just didn't want to get all wordy in my response. I have a 70% POH/30% TOH park that after 20 years experience have learned to 'rig it' to run right. I spend maybe 15 min a day engaged in the operation but it has not always been that way. Learned a lot over the years on managing this park...

2 Votes

Partnerships make me nervous as for every thing that you can agree on there are 100 things you can be misaligned on. Every goal, decision, expectation, vision and operational decision has to be lock step with each other- and that isn't even discussing the money side of the agreement.

What I find a little disconcerting is you (and your family) are putting in all the money and credit while your 'partner' is going to handle the operations. I don't know how to say this without being too blunt but 'acquiring mobile home parks is hard; running them is easy'. That is why large private equity firms and buying up parks all over the country... they have great cash flow and don't require a lot of 'management'. Most parks are owned and operated by out of state or out of the area ownership. Buy your park; run it yourself; keep all the money. Plenty of free resources and advice out there to help you.

1 Vote

All of us who have done this long enough have had our 'plans' go awry on different investments from time to time. Not knowing the exact age of the trailer there is secondary financing out there for buyers of land and older mobiles that have been moved previously- but it is usually more expensive. I think you are going to have to lower your price to entice a buyer to bite. I would not do any seller financing or lease to own deals as you don't want to end up with that home all beat up in five years on a default.

Sell to cover your investment and if you can squeeze out a little more- great. Then move on with what you have learned and try again. As my Dad always said, 'There is no eating ice cream in hell- get outta there...

0 Votes

@Dave Rav I think there are many different types of titles, deeds, etc. If a bank is loaning on a personal property- car, motorcycle, rv, mobile home they keep the title until it is paid off. You get the registration.

For real property and you owe on it you may be the titled owner but the bank holds the deed to the property. Lot of different terms with varying meanings...

Mechanics liens I believe are mostly tied to new construction to ensure sub contractors get paid before a building is sold. Again... I am no expert. I could be wrong (which is not unusual for me :)

1 Vote

Quote from @Dave Rav:

Greetings all! Question. For unpaid back lot rents, can a landlord place a lien on a TOH?

If so, does it also tie up the tenant's ability to obtain a moving permit?

Thanks!

I don't think so. MHs are not real property. If the home is attached to a piece of property you could lien the property and the attached home. It would be like putting a lien on someone's truck because they owe you pad rent.

1 Vote

Kesha,

I would let go developing a mobile home park from scratch. I could list a lot of reasons why from my perspective but Frank Rolfe with Mobile Home University tells the story the best in this podcast. He revisits the topic often in his newsletters and his explanation stays the same.
https://www.mobilehomeuniversity.com/mhp-mastery/the-new-par...

Where I have seen some impressive development in my neck of the woods is in long term RV park development. Larger gravel spaces, concrete pads with picnic tables, small storage sheds included in each lot. Guy in my town built one last year with 30 spaces or so- packed full today. I have one currently and it is very successful. I think this is the next wave of the future for "mobile" home park investing.

Do some digging in that town nearby. How many RV parks and how full? What is monthly rate if they have it? What is the apartment/rental market like... you know the drill.
Good luck. Exciting...

Roger

1 Vote

Memphis, Tennessee

Quote from @Don Konipol:

Quote from @Roger D Jones:

Quote from @JD Martin:

Quote from @Don Konipol:

Isn’t owning a MHP where you own the mobile homes and lease them out just the same as owning an apartment complex but with the greater problems of maintenance, low end tenants, etc.? Isn’t the advantage of MHP ownership the fact that you own the land (pad sites), have limited maintenance and limited management, and that tenants tend to be long term because mobile homes are costly to move?

I would never own a park where I owned the trailers unless I had a good plan to sell the trailers. All I would want is the lot rent. That said, I know a few MHP operators that make some pretty tremendous money on the trailers, mostly by renting to people who need to pay in cash and have someone not ask a lot of questions - illegal/undocumented immigrants, transients, probably some criminals for sure, sometimes people (mostly women) hiding from domestic abusers, etc. People like this generally want to rent until they want to leave, which might just be week to week, and don't want any paper trail. But it is a lot of work and the ones I know also make sure to have a firearm when they are collecting rent in their parks.

JD
I don't know if I would paint POH residents with such a broad brush. We have great long term residents in our POH rentals and do very well financially with them. The key to this though is you to maintain your properties. Mobile homes are like baby chick eggs... easy to damage but also easy to repair. We stay way out in front of our maintenance and yes it pushes up our costs but our NOI is 30% higher than if we were all TOH.

The root problem with POHs is that many park owners become greedy and lazy in their management which then allows these homes to fall into complete and utter disrepair. They then decide one day to sell and throw these ridiculously low maintanance costs out on their proformas not understanding how they sucked the life out of their assets. I get to work with a lot of heavy equipment and power tools in my current job. We do monthly maintenance on every single piece of equipment every month- whether it needs it or not. I jump in a pickup truck- it starts, skid steer- it starts, chain saw- one pull it starts.

Everyone loves the TOH parks- but they are becoming increasingly hard to find. POH are a part of our industry whether you keep them, sell them or tear them down. With equity fund groups buying up all the TOH parks we as private investors will have to learn how to be cautiously successful in the POH park opportunity.

Are MHP with no park owned homes a PASSIVE investment, while a MHP with park owned homes an ACTIVE investment?

@Don Konipol
I think that is a fair statement. I only own MHPs- one all TOH, another mixed park with 13 POHs and an RV park. Certainly the mixed park requires more engagement but the NOI is substantially better. My wife is an accountant and she has several clients who own apartments, shopping centers, hotels, motels- all very successful and none of them are 'passive' with their investments. They are all very engaged and involved so I guess it all boils down to if you want passive invest in T-bills... if you want to earn better- get in the fight.

0 Votes

Quote from @Jay Hinrichs:

Quote from @Don Konipol:

Quote from @Roger D Jones:

Quote from @JD Martin:

Quote from @Don Konipol:

Are MHP with no park owned homes a PASSIVE investment, while a MHP with park owned homes an ACTIVE investment?

Don in my experience with the 3 parks we owned.. owning the park homes was a huge time suck most of them are old and have tons of differed maintenance and parts are not available as easy.
Only way i would do it is to have enough of them to have a full time on site handyman who knew how to fix those things. but thats just me.

Jay
We have a 24 hour per week maintenance manager at our park with 13 park owned homes. Website with tab for maintenance requests which forwards direct to him and cc's me... life is good.

0 Votes

All I can offer is do it right. Lots of mobiles out there with 'add on' rooms but they have to be done to code to actually be added into the square footage. Flooring, walls, roof, electrical, egress with windows and I think there is something about having a door that exits the home... not just into the home. Not sure about that and it may just be a Washington State thing.

I would really try to get a sharp pencil to the numbers before adding on to a mobile home to increase value. May work... just be careful.

1 Vote

All Forum Posts by: Roger D Jones

Roger D Jones has started 2 posts and replied 155 times.

Post: How to handle TOH non payment for lot rent

Post: MHP Partnership Structure

Post: MHP Partnership Structure

Post: 3 Days before closing

Post: Placing lien on a MH

Post: Placing lien on a MH

Post: Mobile Home Park vs RV Park?

Post: When Does Owning A MHP Make Sense?

Post: When Does Owning A MHP Make Sense?

Post: Best ways to add value to a manufactured home?