Bad landlord & advice needed

Hi, I got a bad situation. A small park landlord is horrible. She does not run or maintain or have anyone maintain the park & no leases or normal rents & its run down etc. Anyway, She had a tenant who paid on & off for years. The trailer was in no living condition. Rats,Mold, ceilings collapsed,tarps on roof,etc. The trailer was like a dumpster. Anyway I offered to Pay for removal of home, extermination, etc. If I can bring a mobile home in to sell it. Sure everything was okay BY WORD! So She got the tenant out …I did everything as said & everything went smooth. I move my home in & I ask how much to tell buyers lot rent is she told me & everything was fine…Then I get a call from her saying she has no idea what im talking about & that no such conversation happened etc. So I was a wreck thinking Im in real trouble now…Because I trusted her & nothing was in writing etc. Then I learned the laws & she broke the law by acceptic that gift/donation. I can sew double the amount I put in & court costs etc. She can also not tell me I can not sell it & discriminate against children like she did with one potential buyer basically when she called me up screaming that she does not want familys there. I have a buyer & Im taking real bad loss on all this but I just want it done & over with cause I can not handle the stress anymore that she has caused. He calls her & she tells him she wants it out of there & already told me. Not true never got any notice not even a lease as required within 30 days by law & she told him she did me the favor to keep it on the pad as a place to store it /storage. Again breaking the law. I dont plan to pay a dime in lot rent as I dont even know what she wants. Im trying to get a buyer to move it out now & move it out of state because in this state it would be vary rare to find a park that allows homes in. Im not going to pay the lot rent & I have not got any court notice. I plan to move the home out by the time the court date is here & I wont be going to court either but what I am wondering is if I dont go does that automatically mean the lot rent will have to be paid by me or is that a seperate court date?? All advice & opinions greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance :slight_smile:

Dom07,

First question, have you read Lonnie’s books? If you have, you need to read them again as most of these problems are addressed there and could have been spotted ahead of time saving you time and money.

You have a bad situation here and it sounds like there is little chance of coming to an agreement with this manager. In my opinion you need to get the home out of there asap (doesn’t sound like a place where you should be trying to do business anyway). Start calling all the other parks, explain what you want to do and look for a manager that understands what you are trying to do and needs to have a spot filled. Do NOT tell them about your experience with this park manager as that will be an instant red flag and they won’t want to deal with you.

You mentioned several times that they “broke the law”. In reality that means nothing until you hire an attorney, file suit and go to trial. Do you have the $10,000 + or - that it will cost to do that? Most do not. Forget about it.

As to the lot rent, whether or not you signed a lease, you own a home in the park and will most likely be considered a “month to month” tenant (at least where I live) and will be required to pay the rent. They can bring you into eviction court whether the home is still there or not. DO NOT miss the court date. If you do, you lose automatically and a judgment will be entered against you. If you don’t pay it will go on your credit report as a black mark. Eventually they can garnish your wages or seize assets to satisfy it.

When you go to court, the ONLY thing the judge will want to know is if you paid the rent or not. If you try to bring up the “laws they broke”, you’ll be cut off. Bottom line is, pay the rent, get the heck out of there and consider it a “real life seminar”.

Lyal

Congratulations on your recent admission into Hard Knocks University. I suggest you drop out: negotiate with the park owner to give her title in exchange for past due lot rent. Alternatively, find someone who will take the home and this mess (including assume your lot rent obligation) off your hands even if you have to give it away. Continuing further down any of the paths that you mentioned will just increase your time, energy, and monetary basis in the home and park owner. This is tuition that will probably not be recouped. You failed the test because you didn

Hi,

Just to clarify, how one can prevent this - seemed to me the manager did a flip-flop on him.

What are some of red flags- don’t do business in poorly managed park, don’t move home first?

Thanks - James

Yup, you get the picture. First red flag is how the place is run. Seems like there are no written leases, place is a wreck etc. Not the kind of place you want to be putting families into.

Next piece of advice from the book is to avoid moving homes when you first start out. It always costs more than you think and you’re really on the hook after that. In addition, in this situation, I’d want the park to move the old home out at their expense and give me a place to start and also so they have some skin in the game.

Get the book(s). Less than 60 bucks for both and they’ll show you the right way to do it.

Lyal

To repond to James’ question of how to avoid this is to learn from the mistakes of others and most importantly read Deals on Wheels. That $35 book would have saved Dom all the headaches and financial stress.

Just about every rule in the book was broken and as Daphne indicated, all that is left is the school of hard knocks.

Kind of like trying to put together a large project without instructions and then getting upset for not reading them.

How does one avoid it you ask? Read the instructions Lonnie provides and more importantly, obey them.

Tony