Good evening. I’m a virgin to posting so bare with me. I recently purchased a park in Gonzales, Louisiana. We’re located between New Orleans and Baton Rouge along the Mississippi River. We are fortunate that with all of the chemical plants and their expansion that everything is just hunky-doory down here. I currently rent a few 3 bedroom trailers, not in a park, for $1250. In the park I purchased there are 23 lots and a home. I own 8 of the trailers. With that being said, out of those 8, 7 are extremely old. They rent for $285 a week and have long term tenants. The other lots rent for $250 a month and the area average is $425. The park beings in $13,400 a month as it stands now. The big decision…in my Parish or County to any of you out of Louisiana, there is a moratorium on trailer parks. This won’t be turned over anytime soon as it’s been this way for a while making a park liscense pretty valuable. You can only expand your park 50% of the current area you are using. All new additions have to be curb and gutter which can be expensive. That would allow me to add 15 new lots. My question is, how can I figure out what is best. Do I start plucking out the old trailers and start putting in new models? What is best make and model for renting? 2 bedroom vs 3 bedroom? Do I just rent the lots? So many questions I know but I’m just looking for some direction. Thanks!
It sounds like you’re not sure what kind of Park you want to operate. Once you nail that down you can define the actions to get there.
I personally don’t want to deal with weekly rentals and collections, regardless if they’re long term tenants. I want lot rent only, no mobile home repairs, and world peace. Not everyone wants these things, so need to understand what you want to help with recommendations.
Hopefully you didn’t get a loan against the value of the weekly rental home income as that will limit your options.
Grammar tip of the day
“Bear with me,” the standard expression, is a request for forbearance or patience. “Bare with me” would be an invitation to undress.
My suggestion would be to renovate the best of the homes and sell them. Those not worth renovating replace with new or better homes and sell them. You do not want to be in the business of renting homes just the land. I would also advise you raise the rents to market immediately if the state landlord tenant regulations allow.
So I should not have read the rest of the post nude then?