Hello everyone and thank you ahead of time for your help.
I am looking into investing in MHP’s and am just starting my research. If I find a MHP for sale that has only 50% of the land developed, how would I determine how many pads are actually allowed on this land? Do I need to call the county, if so will they speak with me over the phone about someone else’s property?
Thanks,
Dan
I bought 22 acres of land with an old existing 3+/- acre park on it with the intent to develop the remaining land. There are 22 lots crammed into those 3 acres. So if you were to extrapolate, one could think the entire 22 acres could fit about 100 lots with room for roads and things of that nature. Once I got into it there were wetlands that needed to be worked around (and that were missed during due diligence because there was never a wetlands survey performed), the current laws in my state require a minimum 6500 SF per lot which is about double what my existing lots are, new roads are required to be certain widths, in my state 10% of developed land has to be set aside for “recreational use,” an entrance to the park is allowed on the small side street, but not route 1 (preventing access to the uplands behind the wetlands), buffers, setbacks, storm water management measures (drains, swales, berms, etc), any miscellaneous things the planning board insists upon you including in the development, etc all very quickly use up the available land. In my case, I was finally approved for 31 additional lots thanks to the creativity in layout design of my civil engineer. The 2 years and costs of the engineering and DEP, Army Corps, local permits, & back and forth with planning & zoning don’t make it practical to do this during your due diligence. Every property is going to have its own limitations depending on the location and other specifics. My advice is to buy a park for what is currently in place and definitely don’t rely on how many lots you could potentially add later on because you’ll never be able to figure it out exactly right without going through a very costly and time consuming design process first.
Thanks for the insight MikeO, that sounds like a lot of work!
Thanks for sharing Mike. Best of luck moving forward.
Anytime! Good luck with your search.
Thank you Jason! I appreciate that
I would start by finding a good attorney. They should know where to look and who to talk to for accurate answers.
Probably not a first deal you want to get involved with unless you have some know how on running a park and experience with park development. Also you have to have money. Its not cheap to add additional lots and could get complicated depending on your local government.
Also check with the county water department. We’re only allowed to have 39 hookups in our trailer park. We could have as many homes as we wanted, but only 39 hooked up to the wells. I believe, because we’re only paying for a certain number of persons (they have a numbering schedule listed for that, too). Plus, the homes have to be a certain number of feet away from the well houses. Of course, if you’re on city water, that would be different.