Looking at a RV MH park in west central Florida. The park is a mess but see potential. Asked broker for guidelines and asked if there was knowledge of sex-offenders. Broker indicated guidelines were not enforced plus the seller was aware of sex-offenders in park–plus in our drive thru noticed small children. The broker would accept only a cash offer which throws up all kinds of red flags and actually did not present our nearly full price offer in the 5 days given on our contract. Looking for your comment–questionable broker, questionable seller and maybe buyer beware???
Having sex offenders in your park may be forbidden by your insurance policy, if I’m not mistaken. Sex offenders are not a protected class of citizen.
I think in most states that real estate agents have an obligation to present the offer to the Seller. It’s difficult to “prove” that they did not present it, so not sure what you can do.
Regardless, call your offer a cash offer and finance it in the background. You can usually squeeze that into your feasibility period anyway. At closing they get paid all the same - it is cash for them.
During diligence I would get a list of leases so you can manually verify who’s a sex offender and understand the risk you’d assume until you can clean it up. Let us know how this works out for you - very interesting.
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As far as I know, every state has a sex offender registry, and within a few minutes you could look up and see for sure if there are any sex offenders in the park.
If you did buy it, it’s up to you if you want to try to keep them or cancel their leases.
I believe there are some guidelines as to where sex offenders can live in a community but they must be registered with the Law Enforcement. I know current parks that specifically cater to sex offenders and parolees. I have seen those parks and in some cases I have seen families also live in the park. Those parks that cater to sex offenders and parolees make yuuuuuuuge money because the rent by the room. So each home is bringing in easy $1000 to $1200 per month. If you were to buy a park that caters to this you would know. If you were buying a park that just has 1 offender then its kind of up to you to try to find a way to move them out. You can’t just walk up to him and say “your a sex offender move”. But there are other ways you can work it out.
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Hey Gator, I am very interested in a mobile home park for sex offenders in Florida.I would like any information you have about anyone owning and or running them, Thanks
I’m not in that space so not much I can tell you. But I do know this guy has been trying to see his sex offender park. Mobile Home Parks for Sale near Cocoa, FL
I own 2 “family” parks in Michigan with a total of 3 residents listed as sex offenders. Michigan sex offender law is recognized as among the strictest in the country. The law requires that the offenders register with authorities on a regular basis and prohibits convicted sex offenders from residing within a student safety zone which is defined as the area that lies 1,000 feet or less from school property. That’s it.
My attorney says I have no cause to evict them as long as they follow the rules and pay their rent. If I do try to evict them on “moral grounds”, I am opening myself up to litigation. So you may want to study your state law before you let your emotions dictate your actions.
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Your rules say sex-offenders are allowed?? You have a right to not accept them in particular if the park has children or your NEW customers have children would not stay there because of the PROBLEM!!! decide to live elsewhere!! As the park owner would you place YOUR children in that circumstance!!
Carl, calm down. I merely said this is the law in Michigan and relayed my attorney’s opinion. I inherited these offenders with the purchase of the parks and all my new tenants go through a background search. FYI two of these offenders currently have wives and children. They committed their “crimes” when they were 17 and 18 respectively (over 30 years ago and both for sexual relations with their under-18 girlfriends). When a family wants to move in, I tell them about the presence of the sex offenders and let them decide if that’s a deal breaker.
On a side note, this forum is for reasonable and rational discourse. That means fact based discussions - not emotional accusations embellished with all caps and double/triple punctuation. If you can make a positive point, then have at it. Otherwise save it for your other social media ventures.
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If you would notice I was the one with a question from the start–very rational–as a father of 4 daughters and a public school teacher some of us try to be responsible parents. Having owned over 14 parks we have never faced that problem until we were looking at a park in
Florida. As per MI. graduated from GVSU and just worked on a deal at Greenville, MI. Same question would you have your children living next door??? People can change, so why after 30 years are they still consider sex offender. Maybe the law needs to be changed. So what was said that was irrational and and unbecoming for discussion??? How long have you been on this form?
I’ve been here for 4 years as if that matters. Bringing 37 years investment real estate experience to the forum. To answer your question, no, I wouldn’t want my children to live in a park with sexual predators. I’m just sharing my attorney’s interpretation of the law. You do whatever you want - it’s a free country. In the meanwhile, this has become non-productive so let’s just say "you’re right and I’m wrong . Now go make some money.
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You hint on a few topics including 1) sex offenders 2) all cash request and 3) not presenting offer. I will touch on 1 and 2.
Seller not telling you about sex offenders is a non-issue. You can go to any public website and find them on your own. If you do see 1 or 2, again it is not a major crisis. Tenants and kids are not immediately driven away by these guys unless they are committing some type of negative action in the park. We had 2 sex offenders in a new park we bought, but the place was humming and had families everywhere. We eventually removed the sex offender for two reasons 1) we started getting complaints from tenants with kids and 2) other sex offenders saw that he lived there, so they thought it was a welcome place for them and they wanted to live there too.
In the long-run, I think it is best to remove them, but it is not always a crisis situation.
Regarding the “all cash” request, please keep in mind that a mortgage from the bank to you to buy the park is all cash to the seller. I would not consider that a red flag. It means he doesn’t want to finance the park to you.