I have a lead on a great deal on a double wide in a park that is new to me. I contacted the management to let them know that I wanted to buy a home and their park and then sell it with owner financing. The park manager told me that the owners would not allow land contracts. I asked for the park rule that stated that and after some prodding they looked it up and it said “land contracts with written permission only”. I think that ticked that manager off because she is dragging her feet on getting me the information I need to submit my request. Since the owners are moving on July 13, I am exploring my options assuming that my request will be denied.
First of all I contend that “land contract” refers to deals with real estate, hence the word “land”, and MHs are personal property and I should have the right to sell my personal property using self financing if I choose. Of course this could lead to the park telling me to move the MH since I violated their interpretation of the park rules.
Option 1. Go ahead and buy the property, do not submit application for residency (I don’t have a dealer’s license), and sell using self financing. If they find out and try to eject the MH, argue in court that it was not a land contract.
Question 1. Do you think this argument would hold up?
Option 2. Sign an option to purchase agreement with the sellers and then finance the buyers. That way I never own it. Surely there are other MHs in the park that have been financed by others such as dealers or banks.
Question 2. Do you think this would work?
Please submit any other thoughts or opinions.
I think you need to walk away from this one. The number one rule in doing deals is making sure you can do a deal in the park. If you have already ticked off the manager you aren’t going to get anywhere. I bet they can evict your home because you did not put in an application if for no other reason. Most parks do not allow sales without approval of park management.
Where would you be then? Remember, you are wanting to play in THEIR sandbox.
Thank you for your comment. I’m curious as to how a park can require approval of a sale of something they don’t own. It is my opinion that they have approval authority of who rents their lot (to a degree), but it should be my property to sell how I see fit. The manager is only miffed because I called her on it and found her wrong. My first step is to get my letter to the right people who have the decision ability.
You are probably right that I should walk if that is denied, but now I’m ticked off.
If you were moving it out of the park there would not be an issue. Since you are NOT planning to move it out of the park you would need to be approved by the park to own a home in their park. Credit and background checks are normally run on potential owners before they are approved.
If you had the Manager on your side with what you do, they might not require said approval. (We have never had to be approved to work in someone else’s park because we explained what we were doing AND that we would never live there. Since they were well aware that it was a good situation for them and they were comfortable with us there was not an issue.) Some parks require ANY buyer to go through that process, if the home is to remain. The park also then gets to approve or deny your buyer. Plenty of people have gone wrong here, and if you have not got the manager on your side you may never get someone approved and be paying lot rent for a LONG time. Then how good is your deal?
As a park owner, if someone cannot follow our rules they will be gone. We always try to work situations through with everyone, but their attitude goes a long way toward how much we are willing to do. We DO evict people because of rule violations.
I suggest your read Deals on Wheels if you have never done so. If you have read it, it might be time to read it again.
I thought that was what I said. The park has control over who lives there, within legal guidelines and can check their credit and criminal history. They do not have the right to tell me how I sell my property, only who lives there. I definitely do not want to get into an adversarial situation if I can avoid it.
Yes I read all of Lonnie’s books and recently.
If the deal is really good why not consider moving the home. Now with this being a double wide I would think long and hard about the numbers but this is a viable option.
Another Lonnie Investor and I are exploring the option of moving homes from parks we do not have good working relationships with to parks where we do. We are doing this to gain concessions from our investor friendly park (Free lot rent on any homes in investory) The other Lonnie Investor actually started this process but the park he purchased the home in that would not work with him actually requested he keep the home in their park once he saw the rehab he was doing prior to moving it so he never even moved the home. Now he has done a couple of more deals in that park.
I agree with Ellen pass the deal up if you can not move it. Really pass up the deal if you have not done at least a couple of Lonnie deals because your do not want to move one of your first ones.
Having the PM in your corner is the first thing you need to deal in any park. You are right it is your toy but it is in their sand box. If you do not like the way they play in their sandbox either move the toy out of the sandbox or find another toy and sandbox to play in. Good luck.
Ruben D. Flores
816 918-9041
I’m with Lonnie, I’m too lazy to move a mobile home. They just closed a park in my city and I could have bought numerous Mhs at firesale bargain if I wanted to move them. I’m retired and would rather golf.
I totally agree that a good relation with the PM is critical. I am pursuing this by being very cordial and professional. i just wanted to explore my options and vent a little. I really don’t see where the park owners have the right to tell me how to sell my property.
I’m making too much money doing Lonnie deals in another park to get to worked up about 1 deal in a small park.