Safety and park roughness aside, assume that I have a park where I don’t have to pack a firearm on me 24/7. I figure I can cut my living costs down by 2-3k a month by living in a house on the property. That’s money I can invest in more real estate. What are my biggest risks and pitfalls? Is the biggest risk being muscled by tenants for breaks on rent? Will they still respect the park manager relationship if they know me the owner is also living on site?
Risk- you have not bought an investment- you have purchased a j - o - b. I would live onsite only if I had the skills needed right then and there to do something for the community. If it was hit by a disaster and I was needed to supervise something. that aside- I will NOT purchase anything I can drive to on a casual, unplanned day. Just my 2 cents, keep the change…
Think you are just starting out, you don’t have a lot of money yet, you look at a park manager getting free lot rent and you think I am managing this park and the free lot rent and managers pay may make the difference between being able to buy a park or not.
The most common response I see to this question is tenants will ask for money or rent concessions.
If you can honestly say yes my name is on the mortgage but I am financed to my eyeballs, look at the mobile home I live in, look at the car I drive, look at me working in the park every day, if you don’t pay your rent in full on time either you or I am going to be homeless, now seriously which one of us do you think it is going to be?
What can they really say?
So, how much legally can you write your living expenses off to your mobile home park?
I am actually even thinking about growing a vegetable garden…
You have to start somewhere, sometimes it is on the bottom…
I guess the big issue is where you are in life. I could see doing it if young and single and just starting to build your empire, or older without time or energy and just enough to get by with if you live in the park. I look at the retired manager in one of my nicer parks and could visualize being in his situation if times were tough and no improvements were on the horizon and I was getting close to the end of the road, only as the owner (I am glad to be living on a different planet from that situation an have built rings of protection to keep me from ever being in that situation…) But in most cases I think it does not make much sense. If you have the ability to buy a park you should have the ability to buy a house who’s payment at today’s low rates would not be that much more then the rent you would be giving up on the MH you would be living in. BTW, a lifetime ago, when I started out with apartments, I owned 30 apartments, but rented a room in a house for several years before my situation was rock solid. Everything I earned went back into the business.
single retired more time than money
good jobs are hard to find, nice to be your own boss
The parks I look at pay $1000 to $2000 a year for snow plowing,
I am a night owl anyway so I could do that too.
The park I am looking at now does have a house but it is rented at $650 a month
I would need the income more than the house.
Randy, I had a similar thought visiting my park today. If I ever had to live there because I hit hard times, then I would do it. I could deal with it. But if I did not have to I would never even think about it. Living in the park goes back to an earlier thread. If the tenants think you are their friends there is a strong possibility they may use you or try to get away with not paying.Park visit takes most for me 4 hours unless a major problem. Everything else is done at home. in my home!
I cannot imagine living at the park I am reviewin at the moment, it would be my first park. That being said, I can see both sides of the equation.
On one hand, I want my tenants to know I am going to provide a safe economical a e to stay and in return we are will follow the same rules. I do not see myself any better than any of these people just may have taken a different route. However I see the business side also, all about the bottom line.
I probably lie somewhere in the middle, but expect to sep d a lot on time initially on my first park as I work to turn for rental to lot based approach. My strategy has always been to find my first park close to home to minimize initial costs.