On my morning walk I'll sometimes cut through a manufactured home community (as they're known, not trailer parks). I'm always impressed by the rows of neat well kept homes with their immaculate lawns. Some of the "trailers" even have attached garages and look almost stick built. Clearly the residents take as much pride in where they live as the folks in the million dollar home subdivision nearby.
I've been reading about the plight of communities like this one as private equity funds roll in and snap up parks. The people who live here don't have the financial or political clout to fight them. Most people who buy manufactured homes are already at a disadvantage due to paying much higher financing costs (banks don't consider them real property) and renting rather than owning their lots.
Also, the term "mobile home" is something of a misnomer. You can't simply hitch one to your car and pull it aways. Moving a home is costly (up to $15,000 or more) and may be beyond the resources of owners. So some people have been forced to leave their homes behind because they couldn't pay the inflated rent or the cost of moving it.
Like you, I'm not sure what the answer is to the understandable greed of investment funds. Maybe it could be public land banks that own trailer parks along with other property or legal prohibitions against buying homes you don't plan to actually occupy. After all, supposedly encouraging home ownership has been a national policy since World War II. (At least for some people. African Americans might contest that statement.)
On my morning walk I'll sometimes cut through a manufactured home community (as they're known, not trailer parks). I'm always impressed by the rows of neat well kept homes with their immaculate lawns. Some of the "trailers" even have attached garages and look almost stick built. Clearly the residents take as much pride in where they live as the folks in the million dollar home subdivision nearby.
I've been reading about the plight of communities like this one as private equity funds roll in and snap up parks. The people who live here don't have the financial or political clout to fight them. Most people who buy manufactured homes are already at a disadvantage due to paying much higher financing costs (banks don't consider them real property) and renting rather than owning their lots.
Also, the term "mobile home" is something of a misnomer. You can't simply hitch one to your car and pull it aways. Moving a home is costly (up to $15,000 or more) and may be beyond the resources of owners. So some people have been forced to leave their homes behind because they couldn't pay the inflated rent or the cost of moving it.
Like you, I'm not sure what the answer is to the understandable greed of investment funds. Maybe it could be public land banks that own trailer parks along with other property or legal prohibitions against buying homes you don't plan to actually occupy. After all, supposedly encouraging home ownership has been a national policy since World War II. (At least for some people. African Americans might contest that statement.)