Posted by Rob Harris on June 30, 2001 at 18:23:44:
If the mobile home was in a mobile home park and the park owned the space that the mobile home was on— the answer is no. In my area the parks want the owner of the mobile home to live in the mobile home, and be on the title.
Some areas of the USA Parks do sell the lots or spaces the mobile home is on. In that case I don’t no if the park would agree.
If the mobile home is on its own land–say a 1 ac. lot with no other mobile homes then it would be treated just like a house —and could be l/o
Your on the right track don’t stop now. Use a different twist----like option to buy from the seller then find a buyer. You would be out very little money.
Some of my best returns, by percentage, have been on these “Aluminum Treasures”. I don’t quite understand it, but many folks like living in them, and whenever I have one vacant, it is darn near a fist-fight over prospective tenants, to get the lease. I have had success at buying them, set-up on their own property, and shy away from any in a Park, as the others have said. I have done several that were in Park, and sold on an owner financed arrangement, (Contr for Title), but the Park environment introduces too many elements that are out of your control, so best to stick to MH that either rent a seperate lot, or preferably, come with it;'s own lot; (and deed).
The owners of these gems, seem tog et pretty motivated when wanting out, which will create a good buying opportunity. Best to be very conservative, when establishing what you are willing to pay for these babies, cause the last thing that you would want is having an overpriced MH.
Yes, good money can be made doing mobile home lease/options. Check out the mobile home discussion group. Ernest Tew explains mobile home lease/options in his course called ?Getting Rich Helping Others?.
I?ve done one mobile home lease/option. I leased a home from the seller and took over his $165/mo payments, then found a buyer with $4k option money, who is leasing from me for $200/mo. Mobile homes depreciate, so you would have to be careful not to put your buyer in a deal where he’d be upside down when its time for him to purchase. The real obstacle is finding a park that will let you do lease/options. As Rob mentioned, most parks want the occupant to be on title. An important part of the business is getting tight with the park manager so these obstacles can be overcome. In my pet park, I?m the only guy who is allowed to do lease/options, because I?ve done many Lonnie Deals there, and they trust me. I’ve also done a number of flips, where I get an option from a seller to buy below retail (usually they just want someone to payoff their loan), then help a buyer get bank financing to purchase the home at full retail, and I collect on the spread. This was also suggested by Rob in his post.
Most of the mobile home investors that I know stick with Lonnie Deals (buy used trailers cheap for cash from motivated sellers, double or triple the price and resale by offering owner financing). They?re very profitable and relatively easy to do. If you?re interested in mobile home deals, I would suggest starting out by reading Deals on Wheels. That?s how most of the MH investors here got started.