How do I target Mobile homes?

Question

How do you target mobile homes or do you just mail out to areas where they're prevalent?

I hope there's not a list on list source called mobile homes.

Sam Parkins · Answer

I'll add to my post earlier by mentioning the seriousness of your investing. All points are accurate as to where to find deals and I'll add more, however I'll say that should you want to run a SYSTEMATIC business look into mailing. And by all means, we did them ALL not just one.

• Yes, drive by parks and look for for sale signs
• YES! Target your park (if you want a park home) individually with flyers if you're not mailing. We've mailed AND delivered flyers to targeted parks.
• Almost as important (maybe more) befriend the park owners/managers. They are your key!
• Search Craigslist, MH Village, other Classified sites for available homes
• Newspapers and more importantly weekly periodicals for your area. The type they sell in the gas stations (Penny Savers, etc.)

Once you get to enough people (if you're working hard maybe about 2 to 6 months) and you start to buy some homes and follow through (build trust) parks will start sending you leads as well as others.

However, if you want to systematize your business (when we got to full throttle we ran out of homes to buy in our target counties as we bought all the one's we wanted) then you'll create a business that can run on it's own if you're able to use mailings. You'll create leads when parks don't have any, you'll have widespread name recognition creating more referrals, etc. There are some great examples of these types of systematic businesses - look for very successful land wholesalers or even home flippers. Further, we've gotten leads from bank tellers, gov. employees, park managers, other investors, etc.!

The mailings will also get you to vacant and out of town owners. You'll get some GREAT deals with folks that just need their home OFF of their land/property in addition to hitting all the parks if you mail to personal property lists. So you know, most counties we mailed to ended up at about 2500 to 4500 mailings once we filtered everything.

Hope that helps.

And for homes on private land, you'll have many that are still personal property and you'll have many that are real property. Unfortunately, there's no great answer for targeting to buy these homes unless you wanted to do drive-by's or mail to both personal and real property. You can filter your lists in both personal and real to uncover the ones most likely on property but you'll have a few more steps.

And finally, if the mobile home is personal property it has a title (like a used car). If it is real property then technically the title would have been shredded by the DMV and it has become part of the land just like a house is part of the land. In that case, no title but it should be named on the deed. In cases like that you can still buy the home, but make sure you know what you're doing as you will NOT be able to get another title for it. Some buyers will not buy unless they receive a title even though you can use a Bill of Sale which accomplishes the same transfer of ownership in the eyes of the DMV.

Dean De Pew · Answer

Some state do allow the mobile to be re-titled by DMV. Arizona for one. In some states, a title company can really be your friend. The have the entire county records available and many will supply you with mailing labels or at least the data of about any kind of property you want. Even Mobile Homes. Vacant land, set up for a mobile can = a mobile home on that land that is sometimes a rental, sometimes even an abandoned mobile. Land owners sometimes will literally GIVE you the mobile (0 dollars) just to clear the land, so they can set it up for the next tenant. I have picked up at least 5 or 6 homes this way. Not beautiful but not bad either. Talk to the dealers, sometimes they get trade ins that they do not want on their sales lot, because they are too OLD looking. metal on metal etc. They are frequently less than $5,000.  It is amazing what a coat of paint will do. Sometimes if the rest of the home is nice enough, it is easy to justify putting hardboard siding on it, usually under $1,000. Take an ancient home, strip the aluminum, re-cycle it and offset the cost of the hardboard siding. While the insulation is exposed, it is easy to re-do any problem areas and fix wiring issues too. Only takes a couple of days with 2-3 good guys. When done you might have 7-8K in it and can sell it to someone that has no way to buy a regular home, because of credit, for $15,000 or more on payments. I did this many times. Sometimes several times on the same home. Beware! Mobile home buyers are motivated by different things than the site built home buyer is. Go in with your eyes wide open!

Gene Hacker · Answer

Are you looking for homes in parks or homes on private land?

For parks the best thing to do is hire someone to drive parks in your area and take pictures of for sale signs and document as much additional information as possible (condition, address, etc).  It is common for sellers to have pretty high asking prices but when push comes to shove and they have to move...they will drop the price dramatically.  I have seen homes where the sellers are trying to get 20K and when they run out of time they firesale for less than 5k.  The key is to contact these sellers with a letter saying you are a cash buyer and can close quick.  They will keep your letter as a "worst case scenario", which ends up playing out more than most mobile home sellers realize.

Sam Parkins · Answer

If you're serious then call your target county (pick a county or locality) and get a list of homes as personal property. You can then sort that list and mail to home owners that have them as personal property - not real estate.

For real estate mobile homes (title turned in and more than likely a permanent foundation under the home) they'll be listed in the county as real property.

Depending on your locations the counties may think you've gone insane with your request, so be prepared to explain to them exactly what you want/need. And I believe you can only request the name & address as that's public information. Again, you can mail merge name & address into your mailing and get the job done after you get a list.

Teresa Ludlow · Answer

Mike Watkins

In some states, manufactured homes are considered "non-permanent" housing and can't have the electric meter attached to the structure itself.  Maybe there is a way that you can get a list from your local electric company of "temporary" meters as a way to separate stick built from mobile on private land?

Good luck

Mark Hull · Answer

Mike Watkins  said, a great start to look for the land/mobile home combo would be to do a personal property on land search and just mail to as many as you can?  I wonder how many of these are investor owned vs just owner occupied?  If you have land or can get some, i think driving the parks/talking to park managers would be a great way to find a home to move on your land.

Dawn Young · Answer

Fo you remember which number podcast?  I'd like to listen to it, too.

Mike Watkins · Answer

no just the ones on private land. I would have never thought of that.

I just got done listening to the podcast about mobile homes. It was the one thing they didn't cover.

Ken Rishel · Answer

Prior to the sale of our lending operation, we sent one of our employees into every community we wanted to lend in to put door hangers on every home that looked to meet our standards offering to refinance their home loan on better terms than they currently had with their current lender. The program worked very well for us. I would think it would work for people looking to purchase homes as well.

Mike Watkins · Answer

that's great. Thanks for the info. Will the mobile home have a title like a house would?

How do I target Mobile homes?

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