How much to pay/How much to ask?

[Lance H.]

Hi Everyone,

I've been driving a specific park now for quite a while, talking with people walking around, calling on for sale signs, ect. I'm planning to go see a home tomorrow, the problem I'm having is knowing what I can pay and still make money.

The home I'm seeing is a 1976, 14X70 2 bedroom in a pretty decent park. Needs no work. I feel clueless as to how much I can sell it for, so I don't know what I can offer to pay for it. Do I need to get it under 5k to make money, or can I pay 8 and still do well?

Any advice on how to proceed would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Lance

[Terry Drake]

The question I ask myself is "How long do I want to wait to make a profit?"

If you paid 8k for a home and sold it as is for 1k down and $250/month it would take almost 2.5 years before you even broke even on the deal. Two and a half years is a long time for things to go wrong and leave you with a home you didn't make any money on and one that needed more repairs once you get it back. Of course if you can get higher down payments and/or higher monthly payments then that's a different story. Typically I like to make my money back in 6-8 months on a MH or up to a year max if it was a juicy deal.

Keep in mind your seller is most likely going to want to sell it to you at retail when you really need to buy wholesale or below so YOU can sell at retail and make a profit.

You should also be looking at mobile homes for sale every day on craigslist to get an idea of what's moving out there and for how much.