Park Owners Filling Lots

[Jim Johnson]

So much has been discussed concerning the problem of filling lots in your MHP that have no homes on them. Well, we might have figured out how to solve this in at least one of our parks. Over the past 6 months or so I have been working with one of the local mobile home dealers. This is a guy that finds homes, and we would buy them from him. So after a purchase or two, I talked with him about pulling homes into our park and him selling them. He pulled a few in, and sold them right away. I have my manager show his homes, and he pays her a commission for each home she sells for him. I visited the park 4 weeks back and met with him. He said he was liking how fast homes would sell, but he was on pace to pull in one a month. It turns out, paying for the home and the moving expenses would only allow this pace. So after some thought, about 20 seconds... I offered to pay the moving and set up expenses on the rest of the homes he moves into the community. No space rent until they sell, and he can use the manager to show and sell his homes but I wanted her taken care of... 4 weeks later I have paid for 5 homes to be pulled in at $1700 per home. They are selling within a week of being set up, so 4 additional occupied lots in the last 4 weeks. The 5th home is being pulled in today, and we have a list of park approved people waiting for homes. 6 lots to go and the park will be full. We are going to pull out 6 older homes that we were going to remodel and sell... so I figure I have 12 more move in fees to pay... We are paying $300 per lot for tear downs...

In short- we are very dealer friendly. He finds homes in other parks that are not dealer friendly- and we offer to treat him right...

In short- this deal worked because everyone is being treated right... well... except the people who own the parks he is yanking homes out of...

relationships... relationships... relationships...

Just food for thought folks...