Mobile Home investment as a side deal?

[Eric Barnett]

I have been in the market to purchase a newer manufactured home to place on a five acre parcel of vacant land that I recently closed on. I paid $56,500 cash for the property and I would like to keep this build to under $136,000 all told as that is what I have on hand (roughly 80k). The SoCal mobile home market is active, and there are a lot of cheap units available. While I was not originally setting out to be a landlord, some of these units are cheap, in decent shape, and represent a valuable housing option for many people. I could take a portion of my remaining cash, say 50k, and buy two or three mobile homes, spend minimal on upgrades and either rent them out or owner finance them for a profit. This would mean putting off developing my own land for a time, but it looks to me to be a decent investment. Am I missing something? Are mobile homes that bad of investment, even as rentals? Home prices aren't getting any cheaper here, and people need places to live.