Buying a mobile home in OC SoCal

[Bryan Yang]

Hello, I’ve been looking for rentals somewhere in Huntington Beach or Westminster or Garden Grove area in Orange County California close to my work (Fountain Valley) but they seem to be way over priced for I’d be paying for. So I was looking into buying an older manufactured house around 50-60k (1990-2000) to save the down payment for a condo or townhouse. I’ve talked to a local real estate agent and the lot lease price seems to be around $1000-1200 in average price range. I’m not sure how often the park owners raise the price but I did my calculations with the current rate and it’d be somewhere between $1700-1800 per month. My financée and I make around 84k a year and have savings around 40k. I’m really not sure if we’d be making a wise decision here. I feel like if I fix up the mobile home and spend about 8-10k in a span of 3-4 years, it’d be a good investment but only thing that makes me feel unease is the possibility of monthly land price going up every year. My mother is really against the idea but I wanted to hear different opinions. I know, maybe I’m just seeking someone to say something positive so I can justify in my head what I’m planning on doing will work but I just really want to hear the honest facts plus opinions from people. Does anyone have an experience similar to my situation? Even if you don’t, what would you do if you were in my shoes?