All Forum Posts by: Chris Ebert

@John Beck, are the leases longer than month-to-month? Either way, you should have tenants sign new leases before you close, eliminating any contract issues.

@Adam Philpot , you should also look into city & county ordinances/regulations around mobile home parks. Make sure your park is grandfathered, that you can replace homes, etc.

@Nathan Spradlin, I would recommend posting this in BP's 'Mobile Homes & Mobile Home Park Investing' forum. I will give you my quick take. This deal is extremely rich. Most park owners look for tenant-owned homes and any park-owned homes are given a significant discount in valuation. 7.5% cap rate isn't crazy for a 50+ unit park with majority tenant-owned. The problem with park owned homes is that managing maintenance costs is extremely difficult. My experience is that most parks where the majority of homes are park-owned are mom & pop operators who live close by and do the repairs themselves. I hope this helps. Feel free to DM me with any questions.

@Bob Jones, get the title in your name and the home is yours. Then the park cannot stop you from moving it unless there's some extreme nuance in a local ordinance (I've never heard of this but it can be a possibility). As always check w/ a local RE attorney.

@Sara Hopson, speak with your local magistrate to understand the process. This is ultimately the person that will render judgement.

@Michael Tucker, you can't beat online payments however I wouldn't expect too high of an adoption rate. You could offer online payments along with having the manager collect money orders and make the deposits. Ideally he/she would be able to manange the rent roll in that arrangement. If that doesn't work you could have the tenants deposit directly into your account (you provide deposit slips labeled w/ the unit #) and you manage the rent roll by viewing deposit images online.

@Matt Kauffman, the appraiser will have you walk thru the financials with him and confirm certain #'s (# of lots, avg. lot rent, who pays water/sewer, etc.)

@Will Graham, yes, look at market lot rents and then base your valuation off of that income with little if any assigned to home rental income. If it's a competitive situation, I would nail down resale value of the homes based on age and quality but understand you won't be able to have all homes sold off for a while.

@Michael Tucker, you should have a manager that you feel comfortable acting as an owner of the park as well. Empowering your manager should bring the best out of him. Plus you can see if the neglect was more of the manager's influence or the owner. 

@John Hovanec, unless you live nearby and will be doing all repairs yourself I would run the other way. While the gross income is $3k a month, you still have taxes, insurance, utilities, etc. Plus, your initial expenses due to deferred maintenance will eat into most, if not all, of that.