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Mobile Home Park News Briefing

WRAL: Cary mobile home residents ask developers to pay relocation costs after property sale

Preview:

Residents of a Cary mobile home park were in downtown Raleigh on Tuesday demanding support and compensation from a potential developer as they're being forced to leave their homes.

"Where we live now, it doesn’t look like much to many people, but for us it’s home," said Abigael Dawah. Some of the144 families who live at Chatham Estates pay $400 a month to rent their lots.

They got a letter in January from the current owner, who is selling the land, citing his age and health.

The potential new owner is expected to redevelop the area with more than 300 multi-family units and nearly 100 townhouses.

"We’re asking the Town of Cary for a...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust.

Trib Live: Mobile home park owner takes over as Westmoreland County’s top taxpayer

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A New Jersey-based company that owns mobile home parks and prefabricated residential communities in a dozen states will be Westmoreland County’s largest taxpayer in 2026.

New totals from the county’s tax assessment office reveal United Mobile Homes Properties Inc. has taken the top spot among local taxpayers, replacing the owners of Westmoreland Mall in Hempfield who for decades topped the list of property owners with the most valued assets.

According to the most recent figures, the company’s holdings in the county are assessed at more than $12.4 million, which translates to a market value of more than $140 million.

The company owns more...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Yes, mobile home parks have risen in value every year for the past half-century while office building and shopping mall values have collapsed. I will never forget my first loan meeting on a mobile home park in which the banker told me “we don’t really want to lend on ugly things like trailer parks when we can lend on classy things like office buildings”. I guess everyone found out that ugly things with cash flow beat classy things with no tenants.

River Reporter: Kay supports bill for transparency for manufactured home residents

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ALBANY, NY — Assembly Member Paula Elaine Kay announced that she has signed on and is advocating for legislation that requires manufactured home park owners to provide a written justification for any rent increase exceeding three percent of the current rent. Additionally, property owners must make supporting documentation available to residents upon request, ensuring that increases are clearly explained and tied to legitimate costs. This bill passed the Senate this year and is currently in the Assembly Standing Committee on Housing.

“I’m a proud co-sponsor of bill A340A, a measure aimed at strengthening protections for residents of...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

“This legislation is about fairness and transparency,” said Kay. “Residents of manufactured home communities deserve clear, honest explanations when their housing costs rise”…

Of course, it’s only fair since I receive a written explanation of every other cost in life that goes up, such as gas, insurance, property tax, food, utilities, etc. Wait a minute, actually I don’t receive any explanation on literally any of those things. So then why are only mobile home park owners singled out? Because the Free Rent Movement – of which New York is the ringleader – want to destroy all landlords and take their properties from them. Just listen to a Mamdani speech for proof of this.

 

Tampa Bay Times: Could FEMA hurricane rules wipe out Florida’s mobile homes?

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Wendy and Phil Durocher took their seats in a dim conference room in the annals of the Pinellas County courthouse and got ready to plead their case. They came armed with a binder of receipts, itemized spreadsheets and photographs of their storm-damaged mobile home, meticulously highlighted and annotated.

After months of agonizing, a county magistrate would soon decide whether the Durochers would be allowed to keep their Palm Harbor home, deemed “substantially damaged” from flooding during Hurricane Helene.

Unless the Durochers could prove the county’s building department had miscalculated, their home would have to be torn down or...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Ronald Reagan summed it up when he said “the most dangerous nine words in the English language are: I’m from the government and I’m here to help”.

Lancaster Online: Warwick Twp. OKs United Zion Retirement Community expansion, displacing mobile home residents

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When: Warwick Township Board of Supervisors meeting, April 15.

What happened: Warwick Township supervisors gave unanimous approval to a conditional use application from United Zion Retirement Community to build a medical residential campus adjacent to the existing 157-unit retirement community. The township attached 15 conditions.

Details: United Zion is proposing to construct 78 independent living duplex and townhouse units, with an associated community building and a maintenance building on property it owns at 70 Sherry Drive, Lititz. That land is located at Plateau Village, a mobile home community of 70 mostly older residents. Those...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust.

Hoodline: Tiny Pacifica Trailer Park Fetches $39.5M For Slice Of Oceanfront

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One of Pacifica's most unassuming ocean neighbors just sold for a decidedly not-so-modest price. Saunders Property Company has snapped up Viewpointe at Seaside, a 93-unit manufactured-housing community on the city's coast, for $39.5 million. The ocean-adjacent property at 1300 Palmetto Avenue features a mix of one- and two-bedroom homes on leased pads. The deal shifts the park from former owner The Carlyle Group to an institutional investor that has been quietly racking up mobile-home acquisitions across California, a type of transaction that local watchers say can have outsized impacts on lot rents and long-term affordability in the Bay...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

I’m sure that it will be soon announced that another park bites the dust.

MTFP: Mobile home park unions push ahead on lease negotiations

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On what was the coldest day of April so far, residents of two Missoula-area mobile home parks sat down for lease negotiations with their Texas-based landlord — a first in Montana history, according to the Missoula Tenants Union.

Representatives from Oak Wood Ventures visited Missoula last week to meet with residents of Travois Village in Missoula and Harvey’s mobile home park in Bonner, which the company bought in 2023. After rent increases and other issues, residents of the parks formed two tenants unions and demanded Oak Wood meet with them to negotiate a new lease. 

On Thursday, that meeting actually happened — a fact that tenant...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

There is no such thing as a Montana trailer park “tenant union”. To quote AI: “In Montana there is no state-run "official" registry or government-sanctioned tenant union”. So why did someone even write this story? Because woke writers LOVE the concept of unions – whether it’s the teacher’s union or the teamsters. It makes them think of socialism, communism and all the things they crave. But, sadly, it’s utter nonsense.

VC Star: Camarillo weighs mobile home rent ordinance. Here's what's at stake

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The Camarillo City Council will consider adopting the city’s first permanent rent stabilization ordinance for the city's three mobile home parks April 22.

The proposed ordinance aims to maintain affordable housing for residents while allowing owners to earn a reasonable profit.

If adopted, the regulations would prevent the gap between rent at mobile home parks in the city and rent at other Ventura County mobile home parks from growing wider.

The council voted 3-2 last month to reject a previous version of the ordinance to allow for further revision.

“I think the draft ordinance as it’s currently presented goes overboard in its protection...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

“I think the draft ordinance as it’s currently presented goes overboard in its protection of current residents, and I think it’s unfair to park owners,” Council member Tony Trembley said during the March 25 meeting.

Well, at least one person in Camarillo has a brain.

Capital B News: This Trailer Park Helped Make Atlanta the Eviction Capital of America

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Stephania Melton has been fighting to keep a roof over her head ever since she and her four children moved into their three-bedroom trailer in the Hunter Ridge Mobile Home Park more than two years ago.

The 44-year-old cook and kitchen supervisor from Alabama said the trouble began around March of 2024 after payments for several bills were deducted from her bank account simultaneously, leaving her $2 short on her $1,300 monthly rent.

The Hunter Ridge online payment portal locked her out. 

“I wasn’t able to pay my rent,” Melton told Capital B Atlanta while standing outside her home near Jonesboro. “It’s been two years and they still say,...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

A tenant’s financial mismanagement is hardly the fault of the park owner. I’m willing to bet this person has a zillion other unpaid bills, ranging from their car payment to their insurance. And I’m also betting that any sane adult reading this article already figured that out.

The moral of this article, to me, is do NOT engage in park-owned home rentals. Because this is the type of tenant you frequently get, and the end result is that they will destroy the house, not pay their rent, and then simply run off. It’s a terrible business model. Just rent the land like I’ve been telling you to do for the past 30 years. Let apartment owners deal with this type of tenant.

The News & Observer: A $30M sale is set to reshape Cary and displace 140 families in Chatham Estates

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For decades, Chatham Estates Mobile Home Park has been a quiet pocket of affordability for hundreds of families, seniors and immigrants in Cary.

But fears of displacement have loomed over the 27-acre mobile-home community, and now with a planned sale they are a reality.

According to Town of Cary records, Pennsylvania-based luxury builder Toll Brothers is under contract to buy the land at 607 Cedar St. for the Maple Avenue redevelopment project. The property, owned by Curtis Westbrook Sr. for over 40 years, is expected to sell for about $30 million, according to Triangle Business Journal, which first reported the news.

Toll Brothers and...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust.

WIFR: Ownership change at mobile home park may force Rockford residents off property

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ROCKFORD, Ill. (WIFR) - A fishing pole rests on the ground in Elizabeth Small’s backyard. The owner of a mobile home says it needs a few tweaks before she can cast off again.

Small instead spends her focus on yard work this day off.

“I’m so proud of this place. I really am,” she celebrated.

Inside Riverview Mobile Home Park at 2530 South Main Street, Rockford, the 37-year-old finds a slice of peace on her lot. The property is sandwiched between Illinois Route 2, a gateway into downtown, as well as the Rock River — Small’s backyard.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust.

City of Sonoma: City Council to Hold Study Session on Draft Mobilehome Park Closure and Conversion Ordinance

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The Sonoma City Council will hold a study session at their April 15, 2026, meeting, to review and discuss a draft ordinance related to mobilehome park closures and conversions.

This draft ordinance reflects direction previously provided by the City Council and incorporates updates to align with recent changes in state law, including AB 2782 and SB 610. The proposed updates focus on strengthening requirements related to relocation impact reports, notice timelines, relocation assistance, and protections for residents, particularly for lower-income households and individuals with disabilities.

As part of this study session, the Council will...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Sonoma is doing this because they can already tell their “landlord unfriendly” politics are creating the obvious byproduct of park closures. Just ask New York how the “tax the rich” program is working out for them. The free market works and regulations don’t.

KJZZ: Mobile home advocacy groups are pushing more bills in the Arizona Legislature

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In 2024, a coalition in Arizona successfully changed state law to keep mobile home park owners from restricting certain air conditioners that were considered ugly or noisy.

Now, one of those stakeholder groups is pushing new legislation to improve these communities.

The Arizona Association of Manufactured Home Owners held eight listening sessions with residents, utility companies and groups like the anti-poverty organizer Wildfire AZ to help draft bills that would not only change state law but also add more enforcement.

One bill would require more education for park managers; two others would prevent park owners from charging residents...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

At least eight bills related to mobile homes have been introduced this session, but only a few have moved out of the chamber where they originated — which means they could end up going nowhere

Reality check: Arizona is NOT trifecta blue. In fact, only the Governor is a democrat. So there is zero chance of passage of any socialist anti-landlord bill. Sorry, but if you want to live in a socialist state, you need to move to California. Everyone is fleeing so you’ll have no trouble finding an apartment there!

PESP: Congressman Frost introduces bill to defend manufactured home communities from Wall Street

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On March 23, Congressman Maxwell Frost (D-FL) introduced new legislation to promote affordable housing and fight back against profiteering Wall Street investors by helping residents purchase and own their parks.[1]  Titled the Promoting Residential Ownership of (PRO) Manufactured Home Communities Act, the act addresses the urgent need to protect manufactured housing residents from greed-driven skyrocketing costs, hostile eviction, and unlivable conditions.[2]

The legislation aims to help residents build wealth and maintain long-term housing stability in the face of those rising costs.[3]  “Manufactured housing should be an opportunity for...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

“While this legislation faces an uphill legal battle under a Republican-controlled Congress…”

So if this bill has a zero percent chance of passage, I wonder what Congressman Frost is really up to? Could it be pandering to the crowd before the midterms? Certainly, he wouldn’t waste everyone’s time over something totally self-serving like that, right?

Here’s a statistic you need to be aware of. Since getting into Congress, Max Frost has introduced over 100 bills and, to date, NOT ONE OF THEM HAS EVER PASSED. Pretty impressive results, if you ask me. Only in Washington, D.C. could you have over 100 failures in a row and still keep your job. Winston Churchill summed it up when he said “to lose faith in democracy, all you have to do is talk to some voters”.

The Sopris Sun: BOCC declines to help residents purchase Cavern Springs Mobile Home Park

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Sometimes it doesn’t matter how many heavy hitters are on your side or how many of your ducks are in a row, those in a position of power just won’t budge. That was the case at Monday’s Garfield County Commissioner (BOCC) meeting when a group of said heavy hitters, supporting residents of the 98-lot Cavern Springs Mobile Home Park, who want to purchase the park, showed up bright and early for the public comment period. 

Last year, Aspen-Basalt and Mountain Valley mobile home park residents in the Roaring Fork Valley successfully purchased the parks for $42 million. April Long, executive director of the West Mountain Regional Housing...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

But the BOCC chose not to help Cavern Springs residents take control of their housing. Commission Chair Tom Jankovsky said that the county has reserves now but may not in the next 10 years if oil and gas revenue does not return, and that the budget is tight. “We cut $3.5 million last year out of our salaries — 35 positions we didn’t fund in Garfield County — because we didn’t have the funding,” he told the audience. “We cut back our capital projects from $15 million to $5 million. And that $5 million goes right against reserves. So, at least this commissioner doesn’t see us in a position to help with this.” County communications officer Renelle Lott, told The Sopris Sun in an email, “The county has not contributed public funds to assist in private/owner purchases of mobile home parks or individual homes.” 

Ah yes, the cold hard reality of the whole “tenant-owned parks” concept. These deals only exist through non-profits forking over all the capital and guaranteeing all the debt. And most places in America are not exactly flush with cash. That’s the case in Garfield County and just about every other county in the U.S. So, as a result, the whole “tenant-owned park” concept is coming to an end. Sure, it was a fun ride for those groups who got fees from these deals, as well as virtue-signaling press releases – not to mention their five minutes of fame. But it’s about time that everyone acknowledge that these were never “tenant-owned communities” in the first place, but always just “non-profit owned communities” – and that’s who shows on the title and the loans. It was a fun ride, but the real backers of these things are moving on and throwing their cash at new ways to grab headlines.

12News: Seniors forced to relocate after Mesa mobile home park closure

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A mobile home park closure in Mesa is forcing residents to relocate.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust.

CBS NEWS: Residents of Little Havana mobile home park seek help from officials and organizations after facing sudden eviction

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More than 200 families living in a mobile home park in Little Havana are urgently seeking help from elected officials and community organizations as they face eviction within the next six months.

Residents at Silver Court Mobile Home Park were notified on March 11 that they must vacate the land by Sept. 30. The notice was sent by The Urban Group, a firm representing the property owner. Those who leave earlier — by May 31 — are eligible for the highest financial incentive.

For many, however, the compensation being offered is not enough.

"I think it should be a specific stipend," State Sen. Ileana Garcia said. "I don't think they should be...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

And another park bites the dust.

NH Business Review: ADUs, manufactured homes can help with NH housing crisis

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Galanis and Vayo, along with Abby Bronson, director of policy and advocacy at the Community Loan Fund, participated in a forum entitled “Home Sweet (Extra) Home: How ADUs and other alternatives can boost housing supply in NH.” The April 2 webinar was hosted by NH Business Review.

Housing supply and its affordability are an important workforce issue in New Hampshire, according to Galanis.

She offered data that shows how New Hampshire is making progress on replenishing its housing supply, but that it needs to happen at a faster pace and it needs to be more affordable.

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

According to AI: from July 2024 to July 2025, the state experienced a net gain of 6,554 people.

Texas added around 400,000 new residents during that same period while New Hampshire added a whopping 6,554? Exactly how then is New Hampshire in a “housing crisis”? There are around 93,000 vacant housing units in New Hampshire. Wouldn’t you have to have more people moving to that state than there are existing residential units for it to be in a “crisis”mode? I’m baffled.

Sounds like the typical political grandstanding in a midterm election year to me.

Lost Coast Outpost: After Many Revisions, Fortuna City Council Passes Rent Guidelines for Mobile Homes

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After almost a year of advocacy and tinkering, Fortuna’s city council decided last night to adopt a rent stabilization ordinance for the 283 mobile homes within its city limits. 

Last summer, residents of the Royal Crest mobile home park, many of them on fixed incomes and threatened by the possibility of becoming homeless, began clamoring for rules that would govern how much the owners of the park could increase their rents. The back-and-forth negotiations between the residents, the city, and the owners has taken up much of the last nine months. 

Even in its completed form, none of the representatives from the park’s advocacy organization...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

If there’s a single mobile home park still standing in Fortuna five years from now, it will be a miracle. Why would anyone not tear their park down and develop it to a different use with no rent control?

AZ Luminaria: Mobile home legislation in Arizona target utility costs, abandonment rules and manager training

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For years, manufactured home park owners across Arizona would restrict what types of air conditioners or cooling devices people used on their mobile homes because they were noisy or ugly. That was until 2024, when a coalition of groups changed state law to make the practice illegal. 

Now a new legislative session is in full swing, and with it the hopes for new tools to improve the experiences of mobile home residents in Arizona.

Kath Noble is the president of the Arizona Association of Manufactured Home Owners, one of the groups involved in changing the 2024 law.

This year, she and other stakeholders around the state spent months in...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

“You have to find a Republican sponsor. If you find a Democratic sponsor it will die in committee,” Noble says. “And most bills die in committee.” 

Yes, that sums it up. Passing endless regulations against landlords just doesn’t happen in any state that is not trifecta blue. Arizona is NOT trifecta blue, in fact, it’s not even close. The only thing Democrat in Arizona is the Governor. While any idiot can throw out a new pro-tenant bill (and many do) the odds of passage are, in fact, 0% in this case so why even bother to write an article about it?

NPR: Mobile home residents band together to keep trailer parks affordable

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On a Saturday morning in the ski town of Durango, Colo., a family of five lounges in their pajamas inside a small, rectangular mobile home. This is the trailer Verónica and her family have called home for almost a decade.

Down a narrow hallway, there are a couple of closet-sized bedrooms and a small bathroom with a cheerful gnome shower curtain. But the open-floor-plan living room-meets-kitchen is the preferred hangout space. Right now, a kid's cartoon blares on the TV.

"To the outside world, it might just seem like a tiny little trailer," Verónica said in Spanish. "But to us, it's a home, cozy and full of love, peace and calm."

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

The media loves to make these stories out like it’s some type of cage fight between evil corporate landlords and the angelic tenants – kind of a David vs. Goliath schtick. But the truth is that mobile home park sellers could care less if a non-profit buys their park or not: they are simply focused on getting top dollar. Why do woke writers have to make every article into a showcase on socialism? It’s getting boring.

MPR News: Bill before state lawmakers looks to regulate and cap rent at mobile home parks

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For many people, mobile home parks are an affordable place to raise a family or retire. But manufactured housing is also big business in Minnesota for out-of-state buyers.

Cait Kelley shared her reporting on a bill before the Minnesota Legislature that aims to keep parks budget-friendly.

We attempt to make transcripts for Minnesota Now available the next business day after a broadcast. When ready they will appear here.

Audio transcript [THEME MUSIC] NINA MOINI: For our top story today, we are taking a look at one of the housing bills that's still active at the State Capitol. For many people, mobile home parks are an affordable place to... Read More

Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

Minnesota is no longer trifecta blue and, as a result, has zero statistical chance of passing any form of rent control (the current batting average over the past century is that you have a 100% chance of zero rent control passage unless you have a Democrat House, Senate and Governor). So you can pretty much disregard this nonsense unless a state is trifecta blue – which used to be the case in Minnesota until the 2024 elections blew the blue trifecta to smithereens.

Shelterforce: The Federal Housing Bill: ‘A Bunch of Tweaks, But Good Ones’

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In a Congress largely marked by gridlock, housing may soon be an exception. Or, if the effort to pass the current housing bill falls short, it could be yet another confirmation of federal dysfunction.

As Kim Johnson, senior director of policy at the National Low Income Housing Coalition (NLIHC), observes, “Something needs to be done on housing, and a lot of that stems from members of Congress simply hearing from their constituents.” She cautions, though, that “the trickier question has always been, What is that thing or things that need to be done?

In this year’s Congress, housing legislation has moved quite far, with each house of...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe
  • Incentivize local communities to support land use reforms that make housing construction easier by giving them priority in accessing competitive federal grant money if they add density bonuses and similar measures.
  • Increase the cap on “public welfare investments” from 15 percent of a bank’s capital and surplus to 20 percent to help boost available affordable housing financing by banks.
  • Eliminate the chassis requirement for manufacturing housing, a measure supported by low-income housing groups to reduce housing construction costs.
  • Revise community development block grant (CDBG) rules to make it easier to use CDBG funds for housing construction.
  • Reduce environmental review requirements for small and infill housing projects to speed construction and reduce costs.
  • Authorize a competitive grant program to support local governments and tribes that demonstrate measurable increases in housing supply, incentivizing reforms such as streamlined permitting, density bonuses, and zoning changes.

Does anyone seriously believe that any of the above will accomplish anything meaningful in the years ahead? Of course, the answer is “no”. This is all just posturing for midterms. Teddy Roosevelt once said “we shall endeavor to persevere” which is one of the most meaningless statements in American history – and these acts fit that template.

Penn Live: Rent control won’t save manufactured housing—it will undermine it | Opinion

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There’s a simple reality getting lost in the conversation around rent control in Pennsylvania: it doesn’t protect affordability. It reduces it over time. This isn’t theoretical. Extensive studies show rent control lowers housing quality, discourages investment, and ultimately reduces the supply of affordable housing.

I own a manufactured home community in Bedford County. I’m a hands-on operator, and over the past year I’ve invested heavily to improve the property.

When I bought the community, it was neglected. Residents dealt with muddy driveways, overgrown trees, junk accumulation, blighted homes, and rampant drug activity.

Since...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe
There’s a simple reality getting lost in the conversation around rent control in Pennsylvania: it doesn’t protect affordability. It reduces it over time. This isn’t theoretical. Extensive studies show rent control lowers housing quality, discourages investment, and ultimately reduces the supply of affordable housing.
 
Of course, it’s all true. But I wouldn’t be too worried about rent control in Pennsylvania as HB1250 (the rent control bill) has absolutely no chance of advancing (or even being heard) by the Republican-held Senate. It’s been dead-on-arrive, in fact, for over a year now.

Los Angeles Daily News: Do Palisades mobile home residents have a right to return after fire? The tale of two sites

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Former residents of the fire-ravaged Tahitian Terrace mobile home park in Pacific Palisades are no longer waiting to see what happens to the land where their homes once stood.

Instead, they’re organizing—reviving a residents’ association, working with a statewide advocacy group and exploring a plan to collectively buy the property, which was home to about 150 units before the fire, so they can rebuild and return.

For some, the loss was immediate. Chris Russo, who had just closed escrow on a  670-square-foot home near the beach that she had saved up to buy and grow old in, said the fire destroyed the community the very next day.

“This...

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Our thoughts on this story:

Frank Rolfe

I would say “and another park bites the dust” but these already did and the land will surely be redeveloped shortly.