Posted on 12/23/2005 9:46:06 AM PST by I_saw_the_light
S VEGAS - Wading nearly knee-deep in the mattresses, sooted clothing and discarded tires dumped outside his trailer, Rubin Reams wants visitors to know he hasn't always lived this way. The 51-year-old poker dealer never had much of a financial cushion. But he worked full time and steadily, and owned a 40-foot double tip-out trailer he happily called home. ADVERTISEMENT
Then the mobile home park he lived in was sold to a developer, and the rug — like the land — was pulled out from under him.
"I've always been able to survive. But sometimes I can't believe I got into this spot," he said, surveying his departed neighbors' abandoned belongings. "I feel like I've been slowly backed into a corner."
Reams is caught in a trend sweeping real estate markets where land prices and development are booming. Park owners are increasingly selling out for massive profits to developers who covet the land for posh condominiums, strip malls and office parks.
In the Las Vegas area, where the cost of an undeveloped acre has risen more than 80 percent in a year, 14 mobile home parks have closed or announced plans to close this year alone. That's more than the seven previous years combined.
Experts say the pattern is being repeated in pockets across the nation, particularly in Sun Belt and Pacific Northwest states.
Arizona has seen 30 parks close in the past two years, many in the path of Phoenix's eastern sprawl. Washington's mobile homeowners' association estimates the state has lost 500 mobile home spaces in the past 6 months. Florida is losing 5,000 to 10,000 mobile home spaces a year, according to industry estimates.
Many of the park owners who sell are mom and pop operators who have put off repairs and upgrades for years, can't accommodate newer, larger manufactured homes and charge little for rent. At the same time, corporations are opening bigger manufactured housing communities often filled with pricey high-end homes.
"These parks that are closing tend to be filled with older, small homes. Those homes are far more than affordable, they're cheap. It's for people who can't afford any other kind of housing," said George Allen, a mobile home park owner and real estate management consultant who writes an industry newsletter.
In Las Vegas, a city once known as an oasis of low-cost living, the median price of existing homes has reached $280,000, while the median household income hovers at about $49,300, according to Applied Analysis, a local research firm. Nurses, teachers, senior citizens and casino workers like Reams are increasingly finding it hard to buy into the market.
For many of these people, mobile homes and trailer-park living are a viable and attractive alternative, said Renee Diamond, head of the Nevada Division of Manufactured Housing. On the low end of the rental scale, homeowners like Reams can buy a trailer for several hundred dollars and pay $320 a month in rent. Slots in newer communities rent for about $550 a month.
"I'd just rather have something that was mine," said 39-year-old Shawn Kirby, a former resident of the now shuttered Tropicana Mobile Home park just off the Las Vegas Strip.
When the Tropicana sold to a Florida developer, Kirby and other residents were faced with two options: Let the owners pay for the move to another park or take a lump sum payout of the market value of their mobile homes. Kirby, like many Tropicana residents, took the payout — which at $3,700 dollars, was four times his monthly disability check.
Days after the deadline for relocation, Kirby was back at the eerie ghost town of abandoned trailers at the Tropicana looking for work helping the few lingering residents pack up and move. Several residents were still squatting in empty trailers without electricity or water. Scavengers picked through empty homes marked with orange spray paint to indicate they were slated for removal and probable destruction.
"It turned pretty dark," said Reams of his last few months at the Tropicana. Some desperate residents left behind what they didn't want or couldn't afford to take. The space in front of his trailer home became a de facto trash dump.
The process of uprooting a neighborhood is never pleasant or problem-free, said Marolyn Mann, executive director of the Nevada Manufactured Home Community Owners, a park owners' group. Mann noted that Nevada law requires owners to give six months notice to residents and follow strict procedures for removing or buying the homes. Many owners give more time and pay more than the law requires, but in the end, park owners have a right to sell their land, she said.
"I think it's appropriate to compensate residents fairly. But by their very definition these are mobile homes, meaning they're supposed to be mobile. They were never meant to be permanent," Mann said.
Nevada state officials say the law could be changed to benefit residents. Under current regulations, park owners are allowed to deduct the cost of the disposal of the home from the payout. That cost can often eat up the bulk of the payment, particularly for older mobile homes.
"In essence the homeowner can still end up getting zero," said Allen Scott, an investigator at the Nevada Division of Manufactured Housing.
Government officials in other states are looking at ways to cushion the transition. Housing advocates in Arizona have pushed for "right of first refusal" laws that give residents the first shot at buying the land before it can sold.
In Florida, local officials have begun to seek compensation from the deepest pockets. Elected leaders in Pinellas County, Florida, where 92,000 people live in mobile homes, approved a measure this week requiring developers wanting to rezone parks to pay rental assistance to residents for two years after relocation.
That additional assistance would have helped Reams, whose check from the Tropicana helped him excavate his trailer from the rubbish pile and set out in search of a new place to live.
He stayed at hotels and campgrounds for weeks, until finding a park off a highway just outside the city. His rent is a third more than what he paid at the Tropicana — and more than he can afford in the long-term. But he said it will have to do until he can find something else.
"No, I'm not quite settled, yet," he said. "That's an understatement."
Kirby and other residents were faced with two options: Let the owners pay for the move to another park or take a lump sum payout of the market value of their mobile homes. Kirby, like many Tropicana residents, took the payout — which at $3,700 dollars, was four times his monthly disability check. He could have kept his home at the park owners expense. Instead he chose instant gratification.
Days after the deadline for relocation, Kirby was back looking for work helping the few lingering residents pack up and move.
Didnt the previous paragraph say he was on disability? Geez. Get a dang job then and buy your own stinking property and quit WHINING.
What the H-E-double toothpick is wrong with this? People are selling land that belongs to them... AND...?
"I think it's appropriate to compensate residents fairly. But by their very definition these are mobile homes, meaning they're supposed to be mobile. They were never meant to be permanent," Mann said.
WHAT HAUGHTY ARROGANCE!
People whether impoverished or not, want to OWN the roof over their heads. This is WRONG to toss these folks away. By the grace of God, many of us may not live in a MOBILE home park but that doesn't mean they should be kicked out for more $$$$.
"...but that doesn't mean they should be kicked out for more $$$$"
They are being tossed because it's not their land. They can become home/land owners, then the only people they have to worry about kicking them off their property is the government.
"They are being tossed because it's not their land. They can become home/land owners, then the only people they have to worry about kicking them off their property is the government."
Okay, it's not their land however don't you think it makes sense to have somewhere for these people to live. Maybe some sort of a tax incentive would help the land owner be alittle more considerate. In the old days ... land wasn't climbing as quickly in value ... eventually they will be homeless and that a bigger problem.
I think the point that was being made was he was on disabil;ity, but had returned to try to earn money hel;ping others move out. If he is able to help others move, he should be able to find work.
Amen!
In particular for the reason that it is this very attitude that leads the country towards socialism. It's the "conservative contradiction".
The article very clearly stated the next day he was looking for work helping other people MOVE. Doesnt sound that bad off to me. (and at least where I am,It is fraud if you work while on disability)I know many people who are on disability because they need to be, and many people who are simply too lazy or conditioned to being on the public dole to work. Ive seen people who are blind, in wheelchairs work and be very productive. All it requires is motivation. And you feel like a whole person instead of a loser.
I know. I am not disabled but I have been on public assistance and the mindset is horrid. Self-sufficency is very empowering.
Last I looked, self reliance and personal responsibility were still conservative values. Conservatives are not cookie cutter drones like liberals. We are a pretty diverse group and I resent the implication I am a "poser". Merry Christmas.
Yes, but this has effects on people that selling other types of property doesn't. Also, if the government didn't manipulate interest rates, and give preferential tax treatment and subsidies to certain property such as housing, these types of rapid changes in housing values without a corresponding rise in incomes wouldn't happen.
Exactly. If our particular brand of government manipulated capitalism and free markets fails enough people, they will demand something else.
I know a lot of elderly people with pets for example that couldnt be in an apt that can afford the mobile home. So I didnt want to appear to be a non-compassionate conservative or anything.
I don't know if you are stupid, heartless, ignorant or just a A-hole, methinks maybe all of the above.
What about the ground under their feet?
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