Why You Should Not Skip Out On Introducing Yourself To The Mobile Home Park Management

David and Tempest are a dynamic duo, a rockstar couple that joined Trailer Cash Academy recently and they just closed their first deal for $3,200 in profits. We love seeing couples on this, on the channel, working together, complementing each other’s strengths and weaknesses.

They started their mobile home investing journey right before COVID. And they had a lot of concerns initially about how they were going to succeed. During COVID they just continued learning from our modules.

But David follows the TCA community closely and stays engaged. And he noticed people were still out there closing deals. So he thought if they can do it he can do it too. David and Tempest even got on a Zoom call with another community member and she left them feeling very inspired to take action. And eventually they went out into the field themselves.

So big salute to both David and Tempest for not letting COVID stop them, and even going as far as building a connection with another community member to get motivated and inspired.

They started off doing deals in Pennsylvania and they’re hoping to move on to New Jersey as well. We advised them to not let any license requirements prevent them from getting started and serving people with their skillset. Once they learn how mobile home investing works in that state, later on they can decide on whether getting a license is worth it or not.

Their near term goal is to go into this business full-time. David says he wants to fire his boss first and Tempest says she’ll work until early retirement.

But right now they’re running into some challenges that we discussed on our call. And so in this blog post we’re going to share with you guys the brief coaching session we gave them. You’re going to learn a bit about how to break the ice with park management and the importance of getting information first-hand.

Quick Coaching Session with David and Tempest

So we went straight into the discussion with David and Tempest and continued it on from a call we had with them earlier. They told us that they had been having some challenges lately. Communication was the main issue.

One of the problems they had was with park management, specifically with the park managers creating roadblocks for both buyers and sellers.

”I would say our biggest issue would be with the park management as far as dealing with our sellers and buyers. Because we’re having problems on both ends with the seller and the buyer as well. They’re both having problems with the park. It’s mainly communication issues with the park.

I don’t think the park is as professional as we expected them to be because they hold themselves to high standards. It seems like they’re more interested in the more expensive homes than helping people.“

“We did a wholesale deal where the actual seller was having issues with them. He tried to get out of the home and give the home back to the park. But they wouldn’t take the home from him. So he kinda got, what would you say? Locked into the home? And they still were charging him Lot Rent.

But he moved out. He was out for about 5 months. He pretty much started to panic and got very frustrated. He was nervous. He was like, ‘You guys are my last hope.’ He just wanted out, like completely out of the home, and he didn’t want much for it.

So we helped him out as much as we could.”

This is something familiar to us. We’ve seen that with many park managers, when they have a bunch of newer homes in the community or newer homes are coming in, they tend to not necessarily even send a bunch of buyers over to us, because usually they’re going to send those buyers to those newer homes.

So far David and Tempus have been hearing about the park management being difficult from buyers and sellers. But they haven’t actually broken the ice with the management in that community yet and gotten to know their perspective of things. We asked them why they hadn’t had that type of conversation yet.

“That’s a good question. ‘Cause I’ve asked the seller if it would be a good idea. And he was basically saying it would be a good idea.

I just wasn’t sure about how to approach it because it was a wholesale deal and we know that with wholesale deals you technically don’t really have to communicate with the park.

I mean I did want to communicate with them the more deals we get, especially if we do a fix and flip or something along those lines, where we’ve got to fill out paperwork.

We definitely fully walked the park a few times. So we do have intentions on speaking with the park managers just for future deals or any vacant homes that they have lying around.”

From what David and Tempus were telling us it sounded like the park was just being very conscious of maintaining their standards. They told us that it was a family park with great amenities so it must have been at least a 4 star.

So we insisted that they go ahead and have that conversation with the park. Not even necessarily for this one deal, but in general because they want to know where they stand with the park.

They need to introduce themselves, let the park know they want to bring them value.

Tell them they’ve seen the new homes in the community and the new homes they have coming in. However, there are still some old homes in the community. And they’ve got a ton of buyers they serve that are knocking on their door to live in a community like that.

It’s not necessary to flat out say, ‘Hey I’m doing wholesale deals in your park.’
They can just focus on finding out the value they can provide to the park management. And get clarity on what the park requirements are for buyers. Or get clarity on what their process is when someone needs to sell or move homes out of the park.

We advised David and Tempest to not necessarily say that they have deals they’re working on in there, but act like they’re wanting to serve the community in the near future and they want to be able to serve their clients better.

That might help them build a relationship with the park manager. And it will help us separate what’s facts and what’s not from all these stories they’re hearing, because people are speaking out of emotion.

Even if they’re not investor friendly, that’s cool, David and Tempest should still want to work in that community doing wholesale deals.

What we would do is at least make a phone call. With COVID going on we’re not sure what their restrictions are. But we would make it a priority to get that conversation done sooner than later. Especially since it’s a great community and we want to make sure we have some sort of relationship with the park manager so our deals go smoothly.

Another thing we advised them to do is to go a step further and get one of those FedEx envelopes. Everybody opens the FedEx envelope. So they can draft a letter, where they introduce themselves, how they can get in contact, and describe their intentions to solve the park manager’s problems as far as buying, selling and moving homes is concerned. Then they can take that letter, put it in the FedEx envelope and put it right by their door.

Instead of David and Tempest chasing them down for them to answer the phone, sometimes they’ll actually open up that FedEx letter. It’s got a high open rate.

The other challenge they were dealing with was some of the buyers were complaining that the Lot Rent is too high.

”We pretty much got it from our buyers. When we were trying to advertise the home we had a lot of comments saying how the Lot Rent was really high compared to other parks. And like a lot of people had very bad comments. They called it highway robbery and a whole bunch of stuff.

‘Cause the park rate is $745 a month. But like the average park Lot Rent in that same area drops down to the mid $600 range. So we understand why they’re saying that.

And on top of that, the park itself doesn’t have a very good reputation for some reason. So with that all combined together a lot of people are not trying to live in that park.”

We think David and Tempest should continue to do more test ads for that park. Because it’s only about a $100 difference. That’s not a really big big difference where people would be like, ‘Nah, I just can’t see myself staying there.’

For the right deal, for the right home, people will move to that community.
We encouraged David and Tempest to find out what the facts are. But from the sound of it, it’s a good park with great amenities. So maybe it is just not being managed well and that’s why some people feel that way.

Each park is going to have its own reputation.

I know when we first started there were some parks we liked to work in. There was other parks that we knew were a hassle. They have all their own different nuances. So this is all just good research for David and Tempest. That’s why we don’t just focus on one park. We really try to diversify ourselves by working with multiple parks.

And if there is a park with a little bit of a shady reputation it doesn’t mean we won’t work there. We just know what we’re getting into. So this is all just part of the research and the learning and things will get easier as David and Tempest get more familiar with their area.

Worst case scenario if they’re being non-investor friendly, and David and Tempest don’t see a future in working with the park, then they can always just move the home out of the park after giving the park first right of refusal.

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