George Allen / EducateMHC Blog Mobile Home & Land Lease Community Advocate & Expert

May 28, 2020

Teaching An Old Dog New Tricks

Filed under: Uncategorized — George Allen @ 7:21 am

Blog # 587 @ 29 May 2020; Copyright 2020. Educatemhc.com

Perspective. ‘Land lease communities, previously manufactured home communities, and earlier, ‘mobile home parks’, comprise the real estate component of manufactured housing.’

EducateMHC is the online national advocate, asset class historian, data researcher, education resource, and communication media, for all land lease communities throughout North America!

To input this blog &/or affiliate with EducateMHC, telephone the Official MHIndustry HOTLINE: (877) MFD-HSNG or 633-4764. Also email: gfa7156@aol.com, & visit educataemhc.com

Motto: ‘U Support US & WE Serve U!’ Goal: To promote HUD-Code manufactured housing & land lease communities as U.S. # 1 source of affordable attainable housing! Attend MHM class!

INTRODUCTION: Pretty straightforward content today, so no explanations offered. Enjoy.

I.

Teaching An Old Dog New Tricks

Making an assumption here. Most blog floggers (‘readers’) of this weekly trade news media, are now aware of the monthly ‘MHShipment Volume (+) Stock Market Report’ I research and compile for EducateMHC. It’s distributed as a Resource Document supplement in every PRIME edition of The Allen Confidential! business newsletter. But what is probably not realized, is the degree and nature, range and specificity of the statistical research required for each monthly report.

Besides ‘crunching’ official HUD-Code manufactured housing shipment totals supplied by the Institute for Building Technology and Safety (‘IBTS’), we follow eight public companies (four HUD-Code housing manufacturers & four land lease community property portfolios), relative to their stock prices and market cap values; plus, we calculate a ‘Manufactured Housing & Land Lease Community – Composite Stock Index’ (‘CSI’). All that’s newsy and helpful enough; but ‘the fun begins’ when listening-in on quarterly earnings calls hosted by these pubic firms.

Here’s what we learned – and didn’t learn, during the last week or two, from a few calls:

• At least one HUD-Code housing manufacturer observes how new home shipment volume, going directly into land lease communities, has already returned to the 40 percent level enjoyed before COVID-19.
• Another manufacturer, while experiencing lower sales traffic thru their retail sales centers (a.k.a. ‘company stores’), see higher conversion percentages; i.e. ‘Fewer people visiting, more people buying!’

• And in some cases, retail sales centers located in close proximity to certain major SMAs, or urban centers, are experiencing ‘city folk’ now buying manufactured homes to site in rural and suburban environs.

• Finally; it was surprising (but discouraging), there’s been NO mention whatsoever of CrossMod™ home sales and placements, in any of these earning calls. Wonder why?

It’s also been interesting to observe how one or another HUD-Code manufacturer schedules earning calls as early as 8AM in the morning. And how another firm distributes its’ Form 8-K SEC filing report the same day as its’ earnings call, or so it appears. Go figure.

Point? If you’re not reading EducateMHC’s monthly ‘MHShipment Volume (+) Stock Market Report’, you should be – especially if a Wall Street investor or analyst, HUD-Code housing manufacturer, and or land lease community portfolio owner/operator. Never before, in the history of manufactured housing and land lease communities, have we tracked business and investment performance in this manner! To avail yourself of this new, continuing and illuminating opportunity, visit www.educatemhc.com and subscribe to The Allen Confidential! at the PRIME level!

Furthermore; whether in aforementioned ‘MHShipment Volume (+) Stock Market Report’ or The Allen Confidential! business newsletter, know they are your most accurate, timely, and helpful sources of MH & LLCommunity-related news! How so? Two examples quoted from April/May 2020 issue of NREI magazine:

• Of 17 commercial real estate investment categories, “Hotels, casinos, student housing assets and malls saw the largest jumps in cap rates from 31 January thru 16 March.” P.4. Manufactured housing/RVs (i.e. ‘communities’), along with ‘towers’ & ‘data centers’ experienced the smallest incremental moves in cap rates, with land lease communities at 93 basis points – compared to hotels @ 403 basis points. Did someone say our ‘communities’ are recession-proof?

• And this inside look: “Most of the equity groups have hit the pause button until they can evaluate how the virus will impact the job market long term. Jobs equal renters – it’s that simple.”P.12 And with landlord/tenant legislation in the air, another good and timely reason to be cautious about further property consolidation.

And this from a recent Press Release: REIT, UMH Properties, will conduct its’ annual meeting, 24 June, in virtual fashion! Seems more and more companies are doing so these days. There’s even talk about the highly popular and heavily attended SECO Conference, in September in Atlanta, being done conducted in like fashion, but no final decision yet. However, the 29th annual Networking Roundtable is on schedule for 2-4 September, in Nashville, TN. For information, visit www.educatemhc.com Speaking of meetings, we’ve just learned the 2nd annual Innovative Housing Showcase, on the National Mall in Washington, DC., has been postponed from this fall to sometime during year 2021.

Furthermore, here at EducateMHC we routinely go more afield, than other business news-reporting media, to glean information you can use. Here’s a news tidbit from The Epoch Times, 21-27 May 2020: “According to a study, 68 percent of people who are eligible for unemployment benefits receive compensation that exceeds their prior wage.” So, why go back to work? – they say.

II.

Response to
‘This Patriot
Practices Discerning News Intake & Citizen Punditry’
‘How ‘bout You?’

Unsolicited input from a blog flogger (reader) in California. “George, this will not surprise; but rather confirm, what you know about me. I agree with what is penned here. Do not abide much with TV news except FOX; and stick with my small town newspaper only. I began, after my wife died ten years ago, participating in local government, and have found local small community and county governments – councils and commissions, also do not participate as the ‘national media’ would like us to believe. We stick to government being simple (nothing is really simple) and focused upon protection from evil and infrastructure problems, so we can use our God-given free will to survive, worship, succeed, and find individual happiness!” NB

And this: “I’m with you!” CC

***
George Allen, CPM, MHM

May 24, 2020

This Patriot

Filed under: Uncategorized — George Allen @ 5:21 am

Blog # 586 @ 24 May 2020; Copyright 2020. Educatemhc.com

Perspective. ‘Land lease communities, previously manufactured home communities, and earlier, ‘mobile home parks’, comprise the real estate component of manufactured housing.’

EducateMHC is the online national advocate, asset class historian, data researcher, education resource, and communication media, for all land lease communities throughout North America!

To input this blog &/or affiliate with EducateMHC, telephone the Official MHIndustry HOTLINE: (877) MFD-HSNG or 633-4764. Also email: gfa7156@aol.com, & visit www.educatemhc.com

Motto: ‘U Support US & WE Serve U!’ Goal: To promote HUD-Code manufactured housing & land lease communities as U.S. # 1 source of affordable attainable housing! Attend MHM class!

INTRODUCTION: No introduction needed today. Parts I & II are self-explanatory.

I.

This Patriot

Practices Discerning News Intake & Citizen Punditry

How ‘bout You?

These are tumultuous partisan political and coronavirus times for everyone! Here’s how one individual addresses these politically-combative and life-threatening matters, from and within respective frames of reference.

I no longer read The New York Times or the Washington Post. Today I glean and model my points of view from print news published in two local daily – urban and suburban newspapers, and The Epoch Times – a weekly publication founded in year 2000, espousing truth and tradition, akin to The Christian Science Monitor.*1 News magazines? Over the decades I’ve read them all! Today I read one: World magazine*2. And after decades of frustratingly pointless TV channel surfing, I reservedly rely on FOX News, to avoid what I consider progressive opinions expressed on TV and cable channel networks. And radio? Give me Limbaugh, Katz, and Beck (author of that ‘must read’ novel The Overton Window) anytime, instead of what I used to enjoy on NPR.
Why? Having intellectually processed 40+ years of business acumen and people experience to date, I consider myself an educated and discerning ‘real news’ aficionado, with little time and no patience for fact verification backtracking, and little tolerance or stomach for liberal-slanted faux journalism, unfortunately pervasive throughout today’s print and online secular press.

So, besides being careful what I read, and from where it originates, what do I do to make my views known? I engage in citizen punditry (‘expression of learned views’) by routinely penning Letters to Editors of local newspapers; as well as carefully worded response commentaries emailed to weekly/monthly news magazines, specifically their columnists. Seriously. You should try it sometime soon, again and again.

But that’s not all there is to citizen punditry. Via methods just described, social media and more, conscientious U.S. citizens are increasingly making their views known relative to subversionary activities by ‘deep staters’, the culture war waged in this country today, and whatever other matters they feel weaken or threaten our democracy and society.

Frankly, I’d like to know what you think of discerning news intake and citizen punditry, as described here. Better yet; get busy crafting and sharing as a citizen pundit, your perspective and peerspectives. Do so via gfa7156@aol.com

End Notes.
1. The Epoch Times. Readepoch.com
2. World. Wng.org

II.

‘Sell In May & Go Away!’

Traditional stock market investment strategy for month of May pre-2020

Not this year! Recovering from the quarantine and national economic toll of coronavirus requires ALL of US to do our part in the healing process unfolding during May, June, July and August. As 75 year olds, Carolyn and I remain well-quarantined, thanks to the grocery-shopping of our daughter Susan, and outdoor chores assistance of son Adam. And we remain as engaged as possible; me, writing to you weekly, monthly (The Allen Confidential!), and via MHInsider magazine (‘Allen Legacy’ column). Carolyn is a longtime CASA (Court-appointed special advocate for children) volunteer, and ‘works her case load’ daily by phone and PC.

So, stay engaged and do your part to ensure our great nation returns to the prosperity we’ve temporarily left behind during the coronavirus pandemic! Next week I’ll share some insights gleaned from recent ‘earnings calls’ by some of our eight public MH/LLCommunity companies active in the U.S. today! GFA

May 15, 2020

Land Lease Community = Lifestyle of Choice During Pandemic?

Filed under: Uncategorized — George Allen @ 12:44 pm

Blog # 585 @ 15 May 2020; Copyright 2020. Educatemhc.com

Perspective. ‘Land lease communities, previously manufactured home communities, and earlier, ‘mobile home parks’, comprise the real estate component of manufactured housing.’

EducateMHC is the online national advocate, asset class historian, data researcher, education resource, and communication media, for all land lease communities throughout North America!

To input this blog &/or affiliate with EducateMHC, telephone the Official MHIndustry HOTLINE: (877) MFD-HSNG or 633-4764. Also email: gfa7156@aol.com, & visit www.educatemhc.com

Motto: ‘U Support US & WE Serve U!’ Goal: To promote HUD-Code manufactured housing & land lease communities as U.S. # 1 source of affordable attainable housing! Attend MHM class!

INTRODUCTION: Well, here’s your weekly update relative to the coronavirus hiatus; a look at what is amounting to a ‘lost opportunity’ for the manufactured housing industry – and ‘what to do about it’. Also, an announcement of a new website designed to help homeowners and renters to survive the COVID-19.

I.

Land Lease Community = Lifestyle of Choice During Pandemic?

HOW SO?

Just as there’re more births occurring at home these days than in hospitals – due to fear of coronavirus infection, and fathers prohibited from being present for the event, land lease community homeowners/site lessees are demonstrating support for their lifestyle, by paying March and April rent on time and in full. And May’s rent collection appears, to date, to be off to a near equally strong start – according to recent ‘earnings calls’ by public owners/operators of land lease community portfolios. And this from the National Multi Housing Council:

“Data from the National Multifamily Housing Council shows 80.2% of tenants had paid at least some of their rent by May 6, compared with 78% during the same time period in April. However, rent payments were down from May 2019, and some activists say they will continue with plans for rent strikes to put pressure on lawmakers.”

Hmm. And why might land lease communities be outperforming other types of multifamily rental properties? Well, unlike other forms of multifamily rental (and condo) housing – thinking conventional and subsidized apartment communities here, the manufactured housing owner/site lessee, in a land lease community, is living in a self-contained structure, not sharing walls and risking personal exposure in hallways with other tenants or residents. In other words, they’re more in control of their living environment (i.e. easy to social distance 24 hours per day), as to who comes and goes than would otherwise be the case. This is also the likely reason the investment value of this unique, income-producing property type has remained strong of late.

On a related matter, a recent article in Shelterforce magazine (Think tenant social activists), and titled ‘What Would It Mean to Cancel Rent?’ raises this related issue:

“…decommodified housing in the form of co-ops, land trusts, and nonprofit- owned housing already exist – housing a couple million households – and they all rely on rent payments of some sort for their ongoing operations. Calls to suspend or cancel rent payments across the board have made man managers of this type of housing uncomfortable. On the one hand, not having people on the street or struggling under additional rent burden is central to their mission, and none of them believe rent should be demanded right now from people who can’t pay.” Thinking of resident-owned communities or ROCs here….

So, where does all this leave us today? Depends on what one reads, sees, and hears in trade literature, personal experience, and on webinars, e.g. following out of context webinar observations.

• The Carlyle Group in Washington, DC. an owner/operator of a land lease community portfolio, anticipates more of a U-shaped economic recovery curve, vs. V-shaped one, during next few months.

• Warren Buffett & Sam Zell haven’t “…found anything to buy since the onset of the pandemic.” Lack of deals, due to a large spread, between seller expectations and buyer caution.

• While REIT shares “…are down almost 30% since late February” (Confirmed via EducateMHC’s monthly MH ‘Shipment Volume (+) Stock Market’ Report), rents are holding up well – as just pointed out. To access subject report, visit www.educatemhc.com

Do you have observations and opinions, on this complex and evolving topic that you’d like to share here and or in The Allen Confidential! Business newsletter? Simply email or mail your manuscript to me via gfa7156@aaol.com & GFA c/o Box # 47024, Indianapolis, IN. 46147.

II.

Essence of Manufactured Housing’s Lack of Regulatory Reform Progress, Expressed in One Paragraph!

The following paragraph (lightly edited & only slightly enhanced. GFA) was the final one of 14 comprising MHARR’s typically wordy manufactured housing update, dated May 2020, and titled:

‘A RED FLAG WARNING FOR THE INDUSTRY AND CONSUMERS’.

“…the industry has wasted more than three years of President Trump’s first term and what is, without question, the most promising opportunity it has ever had, to achieve real and lasting regulatory reform within the HUD manufactured housing program. The current ‘slow-roll’ of the regulatory reform process by HUD, its contractors, and other allies, should be a ‘red flag’, a warning to the industry that this opportunity without immediate, targeted, aggressive action, could be lost! There is sufficient time, for now, to change course and move this process forward, but it must be a priority for senior-level decision makers at HUD, within the industry itself (including the Manufactured Housing Institute – MHI), for consumers of affordable housing, and within OMHP (including Administrator Teresa Payne). Put differently, the ‘crunch-time’ for significant action to help both the HUD Code industry and consumers of affordable housing is right now!”

As everyone reading this blog well knows, MHARR headquartered in downtown Washington, DC. has long been regarded, as it still is, the Watchdog of the Manufactured Housing Industry. And the above paragraph is fairly standard fare coming from the pen of Mark Weiss. With that said, however, he cannot pull off regulatory reform alone, just as MHI and NAMHCO (North American Manufactured Housing Communities Owners), as industry and realty asset class advocates cannot. What’s missing? In my opinion, based on 40+ years of observation and experience, as a business owner and land lease community owner/operator, constant cooperation and lobbying among all three national trade entities, is where such timely and vital efforts must begin and concentrate.

III.

CFPB, FHFA*, & HUD Launch Joint Mortgage & Housing Website, during COVID-19

This website is designed to ensure homeowners and renters have the most up to date and accurate housing assistance information possible, during these turbulent times. Interested parties should visit cfpb.gov/housing

End Note. FHFA includes the two GSEs (Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac) as well as the Federal Home Loan Banks.

***

George Allen, CPM, MHM
EducateMHC

Postscript.

If you haven’t heard or read yet, EducateMHC’s monthly MH ‘Shipment Volume (+) Stock Market’ Report brings something to the manufactured housing industry and land lease community realty asset class, we’ve not had, ever before – during our 75 year history! And that is unadulterated new MH shipment volume totals tallied by the Institute for Building Technology & Safety (‘IBTS’) – HUD’s perennial contractor for this very purpose; AND, the stock market performance of four public market HUD-Code housing manufacturers and as many land lease community portfolio owners/operators! If this new cache of timely and useful information is of interest to you, and it certainly should be, subscribe to The Allen Confidential! business newsletter as a PRIME subscriber! Do so today: www.educatemhc.com

May 8, 2020

CORONAVIRUS X 6

Filed under: Uncategorized — George Allen @ 10:54 am

Blog # 584 @ 8 May 2020; Copyright 2020. Educatemhc.com

Perspective. ‘Land lease communities, previously manufactured home communities, and earlier, ‘mobile home parks’, comprise the real estate component of manufactured housing.’

EducateMHC is the online national advocate, asset class historian, data researcher, education resource, and communication media, for all land lease communities throughout North America!

To input this blog &/or affiliate with EducateMHC, telephone the Official MHIndustry HOTLINE: (877) MFD-HSNG or 633-4764. Also email: gfa7156@aol.co, & visit www.educatemhc.com

Motto: ‘U Support US & WE Serve U!’ Goal: To promote HUD-Code manufactured housing & land lease communities as U.S. # 1 source of affordable attainable housing! Attend MHM class!

INTRODUCTION: On a personal note. Friday, 6 May is the 55th day Carolyn and I’ve been self-quarantined together at home. Two days later, we’ll celebrate 57 years we’ve been together since meeting poolside at college, on 9/10/1963. And in a couple weeks we’ll turn 57 around, as I celebrate my 75th birthday! What’s all this have to do with the coronavirus hiatus? Nothing.

However, I think you’ll agree. After 75 years of history, HUD-Code manufactured housing and land lease communities, where eight public companies are concerned, finally have a tracking report in place for tallying new housing shipments and stock performance as well. Enjoy!

I.

CORONAVIRUS X 6

OK, be honest. Are YOU as ‘cornfused’ as I am about ‘how & what’ to call or describe the coronavirus illness that’s changed our lives these past (now) several months? Well, decided to start making a list of name variants as I came across them in the print and online press. Here’re seven documented to date.

Coronavirus

Coronavirus disease 2019; abbreviated as COVID-19 (all in capital letters)

Novel coronavirus (per Chinese Communist Party or CCP)

Wuhan virus (named after Chinese city from whence it came)

CCP virus. Moniker espoused by THE EPOCH TIMES newspaper, directly blaming Chinese Communist Party (‘CCP’) for outbreak of the disease.

Chinese virus, per President Donald Trump. And why not? Think Legionnaire’s Disease.

Do you know of additional variants? If so, please let us know via gfa7156@aol.com

A clue as to how many more Chinese citizens fell victim to the coronavirus than what the CCP has claimed:

Headline: ’21 Million Fewer Cellphone Users in China May Suggest a High CCP Virus Death Toll’ – as cellphones are used (required) by everyone in China – to display colored (green is good) health codes necessary for personal travel.

And this: “Hubei Province (Wuhan city) has used 40 mobile cremators, each capable of burning five tons of medical waste and bodies a day, since February 16th.” P.19

Both texts from The Epoch Times weekly newspaper. In my opinion, a better and far more reliable investigative journalism ‘read’ than either The New York Times or The Washington Post.

II.

MHShipment Volume (+) Stock Market Report

Previously referred to as EducateMHC’s

MHShipment ‘#s&$s’ Report, March 2020 (+) 5/4/20 ‘MH Mfr/REIT Market Data’

Here we implement three changes to what’s already become a seminal monthly data report serving the manufactured housing industry and land lease community realty asset class.

First, a simpler, more descriptive title for said document. ‘MHShipment Volume (+) Stock Market Report’ describes two production and investment performance platforms of vital and ongoing interest to the industry & property type.

Next. We’ve expanded coverage to include the heretofore ‘Big Three C’ (i.e. Clayton, Cavco, Skyline/Champion) firms, plus one (i.e. Legacy), HUD-Code housing manufacturers. And now four – not just three, land lease community portfolio owners/operators, three of which are real estate investment trusts (‘REITs’), i.e. ELS, SUI, UMH, and newcomer MHPC.

Finally. Effective with this March 2020 (+) 5/4/20 edition of the ‘MHShipment Volume (+) Stock Market Report’, distribution is restricted to PRIME subscribers to The Allen Confidential! business newsletter, available only from EducateMHC (www.educatemhc.com)

In paragraphs following here, I’ll share a few salient details from this dual monthly report; but for all the useful details, again, you’ll have to subscribe to the PRIME edition of TAC!

Meet MHPC or Manufactured Housing Properties, Inc. The firm, founded during 2016, debuted in the 31st annual ALLEN REPORT (i.e. ‘Who’s Who Among Land Lease Community Portfolio Firms Located Throughout North America!) and was ranked # 88, after ‘going public’ during late 2019. The firm has its’ home office in Pineville, NC. And is headed by President Michael Anise.

MHShipments. MHARR summarizes performance best. “…HUD Code manufacturers produced 8,338 homes in March 2020, a 9.8% increase over the 7,590 new HUD Code homes produced during March 2019. Cumulative 2020 production now stands at 25,311 homes as compared with 22,569 homes produced over the same period in 2019, an increase of 13.2%.” Quoted from MHARR News Item dated 4 May 2020.

As you likely expect, stock prices for all eight firms dropped between March and April as the coronavirus hiatus exacted its’ health and economic tolls. The good news is everyone’s stock price rebounded, somewhat, between April and early May! Will be interesting to see what occurs as we move from May to June, reopening our national economy.

If you’ve never compared market cap (values) of HUD-Code housing manufacturers and land lease community portfolios, it makes for an interesting study. They too are included in this report. For now, however, let’s just say – excepting out Berkshire-Hathaway and MHPC , both outliers, remaining market cap values range from a low of $263 million to a high of $12 billion.

Finally. For the long term, we (EducateMHC) have created a composite stock index to calculate and publish monthly. During March it was 577; dropped to 357 during April, but now, in May, is up to 480. What to expect in June? Your guess is as good as mine.

Are you presently a subscriber, either BASIC or PRIME, to The Allen Confidential! ? If not, you should be. Why? Simple. No one else in North America, especially where land lease communities are concerned, routinely researches and publishes more apropos information than EducateMHC! You can be satisfied with just the ‘news gathering’ aspect of the newsletter, or pay extra and receive a minimum of a dozen Resource Documents each year – beginning with the 31 year run ALLEN REPORT in January of each new year! Visit www.educatemhc.com and upgrade to PRIME today! GFA

May 1, 2020

A Sobering & Timely Warning!

Filed under: Uncategorized — George Allen @ 2:00 pm

Blog # 583 @ 1 May 2020; Copyright 2020. Educatemhc.com

Perspective. ‘Land lease communities, previously manufactured home communities, and earlier, ‘mobile home parks’, comprise the real estate component of manufactured housing.’

EducateMHC is the online national advocate, asset class historian, data researcher, education resource, and communication media, for all land lease communities throughout North America!

To input this blog &/or affiliate with EducateMHC, telephone the Official MHIndustry HOTLINE: (877) MFD-HSNG or 633-4764. Also email: gfa7156@aol.com, & visit www.educatemhc.com

Motto: ‘U Support US & WE Serve U!’ Goal: To promote HUD-Code manufactured housing & land lease communities as U.S. # 1 source of affordable attainable housing! Attend MHM class!

INTRODUCTION: Prepare to be shocked – if you haven’t already heard and pondered statistics shared in Part I following. And Part II? Well, while not meant to be particularly humorous, there is indeed that overtone among the vignettes shared. Enjoy! GFA

I.

A Sobering & Timely Warning!

Carolyn and I have invested 50 days in self-quarantine, to avoid becoming victims of the coronavirus. So, when I read the following statistics relative to the Spanish Flu of 1917 & 1918, I was reluctant to believe the numbers. Then I checked them via USA Today Fact Check. Learned they are indeed accurate ranges, elevating them as a Sober and Timely Warning to All of Us about Our Future, especially during fall 2020!

First wave of the Spanish Flu, during year 1917, resulted in between three and five million deaths worldwide! Compare that to what’s estimated worldwide during year 2021.

Second wave of the Spanish Flu, during year 1918 and slightly beyond, resulted in between, get this, 20 – 50 million deaths! How can there be such an enormous spread between those two numbers?

In any event; as you – we, plan social and economic activities the next several months, be aware: We do not want a repeat, via coronavirus, of the tenfold increase in Spanish Flu deaths slightly more than 100 years ago!

II.

MH & LLCommunity Trivia

One of the unexpected benefits of being self-quarantined at home, these past 50 days, has been reacquainting myself with books (being read for a second or third time), dusty personal files (of past tales and collected material), as well as trivia from 40+ years as a manufactured housing aficionado and land lease community owner/operator. One archive of MH & LLCommunity trivia is dated year 2000. And much of it is worth sharing here.

Let’s begin with ‘an‘oldie but a goodie’. Why is the front entry door to most HUD-Code singlesection manufactured homes – to this day – on the right side of the home (from the perspective of being in said home and facing forward)? This is a vestigial design practice dating to when ‘mobile homes’ were indeed mobile; and, ingress/egress, for traffic safety reasons, was curbside, i.e. in and out of the right side of the home, away from the traffic lanes of the highway.

Just as REIT name MHC, Inc. evolved to ELS, Inc; ROC Communities (Think, now retired, Gary McDaniel) merged and became Chateau Properties, Inc. in 1997, before being acquired by Hometown America during year 2003. Do you know what the abbreviation ROC represented at that time? No, it wasn’t ‘resident-owned communities’, but rather River Oaks Communities! And how ‘bout REIT Sun Communities? That firm’s ‘early’ name? Some say Sundance Communities. Speaking of REITs, which one’s founder and son are trotter (as in horse racing) fans and use their favorite standard bred steed, The Porter Gray, in their corporate literature? UMH Properties!

Famous and infamous land lease community owners? Let’s see, a former Playboy magazine ‘bunny’ was – and is, as far as I know, still married to a Colorado-based portfolio owner/operator of communities. And at one point in time, late in the last century, a ‘mass murderer’ (i.e. by dint of killing several attorneys and their clients, before committing suicide) in San Francisco, effected his revenge, during a downtown rampage, because a ‘three community deal had gone bad’ a decade earlier. And we’ve had our share – at least two or three I know of – billionaires intimately involved in manufactured housing and communities. If you’d like names, and are willing to dig a bit to get them, read SWAN SONG and ‘Who Will Preserve Your Legacy?’ booklet – both available from EducateMHC.com

To this day, real estate brokers marketing land lease communities default to the 50 years defunct Woodall Rating System to inform property owners their asset quality is of one to five stars in rankikng. Since year 2001, informed owners/operators have used the ABClassification System, first proposed by the late Tom Horner, Jr., now refined and available in its’ contemporary format via EducateMHC.com

In which state can ‘swamp coolers’ (i.e. evaporators) be routinely seen atop HUD-Code manufactured homes? Colorado.

In which city and state is the prestigious RV/MH Hall of Fame, Library, and Museum located? Elkhart, Indiana.

In which state does the term ‘Chapter 723’ bespeak landlord tenant legislation? Florida.

In which land lease communities and states did ‘two story’ HUD-Code manufactured homes debut around the turn of the century? Lido Peninsula in Newport Beach, California & New Colony in Maryland. Why didn’t this novel idea flourish? Too much expensive and time-consuming ‘make ready’ work (e.g. assembly and siding) required on-site.

The Hitchball Club, a social organization for manufactured housing industry peers was formed during the 1970s in what state? Indiana

FGFK has been one of the more unusual monikers for a land lease community portfolio, over the years. What is the unabbreviated name of the company? Five Guys From Kansas.

What now deceased land lease community owner named his portfolio in honor of his first wife’s profession (i.e. Ballerina Properties); owned the only known source of flint in the U.S., if not the world; repeatedly attempted to popularize the term Park Homes as alternative to manufactured homes; and, was one of 19 community owners who met in Indianapolis during August 1993, to form what would later become MHI’s National Communities Council division? The late Ron Richardson of Oklahoma and Nevada.

Which John Grisham novel begins in a land lease community? The Client.

In the U.S. we refer to PITI, in real estate transaction circles, as principle, interest, taxes and insurance, when calculating monthly mortgage payments. In Canada, however, they refer to a similar combination of factors as being PITH. What does the H represent? Heating expense, as it’s more an expense factor to contend with there, than insurance premiums.

Name of a bona fide musical set in a land lease community? Premiered in Chicago during early 2001. Name? Lust in Rust!

Name of a country singer duo specializing in land lease community-oriented tunes since mid-1990s? Trailer Park Troubadours.

Ever hear of the large land lease community, located across a major highway from an active USAF base (i.e. at the time, home to Air Force One, the president’s airplane) that was forcibly closed, via eminent domain, out of concern a terrorist might step out on his porch, with a shoulder-fired ground-to-air missile, and shoot down said plane? This occurred in central Indiana, north of Kokomo, two decades or more ago.

Yes, there’s more, much more, we can share with you in the coming weeks. But for now, enjoy these gems. Do you have some trivia to share? Send to gfa7156@aol.com

For that matter, if you enjoy reading history-laced stories from our industry and realty asset class, you should be reading the Allen Legacy column in the very back of every issue of MHInsider magazine. To subscribe, reach out to Patrick Revere via Patrick@mhvillage.com

George Allen, CPM, MHM
EducateMHC

Powered by WordPress