Blog # 243 Copyright 2013 21 April 2013
Perspective. ‘Land lease lifestyle communities, a.k.a. manufactured home communities & earlier, ‘mobile home parks’, are the real estate component of manufactured housing.
I.
A Potpourri of this year’s MHCongress in Las Vegas
II.
LEST WE FORGET (ALREADY)
III.
Preview of ‘Things to Come’ in Next Week’s Posting
***
I.
A Potpourri of this year’s MHCongress in Las Vegas
Attendance was up this time around, MHI Chairman Nathan Smith tells me, by more than 100 registrants. Seemed enthusiasm was ‘up’ as well. Now, all WE need is a significant uptick in the annual new home shipment number of new HUD – Code manufactured homes!
Matt Follett makes historic pitch for INSPIRE Communities (‘Enriching American Lives Through Affordable Housing Communities’) as maybe, within two to three years, the next real estate investment trust (REIT) from the land lease lifestyle community realty asset class!
“Gee George, where were you on Tuesday (@ NCC Forum)? Wanting to learn from you, is the reason I signed – up in the first place! But had to listen to execs from the big firms again.” Those were the two most frequent remarks I heard from folk, as I visited the MHCongress exhibits on Wednesday. The occasional third question? “Were there any bona fide owners of LLLCommunities presenting this year?” Hmm.
Michael L. Glass is now the National Director of Marcus & Millichap’s 21 land lease lifestyle community marketing specialists nationwide. (216) 264-2000. Be sure to attend his firm’s annual Investors’ Symposium, from 4 – 6PM, on Wednesday, 18 September 2013, at the Hilton/Chicago Indian Lakes Resort in Bloomingdale, IL. Phone the MHIndustry’s HOTLINE: (877)MFD-HSNG or 633-4764 for information and to register.
NCC Forum attendees hear promise of more attention to land lease lifestyle community owners/operators’ needs in the future, including an increased emphasis on statistical research.
MHIndustry veterans miss showman Gub Mix as Awards Luncheon emcee!
Cavco360 Finance Program debuted as means to ‘Recycle Your LLLCommunity Investment’ For info, contact (312) 346-1874 and talk to Stephen Wheeler at HAS-Capital.
An increasing number of firms use the annual MHCongress and International Networking Roundtable, to bring their boards of directors, regional property managers, even investors, together to experience ‘these events’ and meet privately to pursue their own agenda. ROC USA® and a Canadian – based owner of LLLCommunities were just two such firms this time around.
Sure, there’s much more I could share with you, but much of that will find its’ way into print during the next few weeks as we pen and publish the Allen CONFIDENTIAL! and Allen Letter professional journal ‘business newsletters’ during the next couple weeks. Be especially alert to the newly updated (first time since about 1993) Industry Standard Chart of (operating expense) Accounts, along with some new Operating Expense Ratio (OER) percentages provided by ARA MHC Group out of Denver, CO. Copies of the new one pager will be attached as an enclosure to the first publication, and as a lagniappe in the second one. You don’t want to miss updating your OER statistical reference tool! If not already a newsletter subscriber, phone the above – referenced MHIndustry HOTLINE to do so.
II.
LEST WE FORGET (ALREADY)
The following quotes are from the ebook, The New Robber Barons, by Janet M. Tavakoli. Pretty sobering stuff….
From ‘Blame the Victims and Enrich the Perpetrators’, 1/13/2011. “While there were instances of fraud by borrowers, the key drivers of our housing crisis were fraud perpetrated by mortgage lenders and securities fraud – by some of our most revered financial institutions – that provided money to fuel fraudulent mortgage lending.”
“After the largest bank bailout in world history, we have a national epidemic of foreclosure fraud. In cases where foreclosures are being delayed, banks are walking away from abandoned homes and sticking local taxpayers with the bill to clean up the mess they left behind.”
From ‘GSAMP: Garbage Sold at Mythical Prices’. “In 2007, the state of Ohio kicked the California – based New Century mortgage lending carpetbaggers out of the state and barred New Century from doing business after despicable practices. A complaint of alleged fraud on the part of Goldman Sachs detailed its close relationships with Countrywide, New Century, and Fremont. The complaint showed Goldman knew of ‘an accelerating meltdown for subprime lenders such as New Century and Fremont.’ Despite known serious loan problems, Goldman continued to securitize the loans and sell them in packages of residential mortgage backed securities.’
From ‘Countrywide Broke the Law’. “…allegations of suspect practices from mortgage lenders, including Countrywide, now owned by Bank of America, were revealed. According to a former Countrywide employee: ‘approximately 90% of all reduced documentation loans (a.k.a. ‘liars’ loans) sold out of a Chicago office, had inflated incomes, and one of Countrywide’s (mortgage brokerage arms) routinely doubled the amount of the potential borrower’s income…so borrowers could qualify for loans they could not afford.” Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan told First Business Morning News: “Countrywide broke the law, homeowners did not.”
“Despite evidence of widespread interconnected mortgage lending, securitization, and foreclosure wrong – doing and fraud, there are no meaningful felony indictments.”
As most of us in the manufactured housing industry, and as owners/operators of land lease lifestyle communities, well know, chattel loan origination has not returned to anywhere near what it was back in our latest heyday, 1998. And only time will truly tell, if and when it ever does. But in the meantime, it’s helpful, albeit painful, to remind ourselves of what happened, not just to HUD – Code manufactured housing, but to our Big Sister industry, the site – built housing business, about which much of the preceding paragraphs describe. It’s no small wonder we suffer the financial regulatory measures rampant today; and it’s no less a mystery as to why our national economy continues to flounder. Is there a solution in sight? Depends on who you ask, and what aspect of housing finance one explores. But for the time being, we have to make do with what we do and don’t have available to work with in our business environs.
III.
Preview of ‘Things to Come’ in Next Week’s Posting
Interested in reading what a board of directors hears, when briefed about the land lease lifestyle community real estate asset class? Well that’ll be spelled out in detail for you next week in this blog posting. We’ll even take a long look back at the August 1988 edition of Roulac’s Strategic Real Estate newsletter’s final ‘Largest Mobile Home Park Owners in 1987’ listing, the precursor to the ALLEN REPORT annually researched and published since then (#22 @ 2013). You’ll find it interesting to learn how many of the 25 firms on said list, continue to exist to this day, 26 years later!
Do YOU realize there’re no fewer than FIVE ‘MHIndustry & LLLCommunity’ – related meetings vying for our participation, during six weeks this Fall (2013)? That’s right; the 22nd annual Networking Roundtable for land lease lifestyle community owners/operators leads off, 16 – 18 September, in the Chicago suburb of Bloomingdale; followed two weeks later by MHI’s annual meeting in San Diego; then the annual SECO (Southeast Community Owners) Symposium in GA; a leadership conference, hosted by MHI’s National Communities Council, in downtown Chicago in mid – October; and finally, the Urban Land Institute’s meeting (of the Manufactured Housing Communities Council) in early November, also in downtown Chicago. Whew? Can anyone out there afford the time and money, to patronize all five events? I sure can’t. Anyway; more details forthcoming, to help you plan your Fall travels.
And I’ve just gotta tell you. The hinted – at 3”X5” plastic cards describing the
• 5 – RPs of Marketing & Selling New Homes INTO a Land Lease Lifestyle Community!
• 5 – RPs for Marketing & Selling New & Resale Homes WITHIN a Land Lease Lifestyle Community!
• 5 – RPs for Marketing& Leasing Rental Homesites WITHIN a Land Lease Lifestyle Community!
Have been manufactured, delivered, and are ready for distribution to participants at this year’s 22nd annual Networking Roundtable, 18 – 20 September, at the Hilton/Chicago Indian Lakes Resort in Bloomingdale, IL. And not only that, we’re making good progress converting the widely used ‘Ah Ha! & Uh Oh! Worksheet’ (for estimating ‘risky’ &’affordable’ Price Points for new & resale homes in and outside LLLCommunities) into a handy, easy to use slide chart. If ready by September, this too will be distributed as a FREE training aid to every Roundtable participant!
***
George Allen, CPM & MHM
Consultant to the Factory – built Housing Industry,
The Land Lease Lifestyle Community Asset Class &
Affordable Housing Purists & Enthusiasts Nationwide
Box # 47024, Indianapolis, IN. 46247
(317) 346-7156