Blog # 406 Copyright 2016 COBA7® @ 24 July 2016; community-investor.com/blog
Perspective. ‘Land-lease-lifestyle Communities, a.k.a. manufactured home communities and ‘mobile home parks’, comprise the real estate component of manufactured housing.’
This blog posting is the sole national advocacy voice, official ombudsman & historian, research reporter & online communication media for North American LLLCommunities!
To input this blog &/or affiliate with Community Owners (7 Part) Business Alliance®, a.k.a. COBA7® use Official MHIndustry HOTLINE: (877) MFD-HSNG or 633-4764
COBA7® Motto = ‘U Support US & WE Serve U!’ Goal of its’ print/online media = ‘Not only inform & opine, but transform & improve MHBusiness Model Performance!’
INTRODUCTION. Our office phone continues to ring, as callers inquire about last week’s blog’s thinly-veiled description of a shadow agenda affecting manufactured housing, specifically within the home manufacturing and chattel capital finance segments. This week? DISTRIBUTION & CONSOLIDATION trend stats never before published! And finally, the ice may be breaking around FHFA’s Duty to Serve (‘DTS’) rulemaking ice dam.
I.
MHAlive! Presages Networking Roundtable
(a.k.a. 2016 Chattel Capital Summit)
1 August & 7-9 September, are shaping up as two highly important dates during year 2016, for cerebral consideration of manufactured housing’s recent past, present, and near future Zeitgeist (‘spirit of the time’), summarized as the NEW ERA for HUD-Code manufactured housing.
MHAlive! occurs the morning of 1 August, from 9-11:30AM in the library of the RV/MH Hall of Fame in Elkhart, IN – the same day ten RV & MH industry leaders and pioneers will be inducted into the prestigious RV/MH Hall of Fame! No charge to attend MHAlive, just phone the Official MHIndustry HOTLINE: (877) MFD-HSNG or 633-4764 to let us know you plan to attend. For RV/MH Hall of Fame banquet tickets, phone (574) 293-2344. Location for both events? 21565 Executive Parkway, Elkhart, IN. 46514.
25th anniversary Networking Roundtable. Occurs 7-9 September, at the Gaylord Opryland Resort Hotel & Conference Center in Nashville, TN. Event brochure attached to BEBA (Blast Email Blog Alert) announcing this blog posting. Or phone the MHIndustry HOTINE & request a hard copy be mailed to you ASAP.
So, what’s the Big Deal about ‘manufactured housing’s recent past, present, and near future Zeitgeist’, a.k.a. NEW ERA for HUD-Code manufactured housing?
In retrospect (‘contemplation of the past’) it’s SIMPLE; however, looking forward, it’s also COMPLICATED and unpredictable….
DISTRIBUTION.
First example. Manufactured housing’s now 16 year paradigm shift, relative to DISTRIBUTION of its’ shelter products; and WHY?
Well known today, is the disappearance of 10,000+/- ‘independent (street) MHRetailers’ (By the way, do you know freelance consultant Bill Carr is the one who coined that descriptive term?), but not ‘company stores’, from the distribution system for HUD-Code manufactured homes. And how, today, they’ve been replaced in large part – but certainly not completely, by land-lease-lifestyle community (‘LLLCommunity’) ‘owners/operators’ (A term originated by David Helfand, formerly with ELS, Inc. & ARC portfolios) selling and oft seller-financing new homes on-site! You know ‘the numbers’: 25% of shipments into LLLCommunities during 2009; 40+% in 2015; and, an estimated 75% by year 2020.
What precipitated the paradigm shift? Suicidal loss of easy access to chattel capital at the turn of the 21st Century.*1 A sorry matter that continues unresolved; despite professed openness, on the part of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (‘FHFA’), and GSEs (Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac), to consider creative alternatives (one of which will be hinted at later in this blog posting) to get ‘home only’ $ chattel capital – or a hybrid form thereof, flowing to the manufactured housing industry.
CONSOLIDATION.
Then there’s CONSOLIDATION. Everyone, in the MHIndustry, ‘knows about it’, but few ‘talk about it’ much, at least not openly.
First, the REALTY segment. Between 1988 (When first ALLEN REPORT was researched; published in early 1989) and year 2016. In 1987, the TOP 25 (then) ‘mobile home park’ portfolios (owned/operated 181,705 rental homesites), then grew, through consolidation, to 500+/- portfolios throughout the U.S. & Canada – with the 120 LLLCommunity portfolios identified in the 27th ALLEN REPORT, owning/operating 841,796 rental homesites! Just imagine how many all 500+/- ‘players’ own/operate these days….
Consequences? A half dozen real estate investment trusts (‘REIT’s), but with only three in business today; multibillion dollar portfolio transactions occurring during 2016; a precipitous decline in property owner memberships within most state MHAssociations nationwide; and, formation of two national advocacy entities: MHI’s National Communities Council (‘NCC’) division in early 1996, and the Community Owners (7 Part) Business Alliance® or COBA7® in early 2014.
Then there’s the ongoing consolidation of the MANUFACTURING segment of the MHIndustry. During 1977, the TOP 25 ‘mobile home manufacturers’ (A list headed by Skyline, Fleetwood, Champion, Guerdon & Wick) shipped 186,462 new mobile homes, exactly 70 percent of national market share (265,641 total shipments during 1977)! Today, the TOP 25 firms of 1977, have been consolidated (except for Skyline) into mainly, the ‘Big 3-C’ HUD-Code home manufacturers: Clayton Homes, Inc., Cavco Industries, Inc., & Champion Home Builders, Inc. National market share for the ‘Big 3-C’ firms together? 71+/- % of 70,544 new manufactured homes shipped during 2015, with 40+/-% alone shipped by Clayton Homes, Inc.
Bottom line? 25 manufacturers shipped 70 percent of all new ‘mobile homes’ in 1977; and, three manufacturers shipped 71+/- percent of new manufactured homes during 2015. Consequences? Some good; others not so much…
These are but two of the NEW ERA Zeitgeist matters open for discussion at MHAlive! and the 25th anniversary Networking Roundtable. Will YOU be present for either or both venues?
End Note.
1. Given the opportunity, read a reprint of the Manufactured Home Merchandiser magazine classic, circa year 2000, ‘Upside Down in a Mobilehome Park’. FREE copy ‘for the asking’ when you phone (317) 346-7156 or request it via email.
II.
FHFA: Wants Duty to Serve (‘DTS’) Ideas for Serving Underserved (‘MH’) Markets!
This from a 21 July Press Release from the Federal Housing Finance Agency, titled: ‘Update on FHFA’s Proposed Rule on Duty to Serve Underserved markets’:
‘The…goal of Duty to Serve proposed rule is to increase the availability of mortgage financing in a safe and sound manner for very low, low, and moderate-income families across the country. FHFA, as regulator of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, will oversee the development of the Enterprises’ plans to meet their Duty to Serve Requirements.”
And this, a Networking Roundtable presenter’s description of the topic he address on 8 September in Nashville, TN:
“Wise business people look at where they’re already having success and try to do more of it! There’s one company in the LLLCommunity business that’s currently operating with Fannie Mae ‘home only’ loan product in some of their communities. How does it work? What are the key elements of the program? Is it possibly a model for a ‘home only’ loan program with both GSEs?”
You’ll have to be present for this session to learn the details from a CEO who’s creatively answering the FHFA’s Duty to Serve challenge! Perhaps more will follow his lead after the roundtable event ends…
Phone the Official MHIndustry HOTLINE: (877) MFD-HSNG or 633-4764 for a brochure describing the agenda for this 25th anniversary Networking Roundtable, 7-9 September, in Nashville, TN.
**
George Allen, CPM & MHM
Box # 47024
Indianapolis, IN. 46247
(317) 346-7156