When starting your search to buy a mobile home park there are several ways to do this. I would suggest trying each of these as they will all give you a different perspective and comparables to evaluate. Then when you find the park that seems to fit, you will have the knowledge and be able to move quickly. If you wait too long, you will most likely find out it is under contact. So it is best to be ready when the time comes.
When you are searching for a mobile home park to purchase, it is often the park or deal that is least advertised that may represent the best deals.
Here are a few potential ways to find properties:
1. MobileHomeParkStore:
on average we are adding over 80 new properties for sale to the website each and every month. Of these new listings, I would estimate that about 20% of them are reasonably priced and will sell quickly. About 30% are of the listings are borderline and may sit on the site for a few months but will sell within 6 months to a year. The other 50% are overpriced and/or not currently viable projects due to a bad local market or other factors. It is the first 20% that most of you will be looking for. The best way to stay updated on new properties for sale is to join our early investor list. You receive all the new listings by email 48 hours before they hit the site. As soon as I receive the listing, it is immediately sent out to this list of investors.
The benefits of being on this list is twofold: one you get emailed all the listings and you start seeing what parks are listed for and can usually tell which parks are worth following up on quickly. The other benefit is that you will see the listings 48 hours before the general public and are able to get a conversation going with the Seller before he is inundated with all those calls once it is posted on the site.
2. Other Websites:
Loopnet.com, CIMLS.com, Real Estate Company Websites, Business Brokerage Websites, and numerous other similar sites: I purchased a mobile home park in 2006 that was listed on a Business For Sale web site that had been on there for 6 months. I know that if it had been on mobilehomeparkstore or loopnet it would have been sold long before that. It is worth checking out some of these other websites that do not have a big mobile home park investor following.
3. Google Web Searches:
We are always doing these searches looking for new parks for sale to promote mobilehomeparkstore to. Every once in a while there will be a good potential deal listed for sale down about 20 or 30 pages in the search results.
4. Contact Real Estate Brokers that specialize in selling Mobile Home Parks:
These are the professionals that are out there every day trying to get parks listed for sale and will often have pocket listings or listings that they cannot otherwise advertise. I would contact any broker that does business in areas you are looking and be very specific about what you are looking for. It is good to stay in touch with them on a regular basis so when they get a new listing they will think about you if it meets your criteria.
5. Contact other Real Estate Brokers that are in areas that you are looking for properties:
It is amazing how many mobile home parks are listed by brokers that have no idea how to value a park, how to market a park for sale, and where to find a buyer for the park. If you are looking for a mobile home park for sale in a certain state or city, I would find all the brokers you can in these areas and send them an email asking them if they have any mobile home parks for sale or if they know of any. The ones that reply to you with an offer to keep an eye out for you will be the ones that you will follow up with on a regular basis.
6. Direct Mail:
I have been using this method in various forms over the years and have purchased many parks this way. In setting up your direct mail campaign, you will want to set yourself apart from the other companies and individuals that send out massive amounts of mail to the park owners/managers. Here are just a few ideas that I have used in the past:
a. Make your mailing piece stand out from the rest of the competitors.
b. Identify yourself as a real person, not some LLC without an identity.
c. Incorporate useful information in the mailing so that it will be retained by the owner. I continue to get calls from mailings I sent out several years ago from owners that kept my postcard.
d. Possibly include magnets, notepads, or other useful gadgets with your phone number on them that will be right in front of the owner when they decide to sell.
In addition, any direct mail campaign should include more than one contact to each recipient. Anywhere from 3-5 contacts per year should be made in order to keep you and your company in front of the potential sellers. I like to switch it up by varying the mailings to include different letters, postcards, etc so it is not the same piece each and every time.
Another important part of the direct mail process is that you have to get a good list of prospects with which to mail to. The best way to do this is to purchase an existing list like the one we have on our site or with a list service such as infousa.com and then work on building it to fit your needs.
7. Cold Calling:
Basically you can go to our website, MHPS and go to the park directory and start making phone calls to parks that are in the areas you are looking. I have found it best to identify yourself as someone that is looking to purchase a mobile home park in that area and were wondering if this park is for sale or if they know of one for sale. You will get hang-ups and occasionally even be yelled at, but for the most part people will be sociable. Many times these owners/managers will know of other parks for sale in the area. It is often good to follow up by mail with anyone that seems to be a potential prospect in the future.
8. Major Newspapers and Manufactured Home Magazines:
Just like staying on top of listings on MobileHomeParkStore you will need to stay on top of these classified ads to be sure you don't miss potential deals that will be snatched up by other investors. Many of the larger newspapers have an online service that will allow you to sign up to be emailed listings that match particular criteria.
9. An indirect way to find Mobile Home Park deals is to look for mobile homes for sale and then call on these homes. By talking with the owners of the mobile homes for sale you can often find out a great deal about the community and who owns it, what the rents are, the size of it, how many vacancies and such. If it seems to fit into what you are looking for, then you have another prospect and you can start contacting the owner on a regular basis.
10. Driving through potential parks:
If you see a park that looks interesting, take a drive through, write down some phone numbers of homes for sale, stop and talk to the owner/manager, leave your card, and if it seems to be a good fit, follow up on a regular basis. Don't bother the residents though as you will often upset the manager and owner and they will not be open to talking with you.
11. Visit Manufactured Home Trade Shows, Mobile Home Park Investment Seminars, and other industry events. You will make many great contacts with other investors and industry professionals, and will start to develop a network of people that will help you in your search and management of your mobile home park investment.
12. Subscribe to RSS feeds or Google Alerts to get news on mobile home parks that are in the news. You will be looking for parks and park owners that are in trouble. Many times, the owner is not in compliance, behind on bills, or is doing something to stir up a ruckus with the residents. This is a great way to find motivated sellers especially if you have a solution to their problem. Make sure that you have a good solution to the problem so you don't end up in the same boat as the seller.
13. County Tax Records:
most counties have a listing of the mobile home parks in the county and some information in regards to the owners, etc. By searching the country records you might also be able to see what the park was last sold at, is currently valued at by the county(which is often quite low) and whether the taxes are paid. If the taxes are not paid, this may indicate a motivated seller.
14. Contact appraisers, banks, title companies, friends, relatives and let them know what you are looking for and to keep their eye open. Offer them a finders fee if they find something that you end up purchasing.
I had a friend that knew I bought mobile home parks and he passed me on to an awesome deal in Texas. He had done some concrete work for the owner and the owner told him it was for sale. He told me about it and I purchased it about a month later. I sold it a few months after that for a profit of over $100K and wrote my friend a check for $25,000. He has been keeping his eye open ever since.
In another instance I was having my oil changed at Wal Mart in Nebraska. The service guy asked me what I was doing there from Colorado. One thing led to another and he told me about a mobile home park that he lived in that was for sale. I went straight to the park and talked with the owner and purchased it a couple of months later. It was a park of about 45 units but was mismanaged and priced right. I sold the park about 6 months later at a profit of over $75,000. I call this the best Oil Change ever!
15. Heirs:
another great place to buy a park. They usually want cash not a mobile home park to manage.
16. Make Unsolicited Offers:
In the past, I have collected information on certain mobile home parks, number of spaces, lot rents, occupancy, who pays water, sewer, and trash and then plugged this into a basic valuation formula and generated offers. I would prepare a purchase and sale contract with all the standard provisions with the price I was willing to pay and mail these out to the owners. I received a much higher response rate doing this than any other type of direct mail. However, I received many irate owners calling or writing back asking me if I was on drugs or plumb crazy because their park was worth much more than I offered. On the flip side, I had several owners sign the contract and send it back. I purchased about 5 parks using this strategy.
