How Does Renting A Mobile Home Work? Understanding The Basics

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So you’re wondering, “how does renting a mobile home work?” It’s important that you get the basics down, whether you’re curious from the standpoint of a tenant or from that of the mobile home park owner.

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Without a clear understanding of how renting such a home works, the waters can get a little murky. And unnecessarily at that. We’ll put forward the different steps you’ll encounter when renting a mobile home.

Going into this a little more informed can make for a more streamlined approach to renting.

How does renting a mobile home work?

Understanding how renting a mobile home works will make for smoother sailing. You’ll know what questions to ask and what to look for.

Tour of mobile home and park

In most cases, a prospective tenant will want a tour of the mobile home park and plausible housing situation. If you’re the park manager, this is your chance to let that park shine.

As a park manager, you should already be providing the best experience possible to your tenants. A glimpse of this should be seen as you provide a tour to a plausible tenant. Be kind and courteous, going above and beyond to answer their questions and provide insight into the day to day life of the park.

Being open with your tenant is the best policy. Why would you want a tenant who doesn’t want to be around because you misled him or her? Do your part and give them the information they need to make a proper decision. It’s not just about your park. It’s about the people living in your park and the prospective tenant’s life too.

Interview process

This phase may happen in conjunction with the tour. And it’s not just for the tenant to be interviewed. We strongly encourage the tenant to interview staff and plausible neighbors. This will give the park manager and tenant an idea of whether or not an agreement could work out.

Mobile home park management is not allowed to discriminate “based on race, color, religion, sex, familial status, national origin or disability.”

Group of diverse young adutls

Background checks

In many cases, a mobile home park will want to do a background check on prospective tenants. They’re going to want to know if you have good credit. They’ll also want to know if you’ve been wrapped up in any lawsuits or criminal activity.

Things like criminal activity may not automatically annul your opportunity to join the park community. It certainly depends on the nature of the crime and the mobile home park’s intent.

For example, some parks provide housing to sexual offenders and other criminals only. Other parks cater to families and (rightly) feel obligated to mitigate any possible danger to children by disallowing offenders in the park.

What the park does with the findings and how that affects the tenant will vary from park to park.

Terms of the rental agreement

Now here’s where things become more serious. For the tenant and management’s own good, the terms of the rental agreement are important. It should lay out all that management expects from the tenant. Management should also detail what the tenant can expect from management.

This is a crucial part of the process. The two parties signing this document will provide a paper trail and prove important should an issue need to be brought to court. The offended party should be able to point out where in the agreement the offending party veered off course.

Without a signed paper trail, there is little to no recourse in a big disagreement.

Security deposit and other fees

When you rent a mobile home, there will be some fees outside of the monthly rent. For example, when you sign your lease agreement you will be likely asked to make a security deposit payment.

Additionally, the lease agreement should tell you if you need to pay for anything else outside of that and rent. Do you have a pet? Is there a pet fee? What about utilities? What utilities are you responsible for?

Maintenance responsibilities

And this brings us to maintenance responsibilities. It’s our last point in answer to the question, “how does renting a mobile homework?” In a mobile home park, you’ll find that management is responsible for some things while the tenant is responsible for others.

For example, yard maintenance will be the tenant’s responsibility. But if there’s a problem with a utility, it may be the park’s problem to get things working again. This should all be clear in the lease agreement.

Lawn mower

After the rental agreement’s been signed…

Those are just some basics on how does renting a mobile home work. We discussed the importance of the terms of rental agreement should you need to take an issue to court, but hopefully a disagreement won’t get that far. It’s up to the mobile home park manager to be well-versed in the fine art of conflict management. Often, conflicts become emotional, especially when either party hasn’t thought through an issue. It’s up to management to smooth things over before they spiral out of hand.

About Dan Leighton

Dan Leighton has been working in the mobile home industry for over a decade. His focus has been on sales and customer relations - making sure each person in the transaction is comfortable and fully transparent. He has a wife and one son. Dan continues to look for innovative ways to help both sellers and parks get the most bang for their buck.





Written by Dan Leighton

Dan Leighton has been working in the mobile home industry for over a decade. His focus has been on sales and customer relations - making sure each person in the transaction is comfortable and fully transparent. He has a wife and one son. Dan continues to look for innovative ways to help both sellers and parks get the most bang for their buck.

October 29, 2018

 

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