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Marie Liberman, left, and Beverly Chai walk their dogs at Dover Mobile Home Park in Fairfield. The park is owned by its tenants. (Maggie Creamer/News-Sentinel)
In Fairfield, mobile home tenants own their parks
While walking their dogs Thursday afternoon, Marie Liberman and Beverly Chai both say living in a mobile home park in Fairfield is much more affordable than any other housing options.
The two were walking through Dover Mobile Home Park, which has well-paved streets, big lots with grass and gardens, and a community center with a pool.
Liberman bought her home in Dover after her kids left for college, and she realized her house was too big. Thirty-three years later, she has no plans to leave the park.
"Most of (the residents) are elderly and plan to stay here until they die," Liberman said.
Like the other three large mobile home parks in Fairfield, Dover is owned by its residents. They set the rent, hire people to repair the streets, and manage their own community.
The city first tackled rising park rents by enacting a rent stabilization ordinance in 1984.
In the mid-'90s, the city helped residents convert to resident ownership, said Lark Ferrell, a city senior project manager. There are still two private parks, but they are much smaller and have mostly mobile homes that can actually be moved.
The city helped the parks set up a nonprofit. The parks were then purchased with a mix of funding, including tax-exempt mortgage revenue bonds, redevelopment money and low-interest state loans from the Mobilehome Park Resident Ownership Program.
Before the city stepped in, Lark said some of the park owners had raised rents and planned to kick out any tenants on Section 8 Housing, a federal program providing low-income assistance to help with rent and mortgage payments.
By owning the parks, the 722 tenants who live in them vote on any rent increases.
Jean Wright had moved out of the park in 1988 but moved back in 2006 to Casa Nova Mobile Home Park, which is now a senior park. Since then, the rent has gone up twice — by $15 each time.
She said that when the park was owned privately, the landlord would raise rents whenever, but now that it is owned by the residents, she appreciates getting to vote.
Estelle Werner also moved back to her park, Country Club Estates, after being in Oregon for a few years.
She said her rent of $450 has not increased in two years and when it does increase, it is never by much.
Because the park is tenant-owned, she said there is more of a community feel. The park has a library, a living room, a variety of events, and a newsletter with anniversaries and birthdays.
There are multiple ways to transition a park from private to tenant ownership.
Fairfield created a tenant non-profit. Now, state law has expanded to also allow existing nonprofits to buy parks. Lark said that if that option had been available when they worked with tenants in the '90s, she would have suggested it, because an affordable housing non-profit already is established.
Tenants can also buy shares in the purchase of a park, but because mobile home park residents in Fairfield typically have lower, often fixed, incomes, that would not have been a good solution. While still walking, Liberman said she is glad she gets to live in her community and rents stay low.
"It's nice because we consider the economy," Liberman said. "All of us old people are on fixed incomes."
Contact reporter Maggie Creamer at maggiec@lodinews.com.
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dogs4you wrote on Oct 17, 2009 1:33 PM:
CaptainGort wrote on Oct 17, 2009 8:45 AM:
Probably over 1000/mo. Resale value on my 30 year old manufactured home would be far, far, lower if one had to also shoulder that high rent as a total cost of living there. "
CaptainGort wrote on Oct 17, 2009 8:39 AM:
(like a condo) and get to vote. This allows many benefits to arise. Look at it this way: KOA is a TRUE "mobile" home park. The tenants there are free to leave if they can find a better deal....like boats in a yacht harbor. Communities of (im)mobile manufactured homes are PERMANENT...their owners sell them when they move on and the home stays there forever. Just imagine the situation you'd have with your site-built home if the land it is on was RENTED. That's what is going on here. "
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