Runnin' on Empty

This is what you see when you first enter the Upland Cascade Mobile Home Park.  Notice that the waterfall is now trickling slowly rather than running freely as it had in the past.  Is the well running dry?  Perhaps a metaphor as to what is going on behind the walls at our park.

According to my figures the park currently has 12 empty dirt lots and approximately 11 vacant mobile homes out of 188 total spaces.  In my opinion, many of these empty lots and empty mobile homes are the direct result of evictions or 'walk aways' brought about by residents being priced out of their homes via uncontrollable rents and the unconscionable terms of the park's leasing contract.  Is all this now coming back to bite the Tatum Kaplan gang in the butt???  Maybe a little bit.

OK...in our park, the rents range from approximately $600.00 a month to $1300.00+ a month.  The median rent in our park would then be $950.00.  Since we have 23 lots homes that are not collecting rent at the present time then the park is not collecting approximately $21,850.00 in revenues each month.   That would be approximately $260,000.00 a year of lost revenues due to Tatum Kaplan's exorbitant rents. 

I chose to use median rents rather than average rents because I don't have the actual rents charged for each space but if we calculate the above using a low guesstimate of what the average rent might be then this would be what we find.  Lets guesstimate that the average allowable rents at this time for the 23 empty spaces would be $800.00 per month.  Then $800.00 X 23 vacant spaces would be $18,400.00.  The annual loss would be $220,800.00.  Still, with the low estimate, that is a considerable chunk of change. 

Jeffrey Kaplan recently wrote a letter to the Federal Housing Finance Agency.  In his letter, Kaplan cites a 21 year old article that states that "land-lease parks represents over 4% of California's housing stock and...is clearly one of the most efficient forms of housing when measured by the cost per square foot and the quality of shelter."  ("Legal-Economic Analysis of Rent Controls in the Mobile Hom Context: Placement Values and Vacancy Decontrol" Hirsch and Hirsch)  Kaplan then adds, "Yet, this market is currently underserved by lenders at all levels--from the park owners who are unable to refinance their existing loans to developers who would build more affordable housing spaces to potential new tenants who wish to buy new and used mobilehomes. Of course, I believe what Kaplan is getting at here is to have the government free up more money so it can go into his own wallet.  It is my belief that not much ink flows from Jeffrey Kaplan's pen that does not serve to support his own greedy self-interest. The problem with Tatum and Kaplan owned parks is not that loans are not available for refinancing or the purchase of new and used mobilehomes.  It is my opinion that the problem with Tatum Kaplan owned parks reaches back much further than this nation's current economic situation and the core of this problem is that no one now wants to buy into one of their parks because the word is out...the rents are too high, the conditions in their parks are deteriorating and the owners and management cannot be trusted.  It's that simple!