Looking at possibly moving to a trailer park want some info if you guys have it (Denver: apartment complex)

[Biggamer86]

So currently I'm living at an apartment complex and this past lease renewal the place increased my rent by $110.00 a month which is outrageous they've done zero upgrades. The issue is I don't have a ton of money so I was possibly looking into moving from an apartment to a mobile home which I really don't know a whole lot about. Size etc aren't too much of an issue as it's just me and I'm not really picky, I just want a safe area where my vehicle/property won't get broken into that's going to be cheaper than my current rent which total's around $1000.00 a month. As far as area I could move as far north as Thornton and as far south as Parker, I work from home but I have to live close enough to drive into the office a few times a year.

So to sum it up after insurance, renting the spot, and a possible loan on the mobile home would this be cheaper than $1000.00 per month, and what would be a decent area to look at. (preferably one with good fishing nearby)

[lurtsman]

You could split a decent two bedroom apartment that would run around 900 a month and have your share come in around 450. That's better than living in the trailer parks. The trailer parks are awful. Awful. You will be woken up all the time by trashy people getting drunk and screaming in the middle of the night. Don't live in a trailer park unless you really hate yourself.

[reed303]

Originally Posted by lurtsman

You could split a decent two bedroom apartment that would run around 900 a month and have your share come in around 450. That's better than living in the trailer parks. The trailer parks are awful. Awful. You will be woken up all the time by trashy people getting drunk and screaming in the middle of the night. Don't live in a trailer park unless you really hate yourself.

FWIW, I've had the opposite experience. Apartment buildings (4) full of "trashy" people , and mobile home parks (3) that were perfectly fine .

[Biggamer86]

Luster you described my apartment complex to a T with that comment I just learned to tune it out. As long as the people leave me alone I really don't even care about noise anymore I've just learned to live with it until I can afford a real home.

[blendin]

There are a few draw backs to buying "mobile homes" aka trailers.

-If you buy an older one basically you are stuck where you buy it. Most zoning will not let you move older trailers into their counties and cites. Where you can move them is usually very scary.

-Trailers are not built to last by the time they are 30 years old the cheaply built bathrooms and kitchens have had it and are a leaking falling apart mess not worth remodeling.

-They tend to attract low class families so many times they are a disgusting foul boxes soaked in years of animal urine, spilt milk with maybe a few piles of discarded syringes under them and meth lab residue in the bedrooms.

-In the winter they do not hold heat. Expect a high heating bill. If you have a wood stove they can catch fire and burn you in your sleep in less then 3mins.

-Trailer walls are thin you will hear your neighbors, beat their wives, beat their pitbulls and beat their kids. Don't mess with them they will hurt you.

Easy to get into hard to get out of. I knew someone that tried to sell one for 2yrs then gave it to their church.

[bullfish15]

Most of the horror stories about mobile homes in this thread are being spewed by aloof, uppity snobs who have never driven through a mobile home park let alone a city that has one in its city limits. You're going to find the same demographic of people in the trailer parks as you find in apartments. People in a life transition, people just starting out, poor people and gutter trash all call apartments and trailer parks home. Some parks are worse than some apartments and vice versa.

For all intensive purposes, you will own your mobile home and in most cases you will park it on rented land. This poses a unique conundrum because a mobile home is not something that you can just pack up and move right away. It costs a good deal of money to prep a home to be moved and there are often long term leases of the lot involved. The lot rents in Denver are really expensive and by the time you factor in the lot rent and mortgage, you are at or close to market rent for an apartment. Since the value of the mobile home decreases, you will often see sellers bringing cash to the closing table to make up for the difference between the payoff and what you can sell it for.

If you don't mind the asset wrapped in a liability, go for the mobile. It will be yours and you can fix it up as you wish, just be ready to throw down some cash when you plan on selling it. For more flexibility, go for the apartment. When your lease is up, you walk.

[yeshuaschosen]

I managed a trailer park I already lived in when offered the job.What a surprise I got! I didn't have a clue what kind of people the owners or the residents were until I went to work for them.OMG! Basically I had to set up a community watch & work my tail off just to get the place safe & cleaned back up .The surprising thing was that the owners turned out to be much worse to deal with than the residents. I ended up getting fired after my 6th year of working for them because I didn't give a d*** about the job anymore I was burnt out dealing with them.The best advice I can give you is please find out what states have eviction clauses that say you can't be evicted unless you've done something bad otherwise you can get screwed bad buying a trailer. Unfortunately NC is one of these states that has no laws in the books that protects you from being evicted. They don't guarantee that you can sell your home either if you don't want to take it with you.If your landlord cancels your lease here and you don't move within the time frame that they have given you then they can turn around & evict you for no reason except 'holding over' which is BS. Its much cheaper to move out of a house/ apartment. Moving your house & setting it up again is about 4000.00 not including land.Add 30,000 grand to that first number to buy a lot with and you probably haVE 40,000 GRAND IN IT NOW.NC is not a mobile home friendly state so please don't move it here.By the way they are evicting me! Good luck!

[Techn0lady]

Wait a minute - I don' know about Denver, granted being so new here, but I lived in a mobile/manufactured home park in Tahoe about 15 years ago and it was lovely! It was a double wide - had a nice yard and storage space and Tahoe winters make Denver look like a summer's day and I had ZERO problem with heating or heat bills and my neighbors were lovely people all around. So I am finding some of the comments here a bit .... strange. (yes I know that internet comments are worth every penny that you paid lol) . I would be hard pressed to believe that there are not equally nice manufactured home parks here in the Denver area as well.


Of course lower income people will be attracted to lower income housing (duh!) and it is true that there tends to be more crime and such in lower income areas as a general rule - HOWEVER I think the best answer is to just do your due diligence and check out the neighborhood and the home prior to purchase.
I am currently paying $830 for a smallish one bedroom in a nice neighborhood and I could plop down 20K as a down payment on a manufactured home myself and am seriously wondering if maybe I would be better of if I did as well.