Mobile Home Parks Are Most of Golden’s Existing Affordable Housing

Mobile home parks are the largest source of unsubsidized affordable housing. Golden has two parks within the city limits, Golden Hills (40 units) and Golden Terrace (654 units). Mountainside Estates (232 units) is just outside the city limits, and Pleasant View has two parks (63 units).

Slideshow about mobile home parks:

GUHTF Manufactured Housing 5-6-21

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Thistle ROC (https://thistle.us/roc/) is Colorado's Certified Technical Assistance Provider for ROC (Resident Owned Communities). ROC USA (https://rocusa.org/) is a national non-profit social venture that has successfully converted 250 mobile home communities in 17 states to resident ownership, thus preserving affordability and promoting self-determination for more than 17,000 families. They can provide financing and technical assistance so that the existing residents can acquire a mobile home park land from the owner and self-determine their future.

Two Colorado parks recently became resident owned communities!

Sans Souci in Boulder County

River View in Durango

Mobile home owners own their mobile home but not the land underneath, paying rent or “lot fees” to a landlord who owns the park where they live. Here are a couple of informative blogs from Golden Real Estate’s Jim Smith:

Any Talk About Affordable Housing Must Include Mobile Homes (9/2/20)

Big Entities Target Mobile Home Parks, the Last Bastion of Affordable Housing (2/5/20)

Prof. Esther Sullivan (University of Colorado Denver) has a great TedTalk--America's most invisible communities—mobile home parks (video 14:35)

A couple of years ago Colorado implemented the Mobile Home Park Oversight Program (MHPOP) under the state's Division of Housing (https://cdola.colorado.gov/mobile-home-park-oversight). MHPOP oversees the Mobile Home Park Act and a new complaint process (https://cdola.colorado.gov/mobile-home-park-dispute-resolution). This new legislation was in response to a Sunshine Review by the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies. The report stated:

"Clearly, harm is occurring in manufactured housing communities. Those instances of harm are not due to a lack of professional competence among manufactured housing community owners and managers. The harm largely stems from the lack of enforcement of existing laws, bad actors exploiting a relatively loose regulatory structure, and the inevitable tension that arises when the house belongs to one person but the land beneath it belongs to someone else."

The complaint program has had some successes:

Oct. 2020: Residents of seven Colorado mobile home parks operated by Kingsley Management Corp. received a settlement of $146,000 for wrongly withheld security deposits and fees.

Please download this information about What's in Colorado's Mobile Home Park Act?

MHPA 1-pager-b&w-combined

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Please download this discussion about opportunities for mobile home owners to own their parks.

Yes, Mobile Home Parks Can Be Resident O

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