Interview with Larry Abramowitz from Broadview Capital Partners

SHOW NOTES

Welcome back to the Passive Mobile Home Park Investing Podcast, hosted by Andrew Keel. On this episode of the Passive Mobile Home Park Investing Podcast, Andrew talks with Larry Abramowitz from Broadview Capital Partners.

Although Larry might be newer to the manufactured housing community investing space, by comparison, he is making a name for himself, with his entrepreneurial spirit and love for the asset class. He has acquired 16 mobile home communities in only 3 years. In this episode Larry offers a lot of golden nuggets from his mobile home park investing journey. Larry discusses some of the mistakes he has made, including buying too many mobile homes for infill too fast. Larry also discusses his unique take on what his perfect Mobile Home Park would look like. Larry brings enthusiasm and down-to-earth knowledge for passive investors interested in mobile home park investing.

Larry Abramowitz founded Broadview Capital Partners LLC, in 2014, to acquire, remodel and rejuvenate, distressed and abandoned Mobile Home Park communities, as well as multi-family and commercial properties. He has bought and sold over $40M in assets and owns and operates 16 Mobile Home Park communities in the Midwest and Southeast.

Larry holds a B.A. in Manufacturing Engineering from Boston University and an MBA, in Finance & Marketing, from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

***Andrew Keel and Keel Team Real Estate Investments (Keel Team, LLC) do not endorse any interviewee. This interview is for informational purposes only and should not be depended upon for investment purposes. ***

Andrew Keel is the owner of Keel Team, LLC, a Top 100 Owner of Manufactured Housing Communities, with over 2,500 lots under management. His team currently manages over 30 manufactured housing communities across more than ten states. His expertise is in turning around under-managed manufactured housing communities, by utilizing proven systems to maximize the occupancy, while reducing operating costs. He specializes in bringing in homes to fill vacant lots, implementing utility bill back programs, and improving overall management and operating efficiencies, all of which significantly boost the asset value and net operating income of the communities.

Andrew has been featured on some of the Top Podcasts in the manufactured housing space, click here to listen to his most recent interviews: https://www.keelteam.com/podcast-links. In order to successfully implement his management strategy Andrew’s team usually moves on location during the first several months of ownership. Find out more about Andrew’s story at AndrewKeel.com.

Are you getting value out of this show? If so, please head over to iTunes and leave the show a quick five-star review. I have a goal of hitting over 500 total 5-star reviews and it would mean the absolute world to me if you could help contribute to that. Thanks ahead of time for making my day with your five-star review of the show.

Would you like to see mobile home park projects in progress? If so, follow us on Instagram: @passivemhpinvesting for photos and awesome videos from our recent mobile home park acquisitions.

Talking Points:

00:21 – Welcome to the Passive Mobile Home Park Investing Podcast

01:44 – Larry’s journey into Mobile Home Park investing

10:30 – Larry’s team, operations, and growth

13:00 – Managing park-owned mobile homes

15:00 – Infill, the toughest value-added component!

18:53 – Larry’s Mobile Home Park investing strategy and how his strategy has changed over the years

20:52 – Buying too many mobile homes too fast

23:47 – Advice for LP’s (passive investors) limited partner investors of mobile home parks

26:05 – Fixing up a neglected Mobile Home Park

30:26 – Affordable housing is a great asset class to invest in

32:19 – Difficulties with zoning, regulations, and the local government

36:00 – Reaching out to Larry

36:49 – Conclusion

SUBSCRIBE TO PASSIVE MOBILE HOME PARK INVESTING PODCAST YOUTUBE CHANNEL https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCy9uI3KGQmFgABsr9lUtRTQ

Links & Mentions from This Episode:

Reach out to Larry: larry@broadviewcap.com

Broadview Capital Partners: https://broadviewcap.com/

Broadview Communities: https://broadviewcommunities.com/

Keel Team’s official website: https://www.keelteam.com/ 

Andrew Keel’s official website: https://www.andrewkeel.com/ 

Andrew Keel LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewkeel 

Andrew Keel Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/PassiveMHPinvestingPodcast

Andrew Keel Instagram page: https://www.instagram.com/passivemhpinvesting/

Twitter: @MHPinvestors

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TRANSCRIPT

Andrew: Welcome to the Passive Mobile Home Park Investing podcast. This is your host, Andrew Keel. Today, we have an amazing guest in Mr. Larry Abramowitz from Broadway Capital Partners.

Before we dive in, I want to ask a real quick favor. Would you mind taking an extra 30 seconds to please head over to iTunes and rate this podcast with five stars? This helps us get more listeners and it means the absolute world to me. So thank you so much for making my day with that review of the show.

All right, let’s dive in. Larry founded Broadview Capital Partners in 2014 to acquire, remodel, and rejuvenate distressed and abandoned manufactured housing communities, as well as multifamily and commercial properties. Larry has bought and sold over $40 million in assets and owns and operates 16 mobile home parks in the Midwest and Southeastern United States.

Larry holds a BA in Manufacturing Engineering from Boston University, and an MBA in Finance and Marketing from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Larry, we are excited to welcome you to the show today.

Larry: I’m also very excited. Thanks for having me. I always listen to your podcast.

Andrew: Awesome, man. Well, thank you. I guess you know how these start out then. We’d love to learn about your story and how in the world you got into manufactured housing communities.

Larry: I live in Miami, Florida, and when they were available, I was buying a lot of distressed properties here locally, single family homes. I did a little bit of everything. I did single family homes, apartments, land, industrial. I did retail and office. Whatever I could buy in foreclosure from the court that made sense, that the multiples were huge.

These are all cash deals, a lot of undisclosed information. Some of it was surprising. When you bought these deals, you didn’t know a lot about it. But I started buying those deals and making great returns in multiples. Most of these were distressed deals, foreclosed deals, abandoned properties.

Andrew: Was this back from 2008, the Great Recession that you started doing this? Or how long?

Larry: No, here was 2000. This started later than that at least in this area because a lot of these homes that were in foreclosure, the courts took a long time to get through the process. A lot of these were delayed way beyond 2008–2009. A lot of these cases were in court to the 2012, -13, -14. They were still getting foreclosed. We were still able to pick up these assets at great prices.

I did that for a while, and then that dried up. I started 2014 doing this, and then this dried up. So I moved to multifamily. I studied the different asset classes since I already did them all or most of them. I decided to do multifamily just because after analyzing all these classes, I said, people need a place to live.

You diversify with the different tenants. I had never raised money before, and that was the first time I raised money. I decided to buy a hundred-plus unit in Daytona Beach. That was in 2018. After that, tried to buy more multifamily and I syndicated that deal.

I have never raised money, and for that deal I raised $4½ million in about 3 months. Just with my network, I was able to buy that deal. We did very well. I try to buy more of those multifamily deals, mostly in central Florida. At that time, it was getting very hot, the multifamily sector, especially in Florida. The cap rates were very compressed.

After doing offers for six months to a year, I have to find another asset class where I can have deal flow and not lose against the big institutional investors. Somebody told me about mobile home parks. Somebody introduced me to a guy that was doing this for a while, and met with him. He told me about the asset class. I thought it was interesting. He said, if you’re going to do it, you got to go to Mobile Home Park University, at least learn the business.

I went to Frank Rolfe’s class in Charleston, South Carolina. I think he had it at that time. I went there for the weekend and did the class. It took me about six months to buy my first park. I was very meticulous, analyzing every deal.

Also, I started looking in Florida. I was finding the cap rates were even more compressed in the mobile home parks in Florida than in multifamily. I said, I’m not going to switch asset classes to buy a lower cap rate. So then I started looking outside of Florida and found my first deal through a wholesaler in Wichita, Kansas.

It took me a while to pull the trigger. It was also a distressed park, which was my specialty buying distressed assets, but I was used to doing it locally. This was far away. I went to see the asset.

I really liked the location. It was next to the best school system there in Wichita. It was actually fencing the school, but it was just one of these properties that were used to be full. The owner inherited the property from his dad, and he basically ran it to the ground. So I picked it up very, very inexpensively. I think it was $4000 a lot.

The city wanted it shut down. My understanding was that this park had been around the block. When I went to the city they said I was the seventh buyer. The city had changed the code because of this park. They didn’t want mobile home parks because the owner was so bad with the city. They had put all these clauses where you have to spend a lot of CapEx to be able to, within 90 days of buying the park, do the roads, do tornado shelters, you got to do lighting.

They had all these requirements that nobody was ever going to buy the park because it didn’t work. I was able to meet with the city, showing what my plans were to bring the new homes, but I said I can’t do it in 90 days. You got to give me a couple of years to get this done and I’ll do it. I convinced them, and they actually changed the code. Then I convinced them also to increase the zoning. I got it from 62 pads to 79 pads. That was my first deal.

I didn’t know anything about the business other than what I learned in the university or the weekend course with Frank. I just went at it. After I got my dealer’s license, bought my first Clayton home, got it installed and made it a model home and made it my home. I basically spent about a week every month for the first year living there to learn the business and really try to turn the park around.

I couldn’t afford a manager. I had somebody live in the park that still works with me, and she’s doing an amazing job with the park, but at the beginning, I couldn’t afford it. We had a deal where she was still keeping her job and I was helping her turn the park around.

Between both of us, I think we’re at 55–60 occupied lots. When I got it was like a 10 or 15. Right now, I think we’ve brought in almost 40 brand new homes. We paved the roads, added streetlights, brought in about 40 new homes, sold some, rented some. I also bought used homes, so a little bit of everything. Just learning everything from setups to fixing. We had to change the sewer line there.

Andrew: When was that when you closed on the Wichita park?

Larry: July, 2020. Actually, to top it off, I got really sick with Covid right before closing, and I could not go to the park to close. It was a crazy thing because I had to close from my home in Miami. I could hardly speak. I was very, very sick. It was a big deal because at that time, the title company couldn’t do the closing remotely. It was a big deal because they made an exception to let me close remotely. I basically took over this deal without even being there.

Andrew: Yeah, your first deal. That sounds scary. Let me ask you this, Larry. What was your background prior to all this? I saw you had a BA in manufacturing engineering. Did you have another life as an engineer?

Larry: Yes. Way before when I graduated, I worked at General Electric in aircraft engines, appliances division, and manufacturing. Then moved to Colombia when I married my wife’s Colombian. I was running there a paper factory. We made paper and cardboard boxes. I was doing that for about five years.

Then we moved to Miami. Actually, I had a flower importing and distributing company. We imported flowers and sold to supermarkets around the US. That was a business I did in 2000, and actually to 2020 I was doing that until Covid hit. That was my main business until I got set up with real estate.

Andrew: Wow. You’re pretty entrepreneurial, it seems like, your whole life. That’s fantastic. You’ve closed on your first park July 2020. Right now, we’re recording this, it’s August 2023, and you’re already up to 16 mobile home parks.

Larry: Yes.

Andrew: You’ve just been on a rampage, man. That is fantastic. That’s huge growth growth. Tell me about your team. Tell me about your operations, and how you’re able to get so many deals done.

Larry: The first four parks I bought on my own, didn’t raise any money from my investors, and I wanted to really learn the business. I did that for two years. I bought a park July 2020, the next one November of 2020. These were all rough parks. I haven’t bought a stabilized park yet. They’re all been real, crazy turnaround stories.

Then I bought another one in Wichita. That was in May of 2021. Then I bought another one in Wichita in September of 2021. A lot of it was to scale, to be able to afford a manager, and not have to be there. I did 89 segments in American Airlines in my first year. I was going to Peoria, Illinois in Wichita, Kansas.

The biggest hurdle was actually getting to scale, to be able to hire people to help me, not me having to do a lot of the work, and being able to afford managers. That was the first step. Then I decided to start a fund last year, launched at the end of May of last year. That’s how we also got to scale. Before I did that, I started building the team before I raised a fund.

Right now, we have a fully integrated property management. We have a director of operations that basically manages all the managers, every group of communities because we do clusters, and different areas have a manager. Sometimes we have a couple of maintenance people on site, leasing in one of the bigger portfolios. We have a team of five people in that community.

We also hired a project manager this year, which is helping me with all the infill and all the CapEx projects that we have on these value add deals. We have two people in accounting, one in marketing, and we have an administrative, somebody who helps us do titles and a lot of administrative work for all these communities. Now, we have a pretty big team and we’re still growing.

Andrew: That’s fantastic. That’s an awesome three years, dude. What do you think is the toughest hurdle to overcome in mobile home park investing? You’ve seen it firsthand.

Larry: Managing park-owned homes. I was very skeptical of everybody. They say stay away from park-owned homes, and I bought a portfolio with 240 park-owned homes. Most of them were newer. After a year of managing this portfolio, we pretty much learned you don’t make any money in park-owned homes. If you’re lucky, you break even, even if they’re newer. I think that the best thing to do with them is to sell them and sell them as fast as you can.

Right now, we signed up with a new program with Triad, so we’re going to try one of their programs where we finance them legally to the residents, or they’ll finance them.

We also use 21st Mortgage and PEP Lending. We have all these different programs set up in all the communities. Whatever makes sense for the homes, we’re going to try to sell them quickly. The beauty about also getting park-owned homes is you can set up your lot rents to be whatever you want them to be. You can split that any way you make sense. The good thing is when you sell these homes, you can set the lot rent a lot higher, so that helps with the value of the property.

Andrew: Totally. Just for the listeners that aren’t familiar, Triad, 21st Mortgage and PEP Lending, those are all chattel lenders on the manufactured homes directly. They will partner with the park owner and the end buyer of the home to provide financing, right?

Larry: Correct.

Andrew: Very cool. That’s a tough part. I agree with you. My model is the tenant-owned home model and converting the park-owned homes as quickly as possible, to the extent where we are not making money on the sale of the homes. We just want them to become tenant-owned homes. The income from those just don’t turn over, typically. It’s just the park-owned homes are the ones that turn over.

I agree with you. That’s a tough hurdle. But what about infill? Time and time again, that’s one of the toughest value-add components. There are just so many moving parts, and you’ve done quite a bit of it. What can you tell us about infill? Would you say that that’s one of the more difficult aspects about these value-add types of parks?

Larry: Yeah, that was on my list also. Another one that’s a huge hurdle is infill. Not only the CapEx. You need to bring in these homes and set them up. You have to get a dealer’s license to be able to buy for the manufacturers. You have to find a setter to set up the homes. You got to do the utilities.

You have all these different things—electrical, plumbing. You got to get the pads prepared. You got to do a set-up. Some states you have a HUD, which means you have to get a HUD inspector to approve the installation of the pads. Sometimes it takes 30 days.

Sometimes it takes more to set up a house, depending on the state, and get it ready to go. You got to get somebody to do the skirting to put around the house. Then you got to build the decks and the steps. That was a huge learning curve. At the beginning, I thought I could bring in homes and they’ll sell, like my first community that you bring them in and they will sell. It was a no-brainer.

When we first started, we were paying for really bigger homes, 38,000 delivered. Those homes went up to 57,000 at the peak of Covid with inflation. That became less affordable. They were still affordable, but because everything was going up, it was expensive for the typical resident that was applying to live in these homes.

It became a little challenging, those homes that we paid a lot more money for them. But the infill, you have to get somebody approved first, to convince somebody to buy a mobile home. And then to get them approved on the loan, it’s a very challenging process. It takes a lot of effort. It’s a big team effort.

We have two meetings a week to go over the sales calls and see how the leads are going, where the application process is. Because it’s not only getting somebody in and convincing them to buy their home. They have to apply, and you have to almost hand-hold them through the application process because it’s like applying for a home mortgage. They require a lot of documents and it can take 30 days or more to get somebody approved and through the process.

Andrew: And then they might not get approved. That’s what our experience was with 21st Mortgage. You spend all this time, all this effort to get all your ducks in a row, and like you said, you have to hold their hand to get into the application process. Then at the end, oh, sorry, they don’t have the 600 credit score, so they’re not going to qualify. Then you’re like, oh, now I’m back 60 days. I can’t get those 60 days back. I got to restart with someone new.

That’s why we’ve done a lot with Legacy. I think you and I spoke about that, where they have some in-house financing, gives you a little more flexibility. But yeah, there are a lot of options out there, dude. It’s tough.

Larry: You have to rent. If you want to move quickly, you have to have the flexibility to rent these so you can get the high occupancy quickly, and then try to convert them after they’re renting. They like the home and they like where they live, you try to convert them, but you don’t make money on the rentals. It’s almost like a break even on the home, at least try to break even. On the newer homes you can because there’s not a lot of maintenance, but eventually we do want to convert them to home buyers, and it’s a process.

Andrew: Totally. Is your investing strategy still the heavy infill, value-add type of parks, or has your strategy changed from your first deal to your most recent one?

Larry: It’s definitely changed. I want to buy parks that are at least 60%–70% occupied. I won’t buy a 20% occupied park. Again, never say never, unless maybe it’s an amazing deal in a great location.

Infill is very hard. You need a lot of CapEx, especially if you end up renting. We still do that. We still bought a big infill community, but again, it was an amazing deal. It was hard to say no.

I like to buy stuff that’s a little more stabilized. You can start cash flowing almost from day one or earlier, or at least in the first year. Then infill and have all the value-add, add value in rents, charging back utilities.

Andrew: Lower hanging fruit is what I call it. My strategy is very similar. If I can get something 70% occupied, that’s ideal. That way it cash flows earlier versus just sitting around.

That’s really interesting. I think for LPs, investors listening to this, there’s an execution risk part of mobile home park investing with these value-add deals. If you find an operator that’s more of a deal junkie that’s just focused on always doing another deal, not making sure that their ducks are in a row, and that the execution of their projects is prioritized, you could get into trouble.

I’ve heard from some other operators that they closed on a ton of deals but their infill is taking twice as long and costing twice as much because they’re always focused on the next deal instead of getting the projects done and following the pro forma. There’s definitely some risk there. I’m glad you brought that up.

What mistakes have you made that our listeners can learn from in mobile home park investing?

Larry: Going back to the infill, I bought too many homes too quickly, thinking because they were affordable, we will sell like hotcakes. In my first park, I had 15 homes in inventory at one shot, and I was paying interest on the loan because you get a floor planning loan on these homes. I was paying interest, I was paying taxes, and I was paying insurance to have these homes sitting in my lot. Plus I paid all the setup costs out of pocket, and I had all this inventory just sitting at the park waiting to be sold.

I guess the mistake I made was that I said, I’m only going to sell. You always hear that everybody in the business, and when I went to MH university and all that, everybody always talks like, no park-owned homes, sell the homes. I was so stubborn with that, that I said I’m only selling, I’m not going to rent.

After six months of eating all these expenses, I finally decided to rent. It was life-changing for the cash flow of the property. It did cost me out of pocket because you got to put about $15,000 per home in CapEx for installation and all that. I learned that I needed a lot more CapEx if you’re going to rent.

What I do now when I pro forma, I just assume I’m renting every home that I’m bringing in for infill. I don’t assume I’m going to sell it. If I sell it, it’s a bonus. My pro formas are all about renting. I just say, I’m going to rent 100% of the inventory, and if we sell it, it’s great. But if we don’t, we’re still fine because we could pro forma that. That was my biggest lesson.

Andrew: Doesn’t that conflict with your park-owned home comment earlier about that being the hardest park? How do you balance that?

Larry: Well, it does, but now that I’m buying parks that need a few homes only, I’m not too concerned. The problem is when you’re buying a park that needs 70% infill, that is more challenging. But when you need to bring 10 homes into a park to finish, it’s not a big deal.

The idea is to eventually sell them. We do try to sell them. It’s not that we’re not going to sell anymore, but at least in my pro forma I’m being conservative. I’m saying, well, if we’re going to rent them, worst case is we need more money.

I guess I’m punishing my pro forma by doing that, but at least I’m being conservative and I would say more realistic. Unless I want to go slower, and then I say, we’ll sell maybe 3–4 homes a year, but that means it can take forever to fill up a park like that. So we try to just—

Andrew: Predictable, yeah. More predictable to be able to rent them quicker. That makes sense.

Larry, what are the most important things that passive investors need to look out for when investing into mobile home parks?

Larry: I think the key is knowing the GP really well, getting references, understanding who’s in their team, really checking on the GP’s background, on their past performance, background check if anything, or references with other investors. I think that’s number one is making sure that at least your money is invested with a person that’s going to do the best to take care of it and try to perform well with the capital.

I think, too, is look at who’s in the team of the GP. It’s critical that there’s a team backing up the GP who’s going to be running these properties, because it’s not mailbox money like some people advertise. It’s definitely a very operational business. That’s why I like it. I’m an operations guy from my background. This is, running a business.

You’re not renting a warehouse where you’re just collecting checks every month, and you don’t have to really do much about it. Here. you’re running a business. You have a lot of moving pieces, so it’s key to make sure that there’s a team behind it that’s supporting the business plan.

I would say third is make sure you’re aligned with what the business plan is for the GP, what their business plan is and that your goals are aligned with what they’re trying to do as far as returns time, timeline of a project, how long is it. Is it a long-term deal and you’re okay holding your money for 5–10 years, or whatever the plan is? You have to make sure you’re aligned so you feel comfortable with your investment.

Andrew: Totally. One thing that we slid past really quickly is, I like how on your first deal where the deal that you mentioned, like, you brought in too many homes too soon. I like how it was only your money. You used your own money, you put your money where your mouth is on your first couple of deals, you cut your teeth, and now on the deals you do raise money for, you have that experience that you carry with you. Kudos to you instead of learning on someone else’s dime, which I think a lot of other operators do.

Larry, what does the perfect mobile home park look like in your eyes, and why?

Larry: Your answer to this question is always the public utilities. Everything’s perfect, a hundred-plus lots, and all tenant-owned homes. I think that, yes, that’s a beauty, but I don’t think you can make a lot of money today with those parks.

What I like is having a park that’s been neglected, that needs CapEx, where rents are low. They’re not charging back utilities, where you need to fix the park-owned homes, you need to demo old homes and really clean it up.

I don’t mind buying park-owned homes if I really don’t pay much for them. Lately what I do is I put zero value to a park-owned home. To me, now they’re a liability. Especially the older ones, 80s–90s homes are worth zero in my books. I think that you got to give them away and set up your lot rent high.

That’s a strategy that we use now. We don’t really give any value to those. Even though a lot of people think they’re valuable, when you really look at the numbers, you probably don’t make any money on those homes, especially if they’re older. You have to fix an AC unit, it’s $6000 to replace a furnace AC. A roof, maybe $3000. By the time you’re done, you’re spending going into these parks that have old inventory.

Our experience has been you probably have to budget $6000 a home. Then you got to CapEx. Instead of saying, I’m going to sell them for $6000, you’re probably going to have to put in $6000.

My most profitable park was the third park I bought, where there were all park-owned homes, 70s, 80s, 90s. We basically didn’t pay anything for them. We paid for the lot rent. We assumed what lot rents were. No books.

It was an 85-year-old lady, and we bought this park from her. At the beginning, I thought I was going to make a lot of money selling homes, and then we changed the strategy. My director of operations said, you got to give away the homes for free. We are selling them cheap so we can turn the park around.

It took a while to convince me, but after listening to him, we sold the homes for a thousand dollars a piece. We got rid of them like hotcakes, and we brought lot rents from $83 that the lady was charging to some of the residents to $375. Now, all direct bill utilities, all tenant-owned homes, and we’re at $375 lot rents. Really, we have no maintenance anymore.

Andrew: I want to just pause right here because like what you did there, we’ve done a similar strategy. It’s a win, win, win. You were able to sell these homes, which are definitely worth more than a thousand dollars, to people that likely never thought they would be able to own these things. You are allowing the residents to become owners and their lot rent is only $375 a month, which is so affordable.

Where else in business does it make sense to give away something for less than it costs and it’s still a win for the investors? For you, for the resident? I haven’t found anything and I’ve invested in other asset classes. It’s just a unique scenario where you could change someone’s life by allowing them to own this home and only pay $375 a month. They’re paying their utilities. That’s super affordable for a family, right?

Larry: Yes. You can’t beat it.

Andrew: A lot of times when we go around—because we bought a park that was all park-owned homes, and we were converting 136 of them—they think it’s a scam at first. They’re like, wait a minute. I can own this home for a thousand dollars? I’m paying $800 a month right now straight renting this thing. I can own this home for a thousand dollars, then my lot rent goes to $450 a month? Hold on. This doesn’t seem right.

And when you really break it down, they’re like, wow, this is so awesome. This is life-changing. Thank you so much. They’re so grateful, and it’s a win on both sides. I just love that part of the business.

Larry: I do also.

Andrew: Larry, what do you think the future of mobile home park investing looks like? It’s getting more competitive. There are more big players in the space, private equity firms, obviously interest rates are high. There’s a possible recession, but who knows what’s going to happen. How do you see mobile home parks fitting in with all this?

Larry: I still think it’s definitely a great asset class. You can’t find anything more affordable for people to live in the US. I was, at the beginning, a Section 8 voucher. This is the lowest cost housing that’s not subsidized by the government.

It’s definitely a great asset class to be in. We’re providing affordable housing to our residents. I’m basically all in on this asset class. I really think it has a great future, limited supply, but it’s also become more competitive. Rates are definitely so high right now compared to where we were. During Covid, I don’t think we’ll probably see rates that low in a long time.

It’s become very hard to pencil deals in. We were underwriting maybe three to four deals a week. We’re sending offers, but things are just not penciling in. The numbers don’t work. Sellers still looking for the numbers they heard during Covid and last year. Those rates are gone. Now, definitely rates are so much higher, so it’s hard to make deals work.

We’re patient. We only buy if we find the right deal. We just don’t buy if we don’t. Our fund works on capital calls, so if we don’t find the right deal, we won’t call the capital. We’re taking care of making sure that we’re only buying the right deals for our investors.

I still think it’s a great asset class to be in. It is becoming more institutionalized, it’s getting more competitive, and we’re seeing more and more people competing for deals, but I still think that we’re long on this. We want to keep on growing on this asset class.

Andrew: Awesome. What do you think is the biggest threat to mobile home park investing?

Larry: The local zoning or the local governments, like the case I had in Wichita where they wanted to shut down the park. You just have to be very careful when you’re buying, that you’re getting the zoning and the zoning letters, and making sure that you can bring in homes.

There are certain communities where actually the one we’re discussing, they have a clause there in the zoning that if a home is not replaced within six months, you lose the site. To me, that’s a threat. We’re providing the most affordable housing in their city where they need it. On the other hand, they want to shut down the mobile home park.

I understand because a lot of these parks have been neglected by the prior owners, so sometimes the communities don’t like them, but what we do is we clean up the parks, pave the roads, do landscapes, signage. We’re painting all the homes outside. We’re making it really nice. Plus we’re retenanting a lot of these places.

It used to be the police were there two, three, four times a day, and eventually they never come back. That’s what we want from our parks. That’s what we’ve been able to achieve in almost every deal we bought.

In my first community, I saw the police having a coffee a block down the park. I was having breakfast there, and I asked them, how’s the park doing? It was about a year after we bought it, and they almost hugged me. They said, you know what? It’s amazing what you’ve done with it. They were so happy, they didn’t have to go and deal with crime there every day. They were bored because there was nothing else to do.

That’s all we try to do. It’s a challenge working with these cities to understand that we are making things better, providing affordable housing, and to work with us on the zoning.

Andrew: I think that is a big threat, that regulation, and rent control in certain states, things like that. One thing that you said that resonated with me was the fact that the city, if you don’t fill the lot within six months, you lose the ability to fill that lot.

Adding affordable housing to these types of markets, like the Wichitas and these other secondary Midwestern markets, doesn’t make sense for developers to go in there and build affordable housing, like single family duplexes, things like that. Typically, builders make a profit off of the nicer luxury homes if they’re going to develop a subdivision or something like that.

It is sad, and we’ve ran into the same issue where you have to go sit in front of the board, the city council, and prove your case that, hey, we’re going to improve this place. We’re not going to run it into the ground.

I think it’s becoming more and more common that the municipalities will require an age minimum, where it’s like, hey, we’re buying a community right now, and if any home gets torn out of there, you have to bring in a home that’s no older than 10 years old into the community.

They’re trying to get brand new home stocks, which makes sense in some markets, but not every market can afford brand new, now that homes are $60,000 instead of $25,000 what they were before Covid. It changes the narrative. I agree that there’s definitely risk there like the regulation and stuff.

Larry, if any of our listeners would like to get a hold of you, what would be the best way for them to do so?

Larry: They can email me at larry@broadviewcap.com. Also we have a website, broadviewcap.com or broadviewcommunities.com, which is our property management.

Andrew: Awesome. Larry, thank you so much for coming on the show and dropping all these golden nuggets.

Larry: Thanks for having me. It was great.

Andrew: What is one last bit of important advice you would give an interested passive mobile home park investor, just before we sign off?

Larry: If they’re on the sideline, I think it’s vet the operator and go for it, because I think it’s a great asset class to be in. I’m just a big believer this is a long-term growth strategy for your wealth.

Andrew: Totally. Well, thank you so much again for coming on the show, Larry.

Larry: Thank you for having me.

Andrew: That’s it for today, folks. Thank you so much for tuning in.