how do RV parks work? why don't they grow as a form of long term cheap accommodations?

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@GreasyJack

Some of the earliest real “mobile homes” were sort of like what you describe. The first trailer park denizens were in fact living in travel trailers that were originally designed as RV’s. As more and more people started living like that, the trailer companies started catering to them, building trailers that were more comfortable, but less roadworthy. Somewhere around here the schism between RV’s and mobile homes occurred-- the RV trailers kept being aerodynamic with roadworthy suspensions and tires whereas the mobile homes basically turned into aluminum cubes with chintzy wheels and no suspension which could be moved easily enough in a pinch but were not convenient road going vehicles.

Into the 70’s and 80’s, though, it became clear that the vast majority of mobile homes never moved at all after they were initially placed, so mobile homes became even less mobile, to the point that you had to hire specialized movers and add a lot of equipment to actually move them. Eventually they morphed into what we now call “modular homes”, which are basically cheap pre-fab structures which are, at the lower end, similar in size and function to the old mobile home trailers. Part of it is also societal, though-- there is now a stigma to living in something that is identifiably mobile, so another part of the change to “modular” houses was extensively disguising that they are semi-mobile structures.

So to tie this all to your question, the reason why they don’t have cheap RV’s designed for long-term living is that in the real world, it is extremely rare that you would ever need to actually move your trailer after it was initially placed (and I could come up with another long post about the real estate dynamics that keep lot rentals cheap, but I’ll spare you for now). Modular homes serve the function as cheap houses that can be moved to a site and don’t have all the drawbacks of true mobile homes.

thanks for the informative post, GreasyJack. Incidentally, I will point out that technically even the wheels need not be a built-in component of a mobile home. In theory, if that proves a design with cheaper TCO, it could be engineered in such a way that at the time of the move you lift it up and attach rented wheels temporarily.

In terms of the need to move, well, “trailer park rent increases” returns 175,000 hits. It sounds like a big issue, although not necessarily one that the typical poster at SDMB would be familiar with personally. Here is a quote from an investor-oriented publication: http://wealthmagazine.com/2010/06/mobile-home-parks-gold-mines-or-money-pits/

Why are parks so great for investors? Rolfe says the main reason is that customers can’t move their homes. If an apartment renter wants to move, he can just pick another apartment. If a homeowner decides to move, he can sell his home and buy another. But if a mobile home owner wants to move, he either has to sell the mobile home or move it—and moving it is usually too cost-prohibitive. Either way, the park owner keeps collecting rent on the home site.

I saw a specific cost for move quoted in only one place, as $3000, although it was unclear for what type of home (i.e. if it only referred to the huge prefab ones, that has nothing to do with this topic).

But, in any event, it may be that for the typical renter even a $500 move is too expensive. So making the homes cheaper to move would encourage greater competition between parks, drive down prices and make everybody happier. With a cheap enough move we might end up seeing promotions “move your home to our wonderful park and we will reimburse the move cost in return for 6 months contract” and so on.

[GreasyJack]

@code_grey

In terms of the need to move, well, “trailer park rent increases” returns 175,000 hits. It sounds like a big issue, although not necessarily one that the typical poster at SDMB would be familiar with personally. Here is a quote from an investor-oriented publication: http://wealthmagazine.com/2010/06/mobile-home-parks-gold-mines-or-money-pits/

The issue with trailer park real estate is that they necessarily are in areas with low land costs. They are attractive to landowners because they are a way to extract a steady income off a parcel of not-very-valuable land, but nobody gets rich off of them. You can usually put between 4 to 6 trailers per acre, so if rent is at $100-200, that’s pretty good money for a chunk of rural land but is chickenfeed for an urban or suburban lot in most areas.

When suburban sprawl reaches a formerly rural park, or if the housing market just heats up, rents will go up a bit at first, but eventually the landowner will just kick everyone out and either sell or develop the property. When that happens, it’s pretty catastrophic for the people living there-- if you’ve been paying $100 and living in a 70’s vintage trailer for decades, you probably can’t afford to move the trailer and even if you could most parks don’t want to take a new “old” trailer. If that old trailer isn’t on a lot, it’s worth less than nothing-- it’s a liability because you’re responsible for hauling the thing away even if you’ve got nowhere to put it.

One thing that article doesn’t really mention is that the inability to move is a two way street-- if the landlord decides to unreasonably raise the rent, some residents are just as likely to abandon their worthless trailers as move them, at which point the landlord is both out their rent and on the hook for getting rid of the old eyesore. So landlords generally don’t raise rents just because their tenants can’t move.