Mobile Home Listings & News

City debates mobile home conversions

By Matt O'Brien, STAFF WRITER
Article Last Updated: 05/07/2007 02:46:39 AM PDT


HAYWARD — Citing a "current and immediate threat to the welfare of mobile home residents," city officials are looking at calling an emergency moratorium that would temporarily prohibit the conversion of mobile homes to condominiums.
The move follows news that the owner of the Eden Gardens mobile home park on West Winton Avenue is considering a plan to subdivide the park into resident-owned condominiums, thereby exempting the park from Hayward's longstanding mobile home rent control law.

"They want us to buy the land that the mobile home sits on at fair market value," said Charles MacDonald, the unofficial "mayor" of Eden Gardens and a resident there since 1994. "At least 60 percent of our tenants are on fixed income. Why would you want to go, at 70 years old, into a 30-year mortgage?"

The group promoting the conversion, Carlsbad-based Loftin Firm, is making similar maneuvers at mobile home parks throughout the state. But cities are beginningto take notice.

"A lot of our mobile home residents are concerned about being forced out of their homes, particularly many of the seniors living in the parks," Hayward Mayor Mike Sweeney said.

The City Council is scheduled to vote Tuesday night on whether to establish a 45-day moratorium. Sweeney said the measure would give the city time to look at the issue in a "more organized fashion."

This year, following similar concerns, several other Bay Area governments in communities with mobile home rent control enacted moratoriums on conversions. But owners are fighting back.
In East Palo Alto last week, a park owner claiming the city's moratorium is illegal sued the city government there for $14.6 million, according to a MediaNews article published Friday.

State law allows park owners to subdivide parks so that home owners also own the land beneath their home. If that happens, rent control regulations no longer apply. In February, State Sen. Ellen Corbett (D-San Leandro) introduced a bill that would repeal the provisions that allow park owners to effectively force conversions. The bill has not been voted on yet.

Kathie Morris, president of the Hayward Mobilehome Owners Association, said the Loftin Firm went to Eden Gardens residents April 19 and gave a presentation that took many residents by surprise.

"It's really going to change the lifestyles of a lot of mobile home residents," Morris said. "The owner can kind of do anything they want. Rent control goes out the window. We're concerned about a lot of aspects of this."

Owners of the park were not immediately available for comment late last week.

Because it is an urgency ordinance that was not subject to advance public notice requirements, it would take a four-fifths vote Tuesday for the Hayward moratorium to pass.

"We need time to fully vet this issue," Hayward City Manager Jesus Armas said, pointing out that the city last amended the conversion provisions of its mobile home ordinance in 1984.


Matt O'Brien can be reached at (510) 293-2473 or mattobrien@dailyreviewonline.com.