We nterview Vijay and Sumeet on their victory in buying four mobile home parks in less than one year. Discussions will include how they found each property, how they financed them, what the turn-around plan was, lessons learned, amount of time spent in managing them, and related topics that will be greatly of interest in evaluating whether or not to invest in mobile home parks.

The slang term for signing the documents and closing on a mobile home park is often called “pulling the trigger”. It’s a major commitment and one that can create angst with many buyers who are concerned if they are making the right decision. So what are the key factors that must be aligned to feel good about making this big step?

We’ve all heard the rhetorical question: “is the glass half empty or half full”? It represents two different perceptions: 1) optimism or 2) pessimism. It’s a fact that most people fall into one of these two camps. Of course, both have their benefits for self-preservation, but it can also hurt your ability to buy an RV park if you listen to only that one portion of your personality and not moderate it with other viewpoints.

Every RV park owner will have a problem at some point. It may be minor like not being able to decide between two different banks on a loan, or it may be major like a flood or a reduction in revenue due to road construction. But how we approach problems is extremely important. Many of the top business people in U.S. history saw problems as learning experiences to shape and improve their finances. They did not fear problems but they embraced them. And this is a much more healthy approach.

Many a self-storage deal has been saved through creative seller financing. This is the concept in which the seller offers great lending terms to the buyer that offset the other drawbacks. So how can you make a deal work with seller financing that would not work without it?

No mobile home park can be successful without a competent manager. A manager serves as your eyes and ears in the field, as well as your problem-solver, ambassador and mayor all rolled into one. Since the manager is such an essential role, every community owner should focus on what can go wrong and how to mitigate that risk.

There’s a unique strategy that has been used to construct clever mobile home park deals over the decades, but it rarely gets much notoriety. The name of this strategy is a “master lease with option” and it can be a win/win for many situations – as well as the worst idea ever in other circumstances. So what is a “master lease with option”, how does it work, and when is it a good or bad idea?

Bill Gates once said “your most unhappy customers are your greatest sense of learning”. It’s an unusual adage from someone who held a virtual monopoly over the personal computer for decades, but this mantra is true for all industries. So what can you learn from unhappy customers, and how can you make them happy again?

We all hate spending money, but sometimes the cost is offset by having greater confidence in your deal – all the way to the point of having the guts to pull the trigger and sign the closing documents. And the source of much of this confidence are third-party reports. While many of these are bank requirements, others are simply the smart way to proceed even with seller financing. So what are these third-party reports that are a big part of buying any self-storage facility?

One of the most frequent questions we receive is “what software do you recommend using for mobile home park management”? This is a simple question for us to answer, as we have been using Rent Manager for over a decade, and selected them for a variety of reasons.

In a modern America there is nothing more dangerous from a liability perspective than having employees. While they can create value, they can also be a toxic danger to your business. In this RV Park Mastery podcast we’re going to discuss the perils of having bad employees and the damage they can do to your business, as well as strategies to mitigate this risk.

There are two ways to approach any problem: to ask permission or to ask forgiveness. So which is the better choice? In this Billboard Mastery podcast we’re going to discuss when to choose one over the other, and what the ramifications are of that selection.

Buying a self-storage facility is a very important decision. Due diligence is an essential part of the effort to make sure it’s a success. But some buyers try to delegate this work to others.

The definition of a mobile home park is “two or more mobile homes on one platted piece of property”. Of course, with just two people on one tract, that would not be too complicated, but the reality is typically 50 to 100 households or more, and that can create issues. In this Mobile Home Park Mastery podcast we’re going to review what the key problems can be and how to mitigate these issues.

Much of the Southeastern U.S. has not been taken seriously by mobile home park buyers – or commercial real estate investors, in general – for decades. Even Groucho Marx made jokes about the region in 1930. But all that is changing now.

Some self-storage deals sell quickly, and others fester for years. What can be done to craft great acquisitions out of these older offerings that have gathered dust? That’s the focus of this Self-Storage University podcast in which we discuss what makes deals sit without movement, and what the potential options are to forge a successful purchase.

There is continual talk of greater inflation on the horizon, which then begs the question “what would the potential impact be to RV parks?” In this RV Park Mastery podcast we’re going to review what inflation would do to RV park investing – both good and bad – and what investors can do to mitigate the risks. With the government continually printing more money, it’s a topic that should be on all RV park investors’ minds.

There are two ways to get into the billboard business: 1) build a sign or 2) buy an existing sign. There are significant differences in these two options. In this Billboard Mastery podcast we’re going to discuss the key things to know about buying an existing sign and how to mitigate your risk when doing so.