Stating the obvious brings clarity.
There are direct, indirect and a combination of methods that can be employed to deal with a given challenge — especially when it involves people.
Dictionary.com defines Jiu Jitsu as “the use of an opponent’s strengths or one’s own weaknesses to accomplish one’s goals: That was a kind of intellectual jujitsu…”
Almost everyone knows how much the media can help or harm a given business or industry.
Specifically, we know that most media coverage on manufactured housing sadly tends to be more harmful then helpful.
Manufactured housing professionals therefore must be pro-active in teaching the truth about the industry – to professionals as well as to others. We have a great story, but a complex history means it must be properly told.
Beyond positive messages, the problematic and the misunderstood also must be dealt with.
On the Masthead we’ve long believed – and have practiced for years – that the industry must make public replies to slanted or biased news as often as possible.
In the last half of 2016, MHProNews and MHLivingNews increased the tempo of routinely engaging
- states/community associations,
- both national associations,
- company leaders,
- experts, and
- a variety of industry professionals for comments on a variety of issues.
Some will reply off the record, some won’t reply on-or-off the record, but most others are quite willing to go on-the-record as well as provide useful insights on meaty issues.
Those comments from you and your peers allow us to increasingly go beyond aggregating news – as useful and important as news aggregation can be – to:
- generating news,
- reactions to news,
- commentary on news.
This is therefore a collaborative effort. Almost everyone who has provided reactions and commentary to us ought to get a glass raised in their honor. Some of the associations, alphabetically, whose executives have provided us with on-the-record feedback on timely topics include:
Arkansas
California
Florida
Georgia
Indiana
Louisiana
MHARR
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Ohio
South Carolina and
Texas
Others beyond those noted have previously shared their timely takes on important issues too.
Properly crafted, new reaction/analysis articles can often rank high on Google. So even an initial media blast looks and is bad, when we’re provided the needed support, the follow up stories can give researchers now and in the future some other perspective to consider.
That in turn has led to more good-news and favorable stories than the industry has seen in several years.
The essential point is that YOUR bottom-line is either helped-or-harmed by negative or favorable news.
The other bottom-line is that using jiu-jitsu in journalism can turn lemons into lemonade.
Combined with the kinds of commentary you’ve seen on Industry Voices last year, the comments of experts inside and outside of MHVille (the manufactured home industry, aka manufactured homeland) and you have potent mix that often devastates what others have said and written that is a costly slam on our industry.
2017 Golden Opportunity – Captured or Missed?
For those who have forgotten, the Seattle Times pummeled manufactured housing’s biggest brand for the better part of 2 years. That firm and Warren Buffett both responded. MHLivingNews and MHProNews did reports, commentary and analysis, under the presumption that an attack on the image of the largest was an attack on all.
Is our industry in for another round of such attacks? This time, focused on investor owned communities?
The NPR reports in December and yesterday, along with the MHAction and other higher profile posts suggests that industry opponents or skeptics are engaged. Which is why manufactured housing professionals must be ready too.
Protect Educate Promote (PEP)
In conjunction with sponsors and supporters, MHLivingNews.com and MHProNews.com have worked with others to defend and promote the industry. If you are invested in this industry in terms of career or dollars, look carefully at those who are supporting our efforts and do business with their services. Their support makes our work possible.
But much more needs to be done. The results on this page can and should be scaled.
That in turn could increase the value proposition to home owners, attract better qualified customers – those with cash or good credit – and thus yield more sales and profits.
We know this works from actual cases with clients, some of whom have gone on-the-record to share those positive results.
The Profitable Struggle Lies Ahead in DC, 2017
Those who oppose a pro-business, pro-growth agenda in Washington, DC are preparing for the hearings and legislation that are now upon us as the Obama era winds down, and the Trump era begins.
We’ll soon see who gains or retains the upper hand. The cold winds of the political establishment resistance will encourage the warmth of pro-growth, job creating ‘drain the swamp’ agenda will ascend. As one of our client firms recently told us, almost all of their retailers and community clients that talk politics were pro-Trump.
It took decades of regulatory increases to get our economy to point of low growth and skyrocketing debt. So it will take some time to get that pattern reversed, even if the incoming President Trump is successful at getting his legislation swiftly passed.
In the meantime, we in MHVille are not just spectators. We can be part of the process of recovery.
The articles below will show the battles and opportunities that lie ahead.
Keep tuning into the Industry’s first and still only Daily Business News for the latest on the front-lines of what is happening in housing and broad world that impacts our industry, MH homeowners, prospective buyers — and your bottom lines.
Updates on Louisville and Tunica will be hitting the Corporate Press Releases, stay tuned. More articles will be added by the end of this week to dozens shown below, and keep your eyes on the corporate press release and other modules.
Against this Protect Educate Promote Jiu Jitsu backdrop, with no further adieu, we bring you Featured Articles for January 2017. ##
Featured Articles for January 2017
Todd Lamb on NPR’s ‘Mobile Home Park Owners Can Spoil An Affordable American Dream’
by Todd Lamb
Tony, you are the third person sending me this NPR article. I read it and have BIG problems with the way the article was written. Read more…
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Anti Community MHAction Targets Frank Rolfe, RV Horizons and ELS
by Soheyla Kovach
Small-to-large manufactured home community (MHC) operations are no strangers to the ire of anti-investor activists. Read more…
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Paul Bradley ROCUSA Reacts, NPR’s “Mobile Home Park Owners Can Spoil An Affordable American Dream”
By Paul Bradley
Part I of the NPR story needed a balanced industry response that came clean first and then provided many real examples how “the charges” are not typical. Read more…
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Shocking Facts! Making 2017 Grrr8 for Communities, Retailers Starts in Louisville!
by Stan Posey
“Earlier…we wrote at length about the decline in US housing inventory being, in effect, the next crisis for the housing market,” said Myles Udland for Business Insider. Read more…
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HUD Announces Record $1.9 Billion in Grants to “End Homelessness”
By RC Williams
On December 20th, the Department of Housing an Urban Development (HUD) announced that it has awarded a record $1.95 billion to numerous homeless assistance programs across the U.S., including Puerto Rico, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Read more…
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Kelley Reacts, NPR’s “Mobile Home Park Owners Can Spoil An Affordable American Dream”
by Kurt Kelley
There are bad operators in every industry that disgrace themselves and their fellow industry members. Read more…
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Security Mortgage Group Finances $40,853,000 for Communities in a Week
By Soheyla Kovach
Security Mortgage Group – a national award-winning MH Community lending broker – provided $40,853,000 in for several manufactured home communities nationwide, the Daily Business News has learned. Read more…
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Congressman Dennis A. Ross’ statement on Dr. Ben Carson for HUD Secretary
By Dennis A. Ross
I fully support President-elect Trump’s appointment of Dr. Ben Carson as the Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Read more…
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What is the business of America?
By L. A. ‘Tony’ Kovach
Both America and our industry’s members face a similar set of challenges and opportunities.
Read more…
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FHFA, GSEs and the Duty To Serve Manufactured Housing – Mark Weiss, JD – Viewpoint
By Mark Weiss, JD
Chattel lending is crucial to the availability of affordable manufactured housing for American families, representing as much as 80% of consumer loans for the purchase of new manufactured homes.
Read more…
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Media-Based Attack on Investor-Owned Communities=’The Private Equity Takeover of America’s Neighborhoods’
by Soheyla Kovach
In the waning days of December, 2016 – and just five days before National Public Radio (NPR) pulled their slanted Mobile Home Park Owners Can Spoil An Affordable American Dream – Washington DC’s The Hill published a column by Kevin Borden and Jonathan Westin. Read more…
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Tim Williams, OMHA, Responds to Issues Raised by NPR Report on Manufactured Home Communities
By Tim Williams
National Public Radio (NPR) did a two-part report released this week on manufactured home communities, part one of their controversial story – “Mobile Home Park Owners Can Spoil An Affordable American Dream” – including initial manufactured home industry related responses, are linked here.
Read more…
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Inside Look – Tricon Capital’s Recent Manufactured Home Community Moves
by RC Williams
Toronto, Canada based Tricon Capital Group Inc. (TCN.TO), recently announced that its Tricon Lifestyle Communities (“TLC”) investment vertical has acquired a portfolio of three manufactured housing communities in California comprising a total of 421 residential pads for $30.4 million. Read more…
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FHFA Issues Final Rule on Duty to Serve GSEs Will Receive Credit for Chattel Loans
by James R. Ayotte, CAE
On December 13, 2016, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) issued a final rule to implement the “Duty to Serve” (DTS) requirements. Read more…
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More Investor Moves, Insider Action at Sun Communities
by RC Williams
More action for Sun Communities Inc. (NYSE:SUI), as investors and insiders are making moves. Read more…
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Skeptic on DTS Rule Having Much Short-Term Impact on Manufactured Home Lending
by L. A. ‘Tony’ Kovach
Those who’ve read this column for years know that your Masthead writer is: Read more…
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Paul Bradley on the Pending FHFA Final Duty to Serve Rule
by Paul Bradley
This and Leslie Gooch’s article both push for a chattel pilot in Land Lease Communities; ROC USA is right with them! Like Gooch, I see the fundamental issue coming down to what we can work out with the GSEs relative to, as she wrote, “reasonable standards for land leases in conjunction with such homes.
Read more…
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R2D2? Seriously?
by L. A. “Tony” Kovach
Imagine that your garbage collection worker vanished. No one takes that person’s place. Read more…
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Open Letter to Dr. Ben Carson – How You Could Lead HUD to Historic Achievements by Ending a Form of Discrimination
by L. A. “Tony” Kovach
To: Dr. Ben Carson – named by President-elect Donald J. Trump as his desired Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Read more…
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Judge Reverses Controversial Decision to Close Manufactured Home Community
by RC Williams
In a hotly contested property rights versus residents rights case, originally covered by the Daily Business News in September, a Santa Clara County, California Superior Court judge has reversed an order to close Buena Vista Mobile Home Park, Palo Alto’s last manufactured home community, based on a court filing from its residents. Read more…
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Manufactured, Modular and PreFab Housing Industry News Never Sleeps
By L. A. “Tony” Kovach
It’s lunchtime somewhere on planet Earth. As reports we’ve done for years – and added more to this past week – there are international stories about factory-built housing. Read more…
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Loved. Hated. Misunderstood. Distrusted. Feared. Enslaved…and possible Breakthrough to Freedom?
by L. A. “Tony” Kovach
Labels, thinking, deeds and inactions all may have limiting consequences. Read more…
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Trexler Cites Regulatory, Economic Conditions in 2016 – Nobility Homes Announces Quarterly Sales, Income, Profit Results
by Soheyla Kovach
“The demand for affordable manufactured housing in Florida and the U.S. is improving,” said Nobility Homes President Terry Trexler. Read more…
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It’s Not Just Stocks – Dollar Energized, Moving Up vs World Currencies – MH Impact?
by Soheyla Kovach
“Right now, there is an incredible amount of pressure to sell just about every type of currency and buy the dollar,” Financial Stock Market (FSM) reports that Sunrise Capital Partners LLC, chief investment officer Christopher Stanton said. Read more…
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U.S. Existing Homes Sales Reach Highest Level in Nine Years
By RC Williams
Data from the National Association of Realtors (NAR) shows that Americans bought homes in November at the fastest pace in nearly a decade. Read more…
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New Federal Lending Option “Opens” for Manufactured Homes in Quiet, pre-New Year Report
by Soheyla Kovach
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Rural Housing Service (RHS) announced it would begin a pilot project that would open up lending for manufactured home loans on existing (pre-owned, used) manufactured homes, per a report by Brian Collins on National Mortgage News. Read more…
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2017 Millennial Housing Revolution. What About Manufactured Housing?
by Soheyla Kovach
AOL Small Business, and the Washington Post are two of several mainstream media sites reporting an anticipated surge of millennials into the housing market. Read more…
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Post above by L. A. ‘Tony’ Kovach.
