by Michael Barnabas

The klaxon-like warnings are all around us. Another plant closure. A municipality or county that seeks to prevent or close 'another mobile home park.' In areas where there were once 25 retailers, there are now six, or four or… Associations whose cash flows are so low that they, too, may face extinction.

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by Amy Bliss

There has been a great deal of banter lately about whether manufactured housing industry members should belong to their state or national association. Without question, the answer is yes. In 1908, President Theodore Roosevelt said:

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by Paul Bradley

As a LinkedIn member, I saw the question L.A. 'Tony' Kovach posed there:

MH Associations: are you a member? If not, why not? If so, why?

Here's my reply:

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by Paul Bradley

"By its nature, the conventional wisdom resists assaults by words or argument… There's a tendency to suppress doubts, dismiss inconvenient inconsistencies, or deny contradictory evidence. What changes people's minds is irrefutable and sometimes harsh experience. Then the conventional wisdom usually falls. But it's not sweet reason that wields the ax. "
~ Robert Samuelson, Untruth: Why the Conventional Wisdom is (almost always) Wrong

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by Chad Carr

Editor's Note: Please notice the generous free offer for MHMSM.com readers.

A wonderful thing has started happening over the last couple of months: Manufactured Housing Retailers have started calling us asking for information about our accounting systems.

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by Tim Connor

One of the biggest time wasters is when salespeople fail to get to the real decision makers and present their products and/or services to people who cannot say 'yes' or 'no,' but only 'no' or 'maybe.' Since many organizations and individuals are undergoing dramatic

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by Tim Connor

There is a great deal of confusion among employees in many of today's companies due to the mixed signals that are being sent top-down in those organizations. Let me give you an example. The president and executives spend three days hammering out a

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by Suzanne S. Felber, Lifestylist®

It's show time! The Louisville show was a huge success, and in just a few weeks, it will be time for Tunica, MHI Congress and the Great Southwest Home Show. How will you use the new ideas and trends you see at these shows? Now is the perfect time to

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by Deanna Fields

The Manufactured Housing Association of Oklahoma (MHAO) is a small trade association (less than 300 members) representing all segments of the manufactured housing industry in Oklahoma. MHAO is also a member driven organization. We depend on our Board of Directors who are volunteers, who have the task to set the policies/procedures for the association and allow staff to administer those procedures to make the policy a reality.

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by Nadeen Green

In most of my full-length fair housing classes, I include discussion on national origin. Often I will get what I have now come to call "The Curry Question" based on the differences in various ethnic cooking. Part A of that question is usually along the lines of, "It smells bad

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by Edward 'Eddie' Hicks

With the on-going change of land use for older communities, and the dearth of new developments, there continues to be reduction in the number of "investment" grade communities, all across the USA. And those left continue to sell at prices that are the envy of

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by Chrissy Jackson

Again, look closely at the lifestyle that will be created when the Guidelines come off the drawing board and become practical issues. There is a difference in being widely accepted and being legally acceptable.

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by Susan Knowles

The fifth of the month. Residents make their way into your offices dropping off rent checks with a big surge of people walking in as you're trying to close the office for the night. The next morning, you take the checks to the bank, leaving happily, when you happen to look at your receipt and realize only half of

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by L. A. 'Tony' Kovach

In our living room, we have a miniature of August Rodin's famous statue, The Thinker. Everyone will notice immediately that the Thinker is nude. Why? The art lover might opine that thinking should be about a search for truth, and the truth is naked. If as business professionals we could get the facts - the naked facts - how much better off we could we be?

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by Greg McClanahan

This month's message will take you back in time to memories of your first telephone (at least for those of us born by the 1960's). There are many lessons to be learned about life, business and sales success through this story. As you will see, even through brief encounters with those around you, you can make a meaningful impression on others. Don't underestimate your incredible value.

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by George Porter

How can you tell when a home is out of level? There are some regulators who say that you have to be within an inch all over the home and there are others who say that if everything is working, doors, windows, etc., then it's level enough. There should be a way to absolutely say when the home is too bent on the frame or in the roof. How about when the tail ends of the

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by Ken Rishel

COMPLYING WITH THE LAW AND MAKING THE RIGHT LOANS ISN'T ALWAYS EASY.

The biggest surprise to audit teams when dealing with large existing loan portfolios is the lack of any written loan policy and procedure manuals. It is always expected to be MIA with small or new operators, but it always leaves a team wondering how any consistent lending policy can be followed in the larger organizations. What is never a surprise is

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by Ken Rishel

Two months ago, an article ran in the Captive Finance Newsletter, written by a veteran community owner that asked to remain anonymous. Based on who was making the request, and the fact that MHMSN.com and the Allen Newsletter have chosen to run articles by other anonymous writers, I agreed to run the article pretty much as written without the writer's name.

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by Tracy Saville

In business, there are three rules:

1) Know the rules of the game you are trying to win (or survive in our present case);
2) Accept that all the rules of yesterday no longer apply for what will work today and tomorrow; and
3) People who are able to thrive in chaotic, transformative environments, will be the last men and women standing, holding the profit and the opportunities of the future firmly in their hands. Never is this a truer reality than in the worlds of housing, construction, and all the industries that serve these giants.

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by Joanne M. Stevens, CCIM

10. You fail to train your manager to enforce the rules (covenants, guidelines, etc.). Empty beer cans, pop cans, papers strewn are overlooked. You and/or the manager have more pressing matters to attend to. Hint: If every resident had one empty beer can on their homesite lawn, what kind of a community would you have? Try asking yourself this question when deciding to give a notice to a resident. How your park/community looks matters. Sadly, it does not take long for a few messy residents to "train" you.

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by Bob Stovall

One mistake I see community owners make time and again in their marketing (especially online) is to not make clear to potential residents what conveniences are located around the community.

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by Don Westphal

My first contact with the manufactured housing industry occurred in the spring of 1964 when I took a trip on the Illinois Central from Urbana to 20 North Wacker Drive in Chicago to do some research for a term paper for a graduate school class. I lived in a 36 x 8 mobile home in a small trailer park at the time and thought that

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by Don Westphal

The Level IV renewal process is the most complex and disruptive. It involves the complete reconfiguration of an older community that is functionally obsolete in every way or the complete reconfiguration of a similarly affected portion of a larger community. All the research described for the previous levels of renewal

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by Zig Ziglar

It is true that integrity alone won't make you a leader, but without integrity you will never be one. A classic example involving integrity is one displayed by Steuben, the manufacturers of crystal. For generations they've had a policy of breaking every imperfect piece of crystal, no matter how small the flaw. Needless to say, this is a potent

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by Zig Ziglar

I suspect that all of us in the world of business, athletics, music, etc., recognize the importance of teamwork. Old clichés come to mind, like, "Individuals score points, but teams win games."

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