Manufactured Homes are Overlooked as a Way to Quickly Expand Affordable Senior Housing in San Diego County
It has been almost 50 years since a mobile home/manufactured home park was authorized in San Diego County, California.
Source: Times of San Diego – The following are excerpts from an opinion column by Mark Powell, a real estate broker and a former San Diego County Board of Education member.
(Note: Although this essay is particular to San Diego County, there are similar situations in metropolitan areas across the country where local authorities have refused to consider manufactured home community development as the answer to the lack of quality affordable home ownership).
There will be nearly 1 million people over the age of 60 living in San Diego County in just 12 years, so the dire need for affordable senior housing cannot be overstated. One of the most efficient – and widely overlooked – ways to increase the region’s senior housing inventory is to open more mobile home/manufactured home parks, aka land-lease communities.
However, it has been almost 50 years since a new mobile home park was authorized in San Diego County. It’s past time for the local government to approve some.
Manufactured homes are affordable housing solutions for seniors. They are built in a factory and placed on a chassis to allow them to be moved. One of the biggest advantages of a manufactured home is the short building and delivery process.
These manufactured homes can be set up in as little as 7 days, and they can be far less expensive than a traditional site-constructed home. The cost for an average single-family home in San Diego is approximately $847,000. The average cost of a new manufactured home is $127,250
The average manufactured home community monthly rent in San Diego is around $1,000, and at a price point of $127,250, manufactured homes are the most affordable housing option for seniors living on fixed incomes.
The affordable housing crisis in San Diego has always been a supply and demand issue, so approving newly manufactured home parks seems to be the quickest and most cost-effective way to increase the supply and meet the demand. However, there will need to be a buy-in from communities and cities throughout the county.
Even with traditional affordable projects, neighborhoods fight vigorously against them with a NIMBY (not-in-my-neighborhood attitude. When affordable housing options are considered, there is almost always some opposition.
To meet the housing demands of the region, San Diego County needs over 171,000 new housing units in the next 10 years. The city of San Diego alone needs to build over 100,000 housing units by 2029 to meet its current and projected housing needs.
To meet these numbers, opening more manufactured home parks simply makes sense. Seniors living in San Diego are looking for housing that will allow them to live self-sufficient, independent lives, and the local government can help make this happen by approving the more senior manufactured home parks within the county.
