September 26, 2023 • 46 mins
What if affordable housing was just a drive away? Dive deep with Franco Perez, an industry maven who's been at the forefront of revolutionizing mobile homes. From his young life in the Philippines to pioneering affordable solutions in Silicon Valley, Franco's transformational journey has been one of relentless determination and innovation. Major outlets like Forbes and ABS-CBN News have taken note of his revolutionary approach to converting mobile homes into stylish yet affordable living spaces.
The narrative that mobile homes equate to low-quality builds is outdated. Prepare to be enlightened as Franco dismantles these stigmas, showcasing modern mobile homes that not only rival traditional houses in quality but also present a compelling alternative amidst skyrocketing rent and unattainable million-dollar homes. His adept use of video content brings these concepts to life, demonstrating the myriad opportunities this industry holds.
But, as with any innovation, there are challenges. Franco doesn't shy away from these, addressing concerns such as climate impacts on construction timelines and offering solutions through mobile home benefits. Just imagine dodging exorbitant rents and the burdens of multiple mortgages while crafting your dream home – all this becomes conceivable through mobile homes.
His influence isn't just confined to this podcast. Franco's enlightening presence on platforms like iHeart Radio's popular "Passage to Profit" podcast and his keynote at the esteemed Manufactured Housing Institute (MHI) Congress & Expo 2023, where he spoke on marketing manufactured housing to younger generations, stands testimony to his expertise and reach.
Whether you're an investor, landowner, or a hopeful homeowner, journey with us and Franco Perez as we uncover the layers, opportunities, and transformative potential of mobile homes in today's housing landscape.
As you're inspired to embark on your side hustle journey after listening to this episode, you might wonder where to start or how to make your vision a reality. That's where our trusted partner, Reversed Out Creative comes in.
With a team of experienced professionals and a track record of helping clients achieve their dreams, they are ready to assist you in reaching your goals. To find out more, visit www.reversedout.com. We also recently launched our YouTube Channel, Marketing Pro Trends, which summarizes all of our blog posts.
Start for FREE
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
Subscribe to Side Hustle City and join our Community on Facebook
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Welcome to Side Hustle City and thanks for
joining us.
Our goal is to help you connectto real people who found
success turning their sidehustle into a main hustle, and
we hope you can too.
I'm Adam Kaler.
I'm joined by Kyle Stevy, myco-host.
Let's get started, all right?
(00:32):
Welcome back everybody to theSide Hustle City podcast.
Today we got a special guestFranco Perez.
Franco, thank you for joiningthe show sir.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Oh, thanks for having me, I'm excited.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Yeah, I'm pumped too, man.
We're going to talk mobilehomes today, so if you've seen a
big uptick, I guess becauseyou're in the mobile home space
are you seeing this as like agrowing thing?
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Oh, absolutely, it's kind of been the hottest topic
lately.
I mean, you know, there's awhole affordable housing element
to it, there's the wholeconstruction element to it of
how it's advancing.
I mean it's going to fix a lotof the problems that are coming
in the next few years.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
I like it.
I like it, I mean they're moreaffordable.
They're generally built in afactory right.
I actually went to one inKentucky and they build modular
homes.
This wasn't necessarily likethe mobile home right.
They weren't on wheels or anyof that kind of stuff.
These were just modular homesthat they were building and just
put them together, and theywere way more affordable per
(01:31):
square foot than a traditionalhome.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
Oh, absolutely.
It's the future of construction.
I mean, we have so muchconstruction issues that are
happening and part of the wholeaffordable element is of why
cost of living is so expensiveis because building this is
we're building these homes justlike we were 100 years ago, you
know, and nothing's reallychanged.
We're just innovating and wehaven't really shifted to
(01:58):
modular or manufactured ormobile homes.
It's just like you know.
I use this analogy but carsoriginally were only built for
like the rich and wealthy, untilwe were able to build it on an
assembly line and make itaccessible for everyone.
And that's exactly what we'redoing with these mobile homes as
well.
As we're building them infactory, we're building them
(02:20):
with much less material, muchless labor and building them
very high quality home at speed,at a much.
In the end cost is much lessthan what you would at a
traditional stick built home.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Yeah, exactly I mean and you, you know you weren't
born in America, you were bornin the Philippines.
You came over when you were 11.
So you're old enough toremember some of what you saw in
the Philippines, which is still, I mean to this day, a very
affordable country to live in.
But you know, you go to someplaces.
You see real poverty, like youhave people in America here
complaining about not being ableto afford a house or, you know,
(02:52):
being poor, this and that it'sa night and day.
It's a totally different thing.
Talk to the audience here,explain to them kind of what you
saw there and how thatmotivated you once you got here.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
Yeah, I think it's.
It's a whole, I mean, our lifeis all about our perspective and
what we see and how we perceivethings.
Right and when.
When I grew up in thePhilippines, you know there were
.
I remember being a kid and Isee people my age that didn't
have the opportunity to go toschool, right, they were selling
cigarettes on the street andthe side of the road, but you
(03:26):
know, what's weird is thatthey're also very happy and
they're grateful for what theyhave, even if they have nothing.
And then, moving here, Iremember seeing people with a
roof over their head but findways to be miserable or stressed
.
Right, and it's all about howwe perceive things.
I think that's the firstelement to it.
And yeah, after I kind of grewup here, in high school and in
(03:48):
the United States there's therewas a weird, unfortunate, a
fortunate situation where myparents split.
My dad was the main breadwinner, he left the country, and then
it was just me, my single momand my younger sister.
When I was like 17 years old, Ihad to drop out of school,
start working right away, andthen I was in a in one of the
(04:08):
hardest times of my life, justtrying to work two jobs just to
keep up with paying rent.
And it was.
It was difficult, and that'skind of where I realized it.
There's not.
You know, why is this lifeunfair?
You know, I feel like we'regood people.
Why is it that the wealthy areable to benefit from all these
home ownership elements and thenthe middle class or working
(04:29):
class can't really have thatattainable?
And I really think that's whatgot me into this whole mobile
home world as well is becausethere's a lot of false stigmas,
false assumptions and and presperceptions about what mobile
home parks are whether they'retrailer parks or from the media,
(04:50):
and what the news shows usversus the reality of it.
And and came to find out somany people are starting their
wealth building journey throughmobile homes.
And yeah, that's why we builtour business.
Really.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
I love it, man.
I love the journey.
What actually struck me is whenyou sent over your information
and you're saying you're beingable to price these things
$250,000 to $400,000 for one ofthese mobile homes.
These aren't your traditionalmobile homes, guys.
These things look awesome.
How and now is this in theSouthern California area that
(05:24):
you're able to do this at theseprices?
Speaker 3 (05:27):
Yeah.
So we all started in San Jose,silicon Valley area, right.
And I want to express thatthese I can kind of talk about
pricing and like how the mall,like how things work, but keep
in mind, silicon Valley is oneof the most expensive areas in
the country.
But when I describe these,these, this housing issue that
we're having, it's going to behigher than most, but the ratios
(05:48):
are typically the same.
But if we express living in SanJose when I was going through
that struggle, for example, rentin San Jose is about $3,400 a
month for a two bedroomapartment, right.
And then if I wanted to buy asingle family home in San Jose,
median price point is about $1.5million.
And how does somebody that'srenting ever dream of purchasing
(06:13):
a single family home later downthe line when it's so difficult
to attain and so high, such ahigh price and big barrier to
entry to get into right.
And that's where the mobilehome element really becomes a
beautiful thing because it's astepping stone in between
getting to help someone get outof that rental rat race and
start their home ownershipjourney, right.
(06:34):
So people are chasing buying apiece of real estate because
they get to leverage a loan tobuild their net worth, they get
to have the upside ofappreciation and they also get
tax benefits right.
And we can't access that unlesswe own a home, and with mobile
homes it's like a perfect hybridof ownership and a partial
(06:56):
renting as well.
So let's say you buy a averagemobile home in our area it's
about or in San Jose area it'sabout $300,000, right?
So actually I should paint thepicture of the home, of a single
family home.
So if I wanted to buy a singlefamily home and I wanted to put
10% down, it's about $150,000down payment and my monthly
(07:16):
payment would look like about$8,000 a month.
Now if we get a mobile home,for example, 10% of that
$300,000 is $30,000 down, andthen my mortgage would look like
would look like about $2,600.
And then my space rent is about$1,000.
So my total monthly payment isabout $3,600, just a little bit
(07:39):
more than what I would be payingif I'm renting.
However, you're getting a lotof the ownership benefits by
owning a mobile home in thatarea.
Plus, you still get to stay inthat prime area that you're near
your great job or you're inthat great school district and
you don't have to move away orcommute for two hours just to
get to that workplace, andthat's how we're using it as a
(08:03):
stepping stone for people tostart to get out of that rental
rat race into owning a mobilehome, and then, three to five
years later, they have an assetthey can sell to then buy a
single family home later downthe line.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
So one of the issues and I'm here sorry I had to do
my good deed for the day andthen I didn't even need to do it
so one of the issues that we,as real estate investors, you
hear about with mobile homes isdepreciation of the value.
Are you finding that they holdvalue because of being in
(08:37):
California at the cost of owninga home?
So how do you feel like thiscould scale across the country
where these things willappreciate in value and other?
I guess you're going to have tokeep them near what urban areas
, correct?
Speaker 3 (08:50):
Yeah, so that's the thing, that.
That's one of those big mythsthat are not always true, right?
But most of our business andwhere we're seeing this make
sense are all the metro areasLike I'm doing this thing in
Atlanta right now but, yes, sohigh density area.
You're seeing that these mobilehomes are appreciating in value
very equivalent percentages asreal estate housing as well.
(09:13):
So in San Jose in the last twoyears the mobile home price has
overappreciated over 10%, whichis a big difference compared to
what people think is that theydepreciate in value a ton, and
that's average, even includingthe old 1970s homes and the
newer ones too, I mean.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
I would just add them scrolling through your website
while we're speaking here, oryour promotional stuff here.
Those aren't mobile homes, like, I think, a mobile home, so
those aren't the kind that wehave around here, where they
have the Confederate flags andthe four and the four cars.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
Part car parts out in the front like babies running
around with this.
This looks like upscale living.
These are what I mean.
Look at this bathroom with thetub and like.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
I mean that kitchen is better than the kitchen in my
house, for sure that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
A barn door Like.
You got the barn door gamegoing on in here too.
Do you design these?
Like?
How did you work with anarchitect?
Do you have an architecturebackground?
Speaker 3 (10:10):
So we do the full element of the designing.
I'm not an architect myself, Ididn't even go to college or
anything like that but we reallypush the limits of what's
possible in these mobile homes.
And, like you said, likepeople's stigmas and people's
associations with mobile homesare only really what they see in
the media.
But we're used to seeing likebreaking bad or bad news around
(10:34):
it.
But just like apartmentcomplexes, there's very bad
apartments and then there's verynice high end apartments.
But just like with mobile homeparks, like you said, there's
trailer trash looking parks.
But then there's also resortstyle communities and they all
shouldn't be written off all asa bad thing.
But we have communities as wellwith tennis courts, with saunas
(10:58):
and badminton courts and dogparks and all of that and the
same.
With the homes.
We're pushing the quality ofwhat we can do.
We really build these nicerthan what single family homes
are being built to today.
Like you see the finishes there, the standalone tubs, quartz
countertops, stainless steelappliances.
We have 12 foot high flatceilings too, I mean you know,
(11:21):
and these are inside mobile homeparks.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
Wow, I mean, it looks like my brother lives in San
Francisco.
My cousin lives there.
Now my brother lives in Oaklandand what I just saw there was a
gazillion times better thantheir two bedroom apartments.
So it's there's.
I mean, hey, there's way morespace, seriously, but B the
(11:43):
finishes and everything lookfantastic.
That's I would have.
I never know what our guests do, because I like to hear their
story while we go in here,because then I don't have any
preconceived questions becauseI'll fuck them up.
But this was, this is eyeopening.
This is something that I evenyeah, I don't know how you, how
(12:03):
do you?
So that's a great question.
Then, how do you get over thestigmatization of you know I.
You say I'm, I create thesemobile homes, I build mobile
homes.
How do you, how do you get pastthat stigma of of what we were
just talking about in terms ofwhat people have preconceived
notions about?
Speaker 3 (12:22):
Well, I think there's two elements to that.
One is the demand is muchbigger than the perception
problem.
So if people are paying $4,500a month to rent and knock hit
anything back and they reallywant to better their housing
situation and their better theirfinances, guess what?
(12:45):
They're going to exploreoptions.
Like I said, unfortunatelythere's working class people in
these metro areas that aremaking huge sacrifices, like
regretful decisions, just tochase that dream of home
ownership.
They'll buy a home an hour anda half away and realize that
it's so difficult to commute andthat sort of thing.
(13:05):
So once these homes are builtand they're for sale, we get a
ton of attention and demand onthat.
And then the second part ofthat question is getting past
the perception, being youngerand learning how Gen Z thing and
that sort of thing too.
We have to understand that meand you are talking on this
(13:26):
podcast and we can talk about itall we want, but we learn
visually and until you saw it onthat screen and you can
actually see the end qualityproduct and you can actually see
how they're being built.
That's what we've been doingand that's why I'm very proud of
our media team is creating thisYouTube channel.
That's popped off a lot andpeople are super interested
(13:46):
about how they're built and howit helps people's finances.
But it's really our YouTube andour video stuff that's helped
people allow to see what'spossible with mobile homes and
see the style of living and seethat it can be luxurious in a
mobile home park and that'sreally how we're getting past
that perception and now that'swhat's gotten us to grow to LA
(14:10):
market, to other markets as well, and we're really looking to do
this nationwide also.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
Well, we'll think about it.
Dude, like you've got oldhousing stock in Cincinnati real
old, I mean like I can't evenfind something I want.
I want something modern that'sclean, hasn't been lived in and
the stuff you get here is itneeds work.
I mean we just got old housingstock.
(14:36):
You don't have a whole lot ofnew development, everything.
I mean this city, so it's likethe oldest city.
I mean it was the first.
Cincinnati is considered thefirst real American city Because
it was formed essentially rightafter the Declaration of
Independence was signed.
So I mean the houses are oldand there's no space really to
build new houses and theregulations and you probably
(14:59):
deal with this in out west aswell, maybe not to the extent we
do, but there's a problem withdoing like infill projects and
stuff, because there's alwaysthis historic stuff that's
happening when you're talkingabout the city limits.
But there are spaces andthere's opportunities to build
in some of these spots and wejust need new housing stock,
(15:22):
like the stuff that we got, theoptions that we've got.
Nobody wants to go into a house, spend all this money on a
house just to be hit with $30,$40,000 in upgrades that they
wanna make.
Oh, you want a new kitchen?
20 grand, right.
20 grand Maybe.
Well, it depends on how bigyour house is too.
20 grand, 30 grand, whatever.
(15:42):
You want new bathrooms, you'regonna move in there.
You want new bathrooms?
I'll have 10, 12 grand a pop,right, easy.
So I mean you're dealing withthat when you could just say you
know what, I want somethingbrand new.
I got maybe 300 grand to spend.
I don't have a half million.
I don't have $750,000 to spend,plus upgrades.
I want something brand new Icould just move into.
(16:05):
I can go about my life, I cando my thing.
I don't have to sit here anddeal with construction crews in
my house for the next year.
I mean, these are things peopleneed to understand, especially
if you guys are thinking aboutmoving here till, say, like the
Midwest.
I mean these are problems wedeal with.
Speaker 1 (16:23):
I think also when I see this.
I think about my mom, becauseshe you know, my dad died four
or five years ago, whatever itis, and now she's 70 and she's
in great shape.
She's keeping up with the house, but she wants to get rid of it
.
And she wants to live in acommunity, but she doesn't want
to live in like the one of theyou know, seeing your apartment
(16:45):
buildings and even those areridiculous rents now.
So she like something like thiswhere she could sell her house,
take all of that equity thatshe has from the house, buy this
but be part of a communityCause.
That's the big part, that's the.
I think that would be the bigsell for people downsizing.
Is that the community?
Speaker 2 (17:05):
See you all time.
Yeah, don't be in a condo whereyou have to go up elevators and
crap like that, right.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
You have this and then you walk out and you got
the swimming pool and you've gota clubhouse and you've got all
the benefits that you would getmoving into a decent apartment
community without the headacheof being in the apartment
community.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
And it's a ranch.
It's a ranch style house.
This is what they need, right.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
So what you said was very key and a lot of our
clients have these type oflifestyle choices as well.
And, mind you, most of ourbusiness is in family parks, but
these senior communities we'reseeing a lot of that too People
downsizing from.
They either sell or rent outtheir single family and then
they move to these communitiesas well.
And what's beautiful is reallythe sense of community, because
(17:49):
keep in mind that every personthat lives in these mobile homes
are actually owner, resident oftheir home.
So you have that relation.
They take care of their units,they care about their community
and then, especially in thesenior communities, they'll host
events Christmas events,gatherings, thanksgiving events,
that sort of thing and youreally see people that take care
of their units, they take careof their neighbors and they
(18:11):
really have that communityelement to it that you don't see
in apartment complexes.
And it's beautiful and it'squite an amazing thing because
we have people coming from youngto getting a starter home.
And then we have people likeyou said, like hey, they have a
two-story, they want to downsizesomething low maintenance, low
upkeep but they don't want toshare walls and that sort of
(18:32):
thing.
Right, and it becomes a perfectuse case for people in that
situation.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Yeah, and these things are beautiful.
I mean, let's compare.
So if you were to go, sayyou're in San Jose, right,
you're in Northern California,you got.
You know you're looking aroundfor houses, what are you going
to have to pay per square footfor an already existing home
versus one of these?
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Well, they're just 1.5 mil, so.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
Oh, I think it's more than that in San Jose, isn't it
?
Oh, that's just what you said.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
Yeah, In our county it's just, it's right exactly at
1.5, like 1.49, something likethat is the median count, like
single family home.
But, like you said earlier,it's like these homes usually
come with like 30 to 60 K offixing when you get in.
You know it's old stock as well.
Right, the newer homes aregoing for 1.8 and we got ugly
(19:20):
homes for 1.2, 1.3.
And and but you know, I knowwe're talking high numbers here,
but I want people to understandthat like the ratios are kind
of similar, right, Like inAtlanta, medium single family
could be 500, average rent couldbe 1800.
And then the mobile homesthemselves for the newer ones
(19:41):
are like to 180 or 150, $150,000.
Right, but the key thing isunderstanding that this is
allowing a stepping stone andthen allowing an option for
people that most people don'tunderstand is out there, Because
you know most people are justrenting and going on hoping that
one day I'm going to make alarge lump sum, more than I am
(20:03):
today, to be able to one dayafford a single family home.
But that target is a movingtarget and they're not able to
better their personal cash flowbecause they're trapped.
They don't have, they can'treach that single family home
just yet.
But if you can reach getting amobile home for three, five
years, then guess what You'regetting?
Your cash flow is a little bitbetter and it allows for you to
(20:26):
gather some of those benefits ofhome ownership, and then it
allows for you to have betteroptions later down the line.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Yeah, totally does, and you got something new.
You got something clean, yougot something.
I mean, you got enoughheadaches when you're trying to
build your career and you'reyoung and you've got you know,
transportation issues sometimesand you're running around and
you're trying to.
You know, do your best at work,You're putting in extra hours,
you don't have time to bemessing around with a beat up
house, Like you just need.
One of the benefits of rentingis is that you got a landlord
(20:54):
and if something goes wrong youcall the landlord.
Well, when you own a house, youdon't have those benefits and
you're trying to raise kids,like you did trying to raise
kids, and you've got to dealwith that.
On top of all this stuff, LikeI mean, it can get stressful and
to your point, this is astepping stone.
This is a way for somebody toget into that next level but not
have to throw their money awayon rent every month.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
Well, we were we.
I was part of the city visioncommittee or whatever that they
have to.
Every city has to do where theyhave a decade long plan and the
major issue that we wererunning into because of housing
costs so much there andcomparatively speaking to the
rest of this northern Kentuckyand basically the state outside
of certain pockets likeLouisville and Oldham County, is
(21:35):
that young families can'tafford to move in the Fort
Thomas.
They just can't.
It's just they're priced out alot.
I mean it's along the samelines of basically all of
California, like he's talkingabout.
Like.
Something like this would behugely beneficial to the city
resupplying the school districtwith students with, you know,
(21:58):
young guys, young familiescoming back in, instead of old
people just living in theirhouses because they don't have
any other options.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Yeah, yeah.
Have you worked with any citiesor jurisdictions?
Because I mean, this is huge,especially when you're talking
about a state like California,which is largely liberal.
You know they're, they'reparticularly sensitive to the
housing price, housingsituations, I would assume, just
based on their politics.
If you talk to anybody from anyof those groups to say, hey,
(22:26):
look, because politicians wantto want to promote themselves,
right, and they're looking forany edge that they can get, I
could see you as that edge.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
Yeah, no, absolutely.
That is something that Iactually personally do a lot.
You know, I work with the city,the city mayors, and then also
I was just at Washington DCpitching to senators telling
them how this is creating asocial impact for families, the
teachers and that sort of thing.
We also talked about how theconstruction elements of this is
so much better and we need toinnovate on the housing elements
(22:58):
as well.
But I do a lot of lobbying.
I actually do courses where weteach people on how to talk to
government entities and showcasewhy this is important.
That's a big thing that we'redoing lately.
You also talked about what wasit that you mentioned?
There's something that clickedthat I wanted to bring up too.
But, yes, it is.
(23:18):
It is such an important element.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
Oh, with schools, maybe was it with schools and
the school districts, and notbeing able to like oh, what I
was going to say is the keything about this, too, is that
it's not really something.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
The infrastructure is already there.
There's mobile home parksthroughout the country.
Now, it's just a matter of usredeveloping, upping the quality
of these communities and uppingthe quality of the homes in
these communities, right?
So, being that these are mobilehomes, there's not a lot of
permitting or government workthat has to be done, because
it's already a functioningelement that can be done.
(23:52):
So what's beautiful is we canpop into a city like Atlanta and
there's a community that'sthere.
Hey, how can we partner withthe park owner and inform the
residents and inform the citythat this is something that's
really helping the people,allowing a starter home element,
and then we use that model tohelp people get that stepping
(24:13):
stone.
We'll replace a lot of this oldmobile home style homes with
the homes that you saw there andcausing a whole ecosystem of
benefit for people.
Right, and that's what we'redoing.
Speaker 2 (24:26):
I mean, you're kind of playing into the tiny home
thing too.
I mean, even though these looklike they're not tiny homes, but
people think tiny homes aresexy, right, there's like the
opposite thing of tiny homes.
Then there is for mobile homes,right, Like everybody's like oh
, tiny homes, those are cool.
It's almost like if you justcall the mobile home a tiny home
, then people are going to be onit.
You know, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
I think it's.
I think, too is the fabricated.
Look at the mobile home.
It looks like most of them,look like the ones that you know
.
Yeah, they look like when itbaggos.
Yeah, I mean they totally do,as opposed to this, that
actually this looks like youknow.
It looks like a house.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:03):
We push as contemporary as could be.
But yeah, so you mentioned agood point and what's
interesting is that peoplegravitate towards what they see
on the media and the wholereason why tiny homes are
popular because of a show right,but the truth of it is the
practicality of these in citiesare not actual great use cases.
You know it might work in farmareas and that sort of thing and
(25:25):
if that's your thing that'scool, but it doesn't really work
for a regular family in a metrocity or a metro market.
You can't really just store atiny home in someone's backyard
all the time.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
They're illegal in some cases.
Yeah, you can't even do it likelegally you can't have ADUs in
a lot of places.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
So it's all about, like it goes back to, kind of
what I said is that it's amazingbecause when I grew up in in
the Silicon Valley, I knewnothing about Mobile Home Parks
either.
I've never really seen one, notsort of thing.
But when you actually go onGoogle Maps, look up what's
around you, they're spread outthroughout the country and
there's over 64 communities inthe Silicon Valley itself, right
(26:05):
in that one county, and theirtruth is that we don't have an
excuse to go into one of thesecommunities unless we know
somebody that lives there orhave been there previously.
But what's interesting is thatin all of these metro areas
you'll find that there arecommunities throughout the
country, and it's quite shocking.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
What helps them?
So if I'm in a mobile homecommunity, what is beneficial to
them?
Like, where is the right placeto have a mobile home community?
In a metro area, so I need toget downtown on a regular basis,
maybe my job's downtown.
What is it good to go intoareas for you, or is it more
(26:46):
prevalent to see these mobilehome communities where, in
cities where they have good masstransportation?
Speaker 3 (26:56):
It depends on the area we're talking about, but
the answer the first answer tothat question is that these
mobile home parks, to most ofthem are built in the 70s and
they were really built therebefore and previously there.
So you have to look at the cityor the market and see what is
currently there.
It's only until recently thatwe started building new
(27:17):
communities, and usually theseare for these vast growing
economies.
What we're learning in thesecities is that, hey, if, like I
was just at this Nevada marketwhere Tesla built this huge
Gigafactory and built a ton ofjobs, but where are they going
to live?
They don't have housing.
So we're now going to bebuilding a community with mobile
(27:39):
homes themselves, and it's thatwe've realized that, or they've
realized that this is thefastest way that we can build a
ton of good quality housing andmake it available for the
workforce.
It comes down to this analogythat I was talking about with
cars and housing.
I can't remember if I mentionedthis, but because we're
(28:00):
building this on an assemblyline, we can pump out a home so
much faster than if we were todo stick built.
I mean stick built homes takeforever.
You got to transport the labor,you got to transport the lumber
, all the materials, you got toget skilled HVAC, electrical,
all that stuff, and you'reexposed to the weather elements
and permit delays as well,whereas with this it's very easy
(28:24):
to just pump out 100 homes anddo the same development and get
a ton of housing completed at anaffordable rate.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
The funny thing is is like we've automated our food
at this point, like all of ourfood's automated.
Like you go to fast food places, it's automated, right.
I mean, the whole system whereit comes from, everything is
just automated, right.
I mean there's so many thingsthat are automated.
Now, one of the reasons mom andpop stores in places like that
are going out of business isbecause they don't have the
processes that a Walmart has.
(28:57):
You know they don't have theprocesses that you know Target
and some of these McDonald's has.
Right, you know everything'sgoing to be consistent.
You know it's going to be donethe same way, no matter if I go
to the San Jose McDonald's or Igo to Cincinnati McDonald's same
thing, right, like they've gotthe processes in place and it
saves money, it saves time.
But we haven't done that tohouses.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
Exactly.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
I mean what's going on, you know.
I mean it's.
It's like you got to get overthis big stigma, I think,
because when people think, oh,I'm going to build a house,
right, they think of the stickbuild house.
They don't think of what youall the reasons you just talked
about, like how many times havesomebody built a house?
Have you heard of somebodybuild a house?
And they're like, oh God, it'sover.
You know my lumber prices wentup 20%.
(29:41):
My, you know this went up.
That went up, it's.
You know there's delays, wecan't get the permit to it every
time Change orders left andright.
Exactly.
It's like you know, if I lookat your plan, I get that plan.
How long does it take to getsomething from you versus a
stick built house of the samesay square footage?
Speaker 3 (30:02):
So so a resident comes to me with an old unit,
wants to replace it with a brandnew unit.
About a year and a half ago ittook me about 13 months to build
, but now in the last month, wejust broke.
I love continuing to break ourrecord, but we were completed.
We completed our last home inless than in less than two and a
(30:24):
half months.
What so?
From the old unit, removing it,putting the new one in,
finishing it off all the way,ready to move in in two and a
half months and it's insane,right.
And the cool thing about it isthat we can.
We can really stack the processof how it's done, because if we
look at stick built, there'severything has to all be done on
(30:44):
a specific timeline.
But because now we're moving tofactory built, we can work on
things simultaneously.
We're doing the removal of theold unit while we're starting
the construction of the new unit.
And because we're stacking thattimeline, we continue to
compress how long it takes to doand we continue to build it
faster and faster.
Right, and because we're doingit at scale with multiple units,
(31:07):
we get materials at a lowercost, we get labor at a much
more effective cost and we'realso saving so much for the
environment as well less carbonfootprint, less material waste.
If you think about the lumberelement of it on a job site they
cut a piece that they need andthey throw it away, whereas in a
factory they cut what they needand then what's left over they
(31:30):
can stack in store for the nextjob that's needed later down the
line.
And it's the same thing whereyou know it's all process
improvement and that's how we'rebuilding so much faster and
that's how we're going to get tokeeping housing affordable by
fixing that construction issue.
Just like you said, everythingwe own is built in this process
and this stream, like thislaptop, cars and that sort of
(31:53):
thing.
They're built in a factory onan assembly line, because that's
the best way to build.
But we haven't.
We're building homes away.
We've built it a hundred yearsago and there's no change.
And that's scary because, guesswhat, it's not going to get
better.
But most of our workforce is 40years old and older and they're
going to retire soon and wedon't have young people that are
excited to work with a hammer.
(32:14):
That's another point.
That's another point.
It's a huge issue.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
What are you looking at building or partnering with
factories closer to specificmetropolitan areas Like?
Will you have, like, a EastCoast division and a West Coast
division, or I mean I'm assumingright now it's based out of one
factory.
As you grow, are you looking tobe part of the expansion?
Speaker 3 (32:37):
Yeah, so what's cool is we work with really
infrastructure that's alreadythere so we can plug and play
our model within factories thatare already building modular and
manufactured housing, Right.
So you know, that's one of thecool things about this is that's
why I'm, like I mentioned, I'mhere in Atlanta looking at
(32:58):
factories and stuff as well inhere.
You know there are alreadyfactories out in Pennsylvania.
There's a factory in Oklahomathat's capable of using this
model and doing the same thing.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
Yeah, I mean, that's great, you're in Atlanta, you
get.
If you're in Pennsylvania,atlanta you can handle the whole
southeast Pennsylvania, you canhandle the mid-Atlantic.
Into the Midwest Oklahoma, youcan handle Dallas, fort Worth
pretty easily.
You can get up into Kansas City, you know, up into potentially
into Nebraska, maybe Colorado.
(33:30):
No problem, that's nice.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
Yeah, that's awesome, man, I mean especially here,
for you know what you're talkingabout.
When you're in Cincinnati, youknow you've got climate issues,
you've got, you know, rain.
It keeps people from wanting tocome into work.
Right, all it's raining andcan't, you know, can't come into
work.
Speaker 1 (33:49):
It's snow or we get snow.
We get snow for the sleep snow.
Yeah, we get the shit snow.
Speaker 2 (33:54):
Yeah, I mean there's issues or you just there's,
there's, it's too hot or it'stoo cold, like we do not have a
steady climate.
I mean it was a hundred andwhat five degrees a week ago and
now it's like 78 out.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
And it's gonna be 97 again next weekend or whatever.
Speaker 2 (34:09):
Yeah.
So I mean it gets crazy and,and I mean when it's the winter
time, I mean you could have, youcould have a 60 degree day in
the winter and then all of asudden you know a negative five
degree day with eight inches ofsnow.
Right, I mean that kind ofstuff messes with construction
timelines and everything.
So I mean you're dealing withthat and you, here you are.
Like you know, I can get you ahouse in two and a half months.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
Yeah, you can build it.
You can build it from, you know, end of May through the summer.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Yeah, and you're going to be moved in and you got
a house, you're not going tohave to pay rent anymore.
I mean, that's the other thingtoo.
Like you're thinking about this, these people are paying for
the house while they're buildingit, right, I mean, they've
still got a.
You know they got debt, they'vegot to pay.
You know they're.
They're they're livingsomewhere else, right?
Maybe renting, so the entiretime that's taken them a year
and a half, two years to buildthis house.
(34:55):
They're paying two mortgages,kind of right, I mean yeah.
I mean, they're not just you'regetting it to them in two and a
half months.
So the opportunity cost ofmoney is something people have
to consider.
With something like this, too,you know you're throwing money
away at rent while you'rebuilding your house and paying
for the construction.
I mean, that's that's.
That's an issue that peoplehave to think about as well when
(35:16):
they're, when they'redetermining this stuff.
Now, a lot of the people thatwe deal with on this podcast are
people that are they'reinvestors.
They're people that are, youknow, interested in real estate
a lot of times.
Are you?
Are you taking on anyinvestment?
Are you self-funded Like I'msure people are like man, this
(35:36):
sounds awesome, I want to throwsome money at him and invest in
his company, like what's what'shappening?
Speaker 3 (35:44):
We did do.
We did do a fund around a fewyears back and did another one
last year.
Right now we're not actuallyseeding investors we are pretty
self-funded.
But we do have something comingin first quarter of 2024 where
we're working with partnering,like with park ownership, as
well as building out this model.
(36:05):
But as of right now,unfortunately we don't have much
of that involved.
But I think if anything forthese investors to look at is
really look at the parkownership element I mean,
there's so many opportunitiesthere that can be done that way
and we partner with them as well, and they can learn a lot of
that stuff on our YouTubechannel too.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
So guys go out there and look for some land.
What kind of?
What kind of land, like, whatsize acreage would you say is
good for something like this?
Like if I went out and I said,hey, Franco, I'm going to go buy
a lot in Northern Kentucky, Imean, there's lots, not far from
here there's, there's farms.
Speaker 1 (36:44):
There's still plenty of area here to develop, where
you're within striking distanceof downtown.
No problem, within 35 minutes,totally.
Speaker 2 (36:51):
I mean you go out and you could buy.
You know we could buy 50 acrestomorrow.
You know if you were to buy 50acres or somebody listening to
this had land and they were ableto I guess what would be the
process?
I would have to talk to you say, hey, franco, I got this
project coming up.
We're going to build out some,some space here.
We're going to have 20, 30 lotsthat we could put houses on.
(37:16):
Do you think you could deliveron that?
And then we have to run what wehave to call the city, run
plumbing to each one of them orelectrical to each one of them,
all that stuff.
Speaker 3 (37:26):
Yeah, yeah.
So I mean there's it can be assmall as like seven acres to as
big as like a hundred acres thatwe are seeing development.
But the average size, like youmentioned, is around that 50
acre unit and it will depend onlike what's the land cost, what
are the next available utilitysource and that sort of thing.
So one of my good friends isbuilding a park in Bozeman,
(37:50):
montana, where it's a verygrowing economy, and that that
was about 60 acres of land andwhat's cool is that you know all
the utilities are already setto that point and it's just the
development that needed to getdone.
And as a park owner, all you'rereally developing is the
utilities and the roads andinfrastructure, right.
(38:12):
So what's cool is that theowners of the homes themselves
they're the ones paying for thatand they're also the ones
maintaining that you're nolonger worrying about a broken
toilet, a crack ceiling or thatsort of thing.
But your maintenance as a parkowner entity is really just the
utility infrastructure and itbecomes kind of a great
investment compared to a multiunit investment as well.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
And it's, and it's a, it's a big fig leaf or piece
offering for all theCalifornians moving into Bozeman
and blowing up the housingmarket.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
That's true In poor Bozee Idaho like what do you
mean?
Speaker 1 (38:52):
this house is now $600,000?
.
We make $30,000 a year here.
Speaker 2 (38:56):
It's 20 below and it's houses 60.
Yeah, I mean.
So what do you have any idea?
So on 50 acres or 6860 acres,your buddy, how many units do
you think he can get on there?
Speaker 3 (39:09):
Dude, I wish I remembered the numbers on there,
but I believe it's somewherearound 180 units.
Oh, wow, the I have to.
I honestly can't quite remember, but a typical sized lot itself
(39:30):
would typically be about 40feet wide and about 70 feet deep
, so that will allow for us tobuild a home unit that's about
30 feet wide and then 60 feetdeep.
So with that that brings it toabout like a 1800 square foot
perfect three bedroom, two bathhome with a beautiful large
kitchen and great room in thefront.
Speaker 1 (39:52):
Wow, I think that'd be great too, because if you go
to, you know you want to go toYellowstone, you know you can
rent hotels or this gives Airbnboptions for people that are
able to you know to be able tojust rent out.
Just, they're walking up.
Speaker 2 (40:07):
You could just do this and make it an Airbnb.
That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (40:09):
An Airbnb park.
Basically, you get all thenational parks and just be right
outside of them.
Oh, that'd be great.
Speaker 2 (40:15):
Yeah, and you wouldn't have to drive around
and yeah, that'd be really nice.
So I mean, but you couldtotally like go buy some land,
like we could go tomorrow, golook for some land like a
ducking and go buy it scoop up50 acres for Red River, half a
million dollars.
Red River Gorge, you could doit there.
You could totally do it there.
That'd be a great place for it.
And then you put, yeah, you gota quarter acre.
Say you know, break it up intoquarter acres.
Speaker 1 (40:37):
Well, there's nowhere to swim there, like that's,
that's a crazy thing.
So you go, and you go to thesehikes and you can get into the
creek if you want to, but youthere's no like.
There's no like hotels there.
There aren't any hotels therewith a swimming pool.
That I'm there's one, butthere's actually two, but the
one you swim in is like yeah youdon't want it yeah you may come
stay away with some
Speaker 2 (40:57):
flesh bacteria.
Speaker 1 (40:58):
So, yeah, you have, like you could have a place
where people can come, you know,rent affordably.
I mean, I know this is not themodel.
Speaker 2 (41:05):
This is model.
Speaker 1 (41:05):
I'm sorry, I'm just thinking how loud and then you
go swim and actually be in aplace where, like this, is
really nice being here.
Speaker 2 (41:11):
Well, just being the park owner is profitable.
I mean it's great.
I mean you're renting out thelots.
You're not selling the lots,Are you?
You're renting those lots,correct, Correct.
So they're buying the home, butyou're renting them the lot to
put it on and then charging thema fee I think this is what my
(41:31):
conversation was down in Miamiwith this guy and then you
charge them for like utilitiesevery month.
You charge them for likeutility hookup and all that
stuff every month or whatever.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Exactly that.
Speaker 2 (41:42):
Yeah.
So I mean you could do yeah,you go get 50 acres in Kentucky.
You break it up into say youget 200 units on there, 150
units on there Plus you want tosave some of the acreage for
amenities.
Right, you're going to want toput a little park in there.
You're going to want to put,yeah, things like a community
room, probably like a communitycenter that may be stick built
(42:03):
or whatever, that people canrent and have parties and stuff.
So no different than amulti-family building where
you're going to have maybe abasketball hoop or something in
there too for the kids.
But it's, it's kind of likethat, right.
Speaker 3 (42:17):
Exactly, yeah, exactly like that.
Speaker 2 (42:20):
And then I call you and say Franco, I need 200.
And then you pop those suckersout, yeah.
Speaker 3 (42:27):
Yeah, well, that's, that's essentially what we do
for park owners, right, sothey'll have that.
They need to help with buildingit out, the infrastructure,
getting it sold, getting itin-field so that they have those
units filled.
So we handle the wholelogistics of that and once the
park infrastructure is there andwe can also help, like you know
, based on the metrics of what'sthe age group and what people
(42:50):
prefer in that area, we guidewith like, hey, what are the
amenities that will really bringthe best ROI?
What's going to help, you know,get your clientele and more
value into your mobile home parkinvestment?
We do that same level of skillfor these residents that are
already living in the communityas well.
Speaker 2 (43:08):
Well, here you go, guys.
I mean, if you're thinkingabout doing something like this
Franco's, your guy.
I mean you got, you got theexpert right here.
That'll.
That'll maximize theinvestments of whoever.
If you need investors and youwant to buy some land and get
everything hooked up, you get aninvestment group.
Speaker 1 (43:23):
So like I saw you on Best Ever and so I'm in that,
I'm in their Facebook group andguys are doing talking about
mobile home parks all the time.
Speaker 2 (43:33):
Yeah Well, man, this has been awesome, this has been
eye-opening.
I didn't.
I almost forgot about thatconversation I had with that guy
.
Apparently he's killing it nowdown in Miami.
Dude, I mean, he's not doingthem in Miami, he's doing them
all over the place.
But hand over fist money, manhe's.
He's just rocking it out, butyou're doing it, for I mean,
you're helping people at thesame time, which is everybody
likes to make money.
But if you could help peopleand do good and provide a much
(43:57):
needed asset for folks and helpsolve some of this affordable
housing problem.
Speaker 1 (44:04):
I mean God bless you for that.
This is something I've neverthought of for affordable
housing.
I was always like, how do youdrive down the cost of
commodities so that?
Speaker 2 (44:11):
you can't right now, yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
So that rents wouldn't be so high because it
wouldn't cost so much to fixthese places.
And this is like outside thebox of anything I ever totally
is, totally is.
Speaker 3 (44:21):
It really is a beautiful thing and I think for
people out there too.
It's like I think a lot ofpeople in our space are always
kind of chasing that, that like,how do I make it Get some
amount of month, and that sortof thing.
But what's really helped mekind of get driven was realizing
when I helped that first familyget something that they could
have never afforded, and andit's I still tear up today and
(44:42):
once I saw that happen, I justwanted to multiply and help more
families.
Right, how can I help createmore success stories for a
family that couldn't afford andget them to be able to afford?
And that's what drives me everymorning to work late nights and
and it really gets me excitedversus how much we're going to
make, versus that sort of thing.
And I think there's a lot ofpeople out there where that's
(45:04):
really the driver that they needand I hope more people can can
do that as well.
Speaker 2 (45:10):
True entrepreneur right there, franco, we really
appreciate it.
Man, this has been awesome.
Tell people how they can reachout to you.
Speaker 3 (45:18):
Yeah, so all of our links where you can see like
what they look like, 3d tours,that sort of stuff, it's on
wwwfrancotv or you can justGoogle us at Franco mobile homes
and see our YouTube channelthere.
Speaker 2 (45:30):
Man congratulations man.
Immigrant comes to America 11years old, killing it.
I love it.
It's a great story, man.
Speaker 3 (45:39):
Thanks for having me, guys.
Speaker 2 (45:40):
Yes sir, yes sir, Thank you.
Thanks for joining us on thisweek's episode of Side Hustle
City.
Well, you've heard from ourguests.
Now let's hear from you.
Join our community on Facebook,Side Hustle City.
It's a group where people shareideas, share their
inspirational stories andmotivate each other to be
successful and turn their sidehustle into their main hustle.
(46:01):
We'll see you there and we'llsee you next week on the show.
Thank you.
Welcome to Side Hustle City and thanks for
joining us.
Our goal is to help you connectto real people who found
success turning their sidehustle into a main hustle, and
we hope you can too.
I'm Adam Kaler.
I'm joined by Kyle Stevy, myco-host.
Let's get started, all right?
(00:32):
Welcome back everybody to theSide Hustle City podcast.
Today we got a special guestFranco Perez.
Franco, thank you for joiningthe show sir.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Oh, thanks for having me, I'm excited.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Yeah, I'm pumped too, man.
We're going to talk mobilehomes today, so if you've seen a
big uptick, I guess becauseyou're in the mobile home space
are you seeing this as like agrowing thing?
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Oh, absolutely, it's kind of been the hottest topic
lately.
I mean, you know, there's awhole affordable housing element
to it, there's the wholeconstruction element to it of
how it's advancing.
I mean it's going to fix a lotof the problems that are coming
in the next few years.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
I like it.
I like it, I mean they're moreaffordable.
They're generally built in afactory right.
I actually went to one inKentucky and they build modular
homes.
This wasn't necessarily likethe mobile home right.
They weren't on wheels or anyof that kind of stuff.
These were just modular homesthat they were building and just
put them together, and theywere way more affordable per
(01:31):
square foot than a traditionalhome.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
Oh, absolutely.
It's the future of construction.
I mean, we have so muchconstruction issues that are
happening and part of the wholeaffordable element is of why
cost of living is so expensiveis because building this is
we're building these homes justlike we were 100 years ago, you
know, and nothing's reallychanged.
We're just innovating and wehaven't really shifted to
(01:58):
modular or manufactured ormobile homes.
It's just like you know.
I use this analogy but carsoriginally were only built for
like the rich and wealthy, untilwe were able to build it on an
assembly line and make itaccessible for everyone.
And that's exactly what we'redoing with these mobile homes as
well.
As we're building them infactory, we're building them
(02:20):
with much less material, muchless labor and building them
very high quality home at speed,at a much.
In the end cost is much lessthan what you would at a
traditional stick built home.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Yeah, exactly I mean and you, you know you weren't
born in America, you were bornin the Philippines.
You came over when you were 11.
So you're old enough toremember some of what you saw in
the Philippines, which is still, I mean to this day, a very
affordable country to live in.
But you know, you go to someplaces.
You see real poverty, like youhave people in America here
complaining about not being ableto afford a house or, you know,
(02:52):
being poor, this and that it'sa night and day.
It's a totally different thing.
Talk to the audience here,explain to them kind of what you
saw there and how thatmotivated you once you got here.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
Yeah, I think it's.
It's a whole, I mean, our lifeis all about our perspective and
what we see and how we perceivethings.
Right and when.
When I grew up in thePhilippines, you know there were
.
I remember being a kid and Isee people my age that didn't
have the opportunity to go toschool, right, they were selling
cigarettes on the street andthe side of the road, but you
(03:26):
know, what's weird is thatthey're also very happy and
they're grateful for what theyhave, even if they have nothing.
And then, moving here, Iremember seeing people with a
roof over their head but findways to be miserable or stressed
.
Right, and it's all about howwe perceive things.
I think that's the firstelement to it.
And yeah, after I kind of grewup here, in high school and in
(03:48):
the United States there's therewas a weird, unfortunate, a
fortunate situation where myparents split.
My dad was the main breadwinner, he left the country, and then
it was just me, my single momand my younger sister.
When I was like 17 years old, Ihad to drop out of school,
start working right away, andthen I was in a in one of the
(04:08):
hardest times of my life, justtrying to work two jobs just to
keep up with paying rent.
And it was.
It was difficult, and that'skind of where I realized it.
There's not.
You know, why is this lifeunfair?
You know, I feel like we'regood people.
Why is it that the wealthy areable to benefit from all these
home ownership elements and thenthe middle class or working
(04:29):
class can't really have thatattainable?
And I really think that's whatgot me into this whole mobile
home world as well is becausethere's a lot of false stigmas,
false assumptions and and presperceptions about what mobile
home parks are whether they'retrailer parks or from the media,
(04:50):
and what the news shows usversus the reality of it.
And and came to find out somany people are starting their
wealth building journey throughmobile homes.
And yeah, that's why we builtour business.
Really.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
I love it, man.
I love the journey.
What actually struck me is whenyou sent over your information
and you're saying you're beingable to price these things
$250,000 to $400,000 for one ofthese mobile homes.
These aren't your traditionalmobile homes, guys.
These things look awesome.
How and now is this in theSouthern California area that
(05:24):
you're able to do this at theseprices?
Speaker 3 (05:27):
Yeah.
So we all started in San Jose,silicon Valley area, right.
And I want to express thatthese I can kind of talk about
pricing and like how the mall,like how things work, but keep
in mind, silicon Valley is oneof the most expensive areas in
the country.
But when I describe these,these, this housing issue that
we're having, it's going to behigher than most, but the ratios
(05:48):
are typically the same.
But if we express living in SanJose when I was going through
that struggle, for example, rentin San Jose is about $3,400 a
month for a two bedroomapartment, right.
And then if I wanted to buy asingle family home in San Jose,
median price point is about $1.5million.
And how does somebody that'srenting ever dream of purchasing
(06:13):
a single family home later downthe line when it's so difficult
to attain and so high, such ahigh price and big barrier to
entry to get into right.
And that's where the mobilehome element really becomes a
beautiful thing because it's astepping stone in between
getting to help someone get outof that rental rat race and
start their home ownershipjourney, right.
(06:34):
So people are chasing buying apiece of real estate because
they get to leverage a loan tobuild their net worth, they get
to have the upside ofappreciation and they also get
tax benefits right.
And we can't access that unlesswe own a home, and with mobile
homes it's like a perfect hybridof ownership and a partial
(06:56):
renting as well.
So let's say you buy a averagemobile home in our area it's
about or in San Jose area it'sabout $300,000, right?
So actually I should paint thepicture of the home, of a single
family home.
So if I wanted to buy a singlefamily home and I wanted to put
10% down, it's about $150,000down payment and my monthly
(07:16):
payment would look like about$8,000 a month.
Now if we get a mobile home,for example, 10% of that
$300,000 is $30,000 down, andthen my mortgage would look like
would look like about $2,600.
And then my space rent is about$1,000.
So my total monthly payment isabout $3,600, just a little bit
(07:39):
more than what I would be payingif I'm renting.
However, you're getting a lotof the ownership benefits by
owning a mobile home in thatarea.
Plus, you still get to stay inthat prime area that you're near
your great job or you're inthat great school district and
you don't have to move away orcommute for two hours just to
get to that workplace, andthat's how we're using it as a
(08:03):
stepping stone for people tostart to get out of that rental
rat race into owning a mobilehome, and then, three to five
years later, they have an assetthey can sell to then buy a
single family home later downthe line.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
So one of the issues and I'm here sorry I had to do
my good deed for the day andthen I didn't even need to do it
so one of the issues that we,as real estate investors, you
hear about with mobile homes isdepreciation of the value.
Are you finding that they holdvalue because of being in
(08:37):
California at the cost of owninga home?
So how do you feel like thiscould scale across the country
where these things willappreciate in value and other?
I guess you're going to have tokeep them near what urban areas
, correct?
Speaker 3 (08:50):
Yeah, so that's the thing, that.
That's one of those big mythsthat are not always true, right?
But most of our business andwhere we're seeing this make
sense are all the metro areasLike I'm doing this thing in
Atlanta right now but, yes, sohigh density area.
You're seeing that these mobilehomes are appreciating in value
very equivalent percentages asreal estate housing as well.
(09:13):
So in San Jose in the last twoyears the mobile home price has
overappreciated over 10%, whichis a big difference compared to
what people think is that theydepreciate in value a ton, and
that's average, even includingthe old 1970s homes and the
newer ones too, I mean.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
I would just add them scrolling through your website
while we're speaking here, oryour promotional stuff here.
Those aren't mobile homes, like, I think, a mobile home, so
those aren't the kind that wehave around here, where they
have the Confederate flags andthe four and the four cars.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
Part car parts out in the front like babies running
around with this.
This looks like upscale living.
These are what I mean.
Look at this bathroom with thetub and like.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
I mean that kitchen is better than the kitchen in my
house, for sure that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
A barn door Like.
You got the barn door gamegoing on in here too.
Do you design these?
Like?
How did you work with anarchitect?
Do you have an architecturebackground?
Speaker 3 (10:10):
So we do the full element of the designing.
I'm not an architect myself, Ididn't even go to college or
anything like that but we reallypush the limits of what's
possible in these mobile homes.
And, like you said, likepeople's stigmas and people's
associations with mobile homesare only really what they see in
the media.
But we're used to seeing likebreaking bad or bad news around
(10:34):
it.
But just like apartmentcomplexes, there's very bad
apartments and then there's verynice high end apartments.
But just like with mobile homeparks, like you said, there's
trailer trash looking parks.
But then there's also resortstyle communities and they all
shouldn't be written off all asa bad thing.
But we have communities as wellwith tennis courts, with saunas
(10:58):
and badminton courts and dogparks and all of that and the
same.
With the homes.
We're pushing the quality ofwhat we can do.
We really build these nicerthan what single family homes
are being built to today.
Like you see the finishes there, the standalone tubs, quartz
countertops, stainless steelappliances.
We have 12 foot high flatceilings too, I mean you know,
(11:21):
and these are inside mobile homeparks.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
Wow, I mean, it looks like my brother lives in San
Francisco.
My cousin lives there.
Now my brother lives in Oaklandand what I just saw there was a
gazillion times better thantheir two bedroom apartments.
So it's there's.
I mean, hey, there's way morespace, seriously, but B the
(11:43):
finishes and everything lookfantastic.
That's I would have.
I never know what our guests do, because I like to hear their
story while we go in here,because then I don't have any
preconceived questions becauseI'll fuck them up.
But this was, this is eyeopening.
This is something that I evenyeah, I don't know how you, how
(12:03):
do you?
So that's a great question.
Then, how do you get over thestigmatization of you know I.
You say I'm, I create thesemobile homes, I build mobile
homes.
How do you, how do you get pastthat stigma of of what we were
just talking about in terms ofwhat people have preconceived
notions about?
Speaker 3 (12:22):
Well, I think there's two elements to that.
One is the demand is muchbigger than the perception
problem.
So if people are paying $4,500a month to rent and knock hit
anything back and they reallywant to better their housing
situation and their better theirfinances, guess what?
(12:45):
They're going to exploreoptions.
Like I said, unfortunatelythere's working class people in
these metro areas that aremaking huge sacrifices, like
regretful decisions, just tochase that dream of home
ownership.
They'll buy a home an hour anda half away and realize that
it's so difficult to commute andthat sort of thing.
(13:05):
So once these homes are builtand they're for sale, we get a
ton of attention and demand onthat.
And then the second part ofthat question is getting past
the perception, being youngerand learning how Gen Z thing and
that sort of thing too.
We have to understand that meand you are talking on this
(13:26):
podcast and we can talk about itall we want, but we learn
visually and until you saw it onthat screen and you can
actually see the end qualityproduct and you can actually see
how they're being built.
That's what we've been doingand that's why I'm very proud of
our media team is creating thisYouTube channel.
That's popped off a lot andpeople are super interested
(13:46):
about how they're built and howit helps people's finances.
But it's really our YouTube andour video stuff that's helped
people allow to see what'spossible with mobile homes and
see the style of living and seethat it can be luxurious in a
mobile home park and that'sreally how we're getting past
that perception and now that'swhat's gotten us to grow to LA
(14:10):
market, to other markets as well, and we're really looking to do
this nationwide also.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
Well, we'll think about it.
Dude, like you've got oldhousing stock in Cincinnati real
old, I mean like I can't evenfind something I want.
I want something modern that'sclean, hasn't been lived in and
the stuff you get here is itneeds work.
I mean we just got old housingstock.
(14:36):
You don't have a whole lot ofnew development, everything.
I mean this city, so it's likethe oldest city.
I mean it was the first.
Cincinnati is considered thefirst real American city Because
it was formed essentially rightafter the Declaration of
Independence was signed.
So I mean the houses are oldand there's no space really to
build new houses and theregulations and you probably
(14:59):
deal with this in out west aswell, maybe not to the extent we
do, but there's a problem withdoing like infill projects and
stuff, because there's alwaysthis historic stuff that's
happening when you're talkingabout the city limits.
But there are spaces andthere's opportunities to build
in some of these spots and wejust need new housing stock,
(15:22):
like the stuff that we got, theoptions that we've got.
Nobody wants to go into a house, spend all this money on a
house just to be hit with $30,$40,000 in upgrades that they
wanna make.
Oh, you want a new kitchen?
20 grand, right.
20 grand Maybe.
Well, it depends on how bigyour house is too.
20 grand, 30 grand, whatever.
(15:42):
You want new bathrooms, you'regonna move in there.
You want new bathrooms?
I'll have 10, 12 grand a pop,right, easy.
So I mean you're dealing withthat when you could just say you
know what, I want somethingbrand new.
I got maybe 300 grand to spend.
I don't have a half million.
I don't have $750,000 to spend,plus upgrades.
I want something brand new Icould just move into.
(16:05):
I can go about my life, I cando my thing.
I don't have to sit here anddeal with construction crews in
my house for the next year.
I mean, these are things peopleneed to understand, especially
if you guys are thinking aboutmoving here till, say, like the
Midwest.
I mean these are problems wedeal with.
Speaker 1 (16:23):
I think also when I see this.
I think about my mom, becauseshe you know, my dad died four
or five years ago, whatever itis, and now she's 70 and she's
in great shape.
She's keeping up with the house, but she wants to get rid of it
.
And she wants to live in acommunity, but she doesn't want
to live in like the one of theyou know, seeing your apartment
(16:45):
buildings and even those areridiculous rents now.
So she like something like thiswhere she could sell her house,
take all of that equity thatshe has from the house, buy this
but be part of a communityCause.
That's the big part, that's the.
I think that would be the bigsell for people downsizing.
Is that the community?
Speaker 2 (17:05):
See you all time.
Yeah, don't be in a condo whereyou have to go up elevators and
crap like that, right.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
You have this and then you walk out and you got
the swimming pool and you've gota clubhouse and you've got all
the benefits that you would getmoving into a decent apartment
community without the headacheof being in the apartment
community.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
And it's a ranch.
It's a ranch style house.
This is what they need, right.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
So what you said was very key and a lot of our
clients have these type oflifestyle choices as well.
And, mind you, most of ourbusiness is in family parks, but
these senior communities we'reseeing a lot of that too People
downsizing from.
They either sell or rent outtheir single family and then
they move to these communitiesas well.
And what's beautiful is reallythe sense of community, because
(17:49):
keep in mind that every personthat lives in these mobile homes
are actually owner, resident oftheir home.
So you have that relation.
They take care of their units,they care about their community
and then, especially in thesenior communities, they'll host
events Christmas events,gatherings, thanksgiving events,
that sort of thing and youreally see people that take care
of their units, they take careof their neighbors and they
(18:11):
really have that communityelement to it that you don't see
in apartment complexes.
And it's beautiful and it'squite an amazing thing because
we have people coming from youngto getting a starter home.
And then we have people likeyou said, like hey, they have a
two-story, they want to downsizesomething low maintenance, low
upkeep but they don't want toshare walls and that sort of
(18:32):
thing.
Right, and it becomes a perfectuse case for people in that
situation.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Yeah, and these things are beautiful.
I mean, let's compare.
So if you were to go, sayyou're in San Jose, right,
you're in Northern California,you got.
You know you're looking aroundfor houses, what are you going
to have to pay per square footfor an already existing home
versus one of these?
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Well, they're just 1.5 mil, so.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
Oh, I think it's more than that in San Jose, isn't it
?
Oh, that's just what you said.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
Yeah, In our county it's just, it's right exactly at
1.5, like 1.49, something likethat is the median count, like
single family home.
But, like you said earlier,it's like these homes usually
come with like 30 to 60 K offixing when you get in.
You know it's old stock as well.
Right, the newer homes aregoing for 1.8 and we got ugly
(19:20):
homes for 1.2, 1.3.
And and but you know, I knowwe're talking high numbers here,
but I want people to understandthat like the ratios are kind
of similar, right, Like inAtlanta, medium single family
could be 500, average rent couldbe 1800.
And then the mobile homesthemselves for the newer ones
(19:41):
are like to 180 or 150, $150,000.
Right, but the key thing isunderstanding that this is
allowing a stepping stone andthen allowing an option for
people that most people don'tunderstand is out there, Because
you know most people are justrenting and going on hoping that
one day I'm going to make alarge lump sum, more than I am
(20:03):
today, to be able to one dayafford a single family home.
But that target is a movingtarget and they're not able to
better their personal cash flowbecause they're trapped.
They don't have, they can'treach that single family home
just yet.
But if you can reach getting amobile home for three, five
years, then guess what You'regetting?
Your cash flow is a little bitbetter and it allows for you to
(20:26):
gather some of those benefits ofhome ownership, and then it
allows for you to have betteroptions later down the line.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Yeah, totally does, and you got something new.
You got something clean, yougot something.
I mean, you got enoughheadaches when you're trying to
build your career and you'reyoung and you've got you know,
transportation issues sometimesand you're running around and
you're trying to.
You know, do your best at work,You're putting in extra hours,
you don't have time to bemessing around with a beat up
house, Like you just need.
One of the benefits of rentingis is that you got a landlord
(20:54):
and if something goes wrong youcall the landlord.
Well, when you own a house, youdon't have those benefits and
you're trying to raise kids,like you did trying to raise
kids, and you've got to dealwith that.
On top of all this stuff, LikeI mean, it can get stressful and
to your point, this is astepping stone.
This is a way for somebody toget into that next level but not
have to throw their money awayon rent every month.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
Well, we were we.
I was part of the city visioncommittee or whatever that they
have to.
Every city has to do where theyhave a decade long plan and the
major issue that we wererunning into because of housing
costs so much there andcomparatively speaking to the
rest of this northern Kentuckyand basically the state outside
of certain pockets likeLouisville and Oldham County, is
(21:35):
that young families can'tafford to move in the Fort
Thomas.
They just can't.
It's just they're priced out alot.
I mean it's along the samelines of basically all of
California, like he's talkingabout.
Like.
Something like this would behugely beneficial to the city
resupplying the school districtwith students with, you know,
(21:58):
young guys, young familiescoming back in, instead of old
people just living in theirhouses because they don't have
any other options.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Yeah, yeah.
Have you worked with any citiesor jurisdictions?
Because I mean, this is huge,especially when you're talking
about a state like California,which is largely liberal.
You know they're, they'reparticularly sensitive to the
housing price, housingsituations, I would assume, just
based on their politics.
If you talk to anybody from anyof those groups to say, hey,
(22:26):
look, because politicians wantto want to promote themselves,
right, and they're looking forany edge that they can get, I
could see you as that edge.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
Yeah, no, absolutely.
That is something that Iactually personally do a lot.
You know, I work with the city,the city mayors, and then also
I was just at Washington DCpitching to senators telling
them how this is creating asocial impact for families, the
teachers and that sort of thing.
We also talked about how theconstruction elements of this is
so much better and we need toinnovate on the housing elements
(22:58):
as well.
But I do a lot of lobbying.
I actually do courses where weteach people on how to talk to
government entities and showcasewhy this is important.
That's a big thing that we'redoing lately.
You also talked about what wasit that you mentioned?
There's something that clickedthat I wanted to bring up too.
But, yes, it is.
(23:18):
It is such an important element.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
Oh, with schools, maybe was it with schools and
the school districts, and notbeing able to like oh, what I
was going to say is the keything about this, too, is that
it's not really something.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
The infrastructure is already there.
There's mobile home parksthroughout the country.
Now, it's just a matter of usredeveloping, upping the quality
of these communities and uppingthe quality of the homes in
these communities, right?
So, being that these are mobilehomes, there's not a lot of
permitting or government workthat has to be done, because
it's already a functioningelement that can be done.
(23:52):
So what's beautiful is we canpop into a city like Atlanta and
there's a community that'sthere.
Hey, how can we partner withthe park owner and inform the
residents and inform the citythat this is something that's
really helping the people,allowing a starter home element,
and then we use that model tohelp people get that stepping
(24:13):
stone.
We'll replace a lot of this oldmobile home style homes with
the homes that you saw there andcausing a whole ecosystem of
benefit for people.
Right, and that's what we'redoing.
Speaker 2 (24:26):
I mean, you're kind of playing into the tiny home
thing too.
I mean, even though these looklike they're not tiny homes, but
people think tiny homes aresexy, right, there's like the
opposite thing of tiny homes.
Then there is for mobile homes,right, Like everybody's like oh
, tiny homes, those are cool.
It's almost like if you justcall the mobile home a tiny home
, then people are going to be onit.
You know, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
I think it's.
I think, too is the fabricated.
Look at the mobile home.
It looks like most of them,look like the ones that you know
.
Yeah, they look like when itbaggos.
Yeah, I mean they totally do,as opposed to this, that
actually this looks like youknow.
It looks like a house.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:03):
We push as contemporary as could be.
But yeah, so you mentioned agood point and what's
interesting is that peoplegravitate towards what they see
on the media and the wholereason why tiny homes are
popular because of a show right,but the truth of it is the
practicality of these in citiesare not actual great use cases.
You know it might work in farmareas and that sort of thing and
(25:25):
if that's your thing that'scool, but it doesn't really work
for a regular family in a metrocity or a metro market.
You can't really just store atiny home in someone's backyard
all the time.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
They're illegal in some cases.
Yeah, you can't even do it likelegally you can't have ADUs in
a lot of places.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
So it's all about, like it goes back to, kind of
what I said is that it's amazingbecause when I grew up in in
the Silicon Valley, I knewnothing about Mobile Home Parks
either.
I've never really seen one, notsort of thing.
But when you actually go onGoogle Maps, look up what's
around you, they're spread outthroughout the country and
there's over 64 communities inthe Silicon Valley itself, right
(26:05):
in that one county, and theirtruth is that we don't have an
excuse to go into one of thesecommunities unless we know
somebody that lives there orhave been there previously.
But what's interesting is thatin all of these metro areas
you'll find that there arecommunities throughout the
country, and it's quite shocking.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
What helps them?
So if I'm in a mobile homecommunity, what is beneficial to
them?
Like, where is the right placeto have a mobile home community?
In a metro area, so I need toget downtown on a regular basis,
maybe my job's downtown.
What is it good to go intoareas for you, or is it more
(26:46):
prevalent to see these mobilehome communities where, in
cities where they have good masstransportation?
Speaker 3 (26:56):
It depends on the area we're talking about, but
the answer the first answer tothat question is that these
mobile home parks, to most ofthem are built in the 70s and
they were really built therebefore and previously there.
So you have to look at the cityor the market and see what is
currently there.
It's only until recently thatwe started building new
(27:17):
communities, and usually theseare for these vast growing
economies.
What we're learning in thesecities is that, hey, if, like I
was just at this Nevada marketwhere Tesla built this huge
Gigafactory and built a ton ofjobs, but where are they going
to live?
They don't have housing.
So we're now going to bebuilding a community with mobile
(27:39):
homes themselves, and it's thatwe've realized that, or they've
realized that this is thefastest way that we can build a
ton of good quality housing andmake it available for the
workforce.
It comes down to this analogythat I was talking about with
cars and housing.
I can't remember if I mentionedthis, but because we're
(28:00):
building this on an assemblyline, we can pump out a home so
much faster than if we were todo stick built.
I mean stick built homes takeforever.
You got to transport the labor,you got to transport the lumber
, all the materials, you got toget skilled HVAC, electrical,
all that stuff, and you'reexposed to the weather elements
and permit delays as well,whereas with this it's very easy
(28:24):
to just pump out 100 homes anddo the same development and get
a ton of housing completed at anaffordable rate.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
The funny thing is is like we've automated our food
at this point, like all of ourfood's automated.
Like you go to fast food places, it's automated, right.
I mean, the whole system whereit comes from, everything is
just automated, right.
I mean there's so many thingsthat are automated.
Now, one of the reasons mom andpop stores in places like that
are going out of business isbecause they don't have the
processes that a Walmart has.
(28:57):
You know they don't have theprocesses that you know Target
and some of these McDonald's has.
Right, you know everything'sgoing to be consistent.
You know it's going to be donethe same way, no matter if I go
to the San Jose McDonald's or Igo to Cincinnati McDonald's same
thing, right, like they've gotthe processes in place and it
saves money, it saves time.
But we haven't done that tohouses.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
Exactly.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
I mean what's going on, you know.
I mean it's.
It's like you got to get overthis big stigma, I think,
because when people think, oh,I'm going to build a house,
right, they think of the stickbuild house.
They don't think of what youall the reasons you just talked
about, like how many times havesomebody built a house?
Have you heard of somebodybuild a house?
And they're like, oh God, it'sover.
You know my lumber prices wentup 20%.
(29:41):
My, you know this went up.
That went up, it's.
You know there's delays, wecan't get the permit to it every
time Change orders left andright.
Exactly.
It's like you know, if I lookat your plan, I get that plan.
How long does it take to getsomething from you versus a
stick built house of the samesay square footage?
Speaker 3 (30:02):
So so a resident comes to me with an old unit,
wants to replace it with a brandnew unit.
About a year and a half ago ittook me about 13 months to build
, but now in the last month, wejust broke.
I love continuing to break ourrecord, but we were completed.
We completed our last home inless than in less than two and a
(30:24):
half months.
What so?
From the old unit, removing it,putting the new one in,
finishing it off all the way,ready to move in in two and a
half months and it's insane,right.
And the cool thing about it isthat we can.
We can really stack the processof how it's done, because if we
look at stick built, there'severything has to all be done on
(30:44):
a specific timeline.
But because now we're moving tofactory built, we can work on
things simultaneously.
We're doing the removal of theold unit while we're starting
the construction of the new unit.
And because we're stacking thattimeline, we continue to
compress how long it takes to doand we continue to build it
faster and faster.
Right, and because we're doingit at scale with multiple units,
(31:07):
we get materials at a lowercost, we get labor at a much
more effective cost and we'realso saving so much for the
environment as well less carbonfootprint, less material waste.
If you think about the lumberelement of it on a job site they
cut a piece that they need andthey throw it away, whereas in a
factory they cut what they needand then what's left over they
(31:30):
can stack in store for the nextjob that's needed later down the
line.
And it's the same thing whereyou know it's all process
improvement and that's how we'rebuilding so much faster and
that's how we're going to get tokeeping housing affordable by
fixing that construction issue.
Just like you said, everythingwe own is built in this process
and this stream, like thislaptop, cars and that sort of
(31:53):
thing.
They're built in a factory onan assembly line, because that's
the best way to build.
But we haven't.
We're building homes away.
We've built it a hundred yearsago and there's no change.
And that's scary because, guesswhat, it's not going to get
better.
But most of our workforce is 40years old and older and they're
going to retire soon and wedon't have young people that are
excited to work with a hammer.
(32:14):
That's another point.
That's another point.
It's a huge issue.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
What are you looking at building or partnering with
factories closer to specificmetropolitan areas Like?
Will you have, like, a EastCoast division and a West Coast
division, or I mean I'm assumingright now it's based out of one
factory.
As you grow, are you looking tobe part of the expansion?
Speaker 3 (32:37):
Yeah, so what's cool is we work with really
infrastructure that's alreadythere so we can plug and play
our model within factories thatare already building modular and
manufactured housing, Right.
So you know, that's one of thecool things about this is that's
why I'm, like I mentioned, I'mhere in Atlanta looking at
(32:58):
factories and stuff as well inhere.
You know there are alreadyfactories out in Pennsylvania.
There's a factory in Oklahomathat's capable of using this
model and doing the same thing.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
Yeah, I mean, that's great, you're in Atlanta, you
get.
If you're in Pennsylvania,atlanta you can handle the whole
southeast Pennsylvania, you canhandle the mid-Atlantic.
Into the Midwest Oklahoma, youcan handle Dallas, fort Worth
pretty easily.
You can get up into Kansas City, you know, up into potentially
into Nebraska, maybe Colorado.
(33:30):
No problem, that's nice.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
Yeah, that's awesome, man, I mean especially here,
for you know what you're talkingabout.
When you're in Cincinnati, youknow you've got climate issues,
you've got, you know, rain.
It keeps people from wanting tocome into work.
Right, all it's raining andcan't, you know, can't come into
work.
Speaker 1 (33:49):
It's snow or we get snow.
We get snow for the sleep snow.
Yeah, we get the shit snow.
Speaker 2 (33:54):
Yeah, I mean there's issues or you just there's,
there's, it's too hot or it'stoo cold, like we do not have a
steady climate.
I mean it was a hundred andwhat five degrees a week ago and
now it's like 78 out.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
And it's gonna be 97 again next weekend or whatever.
Speaker 2 (34:09):
Yeah.
So I mean it gets crazy and,and I mean when it's the winter
time, I mean you could have, youcould have a 60 degree day in
the winter and then all of asudden you know a negative five
degree day with eight inches ofsnow.
Right, I mean that kind ofstuff messes with construction
timelines and everything.
So I mean you're dealing withthat and you, here you are.
Like you know, I can get you ahouse in two and a half months.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
Yeah, you can build it.
You can build it from, you know, end of May through the summer.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Yeah, and you're going to be moved in and you got
a house, you're not going tohave to pay rent anymore.
I mean, that's the other thingtoo.
Like you're thinking about this, these people are paying for
the house while they're buildingit, right, I mean, they've
still got a.
You know they got debt, they'vegot to pay.
You know they're.
They're they're livingsomewhere else, right?
Maybe renting, so the entiretime that's taken them a year
and a half, two years to buildthis house.
(34:55):
They're paying two mortgages,kind of right, I mean yeah.
I mean, they're not just you'regetting it to them in two and a
half months.
So the opportunity cost ofmoney is something people have
to consider.
With something like this, too,you know you're throwing money
away at rent while you'rebuilding your house and paying
for the construction.
I mean, that's that's.
That's an issue that peoplehave to think about as well when
(35:16):
they're, when they'redetermining this stuff.
Now, a lot of the people thatwe deal with on this podcast are
people that are they'reinvestors.
They're people that are, youknow, interested in real estate
a lot of times.
Are you?
Are you taking on anyinvestment?
Are you self-funded Like I'msure people are like man, this
(35:36):
sounds awesome, I want to throwsome money at him and invest in
his company, like what's what'shappening?
Speaker 3 (35:44):
We did do.
We did do a fund around a fewyears back and did another one
last year.
Right now we're not actuallyseeding investors we are pretty
self-funded.
But we do have something comingin first quarter of 2024 where
we're working with partnering,like with park ownership, as
well as building out this model.
(36:05):
But as of right now,unfortunately we don't have much
of that involved.
But I think if anything forthese investors to look at is
really look at the parkownership element I mean,
there's so many opportunitiesthere that can be done that way
and we partner with them as well, and they can learn a lot of
that stuff on our YouTubechannel too.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
So guys go out there and look for some land.
What kind of?
What kind of land, like, whatsize acreage would you say is
good for something like this?
Like if I went out and I said,hey, Franco, I'm going to go buy
a lot in Northern Kentucky, Imean, there's lots, not far from
here there's, there's farms.
Speaker 1 (36:44):
There's still plenty of area here to develop, where
you're within striking distanceof downtown.
No problem, within 35 minutes,totally.
Speaker 2 (36:51):
I mean you go out and you could buy.
You know we could buy 50 acrestomorrow.
You know if you were to buy 50acres or somebody listening to
this had land and they were ableto I guess what would be the
process?
I would have to talk to you say, hey, franco, I got this
project coming up.
We're going to build out some,some space here.
We're going to have 20, 30 lotsthat we could put houses on.
(37:16):
Do you think you could deliveron that?
And then we have to run what wehave to call the city, run
plumbing to each one of them orelectrical to each one of them,
all that stuff.
Speaker 3 (37:26):
Yeah, yeah.
So I mean there's it can be assmall as like seven acres to as
big as like a hundred acres thatwe are seeing development.
But the average size, like youmentioned, is around that 50
acre unit and it will depend onlike what's the land cost, what
are the next available utilitysource and that sort of thing.
So one of my good friends isbuilding a park in Bozeman,
(37:50):
montana, where it's a verygrowing economy, and that that
was about 60 acres of land andwhat's cool is that you know all
the utilities are already setto that point and it's just the
development that needed to getdone.
And as a park owner, all you'rereally developing is the
utilities and the roads andinfrastructure, right.
(38:12):
So what's cool is that theowners of the homes themselves
they're the ones paying for thatand they're also the ones
maintaining that you're nolonger worrying about a broken
toilet, a crack ceiling or thatsort of thing.
But your maintenance as a parkowner entity is really just the
utility infrastructure and itbecomes kind of a great
investment compared to a multiunit investment as well.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
And it's, and it's a, it's a big fig leaf or piece
offering for all theCalifornians moving into Bozeman
and blowing up the housingmarket.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
That's true In poor Bozee Idaho like what do you
mean?
Speaker 1 (38:52):
this house is now $600,000?
.
We make $30,000 a year here.
Speaker 2 (38:56):
It's 20 below and it's houses 60.
Yeah, I mean.
So what do you have any idea?
So on 50 acres or 6860 acres,your buddy, how many units do
you think he can get on there?
Speaker 3 (39:09):
Dude, I wish I remembered the numbers on there,
but I believe it's somewherearound 180 units.
Oh, wow, the I have to.
I honestly can't quite remember, but a typical sized lot itself
(39:30):
would typically be about 40feet wide and about 70 feet deep
, so that will allow for us tobuild a home unit that's about
30 feet wide and then 60 feetdeep.
So with that that brings it toabout like a 1800 square foot
perfect three bedroom, two bathhome with a beautiful large
kitchen and great room in thefront.
Speaker 1 (39:52):
Wow, I think that'd be great too, because if you go
to, you know you want to go toYellowstone, you know you can
rent hotels or this gives Airbnboptions for people that are
able to you know to be able tojust rent out.
Just, they're walking up.
Speaker 2 (40:07):
You could just do this and make it an Airbnb.
That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (40:09):
An Airbnb park.
Basically, you get all thenational parks and just be right
outside of them.
Oh, that'd be great.
Speaker 2 (40:15):
Yeah, and you wouldn't have to drive around
and yeah, that'd be really nice.
So I mean, but you couldtotally like go buy some land,
like we could go tomorrow, golook for some land like a
ducking and go buy it scoop up50 acres for Red River, half a
million dollars.
Red River Gorge, you could doit there.
You could totally do it there.
That'd be a great place for it.
And then you put, yeah, you gota quarter acre.
Say you know, break it up intoquarter acres.
Speaker 1 (40:37):
Well, there's nowhere to swim there, like that's,
that's a crazy thing.
So you go, and you go to thesehikes and you can get into the
creek if you want to, but youthere's no like.
There's no like hotels there.
There aren't any hotels therewith a swimming pool.
That I'm there's one, butthere's actually two, but the
one you swim in is like yeah youdon't want it yeah you may come
stay away with some
Speaker 2 (40:57):
flesh bacteria.
Speaker 1 (40:58):
So, yeah, you have, like you could have a place
where people can come, you know,rent affordably.
I mean, I know this is not themodel.
Speaker 2 (41:05):
This is model.
Speaker 1 (41:05):
I'm sorry, I'm just thinking how loud and then you
go swim and actually be in aplace where, like this, is
really nice being here.
Speaker 2 (41:11):
Well, just being the park owner is profitable.
I mean it's great.
I mean you're renting out thelots.
You're not selling the lots,Are you?
You're renting those lots,correct, Correct.
So they're buying the home, butyou're renting them the lot to
put it on and then charging thema fee I think this is what my
(41:31):
conversation was down in Miamiwith this guy and then you
charge them for like utilitiesevery month.
You charge them for likeutility hookup and all that
stuff every month or whatever.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Exactly that.
Speaker 2 (41:42):
Yeah.
So I mean you could do yeah,you go get 50 acres in Kentucky.
You break it up into say youget 200 units on there, 150
units on there Plus you want tosave some of the acreage for
amenities.
Right, you're going to want toput a little park in there.
You're going to want to put,yeah, things like a community
room, probably like a communitycenter that may be stick built
(42:03):
or whatever, that people canrent and have parties and stuff.
So no different than amulti-family building where
you're going to have maybe abasketball hoop or something in
there too for the kids.
But it's, it's kind of likethat, right.
Speaker 3 (42:17):
Exactly, yeah, exactly like that.
Speaker 2 (42:20):
And then I call you and say Franco, I need 200.
And then you pop those suckersout, yeah.
Speaker 3 (42:27):
Yeah, well, that's, that's essentially what we do
for park owners, right, sothey'll have that.
They need to help with buildingit out, the infrastructure,
getting it sold, getting itin-field so that they have those
units filled.
So we handle the wholelogistics of that and once the
park infrastructure is there andwe can also help, like you know
, based on the metrics of what'sthe age group and what people
(42:50):
prefer in that area, we guidewith like, hey, what are the
amenities that will really bringthe best ROI?
What's going to help, you know,get your clientele and more
value into your mobile home parkinvestment?
We do that same level of skillfor these residents that are
already living in the communityas well.
Speaker 2 (43:08):
Well, here you go, guys.
I mean, if you're thinkingabout doing something like this
Franco's, your guy.
I mean you got, you got theexpert right here.
That'll.
That'll maximize theinvestments of whoever.
If you need investors and youwant to buy some land and get
everything hooked up, you get aninvestment group.
Speaker 1 (43:23):
So like I saw you on Best Ever and so I'm in that,
I'm in their Facebook group andguys are doing talking about
mobile home parks all the time.
Speaker 2 (43:33):
Yeah Well, man, this has been awesome, this has been
eye-opening.
I didn't.
I almost forgot about thatconversation I had with that guy
.
Apparently he's killing it nowdown in Miami.
Dude, I mean, he's not doingthem in Miami, he's doing them
all over the place.
But hand over fist money, manhe's.
He's just rocking it out, butyou're doing it, for I mean,
you're helping people at thesame time, which is everybody
likes to make money.
But if you could help peopleand do good and provide a much
(43:57):
needed asset for folks and helpsolve some of this affordable
housing problem.
Speaker 1 (44:04):
I mean God bless you for that.
This is something I've neverthought of for affordable
housing.
I was always like, how do youdrive down the cost of
commodities so that?
Speaker 2 (44:11):
you can't right now, yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
So that rents wouldn't be so high because it
wouldn't cost so much to fixthese places.
And this is like outside thebox of anything I ever totally
is, totally is.
Speaker 3 (44:21):
It really is a beautiful thing and I think for
people out there too.
It's like I think a lot ofpeople in our space are always
kind of chasing that, that like,how do I make it Get some
amount of month, and that sortof thing.
But what's really helped mekind of get driven was realizing
when I helped that first familyget something that they could
have never afforded, and andit's I still tear up today and
(44:42):
once I saw that happen, I justwanted to multiply and help more
families.
Right, how can I help createmore success stories for a
family that couldn't afford andget them to be able to afford?
And that's what drives me everymorning to work late nights and
and it really gets me excitedversus how much we're going to
make, versus that sort of thing.
And I think there's a lot ofpeople out there where that's
(45:04):
really the driver that they needand I hope more people can can
do that as well.
Speaker 2 (45:10):
True entrepreneur right there, franco, we really
appreciate it.
Man, this has been awesome.
Tell people how they can reachout to you.
Speaker 3 (45:18):
Yeah, so all of our links where you can see like
what they look like, 3d tours,that sort of stuff, it's on
wwwfrancotv or you can justGoogle us at Franco mobile homes
and see our YouTube channelthere.
Speaker 2 (45:30):
Man congratulations man.
Immigrant comes to America 11years old, killing it.
I love it.
It's a great story, man.
Speaker 3 (45:39):
Thanks for having me, guys.
Speaker 2 (45:40):
Yes sir, yes sir, Thank you.
Thanks for joining us on thisweek's episode of Side Hustle
City.
Well, you've heard from ourguests.
Now let's hear from you.
Join our community on Facebook,Side Hustle City.
It's a group where people shareideas, share their
inspirational stories andmotivate each other to be
successful and turn their sidehustle into their main hustle.
(46:01):
We'll see you there and we'llsee you next week on the show.
Thank you.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.