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News Release
BOISE STATE NEWS RELEASE/November 21, 2007
Boise State Researchers Look at Uncertain Future of Mobile
Homes as Affordable Housing in Boise
On the heels of several mobile home park closures within Boise city limits,
including the closure of the Coffey Mobile Home Park in Garden City, Boise
State University President Bob Kustra commissioned a policy study in fall
2006 to consider plausible solutions. Boise State social science professors
teamed with graduate students and the city of Boise’s housing manager to
survey mobile home park residents, examine the history and economics of
manufactured housing, and identify best practice policy options in use in
other cities.
The result is “Mobile Home Living in Boise: Its Uncertain Future and
Alarming Decline.” The report puts a human face on the problem of affordable
housing, while outlining five strategies for the Boise City Council’s
consideration.
“The threat to mobile home living as an affordable low-cost housing
alternative is alarming,” said Kustra. “Our hope is that this report will
offer new insight on the problem as well as possible solutions not only for
Idaho, but for other cities across the nation that are facing the same
concerns.”
The biggest challenge to mobile homes as viable affordable housing,
researchers found, is the large number of residents (about two-thirds) who
own their home but not their land. “Once the mobile home was the nation’s
most reliable source of unsubsidized low-income housing,” said Todd Shallat,
director of the Center for Idaho History and Politics at Boise State and one
of the principal investigators on the project. “Today the equation has
changed.”
With land values soaring in recent years, some park owners are accepting
lucrative financial offers, and homeowners are finding that the land has
been sold right out from under them. With wages growing at much slower rates
than land values, homeowners are often forced from their homes because they
can’t afford to purchase or rent new lots elsewhere. Even if they are able
to locate a new lot, the $10,000 cost of relocating their home is
prohibitive.
Added to these concerns is the lack of a provision in state law allowing a
city to require mobile home park owners to maintain mobile home units or pay
relocation expenses if the park is closed. Park owners may also legally keep
spaces vacant or put stringent screening criteria in place. In addition,
many mobile home parks are located on the outskirts of town, in areas once
considered undesirable or of little worth, or have become run down and
“shabby,” thus making them unwelcome neighbors of new subdivisions sprouting
up in nearby fields.
Despite these concerns, many mobile home dwellers reported that their choice
of housing fit their needs either because it was a more affordable and less
regulated alternative to an apartment, which also typically does not offer a
yard or garden space, or because they did not feel they needed, or wanted, a
large home. Still others reported that they had purchased a mobile home as a
step toward eventually owning a site-built home, but then found that
finances or the difficulty of selling a manufactured home prevented them
from achieving that goal.
Boise was once the second-largest modular home manufacturing hub west of the
Mississippi, Shallat said. “Many thousands of Boiseans saw mobile homes as
an inexpensive path to the American dream of homeownership. Today many of
these Boiseans are elderly and disabled. Their lots are being sold for
subdivisions and shopping centers, and their homes are too old to move.”
The five strategies outlined in the report are:
• First, as a short-term emergency measure, tap the city’s general fund to
augment Housing and Urban Development (HUD) relocation grants.
• Second, publish a pamphlet that warns homebuyers about the danger of
owning a house on leased land and another that informs mobile home residents
of their legal rights.
• Third, encourage housing cooperatives by working with private lenders and
homeowner associations or by assisting nonprofits like Neighborhood Housing
Services.
• Fourth, fast track the permit and inspection process or ease zoning
restrictions for low-income housing and mobile home parks.
• Fifth, adopt inclusionary zoning that requires developers to provide a
fixed percentage of mobile home lots or affordable apartment units in new
housing subdivisions.
Researchers anticipate that this will be the first of a series of
interdisciplinary investigations on metropolitan issues affecting the
Treasure Valley and Idaho. Future topics could include transportation,
land-use zoning, homelessness, policing, tourism, regional governance, water
quality and foothills conservation.
Researchers on the project included Shallat; Jim Birdsall, Boise Housing and
Community Development; Susan Emerson, Boise State MPA program; Molly K.
Humphreys, Center for Idaho History and Politics; Susan Mason, Boise State
Graduate Certificate in Community and Regional Planning; Kevin Nehila Boise
State Graduate Certificate in Community and Regional Planning; and Roy
Rodenhiser, Boise State School of Social Work.
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Media Contact: Kathleen Craven, University Communications, (208)
426-3275, kcraven@boisestate.edu
Boise State University professor Heidi Reeder has been named the 2007
Idaho Professor of the Year by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement
of Teaching. She is an associate professor in the Department of
Communication. Reeder’s honor marks the 11th time that a Boise State
professor has earned this award, and the seventh time in the last decade.
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Last reviewed on
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
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