“Residents feel forced out of Magnolia development” says USA Today Network

StJonesLandingLebanonMagnoliaDE-creditDEInParkSales-postedDailyBusinessNewsMHProNews- — St. Jones Landing – A 65-home community, located in country-quiet Lebanon, St. Jones Landing is 1 mile from Route 113 as well as minutes from Dover Air Force Base. Living in the country but being close to shopping and restaurants is the best of both worlds. Photo and description credit, Delaware In Park Sales.

Gene Alderson said, “never ever buy a home on some elses [sic] land.” To which Marquis Allen replied, “So true, and yet sad.”

While those posted comments on Delaware Online’s story, “Residents feel forced out of Magnolia development” might have been by community activists. But their comments have the look and feel of actual readers from the general public – expressing their views on manufactured home land-lease living.

And therein lies multi-billion-dollar rub.

Twitter@JerrySmithTNJ-postedManufacturedHousingIndustryDailyBusinessNewsMHProNews- — *Smith account is more balanced than some media accounts, but has the all-too-common errors of improper use of terminology, among other issues.*

The News Journal’s writer Jerry Smith’s account provided a far more balanced presentation than the recent part one of the NPR story on manufactured home communities did.

Smith’s narrative begins with the tension and the drama, “George Makdad and Breanna Waltz are resigned to the fact that they won’t be living in their St. Jones Landing manufactured home park a year from now.”

“Our rights are being trampled and K-4 is breaking laws here,” Smith reports that Makdad, a 12-year resident of St. Jones Landing, said. They’re “not dealing with us in good faith like the law states.”

GoogleSearchResultsResidentsFeelForcedOutMagnoliaDevelopment-postedDailyBusinessNewsMHProNews — Google search results on the keyword search – “**Residents feel forced out of Magnolia development**” – reveal that this ‘local’ story that has been picked up by over 500 sites nationally, as is shown above.

AndyStrineLinkedInk4Management-PostedManufacturedHousingIndustryDailyBusinessNewsMHProNews- — *Andy Strine, credit, LinkedIn.*

The bottom line for this story at present is that both sides – residents and management – are digging in, and there will obviously be more to cover in this struggle the days ahead.

But in the wake of the NPR story on Syringa Mobile Home Park, should this Delware case and others raise a broader discussion about how manufactured home communities handle such resident issues?

MHLivingNewsManufacturedHomeOwnerSatisfactionSurvey-postedManufacturedHousingIndustryDailyBusinessNews-MHProNews — The story linked from the graphic above covers the good, bad and ugly in the NPR’s report on manufactured home community living, as well as provides a home owner satisfacion survey.

NPR’s slanted Syringa story has a wide range of spot-on responses from manufactured home industry professionals, some of which are found in the detailed report linked here.