The answer to that question throughout Western North Carolina comes down to something simple: it depends on whom you ask.
Manufactured housing in the region, on average, accounts for between 15 and 30 percent of overall housing.
According to the Citizen Times, opponents of manufactured housing in the area say “you get what you pay for,” and although manufactured homes are cheap up front, their values and materials degrade over time.
Advocates disagree, saying they are an affordable path to homeownership.
As Daily Business News readers are aware, we continue to cover the challenges as well as the numerous advantages that the manufactured housing industry provides in the U.S., making affordable, quality housing easily available to most of the population.
As the region works to address its affordable housing crisis, manufactured home community owners are pushing for growth, and officials are left with the decision of whether more permissive zoning is the answer.
For longtime Asheville businessman and Wellington Estates community owner, George Morosani, it’s a no brainer.
Describing himself as an advocate for manufactured homes, he’s one of the people driving the push for more permissive zoning.
“It’s just good old working class people that need a place to live,” said Morosani. “What’s most important is at the end of ten years they own the home, and they can have it payment-free for the next 20 or 25 years.”
While manufactured homes are banned in Ashville, Wellington Estates, due to its age, is grandfathered in.
Morosani says that he buys homes and resells them, and buyers put ten percent down and pay off the balance through private financing with Wellington Estates within ten years.
“I’ve always found if someone owns something, they’re apt to take better care of it than if you’re renting,” said Morosani.
And that appears to carry over to Wellington West, which is right across the street and also owned by Morosani.
Some residents there are accusing Morosani of forcing them out, telling them that they need to upgrade their homes and pay the Wellington Estates pad rent, or leave.
“I feel frustrated because I don’t know where to go,” said Wellington West resident Carina Hernandez.
“He said that businesses are businesses, and that’s why we’re taking these out and putting new ones in.”
For Morosani, he says that he has no tolerance for situations like Wellington West.
“This is what the public thinks a trailer park [sic] is,” said Morosani, pointing to a part of the community.
“This is trailer trash [sic].”
“I want to prove a trailer park [sic] doesn’t have to look scruff. The clean up is part of my strategy to persuade city leaders to open up zoning for mobile homes,” said Morosani.
“The difference between trailer trash [sic] in a trailer park [sic] and a manufactured home community is tremendously different. It is not an eyesore. It just takes maintenance. It takes care.”
MHProNews and MHLivingNews publisher L.A. “Tony” Kovach provides deep insight into the opportunity for manufactured housing in Obstacles and Opportunities in Affordable Housing – October 2016, and the understanding that the solution to affordable housing is hiding in plain sight. ##
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Submitted by RC Williams to the Daily Business News for MHProNews.
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