Manufactured homes represent some of the most affordable housing options on the market, in Hastings and beyond. Hastings has long struggled with providing sufficient affordable housing to residents and manufactured home parks like Three Rivers and mobile home parks like Hastings Terrace have helped to fill that gap.
While many residents of these communities own their homes, they rent the land it sits on from manufactured home communities. This “halfway homeownership” has come to a head as lot rents have increased across the state, to the dismay of many long-term residents of manufactured/mobile home communities.

These lot rent increases have outpaced inflation—sometimes as much as 10% annually—and have upset residents, forcing many out of their homes, according to Mary Nehring, a resident at Three Rivers and a volunteer with Manufactured Home Residents Collective (MHRC). MHRC is an organizing group within ISAIAH, a nonprofit “fighting for racial and economic justice in Minnesota,” according to their website.
MHRC attributes the rise of lot rates to “increased out-of-state private equity and corporate ownership. Residents have been identified as a captive audience with limited options for relocation, and as a result, are being squeezed for everything they have.”

Compounding the issue of rising lot rates is that moving a manufactured home can be difficult and expensive. Moving a manufactured home can cost thousands of dollars, sometimes as much as $15,000, and many parks have strict stipulations on what types of houses they accept and how old houses can be, which often keeps residents from moving, even in the face of rising lot rates.

“Their allegiance is not the community,” said Nehring about Three Rivers, which is owned by Haven Park Communities, which owns manufactured home parks across the county. According to Nehring, the aggressive lot rate increases began shortly after the park was purchased by Three Rivers in 2019, however this could not be independently verified.  

While Three Rivers failed to provide specifics on lot rent increases in recent years, as well as the factors that contribute to those increases, they provided the Hastings Journal with the following statement: “Our annual rent adjustments ensure we can continue creating enduring value for our residents while taking into account increased housing and maintenance costs and inflation.”
According to the statement from Three Rivers, the rate increases since 2019 “are in line with market rent in the region.”

Manufactured Home Resident’s Bill of Rights
This trend of rising rates for manufactured home parks has led to the creation of the Manufactured Home Resident’s Bill of Rights which was introduced in the Minnesota legislature last session where it was stalled in committee. The bill, HF2381/SF2391, would limit lot rent increases to 3% annually, provide residents with the opportunity to purchase the land beneath their homes when parks are sold and establish a number of other measures to increase transparency for residents.

Last month, residents of manufactured home parks from around the area, including Cottage Grove Estates, Three Rivers, and Cimarron in Lake Elmo, met with state legislators about the bills and the issue of affordability and rising rates.
Hastings legislators were split on supporting the bill.
Sen. Judy Seeberger (DFL – Afton) signed onto the bill in March of last year and continues to support it.

While Rep. Tom Dippel (R – Cottage Grove) said the bill was “well intentioned and well meaning,” he wouldn’t support the bill as-is, calling it a “partisan smokescreen,” meant to appease voters without actually taking action.
“We need to do a lot more for affordability beyond what that bill stated,” said Dippel, referencing a number of unfunded mandates passed in recent years that have increased the cost of living in Minnesota across the board.

Fixed Incomes
Across the state, an estimated 180,000 Minnesotans live in the state’s roughly 800 manufactured/mobile home communities, according to MHRC. That’s over 3% of the state’s total population.
Because manufactured home parks are some of the most affordable housing options available, many residents have fixed or lower incomes and are left without many other housing options.

As many residents on a fixed income can attest, inflation and rising costs can quickly outpace fixed incomes like social security. Even when paired alongside cost-of-living increases, the growing costs of gas to utilities to taxes can leave residents on fixed incomes at a loss of what to do in the face of increased lot rates.
“People are leaving. They have nowhere to turn. They don’t know what to do,” said Nehring about Three Rivers.
For more information about the MHRC, visit their website at www.isaiahmn.org/mhrc