A New Maine Law Has Gone Into Effect Regarding Residents of Mobile Homes

As someone who spent the first 13 years of life growing up in a mobile home park, I totally understand the frustrations and headaches that many residents of these parks face.

However, it's not always bad either. I grew up in the tiny Maine town of Randolph and lived at the Fairview Estates mobile home park. It was a lovely park of mostly older retirees and young couples just starting their families.

There was always someone to play with, a safe place to ride bikes, a field that was mowed frequently to play sports in and, of course, free trash pickup. We were lucky that our park was locally owned and maintained (and still is to this day!)

Others in Maine have not always been so lucky. We've seen time and time again the large real estate conglomerates come in and scoop these parks up from their local owners. This becomes a problem when certain amenities get cut off and lot rental fees surge.

Maine lawmakers recognized this problem and have stepped up to do something about it. According to an article from WGME 13, the Maine legislature just passed a bill that will require residents of Maine mobile home parks to have first right of refusal to purchase the park themselves before an outside investor can.

What this means is that the park residents would have to come together and at least match the same offer as an out-of-state investor to take over ownership of their own park.

Sure, in some cases it may not be feasible, but in others it absolutely would. This would keep ownership and control of the park local and would also help alleviate burdensome costs like lot rent.

WGME reported that the bill is slated to go into effect in 90 days.