One Post-it note changed the lives of over 800 people living at San Lazaro Mobile Home Park in Boulder County, Colorado. After announcing their intention to sell the mobile home park at a whopping price of $42.5 million, approximately 213 families were left with the tough decision to make the purchase of the land under them or face losing everything that they had built over the years.
As per the law, the Colorado residents of any mobile home park have a time period of 120 days to respond to any signal of sale by the owners and use their right of first refusal. For the residents of San Lazaro Mobile Home Park, that deadline is July 18. If missed, then there would be no restriction on who can buy the land and what they can do with it.
It goes much further than just one neighborhood. Mobile home parks represent the biggest source of unsubsidized affordable housing in America. As soon as ownership passes to someone else, lot rent rises dramatically and homeowners have little power since they are not paying for the house but for the land underneath. It costs at least $10,000-$20,000 to move a mobile home..
Why Land Ownership Changes Everything
San Lazaro remained stable over the years due to its steady management from the same Minnesota-based owner, whose lot rent rates were around $1,000 per month—a good 40 percent below the national median asking rate. And this stability is hanging by a thread now.
At the center of this struggle lies the land ownership issue. Park residents are owners of their property without owning the land it stands on—an inherent weakness making the ownership strong but still vulnerable. This can be addressed by purchasing the park, but the associated expenses will remain regardless of ownership change.
San Lazaro needs to have a well-defined financial strategy in place to achieve this objective. A strategy of this nature has been employed by Roaring Fork Valley of Colorado, which managed to sell two of its park communities in 2025 for $42 million via a combination of institutional loans, grants from the government, and forgivable loans from seven jurisdictions.
A Test Case With National Stakes
What happens here will be felt far beyond Boulder. Over the last ten years, there has been an increase in ownership of manufactured home communities by residents. As far as parks where there are good purchase opportunity laws are concerned, such as New Hampshire, Vermont, and Massachusetts, about 20%-30% of the parks are currently owned by the residents. Moreover, about 22 states have laws to this effect.
This would add impetus to the laws that exist in Colorado regarding this matter and would act as an example for other communities.
For now, however, residents are working together to organize themselves, fundraise, and prepare themselves for the burden of responsibility that comes with being an owner. They understand, of course, that money problems will not go away, but rather that those troubles will be theirs to face. Yet for a group of people who share their food, their services, and their identity, the trade seems worthwhile.
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