I Own A Home But I’m Still Being Evicted

They call us trailer trash, undesirables. Leave us alone. We don't bother anyone. We are paying our rent. Nobody here is a criminal. One in 20 Americans lives in mobile

home

s or trailers. Many of them could face eviction at any time. We already knew we couldn't afford to rent or live anywhere else. Why should we have to rent when we own our

home

? Investors across the country are buying up mobile home parks. And these new owners can choose to dramatically increase the rent or reuse the land without notice. You're talking about families and seniors who have fixed incomes.

Mobile home parks are the most affordable housing available right now. I hope you can help me have more time to find a home for my five siblings and my mother. As one investor put it: “Affordable housing becomes more popular when the nation becomes poorer.” My mother did not have to depend on the government for housing. If she is moved to a place where she has to pay $1,300 in rent for a two-bedroom house for the rest of her life, she will need government help that she didn't need before. For low-income residents, there is often nowhere else to go.

What I am going to do? Where am I going to go? And the guy put in a water heater and said, "Are you going to take it?" I said, “What corner am I going to put it in?” When Alondra Ruiz Vázquez and her husband bought a home in the Periwinkle Mobile Home Park in downtown Phoenix, they had no idea they might be forced to leave. Many of their neighbors have lived in their mobile homes for decades. We each have our own little space where we live. This is our house. We own it. We own the mobile home, but we do not own the land on which it sits.

I just don't think we can, can, and should rent a place where we already have a home. But unfortunately the truth is that we do not own the land. More than 70% of mobile home residents own their homes, but

still

have to pay rent for the lot they are on. And when rent prices rise or parks close, residents can't simply move house. Because mobile homes aren't really that mobile. Moving them can cost thousands of dollars and they might even fall apart if you try. When we bought the place, we thought they would never take it away from us.

We thought we were going to be here for many, many years. Grand Canyon University, or GCU, purchased the Periwinkle Mobile Home lot six and a half years ago. But residents did not receive a notice to vacate the land until April 2022. Alondra and her husband originally moved to Periwinkle to be closer to their volunteer soccer club, which serves refugee children in the neighborhood. This is my kitchen. We have a bathroom there and we have a bedroom. These children are truly special to us. They are from Burundi and are refugee children here in the United States. And they are members of our football club.

When his parents became homeless, they were

evicted

. We were able to bring the kids here. We have been able to help many people. Many park residents fear their only option is to live on the streets. Jerry, Alondra's neighbor, has no idea where he is going. Good to see you. You scared me the other day. I bought this place when I was 55, so it would be the last place I would go for the rest of my life. That was 28 years ago. I am 83 years old now. I'm in and out of the hospital for heart problems. And my doctor told me that if I was stressed, when I told him what the problem was, he said, "Try not to stress about it." It doesn't matter if I try or not.

I wake up in the middle of the night and... That's what I do all night. What I am going to do? Where am I going to go? They treat us as if we were non-existent. Why doesn't the government step in and do something about it? Fight for us. I started to worry about Jerry. Because I know he had a solution. I know I have family or friends, but I don't know where Jerry would go. I started to worry about my neighbor who lives right across the street from me. She is a single mother. I started losing sleep and staying awake at night, thinking, you know, about the families that live here.

Phoenix has historically been known as one of the most affordable major metropolitan cities in the United States, but that appears to be changing. For more than two years during the pandemic, Phoenix suffered from the fastest-growing home prices in the country. And even before the pandemic, 100,000 households couldn't pay their rent. We have many mobile home parks here in the city of Phoenix that currently allow low-income people to have affordable housing. They have been paying rent for years and years. They pay their property taxes like any other property owner. This is Pamela Bridge, an attorney with Community Legal Services.

In January 2023, the Phoenix City Council authorized a $300,000 budget for the company to provide assistance to mobile home renters at Periwinkle and two other parks. But they are not allowed to represent undocumented residents, who are often the most vulnerable to housing insecurity. We receive mobile home calls every day at Community Legal Services, from different mobile home owners and renters who are concerned and who have been receiving notices. We are seeing the same situation over and over again of rent increases or a landlord deciding to sell. I think a lot of out-of-state investors think they can do great business in Arizona and that's what we're seeing, not just in the mobile home world, but with all types of homeowners.

In October 2021, the average rent in Phoenix reached nearly $1,500, which is triple what some mobile home park residents pay. Carmen Prieto is one of these residents. She lives in a mobile home park called Weldon Court in north Phoenix, where she owns a two-bedroom mobile home. She pays about $500 a month in rent. But Carmen and her neighbors were given an official deadline to leave. - Good day. I have been living here for 11 years in this mobile park and it has been as you see, friendly. A lot of people don't know what to do, especially if they have six children, five children.

They have to get a what? Four bedrooms, five bedrooms? Can they really afford it? RV parks are only $500 because we own our RVs. We paid for our tow. We bought it in cash. Carmen receives about $1,100 a month through social security due to a disability. She first moved to the park because it was the only rent she could afford. But now she can't move her house. Mine is a trailer from 1973 and they will not be able to be moved. They already said they won't be able to move. Due to federal housing regulations, mobile homes built before 1976 are often not eligible to be moved.

In fact, any mobile home built after 1976 is technically called a “manufactured home.” But among residents, the name didn't catch on. Even if you are allowed to move house, it can be prohibitively expensive. Arizona offers some relocation funds for mobile home residents who are

being

displaced, but they are often not enough to cover moving costs. Moving it costs them $7,800 out of pocket, which the state helps. But it's harder for us to move. And on the bottom of the trailer, you move all these sidings on the bottom and then they have tires. See, this is the problem. The problem is already there.

I never took it off. I think if we move it, it will be destroyed. It will fall apart. Carmen's daughter, Patty, says park management and city officials did not provide information in Spanish about the Arizona relocation fund. - You don't have papers for us in Spanish and you say you want to help us. Here it is clearly a Latino majority. - I will come to another meeting with those forms. - On the 29th he will bring them in Spanish. And she never did. The Arizona Department of Housing is not legally required to inform tenants about the relocation fund.

But they say they have bilingual staff available to help tenants who contact their office. Still, Carmen says she and her neighbors only received the original letters from the owner in English. They see me on the streets or come to the door. And they asked me clearly: "What does this say?" I had to translate it for him. While it is not illegal to provide documents only in English, it is much more difficult for tenants to understand their rights. So I felt like this monster was targeting these people who don't understand what's happening because it's not in their language.

I think it's our community in general, I mean... First of all, we are not informed of our rights. And second: with fear. Fear that is in the back of all these people's minds. Like, "Oh shit, they're just going to call immigration, arrest us all, and expel us to Mexico." How do we fight against that? All we have is our voice. For Carmen, her trailer is a lifesaver for her family. She is the guardian of her two granddaughters, whom she helped raise at Weldon Court. She even helped deliver her grandson in the bedroom of her house. - And my daughters do consider this to be safe.

They play here, they know all the neighbors. All the children grew up together. My daughters consider this to be my mother's house. So this is my mom's house and I'm going to fight for my mom. Sylvia Herrera is a community organizer in Phoenix. She and her husband, Salvador, have been helping mobile home park residents fight evictions for a decade. You can see gentrification here and this is all part of the plan to get rid of low income communities in the center of the city. So downtown Phoenix and these areas that have mobile home parks are going to be literally demolished.

Investors buy mobile home parks for a variety of reasons: sometimes to build apartment buildings or businesses, and sometimes simply to renovate the parks and charge higher rent. In 2018, Sylvia and Salvador helped residents of a nearby park connect with lawyers after they were told they had to leave. Some residents were able to negotiate to stay in the park, but they say rent skyrocketed dramatically. - Hello. You are all an example of how when you fight you can achieve things. It doesn't matter if the rent goes up, but we want to stay here. We are happy here. And the reality is that in other places the rent is becoming unbearable.

Everywhere the rent is . That's how it is. There are no places. This is the only place you can rent. - Initially we paid $250 dollars for rent. And now we pay $750 plus utilities. And the former owner always had green spaces. The gardeners came and did the cleaning. We always had services. Now we don't have them and we pay more. Sylvia and Salvador are now helping mobile home residents connect with pro bono attorneys. In many cases, the only thing these lawyers can do is buy time. They may try to have cases dismissed based on technicalities, such as failing to give adequate notice of the eviction.

In Las Casitas, dozens of residents crowd into a mobile home to hear updates on their case. - The city says they can't do anything about it. We have a limited time to pressure them. And tell them that everyone has looked for places to go and no one has found anywhere to go. Tell them there is nowhere you can go. Members of all three parks have spoken numerous times at Phoenix City Council meetings to ask for help. One of his main concerns is his children. My brothers and I were born and raised here in our mobile homes.

My parents currently do not have the funds to get us a new place. Just as it is affecting us, it is also affecting our children. And they may not be expressing it. An 11-year-old boy cried and cried while I talked to him, for almost two hours. He left me very sad. If they cannot find new housing by the deadline, residents of Las Casitas, Weldon Court and Periwinkle could become homeless. For them, it is nothing more than a trailer. And these are our homes that are within our reach. I don't want to be one more on the list of people who live on the streets.

Because they have already shown that they don't care about people who live on the streets. Despite the hardships they are enduring, residents are committed to working together as a community to find a solution. We are united as Latinos, right? Yes, we are poor, that's why we live here. But we have to move forward and not give up. Trailers! United! Will never be defeated!