A millennial couple who moved from Baltimore to Florida explain why they bought a $65,000 mobile home as their starter house

• Mobile homes — a type of manufactured house — are a more affordable option for many. 
• Jess Carpenter and her family are living in and renovating their mobile home in Sarasota, Florida.
• Housing advocates want to get rid of many regulations that bar manufactured homes from communities. 

Jess Carpenter and her husband had never considered living in a mobile home when they moved to Florida from Baltimore, Maryland in April 2022. But after spending most of a year in a $3,000-per-month rental apartment in Sarasota while struggling to find an affordable house to buy in the area, they reconsidered their quest for traditional homeownership.

They had a friend who loved her mobile home community in Sarasota, and soon Jess and her husband, Christian, sprung for the cheapest trailer in the park. They put 15% down on the $65,000 1983 one-bedroom home and have lived in it with their 14-month-old son ever since.

The couple had a tricky time getting a loan, though. In many states, mobile homes are categorized like cars or boats and don't qualify for home mortgages. So the Carpenters had to take out a personal loan, which typically has higher interest rates than traditional mortgages. They pay about $600 per month for their loan and rent the land their home sits on for about $1,000 a month. The place is small — 400 square feet indoors with a similarly-sized screened-in porch — but it's allowing them to save and invest in their vintage furniture business.

"I would say it's not an ideal situation — I never thought that I would buy a mobile home," Jess said. "I never wanted to, it was never the plan."

But the couple have also turned their new home into a creative project, and are in the process of transforming it into a 1970s-style beach house full of thrifted pieces. Jess has built a brand online as an influencer, and regularly posts on Instagram and TikTok about the renovation, and she says it's rewarding to disrupt "the stigma against mobile homes."

"It's just been a more fun, creative experience that has also saved us money that I can share online and maybe inspire other people to do the same and not be weird about buying a mobile home," she said.

Most of the Sarasota mobile home park's residents are snowbirds — largely retired out-of-staters who winter in the Sunshine State. But the park offers a slew of amenities for residents, including a pool, restaurants, a mini-golf course, and regular programming like parades and bingo nights. There are nice beaches nearby, and the weather's pretty great. Jess compared their experience to living on a resort or a cruise ship.

In an especially Floridian twist, the park used to be a popular vacation spot for members of the Ringling Brothers circus, which was based nearby. The 1960s-era park used to have two pet elephants, which, Jess says, are rumored to be buried somewhere on the grounds.

These days, though, the community is increasingly home to millennials and young families. Longtime residents tell Carpenter the younger residents and rising trailer values are an entirely new phenomenon.

"They had never seen people with children move in, they've never seen even young couples," Jess said. "And it's the first time that they've ever experienced that the houses have gone up."

Bringing back manufactured housing

The Carpenters are just one of millions of families struggling to afford a home who turn to mobile or manufactured homes as a cheaper alternative. Mobile homes used to be a much more common affordable housing option, but decades of government policies — including restrictive zoning laws and building codes — have strangled the growth of manufactured housing.

A housing shortage, driven in part by the rising cost of construction, is in large part to blame for the affordability crisis. Many housing advocates and policymakers are pushing to loosen federal, state, and local regulations restricting manufactured housing, which is generally much cheaper to construct than traditional site-built homes.

"Starter homes, at least in the Levittown style site-built model, have been eroding for a long time and continuing to move up-market, reflecting that really since the 1950s, residential home construction productivity hasn't kept pace with the rest of the economy," said Andrew Justus, a housing policy analyst at the Niskanen Center, a nonpartisan think tank.

Things might be changing. Last year, the Biden administration proposed loosening the Department of Housing and Urban Development regulations on manufactured housing to increase the supply, including by legalizing up to three units per manufactured structure. But cities and states would need to liberalize their own regulations to pave the way for more of these homes.

Jess said her family hopes to live in their mobile home for two to three years while saving for a larger house. Ultimately, they hope to rent out the trailer — homes in the park go for between $3,000 to $4,000 per month during the winter — and use it as extra living space for visiting family and friends or photoshoots for their business.

And they're banking on the home appreciating in value. The Carpenters' friend recently sold her home in the park, which she bought in 2021 for about $20,000, for about $80,000, Carpenter said, adding that the average price for one of the park's 800-square-foot homes is now about $150,000.