A Plea to HB City Council
BY MICHAEL & SHEILA LUGENBEUHL
January 2022
BY MICHAEL & SHEILA LUGENBEUHL
January 2022
Honorable Mayor, and members of the HuntingtonBeach Dear City Council.
All of us at the Skandia Mobile Home Park for Seniors bought what we considered to be affordable homes, and were told by realtors and the park manager that it would never be anything but a mobile home park for seniors, always affordable, and in a community where we all want to live, Huntington Beach.
We know that the price of a mobile home goes down over time, it depreciates. Again, we are aware of that, but it depreciates slowly over decades. That fact was factored into our current life situations as we contemplated where we would spend the rest of our lives. No one could have predicted an instant drop in value of $60 thousand, or more, in just a few days. The prices of our homes and our quality of life did not drop because of a natural disaster like a flood or an earthquake. This was an attack on our finances and our way of life from a financial predator, with the word predator being described in the Oxford dictionary as: “A person or group that ruthlessly exploits others.” (*See an excerpt from MHU below)
People say everyone has the right to make money. Of course they do, but at what cost?
Here are 3 examples of how to make money in Huntington Beach:
The third scenario is repulsive to most people, and it has already happened once in Huntington Beach by the same people who just purchased the Skandia Mobile Home for Seniors. Many of those who are now threatened to be displaced (let alone all those who already have been displaced by this company) are on fixed incomes. This includes widows, elderly couples in their 80s, and United States Veterans.
Like most low-income or fixed-income elderly people living in Huntington Beach, veterans or not, disabled or not, there is a constant worry about rising prices in medication, and rising prices in daily goods. For those living in Skandia, now they fear losing their homes. Even if they own the home! Not in their worst nightmares did they believe a $700 increase in monthly rent increase would be placed on them….even if it’s slated for 4 years from now. Just the current $75/month increase is detrimental to some.
We here at Skandia provide food to our neighbors when we can; We provide toiletries when we can. We cannot provide $700/month to the scores of veterans, widows and people wanting to live life with dignity.
Just so you’re aware, some of the people living here at Skandia were your teachers. Your soldiers. Your scout leaders.
The fears mentioned above are not unfounded, as described by the recent events below:
IPG bought the property at 19361 Brookhurst Street….Huntington Beach.
- They Bought the property
- Raised the rent
- Forced elderly, who could not pay their new rent, out of their homes
- Then IPG bought those homes, at a fantastical low price
- And now they rent out those homes (to others, of course) at the highest price.
Remember, the people who lost their living spaces also lost their equity. The tactics being used by IPG should be stunning to everyone. This is not your typical business or stock trade practice where you try to buy low and sell high. It’s discrimination. It’s financial exploitation. It’s constructive evection.
Does low income housing no longer include seniors?
Finally,
People in this community bought a home that they could afford, in the best neighborhood they could afford, to age with dignity in a city of their choice, a city that was up until a few months ago a fantastic place to live in. Nobody here is looking for charity; we’re looking for fairness. The yearly price increases over the past decade and into the foreseeable future were tight for many, but also manageable, and we want to, and will fight to, keep it that way by asking that the city council amend the City Charter with a carve-out for mobile home parks to Section 803.
We hope and pray that you’re on our side.
Please do what other cities have done to protect their seniors.
Thank you.
Michael Lugenbuehl
*As Frank Rolfe said in his mobile home university website, “what I’ve found, and again, just as a heartless person, is you know, that the customers are stuck there. They don’t have any option. They can’t afford to move the trailer. They don’t have three-grand. So, the only way they can, they can object to your rent raise is to walk off and leave the trailer, in which case it becomes abandoned property and you recycle it; put another person in it. So you really hold all the cards. The question is what do you want to do? How high do you want to go?”
All of us at the Skandia Mobile Home Park for Seniors bought what we considered to be affordable homes, and were told by realtors and the park manager that it would never be anything but a mobile home park for seniors, always affordable, and in a community where we all want to live, Huntington Beach.
We know that the price of a mobile home goes down over time, it depreciates. Again, we are aware of that, but it depreciates slowly over decades. That fact was factored into our current life situations as we contemplated where we would spend the rest of our lives. No one could have predicted an instant drop in value of $60 thousand, or more, in just a few days. The prices of our homes and our quality of life did not drop because of a natural disaster like a flood or an earthquake. This was an attack on our finances and our way of life from a financial predator, with the word predator being described in the Oxford dictionary as: “A person or group that ruthlessly exploits others.” (*See an excerpt from MHU below)
People say everyone has the right to make money. Of course they do, but at what cost?
Here are 3 examples of how to make money in Huntington Beach:
- Open an excellent restaurant on Main Street, feed the locals and visitors, keeping the image of Huntington Beach as high quality, and and keeping the tourists coming. And yes, make money while doing so.
- Open an advertising company in Huntington Beach. Hire locals who will eat at the local diners, and shop at the local stores. And yes, make money while doing so.
- Buy a mobile home park zoned for seniors, quickly raise the rent beyond what those in the park can afford, force them to move out because they cannot afford the increased rent, take over their house and rent it out at the highest rate possible; even more-so by changing the zoning law and of course, make some good money while doing so.
The third scenario is repulsive to most people, and it has already happened once in Huntington Beach by the same people who just purchased the Skandia Mobile Home for Seniors. Many of those who are now threatened to be displaced (let alone all those who already have been displaced by this company) are on fixed incomes. This includes widows, elderly couples in their 80s, and United States Veterans.
Like most low-income or fixed-income elderly people living in Huntington Beach, veterans or not, disabled or not, there is a constant worry about rising prices in medication, and rising prices in daily goods. For those living in Skandia, now they fear losing their homes. Even if they own the home! Not in their worst nightmares did they believe a $700 increase in monthly rent increase would be placed on them….even if it’s slated for 4 years from now. Just the current $75/month increase is detrimental to some.
We here at Skandia provide food to our neighbors when we can; We provide toiletries when we can. We cannot provide $700/month to the scores of veterans, widows and people wanting to live life with dignity.
Just so you’re aware, some of the people living here at Skandia were your teachers. Your soldiers. Your scout leaders.
The fears mentioned above are not unfounded, as described by the recent events below:
IPG bought the property at 19361 Brookhurst Street….Huntington Beach.
- They Bought the property
- Raised the rent
- Forced elderly, who could not pay their new rent, out of their homes
- Then IPG bought those homes, at a fantastical low price
- And now they rent out those homes (to others, of course) at the highest price.
Remember, the people who lost their living spaces also lost their equity. The tactics being used by IPG should be stunning to everyone. This is not your typical business or stock trade practice where you try to buy low and sell high. It’s discrimination. It’s financial exploitation. It’s constructive evection.
Does low income housing no longer include seniors?
Finally,
People in this community bought a home that they could afford, in the best neighborhood they could afford, to age with dignity in a city of their choice, a city that was up until a few months ago a fantastic place to live in. Nobody here is looking for charity; we’re looking for fairness. The yearly price increases over the past decade and into the foreseeable future were tight for many, but also manageable, and we want to, and will fight to, keep it that way by asking that the city council amend the City Charter with a carve-out for mobile home parks to Section 803.
We hope and pray that you’re on our side.
Please do what other cities have done to protect their seniors.
Thank you.
Michael Lugenbuehl
*As Frank Rolfe said in his mobile home university website, “what I’ve found, and again, just as a heartless person, is you know, that the customers are stuck there. They don’t have any option. They can’t afford to move the trailer. They don’t have three-grand. So, the only way they can, they can object to your rent raise is to walk off and leave the trailer, in which case it becomes abandoned property and you recycle it; put another person in it. So you really hold all the cards. The question is what do you want to do? How high do you want to go?”