A Community Creates Denver’s First Resident-Owned Mobile Home Park

It took two years, but in the Westwood neighborhood of Denver, an 80-family community of mobile homes is on track to become the first resident-owned manufactured housing park in Denver. While resident-owned communities are on the rise across the country, Colorado is also home to some of the biggest, most predatory corporate park landlords in the country, such as Yes! Communities, Ascentia, and RV Horizons-Impact Communities, the last of which was featured in a segment by John Oliver for their inhumane practices.

The term “mobile home” is actually a complete misnomer. The reality is that once a mobile home is set on the land, it can be incredibly risky or completely impossible to move. Moving a home can cost $15,000 or even more—and that’s money most manufactured housing residents do not have. Additionally, while most of these residents own their homes, they do not own the land underneath—meaning they are still beholden to lot rent hikes and rules imposed by the landlord.

The term “mobile home” is actually a complete misnomer….[I]t can be incredibly risky or completely impossible to move.

Residents at Capital City, now known as Montevista Comunidad, were determined to prevent their own park from closing after two shut down in their neighborhood in 2015. They decided they wanted to take advantage of the state’s Opportunity to Purchase law, passed in 2020, to purchase the park themselves through a resident-owned community—a cooperative ownership structure in which mobile home households collectively take ownership of the land and manage the community on their own behalf.

Residents knew that if they failed, they would likely either face mass displacement or the land where they lived would be bought by one of the predatory corporate landlords—two of the biggest existential threats mobile home residents face across the nation.

Building the Community Infrastructure

The effort took two years. But community members benefited from a decade of previous movement infrastructure building. The movement to transform the rights and fates of mobile home residents began in 2014 in the same immigrant neighborhood in southwest Denver when two parks went up for sale.

At the time, 9to5 Colorado, a grassroots member-based organization dedicated to putting women’s issues on the public agenda, and Westwood Unidos, a neighborhood-based organization, were working with residents on the ground to reinstate the bus route in the neighborhood that had been cut two years before, creating a public transit desert. While this campaign was successful, residents leading the effort shared notices they received that stated all 90 mobile homes would be displaced in lieu of “affordable housing” that was more expensive than their homes.

At the time, in Colorado, a landlord only had to give a 10-day notice of sale before the park could be sold. So all the residents and partners could do was fight for relocation assistance.

The effort took two years. But community members benefited from a decade of previous movement infrastructure building.

Residents did win financial assistance, which ranged from $20,000 to $80,000, depending on the size of the families, but few, if any, were able to remain in the city of Denver—much less their beloved neighborhood that shared their culture, language, and values.

Families were split apart. The community’s social fabric and capital were destroyed. This work sparked movement across the state and soon 9to5 was inundated with requests for organizing support in other mobile home parks.

It was clear that virtually no legal, organizing, or other resources were available for these residents—and that the rights afforded to them treated their homes as if they could be picked up and moved at any moment.

One case in neighboring Aurora played a significant role in catalyzing the mobile home movement. In 2016, the park owner tried to rezone Denver Meadows Mobile Home Park to make way for transit-oriented development. This fight was so impactful that it was featured in A Decent Home, the first nationally distributed documentary on mobile home parks in the country.

After a four-year dispute, the park ultimately closed, but it left a legacy of a wave of community-owned parks that have since formed statewide.

Even after the park closed in 2019, residents who lost their homes and livelihoods were determined to do everything in their power to ensure this history would not be repeated. Residents participated in protests, hearings, media stories, and many other activities to put the issue on the public agenda.

As a result, the opportunity to purchase laws, eviction protections, and other policies at the state and local level were passed by legislators who could simply no longer ignore the issue.

Without this tragic yet empowering history, Montevista would have never been community owned. The residents of Denver Meadows showed that power truly does not concede without a demand, organizing, risk, and resolute courage.

A Community Campaign

Fast-forward to 2022, when residents at Montevista contacted 9to5 Colorado, and the work to purchase the last park in the neighborhood began. Resident Owned Communities USA (ROC USA) partnered with the residents for about seven months. ROC USA finances mobile home parks across the country to create community-owned cooperatives. It also provides at least 10 years of technical support to ensure residents have what they need to manage their cooperatives effectively.

Together, residents and…three nonprofits worked to raise the capital needed to purchase the park.

But after conducting a risk assessment, which led to results that 9to5 Colorado did not agree with, ROC USA left the table and residents had to go back to the drawing board to come up with the $11.5 million needed to purchase the park.

In May 2023, Sharing Connexion, a nonprofit that, among other things, has a real-estate rescue program, voted to become the interim owner of the park. Justice for the People Legal Center, a movement law firm that had begun as a 9to5 program and later transitioned into its own nonprofit in July 2023, continued to support the effort, as did 9to5 itself.

Together, residents and these three nonprofits worked to raise the capital needed to purchase the park. Chad Graves, the owner of Montevista, signed a letter of intent to sell, and the opportunity to purchase clock began to tick. Residents were given 120 days to make an offer.

They met the deadline by mid-August 2023—and were given additional time after making the offer to come up with the remaining financing needed. (It helped that the selling owner was flexible and had expressed an interest in having residents buy the property.) While the City of Denver was originally rather hostile toward mobile homes—indeed, for decades, city policy forbade the creation of new mobile home parks or the expansion of existing ones—through the community activism of the last 10 years, it has become a major supporter and was one of the biggest lenders for residents in this transition, voting in March 2024 to provide a critical $2.6 million loan.

Closing the Deal

After many ups and downs, timeline extensions, and close calls of not meeting deadlines, Sharing Connexion finally closed the sale on the park on April 30, 2024. Sharing Connexion will be the interim owner for one to three years—or until the residents are able to manage and operate the park on their own.

While there is a long road ahead to make sure that residents have what they need to take on this enormous project, this is a historical moment for the residents of Montevista and for the wider Denver community. This is the very first park to come under contract to eventually become community owned in the city’s history. We hope that this campaign will set an example for other residents across the state who dream about owning the land underneath their homes.