How Michael Pansolini Built a Mobile Home Park Empire | Investing Strategies & Education

Michael Pansolini (00:00)
So mobile home park investing, the way that we can describe it is either a flat apartment building or ⁓ let’s call it a parking lot. So it works in two different ways. There’s what’s called a tenant-owned home, which means there’s a home inside a park, we call it a mobile home park, that the tenant actually owns. And this is the parking lot model. They’ll bring in their mobile home or they’ll buy an existing mobile home that’s inside that park. And then they’ll pay you what’s called a lot rent.

to keep and live in that home inside your park. It’s basically like an HOA fee if you own a condo, right? And effectively, that works like a parking lot model, right? Like if you were to bring your car into a parking lot and you pay like maybe an overnight fee or a monthly fee to keep your car there. But you own the car and you have to deal with all the maintenance related to that car as well. Same concept with mobile home parks.

Michelle Kesil (02:25)
Hey everyone, welcome to the Investor Fuel podcast. I’m your host, Michelle Kesil. And today I’m joined by someone I’m looking forward to chatting with. We have Michael Pansolini, who has been making serious moves in the mobile home park space, as well as creating an educational platform. So really excited to have you here on the show.

I think the listeners are really going to take something away from how you’re approaching your portfolio management and educating people on their investing journeys with mobile parks. let’s dive into all of those conversations.

Michael Pansolini (03:11)
Absolutely. Thank you for having me, Michelle. I’m excited to be here.

Michelle Kesil (03:14)
Amazing. first off, for those who are not familiar with you and your world, can you just give the short version of what your main focus is?

Michael Pansolini (03:25)
Sure. So ⁓ my background is private equity in Manhattan. So I actually live in downtown Manhattan next to the World Trade Center. And I used to work for a large private equity shop, ⁓ Brookfield Asset Management. They’re the second largest in the world. And I oversaw a portfolio of mobile home parks for that private equity shop. It was a four and a half billion dollar portfolio. So it was quite large. The scale was obviously massive and it was quite an undertaking to

develop operations and oversee not just the operations, but the acquisitions and dispositions and refinances of those assets and portfolios. So recently within the last year I’d left Brookfield. I started an educational platform on how to invest in mobile home parks for entrepreneurs, teaming up with Ryan Naris, who is one of the 15 largest in the country with 85 mobile home parks and over 4,500 lots. So he is

The de facto expert, we call him the godfather of mobile home parks and he has created so many other mobile home park owners through his existing educational platform. We joined up, me and Ryan, me on the institutional side, him on the entrepreneurial side. And we create quite a potent combo because now we can teach all the tools from the institutions while simultaneously teaching that scrappy mentality that exists on the entrepreneurial side. And simultaneous to that, I’ve also been building my mobile home park portfolio.

alongside Ryan, who already has scaled to quite a large portfolio. So that’s

10,000 foot story. Really excited to be here and share more about the educational platform as well as how I’ve been approaching building my own portfolio in the mobile home park space. And of course, there’s always a question. Mobile home park ⁓ investing is kind of a niche investment within real estate.

And there’s always questions with regards to what is this and how does it work? And so I’m happy to answer those questions as well if anyone has them.

Michelle Kesil (06:15)
Amazing, absolutely. Yeah, that’s a great place to start. What is this and how does it work? Like, let’s just answer it here and now for those that might not have any idea.

Michael Pansolini (06:20)
Yeah.

So mobile home park investing, the way that we can describe it is either a flat apartment building or ⁓ let’s call it a parking lot. So it works in two different ways. There’s what’s called a tenant-owned home, which means there’s a home inside a park, we call it a mobile home park, that the tenant actually owns. And this is the parking lot model. They’ll bring in their mobile home or they’ll buy an existing mobile home that’s inside that park. And then they’ll pay you what’s called a lot rent.

to keep and live in that home inside your park. It’s basically like an HOA fee if you own a condo, right? And effectively, that works like a parking lot model, right? Like if you were to bring your car into a parking lot and you pay like maybe an overnight fee or a monthly fee to keep your car there. But you own the car and you have to deal with all the maintenance related to that car as well. Same concept with mobile home parks.

you are a tenant-owned home and you own that home, everything in

and on the home is your responsibility to maintain and keep up to date and working. Now, on the other side of that is what’s called a park owned home. So it’s exactly what it is, right? It’s a home that is owned by the park. So if I’m the park owner and there’s a home that I own inside that park, it’s called a park owned home. And now I can do kind of like a flat apartment model, right? So I can take that park owned home and I can rent it to someone who wants to come in and pay

you know, higher than a lot rent, right? Because in that case, the tenant owns the home like more, more in line with what an apartment rent would be. So if, know, the average lot rent in the United States is $500, let’s say that the average tenant, park owned home rent would be about a thousand dollars. So an additional $500 for me as the park owner to kind of maintain that home and anything in and around it. So that’s the two different models in mobile home park investing.

And to kind of just like bring this full circle because people are probably like, well, which one would I do? Generally speaking, people like the tenant owned home model. And the reason is the maintenance is on, you know, the individual who owns the home versus you as the owner of the park. There’s obviously, you know, some some pros and cons related to tenant owned homes versus park owned homes as the owner. You lose control of the home. Right. And that could be a bad tenant that lives there for years. And potentially you can’t get rid of that tenant if it’s a tenant owned home.

But on the flip side, do you wanna be fixing the toilets? It’s the same problem as apartments if it’s a park owned home. ⁓ there’s an ongoing debate in the industry about which is better, which provides more cashflow ⁓ and ultimately which is the safer investment. But both can be extremely lucrative. And if you take the approach of, hey, what’s best for me ⁓ as an investor with my specific skill set and with the amount of time I have to invest.

then you can decide between those two strategies. And I think that’s what makes this a really cool investment type.

Michelle Kesil (09:28)
Amazing. Thank you for sharing that. that is super fascinating. And as far as your educational platform, like is this the type of stuff you teach on or what exactly like does this educational platform entail?

Michael Pansolini (09:30)
Yeah.

Yeah, so our educational platform is kind of encompasses everything from learning about what mobile home parks are, or if you’re already kind of have an understanding of this industry and this asset type, just diving right into, well, how do I find these parks to buy? Whether off market or on

you know, we teach an off market approach because you can get better deals. How do I underwrite these and analyze these deals? Because they are a little bit of a complex asset type with a different modeling approach than you would typically have.

in other, you know, let’s call it multifamily or commercial assets. So there’s like specific models that you want to use to evaluate these specific types of assets. And then from there, you know, how are we getting from the analysis of I want to buy this to the closing table? So that whole process of diligence, you know, negotiating with the seller, getting your contracts in place, understanding the different parts of diligence that are important for this asset type. Now, finally, you’ve gotten a closing table.

and you’re signing the paperwork, you know, have your financing in place, which we also teach. What do I do now? I have this thing, this, this crazy asset that no one has heard of. ⁓ How do I operate that on a

basis and how do I do it most effectively and how do I implement the best operations to offload as much as possible from an automation standpoint, but still keep my finger on the pulse and make sure things are operating effectively. And then from there, you know, I really like this. What do I do now? I want to scale.

Well, how do you do that effectively? And, know, what are the different tools and technologies I can use to scale? How do I partner with people? You know, I, we kind of talked before we started the recording about my strengths and weaknesses as a portfolio manager. Well, partners are typically the best way to take strengths that you don’t have and implement them in your team. So how, are you thinking about partnerships? What is a fair equity split between partners? These types of things are super important and often overlooked in many other courses and masterminds.

And we really dive into that. We really try to get a good understanding of what’s fair fairness in partnerships and an understanding of what your strengths and weaknesses are is the most important part of investing, especially if you’re going to be a portfolio manager or a syndicator or whatever the case may be. So that’s what we teach. And that’s what we are passionate about teaching.

Michelle Kesil (12:36)
Amazing. Yeah, that education is so needed because people don’t learn this. So that’s a beautiful way that you’re bringing this. Definitely not. Just calculus, you know.

Michael Pansolini (12:44)
Yeah, they don’t teach this in high school. Yeah, exactly.

a squared plus b squared equals c squared. don’t think I’ve used the hypotenuse formula since I left college. Well, actually, yeah.

Michelle Kesil (12:57)
I definitely haven’t.

Yeah, absolutely. So let me ask you this, like, what are you most focused on or scaling or solving next?

Michael Pansolini (13:12)
Yeah, so in terms of in terms of what I’m trying to build right now, I love building, right? So I’m outside of just my mobile home park portfolio, which is constantly growing and it’s growing in a great market. New York State, highly regulated market can be difficult to operate in. But, you know, as we talk about in my course, in our course and in our mastermind.

It’s important to be able to differentiate. So what is like a very scary thing for most investors regulation? Well, if you can overcome that regulatory environment, whether you have, you know, a good legal team or process he set up to handle those legal requirements, then you might be fishing in a pond that no one else is fishing in. Right. And so now you can get deals at a lower basis because there’s less competition. And so this is what I’m focusing on right now in order to scale my mobile home park business.

At the same time, I have this educational business and what I get to see firsthand is exactly what issues our students are running into and what the industry’s issues are. And so I try and think like an entrepreneur all the time and say, hey, where can I implement these great new technologies that are burgeoning in the market to help these owners? One of the things that I found is that a lot of owners

of mobile home parks, they’re having trouble ⁓ refurbing the mobile homes inside their mobile home parks. So they don’t know what to do. They don’t know how much it should cost and they don’t really know how to, you know, sell it and market it to the next buyer. But inside the market as well, inside our little ecosystem exists what’s called a Lani dealer, which is basically a mobile home flipper. So imagine you’re a single family home flipper,

but now you’re flipping mobile homes instead. That’s an actual ⁓ niche within

this market. The problem is that, you know, unlike calling your local handyman and saying, hey, like I need help fixing this or refurbing this or whatever the case may be, there’s not really like a marketplace for Lani dealers, people who are specific to mobile home park flipping. So recently I’ve created this ⁓ system called Lani match and we’re still kind of working out the name, but effectively you can go on there, you can select your markets and then you can be matched.

with someone who can help you refurb your mobile homes, ⁓ you know, within your market, who has reviews, who’s worked on other mobile homes, you can see how many they’ve worked on. So, you know, there’s all these kind of opportunities in the industry, especially with all the new tools, whether it’s AI, whether it’s, you know, being able to build an app just by speaking to an AI agent. ⁓ So I’m utilizing all of these, you know, brand new tools in the industry to revolutionize

mobile home park investing. And that’s just one example of what we’re doing over at the MHP Pros and how I’m building my own portfolio.

Michelle Kesil (16:53)
Amazing, that’s exciting stuff. And when it comes to building your own portfolio, what have been some of like the obstacles that you faced and how did you overcome them?

Michael Pansolini (16:56)
Yes.

Yeah, so one of the I think one of the hardest things about building your own portfolio You know, it’s it’s finding the right partners. All right, and I took my time before I ventured into The actual purchase of a mobile home park in finding people who complimented my skill set and Before we started recording we kind of had to get to know you session, right Michelle and one of the things I mentioned was that my weaknesses Were that I never swung a hammer really now I sat

in the 40th floor of a large, you know, 50 story building ⁓ in Manhattan. And I never got on site very often because that wasn’t my job. I was an analytical person and I was a spreadsheet person. And I still am.

you know, I’m starting to develop that other side of my persona, which is like that boots on the ground persona. So, you know, I recognize that. And I ended up partnering with someone who had mobile home refurb experience.

And so that was probably one of the major challenges. Like how do you navigate this, these waters of like finding a friend? You know what I mean? It’s like you’re back in high school or kindergarten. It’s like looking for somebody who you want to be friends with. It’s the same kind of concept. It’s like a marriage for finding a partner. It takes time to develop those relationships and then develop the trust that you need to kind of jump into an endeavor together. And these aren’t things you learn in the corporate world. These aren’t things that you learn in college.

You have to kind of test each other with like little projects first and understand how you work together well and how you don’t work together well in order to kind of build that foundation for a larger relationship that ends up being a business partnership. So that was, think, the number one most difficult piece for me, you know, in starting my portfolio. Now it’s like, frankly, like where do I start investing next? You know, you always

finding the first market to invest in is always, think, one of the more difficult aspects of ⁓ investing in general. Even if you’re a multifamily investor or you’re a commercial retail investor, where do I invest? What’s the best market to invest in? It’s always a question that everybody has. And sometimes it just kind of falls into your lap. And when you’re in a market and it works well, then great, continue to build out in that market. But sometimes you’ve now exhausted that

You have to move to another one. So I think with scale comes the challenge of finding the new good burgeoning markets on a regular basis and deploying capital there and having confidence to deploy capital there. those are kind of two, I would say, the larger challenges that I’ve faced. And now that I have my partners, it’s how do we grow? How do we continue to find the best markets to invest in?

Michelle Kesil (20:02)
Yeah, absolutely. mean, relationships are everything in this space, so that’s such an important topic to bring in. ⁓ So what is like the next real goal that you have?

Michael Pansolini (20:07)
So true.

Yeah, I would say 100 lots within the year. So currently, I think we’re at 37. So we want to get to 100 and scale pretty rapidly. And that’s going to take. It’s just going to take a lot of effort to close deals quickly in order to get to that goal. I think it’s probably a goal that we will come close to achieving, but not achieve. But I think in goal setting.

You should always set something that is slightly unachievable or at the cusp of what might be unachievable. This way you might surprise yourself and you you’re always pushing at that point. So that’s my goal right now is to build this portfolio to 100 lots within the year. And then from there like my five year goal is to get to about a thousand lots. And then from there you know who knows. It’s really.

One of the coolest parts about being an entrepreneur is, you you can put your effort where you want to, when you want to. And what I found is like, I have a lot of different varying skill sets and I get to decide, hey, what am I having the most fun doing? What’s the most lucrative avenue? And deciding between those sometimes, maybe the most lucrative avenue isn’t, you know, something I’d be passionate about. And so I wouldn’t pursue it. And so I would say like, as I decide,

path to take. It’s a combination now as an entrepreneur of what am I passionate about? What brings me joy that I can wake up every morning and sit down at my desk and really be excited about what I’m going to do? And then also, like, how do I put food on the table? Because that’s important, too, right? But it’s cool that you can you can make that distinction as an entrepreneur. It’s a really freeing mentality.

Michelle Kesil (22:09)
Yeah. The mentality piece is so crucial, especially as entrepreneurs. Amazing. So yeah, a lot of people that listen to this maybe are newer to investing or they’re looking to level up. ⁓ Would you say that, like how could your educational platform support these people that are just starting out and curious to learn more?

Michael Pansolini (22:14)
Yes.

Yeah, so I think real estate investing, there’s a step-by-step process you need to follow. The first is education. You always need to educate first, you have a lot of previous experience in real estate investing and now you need to get asset-specific experience. So let’s say it’s mobile home parks in this case. You need to get the education, you need a foundation of education, the same way you would go to college.

You you need the education piece and then you can move into the practical piece, right? You can’t get stuck in the education piece though. Like, you know, I have friends who have like three different master’s degrees, but they’ve never done anything, right? And so just don’t, don’t be that person. You have to actually use your, you know, the practical piece of that education and go out and do things, but get educated first so you can have good solid conversations with people who have done it before.

instead of seeming uneducated and then therefore uninteresting to, you know, those individuals who could maybe help you level up to the next stage. So once you have your education and your foundation and you’re ready to take action, right, start taking action. And what will inevitably happen is you’ll realize all of your unknown unknowns are becoming known unknowns. So what is an unknown unknown? It’s what you don’t know that you don’t know. You know, things that

you wouldn’t even think about asking as a question. Those start to become known unknown. So things that you now understand that you’re not really familiar with. So you might start to try and buy a park, but you realize, I know nothing about financing. I don’t know what kind of financing would match with this specific asset. So now it’s a known unknown. And at least now you can go ask that question to whether it’s a mentor or to a financing professional, you know.

And these are people that we can connect you with or we can teach you ourselves. So once you so again, like education, action, understanding your known unknowns. And then I think the next and most logical step that people tend to overlook and think is not as important is getting yourself a mentor, whether it’s someone who just takes a chance on you and is now like a business partner. Maybe you give them more equity because they have more experience.

and they’re teaching you along the way. That is so valuable because you’re standing on the shoulder of a giant. All the things that you don’t know, he’s going to teach you. It’s like, you know, going to be a professional baseball player without a batting coach. Like this person is going to teach you what pitches are coming and how to prepare for them and then how to swing that bat correctly. Right. You need that.

It’s not like this is not a question of whether you do or don’t need it. You need it in one way, or form. It can be a paid mentor. It could be, like I said, someone who takes a chance on you can be a business partner, but you need that person because you can’t go out alone. We’re social beings as humans and you definitely need to build those relationships in order to scale to the next level. And, know, I think I talked about this on my own podcast, but there is a negative connotation towards.

like gurus and mentors, because they’re all promising you financial freedom. They’re all promising you $10,000 a month. Ryan and I, we don’t promise it. And the reason we don’t promise it is because this is hard work. And if you don’t put in the work and you don’t take the action, you don’t listen to what we say, you’re not going to do those things. And so that’s the disclaimer that every mentor should give, especially paid mentors, should give to their students. It’s like you get out what you put in.

and this is not easy, but it’s also not difficult. The differentiation between hard and difficult is, difficult is maybe you have to like learn a bunch of things that are very like rocket science before you can figure it out versus hard. Hard just takes grit, hard takes discipline. If you have those two things, you can do this. It’s not difficult, it’s just hard, if that makes sense.

Michelle Kesil (26:49)
Amazing. That is so valuable. Thank you for sharing all of that. It’s so important for people to hear. And before we wrap up here, if someone wants to reach out, connect, collaborate, learn more from you, where is the best place for them to reach you?

Michael Pansolini (26:52)
Absolutely.

Sure, so I’m not hard to find. You can find me on LinkedIn at Michael Pansolini. You can also find me on Instagram. You know, I’ve been recently releasing little reels here and there that are fun to watch about mobile home park investing. So that’s underscore Mike pans P A N S. And otherwise you can find me on all other socials on YouTube and at the MHP pros.com. That’s our specific.

website for our mentorship program and our mastermind. So if you have any other additional questions, you can reach out to us there. We’d be happy to schedule a call and kind of show you around our platform.

Michelle Kesil (27:41)
Perfect. Well, listen, I really appreciate your time, your story and perspective. We need more people in this space who are doing things in this right way. So thank you for being here.

Michael Pansolini (27:52)
Absolutely, thank you so much, Michelle. Have a good rest of your day.

Michelle Kesil (27:54)
Yes,

and for those of you that are tuning into the show, if you got value from this, make sure you’ve subscribed. We have more conversations coming with operators just like Michael who are building real businesses and we’ll see you all on the next episode.