I manage a mobile home park with 60 mobile homes that are all owned by the tenants or they are in the process of buying - Lonnie Deals. Our biggest problem is trash. We contract with a company to pick up trash once a week and each lot has one of the big roll out trash containers. That part is manageable. The problem is the bulk trash like furniture, TVs, tires, etc. It is getting harder and harder to dispose of these items because the county/city keeps getting tougher and tougher to work with. They charge for some items and we have to go different places to dispose of different kinds of items. We have asked one other park, that we have a relationship with, what they do and they charge $50 to carry off bulk trash. We have been doing this for nothing as a service. We used to charge $10 but some tenants don’t have cars and the stuff was being dumped out on the property away from their trailers.
Nancy, I will assume that each tenant has signed a lease that prohibits leaving things in the yard (trash or otherwise). Enforce the terms of this lease…if they don’t get it clean and keep it clean- evict. Contact your Lonnie Dealers and tell them what is going on- they too have a vested interest in you not evicting. If your lease doesn’t cover this topic- get a lease crafted that does – and get everyone to sign it. No sign- No stay.
I too offer an annual big item pick up day….but that is the only day that residents leave a furniture item at the curb. As for tires… they should pay to dispose at the tire dealer like everyone else.
Perhaps a letter reminding everyone what they have already agreed to would help get some back in line- then evict the stubborn ones.
Nancy,
I work in several parks that place a 20-40 yard dumpster once a year. The residents are alerted in advance of its arrival and when it will be leaving. It is usually there for 1 wk. No tires, no brush, no garbage, A/Cs, or fridges. You’d be amazed at the crap that people will finally throw out when given the opportunity. The scrappers love them because all the metal gets concentrated in one place for a week.
I work in another set of parks that has a 40 yard dumpster “hidden” and locked behind a fence by one of the sewer plants. The maintenance men use this to clean up the park. Because it is only emptied when maintenance calls for it, any resident wanting to reclaim some broken junk asks for it at the office. They never ask.
In both cases, residents are still written up and fined for leaving junk around.