Mobile Home Communities

History of Mobile Homes and Mobile Home Communities

Historians of mobile homes and mobile home communities consider both to be major housing innovations, as mechanisms for meeting the chronic national demand for affordable homeownership. Originating in the early 1920s, trailers were considered tourist housing, and communities, termed “auto parks,” were developed for a recreational clientele. Since the 1930s, however, trailer parks have carried the stigma of group housing for those down on their luck. The negative stereotypes that became associated with mobile homes and communities emerged because the federal government used them as temporary housing: for New Deal workers involved in large construction projects in the 1930s; for defense-plant workers during World War II; and for housing emergencies created by natural disasters. After World War II, trailer parks were thrown up near universities to house returning veterans taking advantage of their government-provided educational benefits. Such “tin-box” mobile communities were considered temporary, meant to fill a postwar vacuum for housing nationwide.

Between 1980 and 1990, the United States experienced a more than 50-percent increase in mobile home numbers, to 7.3 million units. By the 2000 census, those numbers had climbed to almost 8.8 million, or 7.6 percent of total U.S. housing units. Mobile homes and mobile home communities are usually in rural and sub-urban areas, in the South and West where climates are warmer. Of course, many mobile homes are not situated in communities. Rural areas in particular are characterized by individual mobile homes scattered alone or next to a “stick” house, typically owned by a relative who also owns the land. According to the industry, however, half of newly manufactured homes are placed on land owned by the homeowner or someone else.

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