Residents creating cooperative to save their mobile home park

MILNER, Colo. — Affordable housing is hard to come by in many mountain communities of Colorado.

Take Routt County, you need to make more than $200,000 per year to live in a median, single-family home there, according to the Yampa Valley Housing Authority. That price is out of reach for most workers in Steamboat Springs and the housing authority said it’s hollowing out the middle class. 

Residents in Milner Park, just ten miles west of Steamboat Springs, are banding together to save their affordable neighborhood. They got a letter back in July notifying them that their mobile home park was going up for sale. 

State law gives them 120 days to make an offer before the park goes on the market, giving residents a head start before other buyers or developers can snatch it up.

Melanie Stewart raised her family in Milner Park and has lived there for 24 years. She said three years ago, an investment company bought their mobile home park $3.7 million. Lot rents have nearly doubled since going from $500 per month to $925.

“We don’t want to move. We want to stay here,” said Stewart. “We’re all contributors to the community. We have people who work at the ski resort, the school district, the grocery stores, the city, small business owners, restaurants. We’re the backbone of the community up here, the working community.”

There are 40 families who live in Milner Park. Stewart said there are 85 residents total with 25 of them being children. She said 90% of residents have agreed to form a cooperative and buy the land beneath their homes themselves, hoping to avoid potential displacement. 

“In the long run that will provide stable, affordable, predictable housing costs for everybody who lives here,” said Stewart. “If we aren’t successful in purchasing the park, it’s gonna go on the market and then some other investment company will purchase it. They’ll either continue to raise our rents annually or possibly even repurpose the land for a different development.”

The price tag is $8 million and they have until November 21st to make an offer. 

She said it’s unfortunate that people’s housing is a commodity. 

“This is a housing crisis for all of Colorado. Every trailer park out there is being bought up by investment companies and they just look at the bottom line for profit,” said Stewart. “Meanwhile, the families that are living here are the backbone of the community who are living paycheck to paycheck a lot of the times.”

If residents can make an offer by November 21st, by law they will have another 120 days to secure the financing. The Yampa Valley Housing Authority is helping to connect them with resources, like philanthropic loans. 

But, they still need help securing funds to make sure their payments will be affordable for residents. You can donate to the Routt County Workforce Housing Preservation Fund or the neighborhood also created a GoFundMe. 

“We also will be starting with zero capital reserves,” said Stewart. “Any help that we can get to help build up that fund from the beginning to help keep our monthly costs at or below where they are is our goal.”

More information about the cooperative can be found on the group’s fundraising website.