Roughly 20 million Americans live in manufactured houses, which are homes made in factories.

Although they’re often called mobile homes or trailers, that’s really a misnomer because their owners can’t easily relocate them. Typically, the people who own them rent the land underneath the houses from the owners of manufactured home parks. Sometimes, an owner will rent their home to someone else while paying to rent the land as well.

Manufactured homes tend to be far more affordable than other single-family homes because they have lower upfront and monthly expenses. A typical one costs around US$120,000; smaller ones, known as single-wides, cost around $87,000.

I’m studying poverty, inequality, collective action and rural housing as a sociology Ph.D. candidate. In 2025, I began to conduct in-depth, on-the-ground research documenting the experiences of residents in manufactured home parks in rural Wisconsin whose park was either for sale or had been sold to a private equity firm. So far, I’ve interviewed 15 people as part of an ongoing study that is forthcoming and not yet published.

I’ve found that in this region, as is occurring in the rest of the country, rents tended to spike soon after those firms bought the parks. Those rent hikes are, in turn, creating a crisis for many low-income........

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