Land Lease Communities

Leased land

Leasing the lot changes the title, and the title changes the loan

In a land lease arrangement you buy the home and rent the ground it sits on. It is a real slice of the market but not the majority. Of 70,700 new manufactured homes placed for residential use in 2025, Census counted 18,700 in a land-leased or manufactured home community and 7,800 on private property inside a subdivision or planned unit development¹. Another 43,700 went on other private property outside any community¹.

The consequence shows up in the paperwork. Whether the homeowner owns the underlying land plays a key role in whether the home is titled as personal property or real property, and that distinction affects many aspects of financing, with major implications for cost and security of tenure². In 2025, 50,900 of those 70,700 homes were titled as personal property and only 15,600 as real estate¹.

Then the loan follows the title. CFPB found that for 72 percent of chattel borrowers the consumer does not own the land and is ineligible for a mortgage². FHFA's analysis of 2024 data puts average rates at 9.24 percent for personal property loans against 6.63 percent for traditional mortgages, with a 65.6 percent denial rate for personal property borrowers³.

Six things to understand about leasing the lot

Census tracks where new manufactured homes are placed, and the placement category lines up closely with how the home gets financed.

Land-leased community

Census's own category, covering 18,700 of the 70,700 new manufactured homes placed for residential use in 2025¹. It is the arrangement where the buyer owns the home and does not own the ground under it, which is the fact CFPB ties directly to chattel financing eligibility².

Subdivision or planned unit development

The other inside-community category, at 7,800 placements in 2025¹. Together with land-leased communities that is 26,600 homes placed inside communities of some kind, against 44,100 placed outside them¹. The two are not the same thing on paper, so read which one a listing means.

Other private property

The largest single category by a wide margin. In 2025, 43,700 of the 70,700 new manufactured homes went on other private property, with a further 400 placed somewhere else¹. Most buyers of new manufactured homes are not moving into a community at all.

What it does to the title

Personal property titling dominates. Of the 70,700 homes placed in 2025, 50,900 were titled as personal property, 15,600 as real estate and 4,200 not titled¹. FHFA reads the same survey as showing 78 percent of new 2024 homes titled personal property and 18 percent real estate³.

What it does to the loan

Chattel loans are secured solely by the manufactured home and not land, while manufactured home mortgages are secured by home and land together². FHFA describes the resulting financing gap as one that frequently offsets the lower purchase price of the home itself³. Chattel purchase terms run 20 years against 30².

What nobody publishes

There is no federal series for lot rent. Census records whether a new home was placed in a land-leased community but not what the lot costs¹. No national count of manufactured home communities or of who owns them was located in the federal sources used here either. Those numbers have to come from the community itself.

Placed in a land-leased community, 202518,700 homes

National lot rent figureNot published

What does it cost?

The honest answer on lot rent is that no government source publishes one. The Census Manufactured Housing Survey records placement in a land-leased or manufactured home community, which is how we know there were 18,700 such placements in 2025¹, but it does not record the rent. There is no national or state lot rent series to cite, so this guide gives none. Your only reliable figure is the lease in front of you.

What is published is the home and the financing. The 2025 average sales price of a new manufactured home was $127,200, with single-section homes at $85,600 and double-section at $157,100, excluding land, site work and installation⁴. On top of that, leasing the lot generally means chattel financing, and FHFA reports average rates of 9.24 percent on personal property loans against 6.63 percent on traditional mortgages from 2024 data³.

Placement and titling counts are Census Bureau Manufactured Housing Survey 2025 annual data. Rate figures are FHFA's analysis of 2024 HMDA data. No federal source publishes lot rent, so no rent figure appears here.

Hiring

How to buy into a community

1

Who does the work

Three separate parties. A retailer sells and arranges delivery of the home, the community owns and leases the lot, and the financing usually comes from a specialty lender. CFPB found the four largest manufactured housing originators are specialty lenders offering primarily chattel loans, and that the top five wrote nearly 75 percent of chattel loans².

2

What pros will ask

Whether you will own or lease the ground, first, because that decides the title and the loan². Then whether the home is single-section or multi-section: of the 50,900 homes titled as personal property in 2025, 21,300 were single-section and 29,600 multi-section¹. Expect questions about lot dimensions and the community's own placement rules.

3

What to check before signing

Read the lease as carefully as the purchase agreement, since no published data exists on lot rent levels or escalation. CFPB flags security of tenure as one of the things land ownership affects². Then confirm the loan type. Over 60 percent of manufactured housing borrowers do own their land, and 17 percent of those still take a chattel loan².

Land lease community questions, answered straight

What is a land lease community?

It is the arrangement where you own the manufactured home but not the ground under it. Census tracks it as a distinct placement category, land-leased or manufactured home community, separate from private property in a subdivision and from other private property¹. CFPB frames the same fact from the lending side: for most chattel borrowers the consumer does not own the land and is therefore ineligible for a mortgage². Whether you own the land drives the title, the loan and what CFPB calls security of tenure².

How many people buy a new home into one?

A minority of new placements. In 2025, 18,700 of the 70,700 new manufactured homes placed for residential use went into a land-leased or manufactured home community¹. Another 7,800 went onto private property in a subdivision or planned unit development, making 26,600 inside communities altogether¹. The larger group, 43,700 homes, went onto other private property outside any community, with 400 placed elsewhere¹.

What is the average lot rent?

No agency publishes it. The Census Manufactured Housing Survey records whether a new home was placed in a land-leased community but does not collect or publish the rent¹, and no other federal series covering lot rent nationally or by state was found for this guide. Any national average you see online is an estimate from a private compilation, not a government survey. Ask the community for the current rent, the escalation terms and the history of increases, in writing.

Does leasing the lot change my loan?

Usually yes, and substantially. Chattel loans are secured solely by the manufactured home and not land, while manufactured home mortgages are secured by the home and the land together². FHFA's analysis of 2024 HMDA data puts average rates at 9.24 percent for personal property loans versus 6.63 percent for traditional mortgages, with personal property borrowers facing a 65.6 percent denial rate against 8.8 percent for site-built³. CFPB also gives chattel purchase terms as 20 years against 30 for mortgages².

Could I get a mortgage instead?

Only if the loan is secured by the home and the land together². CFPB found that for 72 percent of chattel borrowers the consumer does not own the land and is ineligible for a mortgage². The flip side is worth knowing: over 60 percent of manufactured housing borrowers directly own the land where their home sits and may be eligible for a mortgage, yet 17 percent of those borrowers take a chattel loan anyway². If you own the ground, ask for both quotes.

Sources

Where these facts came from

Every figure on this page was read out of the page linked below. We do not cite cost aggregators.

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