Rent and Mobile Homes

It is usually legal for your park owner to increase your rent after you move in unless your mobile home park is subject to rent control. Rent control issues are discussed in the next section of this chapter. A rent increase might be illegal if it does not affect all park tenants the same, as described above. But if the rent increase is legal, the park owner may be able to evict you if you refuse to pay the increase.⁴⁵

If the owner wants to increase the rent, the correct procedure is for them to give you a notice terminating your tenancy and at the same time offer you a new tenancy at the higher rent.⁴⁶

Rules about rent increases for mobile homes are different from rules about other rentals. If your park owner has a rule about the amount of a rent increase, or the time when they can impose a rent increase, the owner’s rule must be legal. This means that if the Attorney General is not notified about the rule, or if the rule is unfair or unreasonable, the rule and the rent increase will be illegal. See Park Rules. If you feel that a rule about rent increases is improper, you can contact the Attorney General Office's Consumer Hotline at (617) 727-8400 or file a complaint online.

In 1977, the state legislature enacted the first law that allowed a town in Massachusetts to control rents in mobile home parks. That town was Peabody. As of May 17, 2024, according to the Attorney General’s Office, the following cities and towns have rent control for mobile home parks:

• Attleboro 
• Belchertown 
• Bernardston 
• Brimfield 
• Brookfield 
• Chelmsford 
• Cheshire 
• Chicopee 
• Dalton 
• Easton 
• Kinston 
• Lakeville 
• Ludlow 
• Merrimac 
• Middleboro 
• North Adams 
• North Redding 
• Orange 
• Palmer 
• Peabody 
• Pittsfield 
• Raynham 
• Rockland 
• Roxbury 
• Salisbury 
• Springfield 
• Wales 
• Warren 
• West Bridgewater 
• West Stockbridge 
• Williamstown

If you do not see a particular municipality on this list, you should check with that city or town hall to see if they have rent control provisions.

If you live in a town with mobile home park rent control, a park owner cannot increase your rent unless a local rent control agency approves the increase. To find out how the rent control ordinance in your park actually works, you should contact your local town or city hall and ask for a copy of the regulations. These regulations will tell you what your rights are.

Rent control regulations are slightly different from place to place. In general, mobile home rent control regulations follow certain principles:

• Each city or town sets up an agency and a process to review rent increases. The process will tell you how decisions are made. The agency is made up of local government staff or an appointed board with the power to make the decisions.
• Some regulations give agencies the right to make rules that limit the reasons why park owners can evict tenants. Not all municipalities with mobile home rent control do this.
• Each sets up a legal standard, or formula, that the local agency must use to determine whether, or to what extent, a park owner can increase the rent. Rent control formulas are used to set specific rent increases for individual park tenants and general rent increases for all tenants in a particular park.

Although rent control formulas vary from place to place, most allow park owners to earn what is called "fair net operating income." A fair net operating income is defined as total income the owner earns from the park, after deducting operating costs. Each city or town with rent control decides what are appropriate operating costs and what is income. Check with your local rent board to find out the formula for your park.