April 2008 Newsletter

1. Transcripts of How to Buy, Sell, and Operate an RV Park From CD's Recorded,  By Frank Rolfe and Dave Reynolds
2. How To Evaluate An RV Park From The Security And Comfort Of Your Car, By Frank Rolfe
3. RV Parks and Campgrounds For Sale
4. Comments
5. Featured Listing
6. RV Park and Campground Memberships For Sale
7. RV Park Employment
8. Links to some interesting articles we have found this month.
9. Tell us what you think and send us your articles!

Dave: Right. Yeah, so those are basic thoughts on building an RV park.  I  guess we’ll move on here.  I think we’ve covered a ton of stuff.  I guess we’ll move on to a few final thoughts here and then we’ll wrap it up.

Frank: All right. Well, do you want to start the first one, Dave?

Dave: Sure. Yeah, I guess the first one is let’s say you’re out there looking to buy an RV park.  I think one of the key things is you need to know what your budget is, how much money you have set aside.  If you have $150,000.00 set aside then that’s all you have to your name.  I wouldn’t suggest going out there and looking for a park where you have to put $150,000.00 into.  I would probably look at maybe 100,000.00 or so.  You definitely want to not stretch yourself too thin.  If you’re gonna quit your job and all that kind of stuff and basically change your lifestyle, you need to have some type of nest egg or something to fall back on in case things don’t go as planned.

Frank: Yeah, absolutely correct.

Dave: So first thing is definitely don’t stretch your budget too thin.

Frank: Absolutely. Yeah, because you have to be ready and you need to have some money that you’re holding back for the natural problems that will come up.  Right, and the last thing you want to do is get in the park and realize that you’re gonna have difficulty making it happen, and paying the bills, and it’s just not good.  So you always want to have more capital and I think it’s a natural rule in life.  Things always end up costing more than you think.  Right, so you want to have not all of your money on the down payment.  You want to have some money left over for a rainy day, and fixing things, and things like that.

Dave:  Right. Okay, and I guess the next item would be you’ve listened to over 20 hours now of tape or CD and you need to sit down now and decide really are you ready to own an RV park?  What type of RV park do you want to own, seasonal, nightly, destination, whatever it is, and you need to really decide is this something you want to tackle?  Because owning an RV park is not like owning an apartment building or a mobile home park where you just kind of sit back and deal with problems, collect the rent on the first, and just deal with the problems that come up.

You’re there, it’s a business.  It’s typically people are in and out of there all the time, every day, so it’s not like you can, well, I’m gonna take a three-week vacation.  If it’s you and your spouse running the park, and no one else is working there, and it’s the middle of the summer and your traffic is there, it’s not like you can just pull up and take a two-week vacation most of the time.

Frank: That’s exactly correct.

Dave: And it kind of goes on to say if you’re a family, if you’re gonna be a family running the project, are your kids or is your spouse, are you guys all behind each other on the plan?  Is it something that you really want to do as a family?  Because most of the successful RV parks run by families have the whole family taking a part of it, whether mowing the grass or sitting in the office, they’re all basically helping out as they’re able to.

Frank: Yeah, I mean I myself have not had an experience but Dave, you were moved as a kid into a park, correct?

Dave: Yeah, I moved into a mobile home park, actually.

Frank: Right, but similar thing, as a family business, right?

Dave: Sure.

Frank: And did you like that?

Dave: Well, no, I didn’t but there were other reasons involved with that.  I mean we went from a huge town to a tiny town and lost sports and all that kind of stuff.  I liked working and getting the paycheck.

Frank: Well, sure, but again the key is will your kids be happy in the new atmosphere or not?  ‘Cause as Dave says, even though financially it might work for you, you think, if it’s gonna mess up your family, maybe it’s not still a great idea.

Dave: Sure, and so I think a lot of people wait to buy an RV park and they actually run it after their kids have moved out in kind of midlife crisis or a retirement kind of thing where a lot of people – and it’s worked successfully.  But it has worked real successfully for a lot of families.  I know several that own parks and they love it.

I guess the next thing is – this is kind of like a pun but you probably are not gonna go out and buy a campground because you like the idea of camping.  Because if you’re buying a campground because you like to stay in your RV and visit the country, that’s not the reason to get into the business ‘cause you’re not gonna be doing much of that anymore.

Frank: Yeah, and of course it’s a lot less expensive if that’s your only desire just to go camping more.  Right?  It’s kind of like I’ve seen people, again, another one of my corny bad analogies, but a guy will be so into cars that he wants to be a car dealer when in fact all he really wants is access to cars.  He’d be better off buying a couple sports cars, or renting them, or something, rather than risking his entire life on a car dealership when he really never wanted to be a car dealer.  He just wanted to have access to all these fancy cars.

Dave: Sure. Yeah, I mean you’re not gonna go out and buy the restaurant just because you like to eat.

Frank: Yeah, and of course it’s a lot cheaper just to go eat more.  If you get to eat out only once a week and you want to eat out every night, you’re not better off just buying a restaurant.  You’re better off just changing your budget to eat out every night because buying the restaurant is not going to really satiate your desire.

Dave: That’s right. Yeah, you’ll get tired of it real quick.

Frank: Exactly. Then you can go to a different restaurant, but if you own the restaurant, you’re stuck there.

Dave: Yeah. Okay, next item would be with owning an RV park we’re talking here more of the overnight, people in and out every night, or every weekend, or whatever, but you have lots of long hours.  During your season you’re gonna have from sunrise to sunset, sometimes after, that somebody has to be on call to deal with problems, deal with check ins, run the convenient store, rent the boat rentals out, or whatever it may be.  And during that season, you’re not gonna have a lot of privacy.

I mean a lot of people own the park and they have their house in the park, or like a typical KOA where the houses are apartments right above the store.  And so your personal lives, if you’re used to living in a rural area, or in a city, and you have your own house, and nobody ever comes in and bothers you, that’s not gonna be the case anymore.  People will bother you and be calling you all hours of the night.  Employees will call in sick, and you’ll have to work two shifts, or whatever it is.  So you’ll definitely have a lot more contact with the public, as well.

Frank: And really, if you’re not a people person, RV is probably not the thing for you because it is a very people person thing.  In other words, if you want to be an investor and not the operator of the RV park, that’s one thing.  But if you’re gonna actually run the thing, it’ll be hard to be successful without being a people person.  So if that’s not part of your personality then it’s probably a really bad idea.

Dave: Right, and I think I already talked about it but definitely the kind of campground operation you want to buy.  Do you want to buy the seasonal park where you’re open in the summertime, or do you want to buy the year-round park where you’re open year round and the business is always going strong?  Or did you want to open the overnight type park versus the destination, the park near Mount Rushmore, or on the beach, or something, or do you want to – that’s more permanent type park where people stay there for months or full-time year round?  So all different thoughts that you need to decide in what you’re looking for.

And another thought is if you are gonna move to say a different city or state, or if you’re used to living in the city and you’re moving to – you’re buying a park in the mountains and it’s a completely different climate, you want to make sure you’re gonna like that area and that city first before you actually make that move, and pull everything up and move stakes.

Frank: Yeah, absolutely. ‘Cause once you’re there, it’s too late.  Visit that town if you can more than once.  One time out you may have a really lucky trip, the weather’s good and everyone’s smiling.  But you need to go several times to kind of average them together because a lot of people have screwed up in thinking after one great trip it’s a great place.  And then when they move there, they don't fit in or like it at all.  How in the world did I get stuck here?  And you’re stuck there.

Dave: It’s hard to sell it back once you take over ownership.

Frank: That’s right. You’re just basically stuck.

Dave: Right, and a lot of times when you’re making such a big change or lifestyle, your husband quits his job, or you both quit your job, and you decide you’re gonna go run your own business and run an RV park, a lot of times your family members (parents, siblings, etc) are gonna think that you are crazy.  We’re not talking to you.  You’re gonna lose everything..  So you’re gonna have to in some cases deal with that family negativity, or ridicule, or whatever it may be in your case.

Frank: Yeah and I’ve had the same problem.  People still ask me all the time when I’m gonna get out of that stupid trailer business.  Although I got to tell you, there was a whole lot more respect in the industry in about 1997 or 8 when The Millionaire Next Door came out, or maybe it was called The Millionaire’s Handbook.  I can’t remember which one.

It was a national best seller and if you look in that book, it has a section called kind of like, “What do millionaires do?”  And about, gosh, four or five entries down is owning a park.  Right, and I think it says mobile home or it says mobile home and RV, but it’s all the same thing.  I mean the guy who wrote the book, he’s not an expert and doesn’t know probably what an RV or a mobile home even is.

But at any rate, next time someone laughs at you, you might take solace in pulling the book out and looking at it, or just looking through the Forbes 400 which contains Sam Zell, who again, was probably not an RVer but is a billionaire off of basically mobile home and RV parks kind of as a hybrid.  But it is a very large industry.  There’s several publicly traded RV manufacturers.  There is at least one REIT which is very heavily involved in RVs.

Dave: Correct.

Frank: Yeah. Again, it’s not a goofy start up, hardscrabble, ne’er-do-well business.  It’s just a business that people don’t know or understand ‘cause they actually have no personal contact with it much at all.  Right?  And there’s lots of business like that out there, right?

I mean I see trains pass all the time.  I don’t know who builds train cars, right, and I’m sure it’s a multibillion-dollar industry.  But I could see the average person if someone says at a cocktail party, “Well, I’m with the company that builds train cars,” or, “I build train car wheels,” people go, :Oh, how quaint.  My son has a toy train.  Are they plastic, or are they metal, or something?”

And so it’s the same thing with the RVs.  I don’t tell people anything about it at cocktail parties because they don’t know what the heck I’m talking about, right?  So the last thing you want to do when someone says, “Oh, so what do you do?” say, “Oh, I run an RV park.”  They’d be like, “What the hell are you talking about?  What’s an RV?  What do you mean?”  So you can just say, “I’m in real estate.”

Dave: Yeah, they understand that better.

Frank: Yeah, they understand that.  Actually they really don’t understand that but at a cocktail party it sounds more important so they’re, oh, you’re in real estate.  Sort of like the guy that works at the gas station says, “I’m in oil.”  Same kind of deal.

Dave: Yeah, when I first told my grandma that I was gonna buy my first mobile – it was a mobile home and RV park in Colorado.  She basically told me I was an idiot and actually she wouldn’t talk to me for about six months.

Frank: Yeah, that’s how mine was, too.  Did we have the same grandmother?  I never checked that out, actually.  I’ve had the same problem all along.  It’s just if you’re looking for reinforcement from your peers, forget it.  You won’t get any.  No one will ever tell you that you’re smart, or a good investor, or anything getting involved in RVs because they don’t know what the hell they’re talking about, right?

But when you say it they think of maybe some kind of Jeff Foxworthy mobile home thing, or joke, or something.  They can’t understand what you’re talking about so it’s easier just not to talk about it with anybody.  It’s just better to change the conversation.

Dave: So I guess a few more final thoughts.  Why do you want to buy an RV park?  Are you buying it for full-time income?  For land appreciation, speculation?  Are you gonna supplement your retirement or are you just plain bored and you need something to do?

Frank: Yeah, and that last one’s not a good idea.

Dave: No, probably not.

Frank: No, that’s a bad idea. You might build radio controlled airplanes or something if you’re that bored but don’t do RV out of boredom.

Dave: Sure, if you’re real bored and that’s the whole reason you’re getting into it, just go work for another RV park.

Frank: Exactly. That’s exactly correct.

Dave: Right, and then choices between franchises or independent type RV parks.  Like one that we just talked about a few minutes ago was sometimes the franchise will have good training programs so if you’re new to the business that might be a good option.  Start out with a franchise or maybe even go to some of their training programs.

Frank: Exactly.  All right, well let me give one final wrapping up concept here, Dave.  This obviously has grown into a very, very large number of hours of taping here and the key item here was that Dave and I were really concerned with our thoroughness more than our timeliness.  I mean, yes, we could have distilled it down to one or two hours, but what kind of product would you get?  We’d gloss over almost everything.  You’d learn virtually nothing.  And we didn’t want to have something where people would just say, oh, gee.  Yeah, I got the little funny RV CD.  That was kind of entertaining.

What we tried to do here was something where there would certainly never be any equal to the raw amount of information that was tossed out.  And so hopefully we’ve accomplished that, and even though it may seem like Dave and I ramble and amble here sometimes, really we’re working for the most part from a script of information that we wrote that we thought needed to be included which is only a little smaller than the Guttenberg Bible, maybe only four pages shorter I think.  Obviously you can’t see us moving the papers around, they’re in the background and we’re going through all of these pages, and pages, and pages of notes and points and to make sure we didn’t miss anything.

And I’m happy to say I don’t think we did.  I don’t think we missed anything at all.  Of course if we did miss anything at all you’re always welcome to contact us at the site and say, oh, I’m still curious on this one item, but I don’t think we missed much.

Dave: Sure, and I think the more you continue to educate yourself, and look at other parks out there, and start getting an eye for what you’re looking for, like Frank says, we covered everything that we could in detail.  And just if you continue your education or you’re looking out for other stuff out there that is related to RV parks and how to buy them, sell them, manage them, or whatever, it’s definitely gonna help you in your journey to be successful.

Frank: And one more item.  Some people always say that Dave and I are a little negative on things and that’s because we try and be very realistic.  In listening to all these tapes if you say, well, gosh, these guys sure sound – I don’t know what, overly serious or worried, that’s because that’s what we think people need to understand are all these potential pitfalls, and problems, and such.  And if you say to yourself, well, gosh, that’s not what I dreamed RV ownership would be.  I thought it would be just this fun little goofy thing, then if we’ve educated then not to buy an RV park then we’ve also done our job because you don’t want to go buying it unless you’re looking at it as a serious legitimate business. Right?

And that’s why throughout we’ve told you don’t lie to the bank, don’t lie to these different people, because it isn’t just some little hobby.  It’s an actual business and if you know what you’re doing and work it, you can make lots of money with it.  Not that you’ll make a billion dollars but again, it’s the kind of thing where you don’t take it lightly.  And that’s why we tried to design this to be so very thorough was so we would not be contributing to people not taking it seriously.

Dave: Right, and kind of to add on to that point is there are so many of these late night television shows promoting the no money down, make millions in real estate, buy foreclosures, buy this, buy that, for no money, guaranteed wealth, and all that.  You never, ever hear of these people talking about any negatives.  But I can guarantee you if you look at all the people that have bought their courses and all that type of stuff, the number of people that have actually lost their life savings or had foreclosures because they bought into this no money down, make millions, flip the house, and all that type of stuff, there’s just got to be a tremendous amount of these people that have lost life savings, and time, and just basically wasted their time in that whole business plan.

So like Frank said, we’re trying to educate you with the good and the bad side and so you can know what to look out for and know what to look for.

Frank: And I saw last night on late night TV, Dave, they’re now selling The Man From U.N.C.L.E. CD set, which I think is 28 tapings, so we’re only maybe ten short of The Man From U.N.C.L.E.  I’m definitely proud of that.

Dave: Right

Frank: Right, and unlike a lot of products, again, our products are all backed by the fact you can always reach us at the site.  This is not just a standalone product with no further reinforcement or human contact that’s available.  We’re always there at the site if you have any questions additionally and you will find that we are perhaps the only really friendly people out there doing this type of thing.  You can call and actually get Dave, and you can actually get me, and we will happily answer your questions and in almost all cases not charge you for it unless it’s some special assignment you want us to work on.  But it’s been our goal to create the best information out there and I think we’ve yet accomplished it, Dave.

Dave: Right, and along with that, what we’ve made out there is a tremendous amount of questions or people that want to listen to other people’s questions and so forth, we might put together some type of a monthly question and answer show or something like that, maybe a forum or something where people can post questions.  Because if we respond to every question one on one, it’ll be difficult for us to get to all of those.  But if we could do it in some manner where you post a question or call into a Q&A session where we can get 50 peoples questions answered in an hour or two, that would be much more beneficial for everybody out there and would definitely be a great addition to the site and everything else like that.

Frank: Right, exactly.

Dave: All right. Well, Frank, I guess thanks for being on these tapes with me.

Frank: Well, Dave, yeah, it seems kind of sad signing off.  We’ve been together so long on this one that it’s almost like The Walton’s homecoming reunion.  But again, all great things must end so I’m just glad I think we did a good product and we hope everyone enjoyed it.

Dave: All right. Thanks again, Frank.

Frank: Thanks a lot.

Dave: All right, bye.

Frank:  Bye.

RV Park & Campground Investment Series

We have completed the series on RV Park and Campground Investing.

Over 20 hours of audio (on CD) with Frank Rolfe and I, taking you through the process of:

• Finding RV Parks and Campgrounds To Buy
• Evaluating RV Parks and Campgrounds
• Negotiating and Buying RV Parks & Campgrounds
• RV Park & Campground Due Diligence
• Operating, Turnaround and Selling RV Parks

Find out More about this Product! 

HOW TO EVALUATE AN RV PARK FROM THE SECURITY AND COMFORT OF YOUR CAR

by Frank Rolfe

Nothing can replace the down and dirty walk-through of an RV park, to really see what you are buying. However, if you are just casually looking at an RV Park, or if you get out to the park and its 110 degrees or raining, it’s actually possible to do quite a lot of diligence from the cozy comfort of your automobile. Here’s how to do it.

On the approach, you can quickly get a feeling if this is a location you would want to invest in. One of the biggest determining factors in an RV Park is location – is it in a safe part of town, and is it easy to get to? If it takes you several attempts to find it, imagine how our customers are going to react. They’ll just get back on the highway. And also note any sources of irritation to the customers such as the producers of loud noises (airports, quarries, etc,) or bad smells (sewage treatment, dump, etc.)

You can pretty easily get a feel for what kind of investment was made in building the RV park. Are the roads dirt, gravel, asphalt or concrete? Are there concrete patios, or just grass? Is the power system new, or from the age of Charlie Chaplin? Obviously, the greater the quality of improvements, the better park it is.

Do you see evidence of a well, or is the park on city water? And do you see any signs of private sewage, such as a packaging plant (looks like a big swimming pool with green water and a fence around it) or a lagoon (looks like a big green pit). It’s hard to tell septic from your car, but that’s another possibility.

Count up how many pads or lots the park contains. If you count 100, and the sales flyer says 140, then you certainly have something to talk with the seller about. Often, sellers will count lots that have been abandoned for decades as usable. You may be off in your count by one or two – but not twenty!

Are the RVs in the park nice, new and big? Or are they old school busses filled with hippies that got lost on the way back to California? Let’s hope it’s the former and not the latter. Remember how hard it will be to change the image of a park that already has an undesirable tenant base.

The RVs probably tell the whole story. But if you look at the pool and see the cast from Deliverance, then you may need to have second thoughts, unless it is priced so cheaply that you already assumed a complete turn-around was in order.

Starting at the entry, what will it take, in dollars, to make this RV park the kind of asset you would want to own? Make a complete list of every possible problem and upgrade, and you can get the actual pricing later. Include infrastructure repairs, landscaping, signage – everything.

Conclusion

You really can tell a lot about an RV Park from looking at your car windows. So if its too hot, or too rainy, or you broke your ankle, you can still have a successful diligence field trip without getting out of your car. While it is not the most complete form of evaluation, it can cause you to drop a deal or get all excited in just one quick drive thru.

4-4-08

I know we've had a good amount of extra attention on the businesses for sale we advertise due to the rvparkstore.com. Your excellent service and response time have been very beneficial to the businesses we market. I have been personally impressed to receive phone calls from you in order to clarify questions or confirm a major price change.

Thank you!

Phil Artz Parks and Places, Inc.

4-8-08

Thank you Diane! 

We had a lot of great responses from RVPark & MobileHomeParkStore.com.

Hope the rest of your day is great!

Shannon

Big Lake Lodge & RV Park For Sale In Okeechobee, Florida

BIG LAKE LODGE & RV PARK ON THE BEAUTIFUL LAKE OKEECHOBEE RIM CANAL...ONLY MINUTES BY BOAT TO THE LOCKS TO THE WORLD FAMOUS LAKE OKEECHOBEE!

SELLING TO THE HIGHEST BIDDER AT AUCTION

JUNE 7, 2008 12:00 PM

PROPERTY CAN BE PURCHASED PRIOR TO AUCTION ACCORDING TO AUCTION TERMS!

Big Lake Lodge & RV Park features concrete roads, a large owner/manager manufactured home, an office and linen storage, a maintenance shed, a concrete pavilion with picnic tables and more.  To enjoy more than just the view of the beautiful waters the park offers a pontoon boat, 16 docks and 32 boat slips, a concrete boat ramp, and a fish cleaning station.

You can visit Big Lake Lodge & RV park via their website at www.biglakelodge.org

RV Park For Sale in the Midwest US

616-957-2496 888-849-6172 sales@resortsinternationalna.comw

ww.resortsinternationalna.com

This section of RVParkStore.com is growing quickly.  Memberships are being listed and sold quickly.  With about 200 memberships currently for sale, this continues to be the prime outlet to buy and sell campground memberships. 

Best of all, when you are selling your membership, we do not charge you up front to do so.  You only pay us if you are successful in finding a buyer from RVParkStore.com. 

Your system works!  A buyer found me through your web site (listing #MB149) and a sale has been concluded.  Thanks for your good Service.

Are you searching for good quality employees or looking for a position with an RV Park?  Then be sure to visit our ever growing employment listing sections.

All listings in these sections are FREE!

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