Subject


Subsection 723.006(7), F.S., authorizes the Division of Florida Land Sales, Condominiums and Mobile Homes to adopt rules to implement Chapter 723, F.S., the “Florida Mobile Home Act.” Subsection 723.006(10), F.S., authorizes the division to require mobile home park owners to “fully and fairly disclose all matters required of this chapter.” Mobile home park owners are required by Section 723.012, F.S., to prepare a prospectus or offering circular containing many specific disclosures, especially any direct or indirect financial obligations the park owner may impose. Subsection 723.011(3), F.S., indicates that the prospectus or offering circular is the “disclosure document intended to afford protection to homeowners and prospective homeowners in the mobile home park.” However, some mobile home park owners impose entrance fees, application, background check and/or screening fees, administrative fees or such other fees, costs, or charges on purchasers of mobile homes situated in the mobile home park or new mobile home owners coming into the mobile home park without disclosing them in the prospectus on the basis that these individuals are not yet homeowners (e.g.: renting or leasing a lot within the park) and so are not protected by the Florida Mobile Home Act. The proposed rule would clarify that a mobile home park owner must disclose in the prospectus any direct or indirect financial obligations that may be imposed as a condition of tenancy, occupancy or ownership of a mobile home in the park. The proposed rule would modify Rule 61B-29.001, F.A.C., by adding the definition of “other fees” for Chapter 723, F.S., that includes “entrance fee” and “application fee” as those terms were found to be commonly understood in the mobile home industry by the Division of Administrative Hearings in Florida Manufactured Housing Association, Inc. v. DBPR, Division of Land Sales, Condominiums, and Mobile Homes, DOAH Case No. 88-1133RP, to clarify what should be disclosed in the prospectus.