Every result on page one for this question answers it from the resident's side. Tenant advocacy sites, a Justia legal answer, a state landlord-tenant PDF. Nothing written for the operator, which is odd, because the operator is the one who has to do something about it.

And the something is usually urgent. A resident moved to Arizona two years ago and has been renting the home to a stranger you have never screened. A daughter moved in to care for her mother, her mother died, and the daughter is still there. A home sold and the buyer moved in without ever signing anything. In each case somebody is living on your property under an arrangement you did not agree to, and your options depend almost entirely on documents you may not have.

That last point is the hard part. About 52% of people who own their manufactured home but rent the land have no written lease at all. Most of the remedies below are conditional on lease language. No lease, no remedy.

This guide covers whether a resident may rent out their home, what a guest is and when they stop being one, whether you may charge for extra occupants, and — the practical core — how you remove somebody who is living in a home with no agreement.

General information for operators, not legal advice. Removal procedures are state-specific and unforgiving of missed steps. Use counsel before acting on any of this.

Key takeaways

• A right to sell is not a right to rent out. Every statute we examined keeps them in separate sections. Do not assume one implies the other.
• California permits subleasing only as a medical exception — physician-confirmed, primary residence, six to twelve months.
• Oregon requires a three-party agreement the landlord must sign, with the renter paying space rent directly to the landlord.
• New York gives an express right to sublease subject to consent "not unreasonably withheld."
• Washington, Florida, Arizona and Colorado are silent — you may prohibit it by rule.
• Guest fees are heavily restricted. California: no fee for 20 consecutive days or 30 days a year. Washington: none unless a guest stays more than 15 days in any 60.
• Removal turns on your lease text. Oregon's 24-hour remedy requires that the agreement prohibited unpermitted occupancy — and that you never accepted rent from the occupant.

Selling is not renting

This is the distinction everything else rests on, and operators get it backwards in both directions.

Most manufactured housing statutes protect a resident's right to sell their home in place. Oregon's ORS 90.680 provides that a landlord may not deny a tenant the right to sell a manufactured dwelling on a rented space. Washington's RCW 59.20.073 makes the rental agreement assignable "to any person to whom he or she sells or transfers title to the mobile home," with consent not to be unreasonably withheld. Minnesota protects in-park sales at §327C.07.

None of those reach renting. The Washington provision is triggered only by a sale or transfer of title. Oregon puts sale at §90.680 and renting in an entirely different section. California separates them by article — sale and purchaser approval at §§798.70–798.75, renting only at §798.23.5.

No statute we reviewed conflates the two, and the practical consequence is important in both directions:

• For you: a resident invoking their "right to sell" as cover for renting the home out is invoking the wrong right.
• Against you: a rule barring subleasing does not let you interfere with a sale. Those are separate rules and separate processes, and the sale side is governed by the rent-or-sell and in-place sale process.

Where subleasing is a right, and where it is not

New York's RPL §233(t)(2) is the most resident-favourable: a manufactured home tenant "shall have a right to sublease his premises subject to the written consent of the park owner in advance of the subletting," and "such consent shall not be unreasonably withheld." An unreasonable refusal lets the tenant proceed anyway and recover attorney's fees.

In the four silent states, a well-drafted rule prohibiting or conditioning subleasing is enforceable as an ordinary park rule — which means it must satisfy the reasonableness and uniform-application tests those statutes impose, and must actually be adopted as a rule rather than buried in a lease. The 50-state index maps where those standards sit.

California: a medical exception, not a right

Civil Code §798.23.5 is often described as California's subleasing right. It is much narrower than that.

A homeowner may rent out the home only where "a medical emergency or medical treatment requires the homeowner to be absent from his or her home and this is confirmed in writing by an attending physician." And only where the home "serves as the homeowner's primary residence."

The conditions that follow are substantial:

• Minimum term six months, unless management approves shorter; capped at twelve months absent approval
• Management may require one year of prior residency before permitting a rental
• Management may require a new security deposit of up to two months' rent
• The homeowner remains liable for park rent and other charges
• The homeowner may not profit — they may charge the renter no more than "an amount necessary to cover the cost of space rent, utilities, and scheduled loan payments"

That last condition tells you the legislature's intent precisely. This is a hardship provision for someone in hospital, not a mechanism for turning a home into an investment property. Outside it, a California park may prohibit subleasing by rule.

Oregon: the three-party agreement

Oregon takes a different and, from an operator's perspective, more workable approach.

ORS 90.555 requires that a facility tenant not rent the home for more than three days without a written subleasing agreement among three parties: the facility landlord, the facility tenant and the renter. The renter pays space rent directly to the landlord.

Because you must be a signatory, you control whether it happens at all. That is effectively a veto with a paper trail — better than a prohibition, because it converts an unauthorised arrangement into a documented one where you know who is living there and you are collecting from them.

Two conditions worth knowing. You may screen the renter, but you "may not apply criteria more restrictive than" you apply to your own direct tenants. And you may terminate the subleasing agreement without cause on 30 days' notice, or for cause on the same grounds applicable to your other residents.

One carve-out: where the landlord itself rents out homes it holds for sale, it "may not prohibit the facility tenant from entering into a subleasing agreement while the facility tenant actively markets for sale." An operator running its own rental programme cannot deny residents the same option while their home is listed.

Occupant, guest, resident, tenant

These words are defined differently across states, and the definitions decide who has rights.

Washington defines both. A "tenant" is any person, except a transient, who rents a mobile home lot. An "occupant" is "any person, including a live-in care provider, other than a tenant, who occupies a mobile home, manufactured home, or park model and mobile home lot."

That distinction matters enormously in Washington, because RCW 59.20.080 protects both: a landlord shall not terminate or fail to renew a tenancy "or the occupancy of an occupant, of whatever duration," except on the enumerated grounds. In Washington, occupancy alone confers protection. There is no self-help route, however informal the arrangement.

Arizona defines "resident" as a person entitled under a rental agreement to occupy a space to the exclusion of others, and defines "guest" as a nonresident staying with consent "for one or more nights and not more than thirty days in any twelve-month period." It does not define "occupant."

Colorado defines "resident" broadly — "an individual who resides in a mobile home that is located in a mobile home park, regardless of whether the individual is the home owner."

Florida defines "mobile home owner" but not resident, tenant, occupant or guest.

Some people expressly have no tenancy rights. Arizona's §33-1413.03 provides that caregivers "have no rights of tenancy." California's §798.34 treats guests, companions and caregivers similarly, with their rule violations attributed to the homeowner.

The practical rule: know which category your state puts each person in before you act, because in Washington an occupant of three weeks has statutory protection, and in Arizona a caregiver of three years does not.

Guest duration and guest fees

Guest fees are more restricted than most operators realise, and getting this wrong creates an uncollectible charge.

Arizona is the outlier that permits guest fees outright. Everywhere else, the thresholds are the operative fact, and the live-in care provider exemption is universal across the states that address it. A community charging a guest fee for a caregiver is charging an unlawful fee in California, Washington and Arizona alike.

Florida's provision is the broadest constraint of the four and is easy to overlook. "No financial obligation... except the lot rental amount" reads naturally to bar additional-occupant charges entirely.

Approving a subtenant

Where subleasing is permitted, you generally may screen — but the procedure is regulated.

California applies the same approval machinery it uses for purchasers. Management must supply written approval standards including the minimum credit score, may reject only for prior-tenancy conduct history, inability "to pay the rent, estimated utilities, and other charges," or fraud or concealment — and must approve or reject in writing within 15 business days of receiving the information. Silence is approval.

Oregon permits screening on criteria no more restrictive than those applied to direct tenants.

New York requires consent in advance, not unreasonably withheld, with attorney's fees available to a tenant who is unreasonably refused.

Note what none of these permit: rejecting a subtenant because you would rather not have a rental in the community. Where the right exists, your discretion is a screening discretion, not a veto. The criteria themselves, and the documentation that defends a denial, sit in the resident screening guide.

The unauthorized occupant

Now the practical core: somebody is living in a home and has no agreement with you.

The remedy depends on which of three situations you are in, and on what your lease says.

California has a specific route for the unapproved buyer. Civil Code §798.75 requires an executed rental agreement for park occupancy. A purchaser who fails to execute one "shall not have any rights of tenancy," becomes an unlawful occupant if they do not surrender the site within five days of management's written demand, and is then subject to unlawful detainer proceedings.

Oregon has the fastest remedy, with three conditions. ORS 90.403 permits a landlord to recover possession from an unauthorized occupant after "at least 24 hours' written notice specifying the cause and the date and time by which the person must vacate" — but only if:

1. The tenant has vacated
2. The rental agreement prohibited subleasing or allowing another person to occupy the premises without written permission
3. The landlord has not knowingly accepted rent from that person

Service of the notice "does not create a right of tenancy for the person in possession."

Read condition two again. The 24-hour remedy is only available if your lease contains the prohibition. If it does not, you are in ordinary proceedings. And condition three is the one operators breach without thinking — accepting a payment from the occupant to keep the money coming in destroys the remedy.

Florida has a general statute, with limits. Fla. Stat. §82.036 allows a property owner or authorized agent to request sheriff removal of unauthorized persons — but only where they "are not current or former tenants pursuant to a written or oral rental agreement," and where no litigation over the property is pending. An oral agreement is enough to take you outside it, which in this asset class is a real risk.

Washington offers no shortcut. Because occupancy of whatever duration is protected, removal runs through the Act's enumerated grounds and unlawful detainer. Self-help is unavailable regardless of how the person got there. The process itself is set out in the delinquency and evictions guide.

Three rules follow from all of this:

1. Put the prohibition in the lease and the rules, because two of the four remedies depend on it existing.
2. Never accept money from an unauthorized occupant. It converts them into someone with an arguable tenancy.
3. Act on it early. Every day of tolerated occupancy strengthens their position and weakens your uniform-enforcement record.

The absentee owner

Can a resident move out permanently and keep renting the home indefinitely?

No statute we reviewed imposes a general owner-occupancy requirement, and none expressly authorises an operator to impose one.

California comes closest without saying so: §798.23.5 reaches only a home that is the homeowner's primary residence, management may require a year of residency first, and the term is capped at twelve months. Indefinite absentee renting falls outside the statutory right, so it may be barred by rule.

Oregon goes the other way and protects the absent owner expressly: a renter's occupancy "does not constitute abandonment of the dwelling by the facility tenant." The absent owner remains the tenant.

For context on scale, and treating the vintage honestly: of roughly 6.7 million manufactured housing units, about 71% were owner-occupied and 28% renter-occupied, per figures compiled in early 2023. No dataset we could find isolates the share of homes inside land-lease communities that are renter-occupied, or measures absentee ownership specifically. Anyone quoting you that number is estimating.

What the records have to carry

Every remedy above turns on documents and dates:

• The lease and rules text in force for each resident — because Oregon's 24-hour remedy exists only if the prohibition was there
• Who is authorized to occupy each home, and on what basis: tenant, approved subtenant, caregiver, guest
• Guest arrival dates, because 15 days in 60 and 20 consecutive days are counted, not estimated
• Every payment received and from whom — accepting rent from an unauthorized occupant destroys the Oregon remedy and creates an arguable oral tenancy in Florida
• Sublease approvals and denials, with dates, because California's 15-business-day clock runs against you
• When the registered owner last occupied the home

The one operators cannot produce is the fourth. Payments get posted to a homesite ledger without recording who handed them over, and a year later nobody can say whether the community accepted rent from the occupant or from the absent owner. That single ambiguity decides the case.

Documenting the breach itself — notice, service, cure — follows the same discipline as any rule violation.

How RIOO fits

RIOO is a property management platform built natively on Oracle NetSuite, with the homesite as the record — which is what makes occupancy provable rather than assumed.

Each homesite carries an authorized-occupant list with the basis and date for each person, so a caregiver, an approved subtenant and a long guest are distinguishable rather than all being "someone living there." Guest arrival dates are recorded, which is what makes the 15-in-60 and 20-consecutive-day thresholds countable instead of arguable.

Because payments post against a named payer on the homesite ledger, the question that decides an Oregon or Florida removal — did we ever accept money from this person — is a query rather than a memory. And the lease and rules version in force for each resident is attached to the homesite, so you can show what prohibition existed when.

See how RIOO handles manufactured housing communities.

Conclusion

Three questions, three different answers, and all of them decided before the problem arises.

Can a resident rent the home out? In most states, only if you allow it — so the rule needs to exist and be properly adopted. What may you charge a guest? Less than you think, and nothing at all for a caregiver. How do you remove someone with no agreement? Through a route that, in half the states examined, requires a lease clause you either wrote years ago or did not.

The operators who handle this badly are not the ones with unauthorized occupants. Everyone has those. They are the ones who discover, at the point of acting, that there is no written lease, no adopted rule, and a ledger showing eight months of payments from the person they are trying to remove.

Frequently asked questions

Q1. Can a resident rent out their manufactured home?
It depends on the state. New York gives an express right subject to consent not unreasonably withheld. Oregon permits it only under a three-party agreement the landlord signs. California permits it only as a physician-confirmed medical exception. Washington, Florida, Arizona and Colorado are silent, so an operator may prohibit it by rule.

Q2. Does a resident's right to sell their home include a right to rent it out?
No. Every statute we examined places sale and rental in separate provisions, and the assignment rights attach to a transfer of title. A right to sell does not imply a right to rent.

Q3. Can I charge a guest fee?
Only within limits. California bars a fee for a guest staying 20 consecutive days or fewer, or 30 days or fewer in a calendar year. Washington bars guest fees except for guests staying more than 15 days in any 60. Arizona permits a guest fee if the rental agreement provides for one. No state that addresses it permits a fee for a live-in care provider.

Q4. Can I screen and reject a subtenant?
Where subleasing is permitted, you may usually screen — but on regulated terms. California requires written standards, limits rejection grounds and imposes a 15-business-day decision window after which silence is approval. Oregon bars criteria more restrictive than those applied to your own direct tenants.

Q5. How do I remove someone living in a home with no agreement?
It depends on the state and your lease. California gives an unapproved purchaser five days from written demand before unlawful detainer. Oregon allows 24 hours' notice, but only if the tenant has vacated, the agreement prohibited unpermitted occupancy, and you never knowingly accepted rent from that person. Washington offers no shortcut — occupancy of any duration is protected.

Q6. Does accepting rent from an occupant matter?
Yes, decisively. It defeats Oregon's expedited remedy outright, and in Florida an oral rental agreement takes the situation outside the sheriff-removal statute. Do not accept payments from someone you have not approved.

Q7. Can I require the owner to live in the home?
No statute reviewed imposes an owner-occupancy requirement or expressly authorises one. California's sublease provision reaches only a primary residence and caps the term at twelve months, so indefinite absentee renting sits outside the statutory right and may be barred by rule. Oregon expressly protects the absent owner's tenancy.