Sen. Nangle's bill to protect mobile home park residents advances with strong, bipartisan support

Posted: May 09, 2025 | Housing and Economic Development, Senator Nangle

AUGUSTA — On Friday, May 9, a bill sponsored by Sen. Tim Nangle, D-Windham, received two positive committee votes, moving one step closer to becoming law. LD 1145, “An Act to Protect Residents Living in Mobile Home Parks,” has now passed out of the Legislature’s Housing and Economic Development Committee with two “Ought to Pass as Amended” reports, each offering slightly different timelines for resident cooperatives to form and secure financing. The two reports will now be considered by the full Legislature.

“I want to thank my colleagues on the Housing and Economic Development Committee for their careful consideration of this bill and their commitment to protecting Maine’s communities,” said Sen. Nangle. “Mobile home parks are communities, often built over decades, where neighbors look out for each other and families find stability. This bill is about preserving those connections and protecting the dignity of residents in the face of profit-driven disruption.”

The bill aims to protect mobile home park residents from corporate buyers by:

  • Requiring park owners to provide written notice to residents when they intend to sell
  • Establishing a clear “right of first refusal,” enabling residents to match a bid and purchase their park if they choose
  • Providing a timeline for residents to form a cooperative and secure financing, with one report recommending 60 days to organize and 90 days to secure financing, and another recommending 30 days to organize and an additional 90 days to secure financing and close the sale
  • Clarifying that park owners are not required to complete a sale if residents cannot secure financing within the specified period

Both versions of the bill include an emergency preamble, meaning the final bill will go into effect immediately upon becoming law if it receives two-thirds support in both the House and Senate.

During the public hearing, Sen. Nangle shared his family’s personal experience managing a mobile home park in Massachusetts for over seventy years, emphasizing the value of community-focused ownership over profit-driven corporate acquisitions. He highlighted how Massachusetts law allowed residents of his family’s park to successfully purchase the community themselves, preserving affordability and stability.

Speaking in support of LD 1145, Nora Gosselin, Director of Resident Acquisitions at the Cooperative Development Institute, emphasized the feasibility of resident purchases under similar statutes:

“The Opportunity to Purchase statute has been an essential stepping stone, a proof of concept. Under this statute, two cooperatives successfully purchased their properties within the last year for $26.3M and $8M respectively, showing that residents can indeed pull off these transactions on competitive timelines and at competitive price tags. […] The law needs to be strengthened into a Right of First Refusal to build upon an effective model, in an environment with so many aggressive, deep-pocketed, out-of-state corporations, amid an affordable housing crisis.”

LD 1145 will now proceed to the House and Senate floors for further consideration. It is expected that the differing recommendations on the resident cooperative timeline will be resolved before the final vote.

Sen. Nangle represents Senate District 26, which includes Windham, Raymond, Casco, Frye Island, and part of Westbrook.