A Decent Home

When housing on the lowest rung of the American dream is being devoured by the wealthiest of the wealthy, whose dream are we serving? A DECENT HOME, directed by Sara Terry, addresses urgent issues of class and economic (im)mobility through the lives of mobile home park residents who can’t afford housing anywhere else.

When housing on the lowest rung of the American dream is being devoured by the wealthiest of the wealthy, whose dream are we serving? A DECENT HOME, directed by Sara Terry, addresses urgent issues of class and economic (im)mobility through the lives of mobile home park residents who can’t afford housing anywhere else.

A mobile home is one of the most affordable forms of housing in the U.S. For residents like Luz, the move allowed her to live in a place she can call her own, and provide for herself and her daughter. But residing in a mobile home park also means living with stigma and now uncertainty as America is in the center of a housing crisis.

Sara Terry talks about the motivation behind her film, A DECENT HOME, and what makes for a decent home for Americans today. The filmmaker and journalist reveals her thoughts on mobile homes and mobile home parks - the residents, the industry and stigma, the affordable housing crisis, and our complicated relationship with what the American Dream represents for each and every one of us.

Mobile Home University's Frank Rolfe leads a boot camp on how to invest in - buy, sell and operate - a mobile home park in the United States. The MHU co-founder tells it like it is; a park is a business and "you don't want to know your customers' names" as the investment is not about the people who live on the land they rent.

Mobile Home University co-founder Frank Rolfe brings a group of potential investors to a mobile home park in Illinois to show them what makes for a good investment while pointing out what he sees as unfavorable. At the same time, residents look on not knowing what this visit holds for their future and the fate of affordable housing.

In Mountain View, California, Santiago Villa Mobile Home Park sits in the shadow of Google's headquarters. Residents, some of who work at the tech giant, talk about why living at the park is the only economical choice for them and their family. They also share frustrations regarding increasing lot rent as they own their homes but not the land, and development continues to pop up around them.

Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Zach Wahls (D-IA) meet with Candi Evans, a Golfview mobile home park resident in North Liberty, Iowa, to talk about the issues and solutions surrounding the mobile home park industry. Golfview had been purchased by an investment firm that raised the rents exponentially and the residents refused to sit idly by.