TAMPA, Fla. — Within days of moving into Waterside Mobile Home Park in Gibsonton, Jennifer Rivera Cruz said she broke out in hives. When the allergic reaction didn’t get better, she panicked. Overwhelmed, she covered her face with a blanket and wept.

As soon as the sun set, hordes of termites squirmed from the walls, swarming Cruz, her wife, Dena Guzman, and their three children.

“We would wake up every day at 2, 3 o’clock in the morning, feeling stuff walking in my hair, on my face,” Cruz said.

The couple said they begged their landlord to do something. They had just moved from a different park in Tampa, owned by the same company, where the infestation was just as bad. They decided to stop paying rent until the termites were exterminated.

A month later, the landlord evicted the family.

Twelve current and former tenants shared similar stories with the Tampa Bay Times about life inside a group of dilapidated mobile home parks. The parks all have the same owner — an investment firm known for buying and gutting struggling businesses ranging from newspapers to bus stations.

Since 2022, corporations linked to Alden Global Capital bought about 40 mobile home parks in Hillsborough County, records show. The acquisitions came at a time when rising interest rates deterred most other corporate investors.

Neither representatives from Alden nor the individual parks responded to questions or interview requests from the Times. It’s unclear if Alden plans to make these Tampa Bay communities a long-term investment or sell them, as it has done with other businesses.

Mobile home parks often serve as a last resort for vulnerable people struggling to afford the record-high cost of living. Experts say they fear firms like Alden prey on immigrants, low-income families, formerly incarcerated residents and others who have nowhere else to go.

Tenants were already reporting termites, rats, raw sewage and other health and safety concerns before Alden bought the properties, records show. Many parks also had high eviction rates before the ownership change, court data shows.

A report from the Private Equity Stakeholder Project, a nonprofit watchdog of the private equity industry, found 63 Alden-owned parks across Florida. Most are concentrated in Tampa Bay. Jordan Ash, the nonprofit’s director of housing, said Florida has the most private equity or hedge fund-owned manufactured housing parks of any state.

“Given that there’s already a shortage of affordable housing, it’s very concerning that not just Alden but any kind of corporate investors are buying up these parks,” he said.

Though her neighbors were experiencing the same problems, Rivera said most were afraid to speak up. Many were living on weekly leases. Poor credit, criminal records, prior evictions and financial constraints would make it hard to find a new home if the landlord retaliated.

“They do take advantage of people and it’s not fair,” she said.

‘Vulture capitalism’

Randall D. Smith formed Alden Global Capital in 2007 as a hedge fund. The firm established a reputation for buying local newspapers and implementing mass layoffs. The Orlando Sentinel and South Florida Sun Sentinel are among the Florida newspapers Alden owns. The company has followed a similar formula, often called slash-and-burn, after acquiring shoe stores, pharmacies and bus terminals.

The firm buys a distressed asset, slashes the operating budget and looks for ways to maximize short-term profits. For newspapers, that means increasing subscription prices and ad revenue and selling off real estate holdings. Debt from Alden’s newer investments are often transferred to these media companies, filings show.

According to reporting from the News Guild, a union that represents journalists across the country, the company and its executives have failed to pay loans and rent. In 2021, a company linked to Smith defaulted on a $70 million loan it used to buy a Dallas office tower. The building went into foreclosure. That same year, Alden and related businesses vacated a Manhattan office space after the landlord sued over a year of missed rent payments, the News Guild found.

Once the firm extracts as much money as it can from an asset, it has tended to either sell to another investor or file for bankruptcy. Critics call the practice “vulture capitalism.”

Alden has been in the mobile home industry since at least 2020. Using a subsidiary called Homes of America LLC, it purchased more than 130 parks across the U.S. Nearly half are in Florida.

“In some of the parks there were problems beforehand. What’s clear is that those problems got much worse,” said Ash.

Mobile home residents from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, to Christiansburg, Virginia, reported rent increases of up to 40% following Alden takeovers. Others, like Theo Gantos, who lives at the North Morris Estates mobile home park in Michigan, said the company began threatening longtime residents with eviction, claiming they had unpaid debts from long before the ownership change.

“When these guys started taking over, everything started breaking down immediately,” Gantos said.

Alden entered the Tampa Bay market in October 2022 with the bulk purchase of at least 10 parks in Seffner and Thonotosassa, as well as some in Pasco County, property data shows. The next year it bought more than 20 Hillsborough County parks from Atlanta-based Jordan Capital AM. There are more than a thousand homes in the parks in total, according to state records.

Most of Alden’s extensive holdings in Hillsborough County appeared intact after hurricanes Helene and Milton swept through the region 13 days apart, a Times review of the company’s properties found.

Many of those communities already had crumbling infrastructure and broken-down homes in need of repairs. Hillsborough County code enforcement records show more than 230 complaints made — mostly related to sewage disposal, pest infestations and mold — in a two-year period before Alden took over. Since the sales, another 130 complaints were made.

Most of the residents the Times interviewed declined to comment on the record, fearing possible retribution from their landlords. They shared stories of vermin, mold, sewage, faulty air conditioners, excessive late fees and excessive charges on water bills.

Dolly Rogers spent more than two years in a park called Livingston Family Communities in Lutz, with a roof that leaked and sagged, saturated with water. The walls were soft and caved in when she touched them. Mold grew in the insulation and the cabinets.

When she reported the problems to the park’s management, Rogers said she received temporary or partial fixes. Holes in the ceiling would be patched with mesh tape. The kitchen cabinets were replaced at one point, but the moldy insulation stayed.

Rent was charged weekly and collected in the park’s office, with compounding fees for every day the money was late. Rogers and other tenants found this unsustainable — if ever they got behind, it was impossible to catch up.

“When you’re doing that and you live paycheck to paycheck, you really can’t afford to move,” Rogers said. “If it wasn’t for my parents helping me, I wouldn’t have been able to leave.”

Some longtime residents had heard of Alden and said they were concerned about the change in ownership. Others had no clue who was collecting their rent.

“There was a change in the name,” recalls Audra Oliver, who moved into Waterside in July 2022 — just before Homes of America acquired the community. “But the management stayed the same.”

Oliver lived there for a year and eight months, while a stream of sewage from homes uphill pooled beneath her own. Blockages caused sewage to bubble up in her bathtub. She and her sons slept and ate beneath swarms of termites that would sometimes fall from the ceiling into their mouths, she said.

Oliver pleaded with management to fix the issues. For months, she treated the walls for termites with vinegar and rubbing alcohol. She wore shoes while she showered. She called the county’s code enforcement office at least twice, records show.

Oliver said she’d never lived in a mobile home before, but it was the only affordable option she could find after she divorced and moved from Connecticut. As things deteriorated in the park, she felt trapped: she was told she would not get her security deposit back until nine to 10 weeks after she moved.

“They lock you into poverty,” Oliver said. “I couldn’t get out, and I’m stuck having to deal with this life.”

‘Things need to change’

Records from the Florida Department of State show Homes of America formed a subsidiary, “Glennwood MHP LLC,” just days before using it to purchase the Glennwood Mobile Home Park in Tampa in October 2022.

Rivera and Guzman moved in with their family a month later.

Right away, they said they noticed problems: the park was strewn with trash. Sewage pooled in lawns. And as soon as darkness fell, the termites emerged. Repeated inspections from the Hillsborough County Code Enforcement office confirm the property was infested.

It took weeks to lodge their complaint with the park’s owner, who the couple knew little about. In May 2023, they were offered a space at Waterside, another Homes of America property.

“It was an upgrade — that’s what we thought,” Guzman said.

But on their first night, they realized this home had the same issues. Guzman sent a letter to the manager warning they planned to withhold rent, in compliance with Florida’s landlord-tenant law, if the termites were not eradicated.

Mobile home parks are licensed by county health departments and regulated by the Division of Florida Condominiums, Timeshares and Mobile Homes, part of the Department of Business and Professional Regulation. But when residents report complaints and disputes, they are often met with untenable wait times, or told there is nothing the agency can do, said Rep. Paula Stark, R-Kissimmee.

“These are our most vulnerable citizens that are in these mobile home parks,” said Stark. “Things need to change.”

Stark became interested in reforms before she was even elected, after talking with residents of an Alden-owned park around the corner from her home. The water system there consistently fails and is often discolored, she said, “looking like a glass of iced tea.” Residents reported that lot rent more than doubled since Homes of America took over three years ago.

Last year, Stark introduced a bill for senior residents to have home health aids without paying additional rent. It also cleared the path for easier mediation between park owners and tenants in rent disputes. The bill passed and went into effect in July.

But there is more to be done, Stark said, and corporate ownership complicates matters.

“There isn’t a direct path from homeowners to someone that will make a decision or get something done,” she said. “You have all these layers that you have go through, and you never know where the buck stops.”

Properties for profit

Some experts speculate Alden’s motive for buying mobile home parks is not the rent but the land beneath the trailers. Located in a rapidly growing metro area, the property is ripe for redevelopment.

Alden has a history of cashing in on real estate holdings attached to its investments.

After the firm shuttered Greyhound bus stations in cities like Chicago, Cincinnati and Richmond, Virginia, developers swiftly unveiled plans to build apartments and retail spaces on the sites.

None of Alden’s mobile home parks in Tampa Bay have been listed for sale. But Ash, the housing director at the Private Equity Stakeholder Project, said Alden isn’t usually in a rush, holding onto properties as long as they squeeze out profit.

“It’s clear when they purchase an asset, they have a strategy,” said Ash. “Whatever their motive or intent is, it’s not to have long-term stability with residents who are currently living there.”

Within two years of purchasing their first park, Alden sites have filed more than 200 evictions in Hillsborough County — more than most individual park owners have filed in more than three-and-a-half years.

However, many of those parks were already filing evictions at high rates before Alden took over, court data shows. The Times found many employees of the original park management stayed on to work for Homes of America.

After a recent hearing for an eviction filed by Grandview Estates — a Seffner community acquired in 2022 — Times reporters approached Patrick Singer, the attorney representing park managers. Singer has handled at least 65 cases for more than 20 Homes of America parks, but he said he didn’t know anything about Alden Global Capital.

Normally, fewer than half of eviction cases end in a tenant’s removal, as filings are often used as a method to collect an overdue balance. But the report from the Private Equity Stakeholder Project found two-thirds of the company’s evicted tenants were forced to leave. It also found 13 Alden-owned communities in Florida with eviction filing rates at 10% or higher.

It’s a pattern that has played out with investors before, said Tom DiFiore, an attorney with Bay Area Legal Services.

“What you’re looking at is a common situation when you want to shut down a mobile home park,” DiFiore said. “Basically their goal is to get everybody out of there, so they can turn it into something more profitable.”

Sunk costs

At first, Rivera and Guzman liked their chances in court. They had documented all of the property maintenance complaints, and explained their plight to the judge. Still, they needed to pay $6,000 into the court registry just to move forward. If they lost, Guzman was afraid they wouldn’t have money to relocate.

She decided it wasn’t worth the risk, and the case defaulted in favor of their landlord.

Having an eviction on their record made it nearly impossible for the family to find a new place. Over and over, their applications were denied.

“People treat you different,” Guzman said.

Eventually, managers at an Auburndale park in Polk County gave the couple a chance to explain. Rivera and Guzman spread out their records — dozens of photos of termite damage, emails with their old park management and code enforcement, their letter to the judge. Afterwards, they were able to purchase a home in the park and pay rent for the lot.

But they agonized about sunk costs: Most of their furniture was thrown out after the termite infestations. They spent all they’d saved on a recreational vehicle and paid Cruz’s brother to park on his land. They lived there with their three children and two dogs while they applied for more permanent housing.

Guzman said they spent more than $2,000 on application fees in the eight months they spent searching for housing.

Others are still displaced. After she was hospitalized with a bacterial infection, Oliver had had enough. She moved in with her aunt in Riverview — but there wasn’t enough room for her sons. One stayed with friends, while the other worked on his college campus through the summer to take advantage of the dormitories.

“My whole family is broken up,” Oliver said. “I’m hoping and praying I can find something by Christmas.”

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(Tribune Content Agency is owned by Alden Global Capital.)

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