Some Alana lady has a big piece making "The Case for Trailer Parks". Really? Must be some really amzing stuff she's ingested. If I had the deed to a trailer house and the opportunity to live in Hell (which, admittedly, I may already have earned), I'd rent out the trailer and live in Hell. It's probably a whole lot safer.
Apparently, she has failed to grasp a fundamental fact about trailer homes: they're tornado magnets. I mean really, there's not much difference between an Arkansas divorce and a tornado: in both cases, someone's gonna lose a trailer.
Now, some of the manufactured homes don't look too bad, and they're energy-efficient and have a lot of features - and they're inexpensive (if you own the lot). Even so, when they arrive at the homesite for assembly, odds are pretty good that when it's put together, somebody's going to mess up a seam. There goes your energy efficiency, and in comes the water, mold, and mildew.
That's a lot less likely with standard construction, and it's one reason why the traditional balloon-frame homes appreciate far more than manufaured homes - and you can forget about a trailer ever doing more than declining in value. Despite what Alana thinks, there's no better case to be made for trailer parks than for any other bum camp. The only thing in the plus column is that they provide low-cost temporary housing
Manufactureds (or modulars; they're referred to by both terms) are a step up, in that if you buy the land you plop it on, you actually have a shot at seeing some increase in value over time, assuming - as noted above - that you have a decent assembly crew. I've seen some really nice ones, but they were new. It'd be interesting to see what they look like in, say, a decade.
The main source for appreciation in housing markets, however, is going to remain the balloon-frame, on-site built, single-family home. Sure, they can run into issues: sagging foundations, water infiltration, but they build value in general over time. I bought my first one for $50,000 on a very large lot, and yes, it had some problems to address. But hey, a decade later, we peddled the place.
The current one is on a mountain, so great views and no Portland BES hassles. We paid almost exactly what we peddled the old place down in the valley for, and - yeah, it needed things; we had to get rid of the L-P siding that was growing mushrooms, but that gave us the opportunity to add 2" of styro insulation out there.
So it's more energy-efficient. We did some other stuff to it too, and it'll likely sell for well above median next year.
Trailer parks? No thanks.