We are a Floating Home Owner Tenant Movement!!!
Angela Garvin was invited as a guest on Columbia County radio station KOHI AM1600 for a 2-part series to tell the story of her journey from an enthusiastic and excited, first-time, floating home owner to becoming the victim of a marina landlord who violated her rights to a near-breaking point and how surviving that experience gave her inspiration to help empower a community of floating home owners who rent their slips.
Many floating home marina owners operate their marinas very professionally, some even hire professional management companies, and their tenants have very few issues and enjoy their floating homes immensely – it truly is an incredible way of life! This is not that story.
Some floating home tenants cause real problems for their landlords and their neighbors by dealing drugs, disturbing the peace or not paying their rent. This is not that story either.
Angela’s marina owners frequently made up rules which, in effect, prevented her and her family from being able to move in and live in their floating home for years, all while she was still responsible for paying rent to the moorage. In constant fear of being kicked out of the moorage should she refuse the owners any of their requests, she searched for any laws pertaining to floating home owners which she might find useful or an organization who could advocate her as a floating home owner but she came up empty each time.
At one point, she was living in her 3rd temporary housing situation (one of the FIVE total temporary rental homes before her ordeal was done and she was finally able to move into her floating home permanently), when she became curious about what rights a tenant has who rents a floating home from a landlord who is also a floating home owner who rents their slip from a marina. So, she did a quick web search for “Oregon floating home tenants.”
What came up was not what she expected. For the first time, she realized that, in her own situation as a floating home owner at a rental moorage, even though she was a home owner, she was considered a tenant first under Oregon law. By searching under tenant laws after this discovery, she quickly discovered the existence of a package of Oregon laws which specifically protect floating home owners who own their homes and rent their slips. She realized that she and her family had been victims of marina owners who had been demanding things that are not allowed under Oregon Statue Law.
Armed with this new information, she took that experience, and vowed to do all she could to make sure that didn’t happen again to other floating home owners. Angela then teamed up with a group which drafts legislation for manufactured housing community tenants because floating home owners are in similar circumstances (manufactured home owners who own their manufactured houses, but rent space at a park, are similar to floating home owners who own their homes and rent slip space at a marina).
Inspired, Angela then set out to inform and share information about what she’d learned with other floating home owners at her marina – she knew that she was not the only one whose rights had been violated but found that tenants at her marina were too frightened of the perceived wrath of their landlord and being targeted in retaliation for joining a tenant group – a common occurrence at moorages where the landlords either don’t know the laws of believe they are above them. So, she broadened her search for floating home owner tenants who might need help and sent out mailings and flyers to reach nearly every rental marina in the Portland, Scappoose and St. Helens waterways.
Floating home owner tenants from everywhere came out to learn about what was going on with floating home laws and their rights. And together, the group of floating home owners have rallied and are making a difference. They are changing laws and will no longer settle for just living in fear.
If you missed the shows and are curious about how the Floating Home Owner group came to be and a detailed account of Angela’s story, you can listen here. Just scroll down to “Listen to Clean Columbia County Odd Friday, navigate to the folder with 2018 shows, and download both shows (June 8th and June 15th, 2018) to listen.