Florida Mobile Home Park has been looted and residents fear as the eviction date approaches

Earlier this month, Marisol Sanchez fell to her lap and sobs outside the Sweetwater trailer where she and her late husband, Diego Valdez, were once invited to the house. The front door broke and some windows broke – the place had been looted.

Six weeks ago, 55-year-old Sanchez had left a trailer for the Li’l Abner Mobile Home Park. In November, the property owner announced that the park would be closed to make way for the new, affordable housing complex, offering residents a $14,000 acquisition if they leave by January 31st.

Approximately 15% of Sweetwater’s population, about 3,000 people, lived in Lil Abner at the beginning of the new year. Since then, it has become a ghost town. Of the 900 households in the park, only 250 remain. They have condemned the ownership acquisition offer and are staging the legal battle against their eviction conditions, currently set for May 19th.

The rest was paid.

For the numerous Li’l Abner homeowners who purchased trailers multiple times the acquisition amount, $14,000 was peanuts. For them, eviction represents a huge and unjust loss of both wealth – their homes were their main assets – and the community. Many have struggled to find new affordable homes around Miami, and recently ranked the second most affordable American metro area for renters. And the statewide trends closing trailer parks have left mobile home owners there. The house is hardened to the ground and can only be moved at a five-digit cost, so it is not really that mobile and there are few alternatives.

So, armed in some cases for just $14,000, hundreds of families are confronting South Florida’s increasingly expensive housing market, often leaving behind furnished trailers.

“They took my life,” Sanchez cried.

“It’s very clear that they haven’t followed the rules.”

It was 2013, and when Sanchez met her husband, he was stomping customers in Sabortropical. He was polite and gentlemanly, Sanchez said, that it was raining that day and that Valdez offered to drive her and their mutual friends in their home so they wouldn’t have to walk. The two got married five years later.

Valdez, 76, lived at Li’l Abner for 32 years. According to Sánchez, her husband was deeply volatile by the November announcement that park owner Crei Holdings decided to close Li’l Abner to create space for multi-family affordable housing.

Crei Holdings had already built a complex like this. This is called Li’l Abner II. At Sweetwater, where central households make $4,600 a month, Li’l Abner II’s one-bed, one-bath apartment rental starts at $2,194. Another multi-family structure on the property, Li’l Abner III, is under construction. In 2026, we promise as early as workforce and affordable advanced housing.

It is hardly comforting to those living in Li’l Abner. This park is one of the few places left in Miami-Dade where they can afford to own a home.

Crei Holdings was offered to trailer owners who would leave $7,000 by April, and those who would leave could earn $3,000. In any case, all residents must leave by May 19th, says Urban Group, the development management company that oversees the park’s conversion.

Notices of the park’s closure sparked anger among residents who protested the terms of the compensation package. In some cases, they were arrested for doing so. David Turnicker, the lawyer representing the mobile home owner, said he would have to meet with his client at a park near the FIU as he himself was banned from Li’l Abner for the threat of arrest.

Many mobile home owners have seen personal wealth and home security evaporate overnight.

A large portion of Sanchez and her husband’s savings were tied up in their home, their biggest asset. In December, the couple, along with 185 other mobile homeowners in the community, filed a class action lawsuit against CREI Holdings, Miami-Dade County and the City of Sweetwater.

The plaintiffs are seeking more time to find more money for each homeowner, including $50,000 and attorneys’ fees, claiming it is not in accordance with Florida laws governing mobile home parks.

Turnicker, the lawyer for the trailer owner, is optimistic about the client’s outlook.

“The law is very clear about the procedures to drive out mobile home parks, and I feel it’s very clear that they’re not following the rules,” he said.

Sweetwater and Miami-Dade reject the allegations that they acted inappropriately. Crei Holdings said it is in full compliance with Florida law in the settlement of the park.

“The phone won’t ring.”

Despite Winker’s legal trust, Vacate’s notices have taken a heavy emotional and sometimes physical sacrifice to some of the residents of Li’l Abner.

As soon as the eviction announcement was made, Valdez’s health began to deteriorate, his wife said.

“He was depressed,” Sanchez said, with the prospect that “his life” must be left behind, he was increasingly emphasized about the couple’s financial future. Retired Valdez was suffering from high blood pressure. Sanchez became his full-time caretaker.

The widow exacerbated the stress, was a recurring outreach from the city group, and reminded residents of the acquisition deadline. For Sanchez, follow-up was a pressure campaign.

“They often sent letters to us. We got a call while we were lying in bed at night, and the phone wouldn’t stop ringing,” she recalled.

In a statement to the Miami Herald, the city group confirmed that follow-up with the remaining residents who have decided to take part in the lawsuit is “ongoing.”

“We want to ensure that everyone is aware of the resources they have access to,” it read.

Ultimately, Sanchez said the uncertainty was too much for her husband. He put the keys in their trailer on January 31st and raised $14,000 in payments.

He died the next morning early in the morning of a heart attack.

“He left a life there,” cried Sanchez. She added that $14,000 covers her husband’s medical and funeral expenses.

What it didn’t cover was the cost of the move, Sanchez’s adult daughter helped her pay. With nowhere to take her belongings, Sanchez left almost all of her worldly possessions in her trailer.

At the end of January, many residents who needed $14,000 did the same. They delivered the keys to the urban group and passed through a fully decorated trailer.

According to residents who stayed, that was when looting began.

The Sweetwater police department, which has two non-service officers stationed at the park’s ownership dime in Li’l Abner, told Herald it had never seen an increase in reports of community looting or vandalism.

The condition of the park is a different story.

Mattresses, clothes, photos, children’s toys, and other people of little value to thieves – scattered across the park. The abandoned trailer was exposed, windows shattered and doors were destroyed. The purebred cat, once a pet of the family, struggles to get lost in their new life, wandering into the rest of the residing trailers in search of food.

“It looks like a zombie movie,” said Miguel Herrera, a 10-year resident of the park, who said that abandoned trailer started roaring around the neighborhood a few days later, causing the cause of a blaze that has yet to be decided.

When asked about parks that were looted by the Herald, the city group highlighted its commitment to “the continued safety of our community,” but did not directly address looting or vandalism.

Gladys Arias, 72, lives across the street and is down two doors from an old trailer for Sanchez. She decides to stay at her home and wait for the outcome of the lawsuit.

“I live in constant fear,” confessed Arias.

“Just yesterday, around 2pm, someone broke into the trailer,” she reported, pointing to the road. In a group chat in the neighborhood, another resident reported that the burglar had broken into a trailer for their residents, Arias said.

She was worried that her house would be next.

Herrera shook her head strictly at the concerns of her neighbors.

“When you’re scared,” he replied, “There comes a moment when you say, ‘It’s fine, I’ll go too.” ”

“This,” he complained, “It’s all calculated.”