Stop Fighting Rent Control — Ali Nasir, Rise 360 Ventures

Host: Most investors follow trends. Very few develop edge. This show focuses on something different — how serious operators build durable wealth in overlooked niches, starting with mobile home parks. We'll break down the strategy, underwriting discipline, the roadblocks, and the operational execution that will make your capital aligned with long-term returns. This isn't about chasing deals. It's about thinking like an allocator and executing like an operator. This is the Mobile Home Park Exchange.

Host: Our next guest has over 40 years of experience in the manufactured housing space. He's operated over 2,000 units and has seen the industry evolve through multiple cycles — from mom-and-pop ownership to this institutional wave of capital. He recently published a piece arguing that instead of the industry fighting rent stabilization, operators should actually be helping shape it. Today I'm honored to welcome Ali Nasir from Rise 360. How are you doing, Ali?

Ali: I'm doing great, Frank. Thank you for having me.

Host: You put out a piece recently — your position was that we should be supportive as an industry of rent stabilization. I'd like you to go a little deeper and clarify that position.

Ali: We have to be able to confront these challenges head-on as an asset class and as an industry — both collectively and individually.

Ali: My point is: what is the alternative? What are we doing now? The noise is there. The push is there from municipalities and residents. All we're doing is reacting and playing defense. I don't really see a collective offensive strategy to achieve our goals in terms of being able to earn and charge the market rents that are justified given what we've invested in the community — operating costs, capex, taxes, all the things that go into running a community. We haven't taken proactive measures to present our case. And I think if you look at communities and organizations who have taken the approach I'm suggesting — where they're proactive in terms of communicating with their residents and demonstrating what they're doing — they're finding better results and less pushback.

Ali: The other point I want to make is that we need to root out the bad actors — the ones charging or increasing rates exponentially in ways that are unjustified. Those extreme cases become the examples at the city, state, and federal level and give us a bad reputation as a whole. My argument is that we should prevent and reduce that type of activity because it reflects on all of us. That's the whole stigma, the whole challenge.

Host: We do have, as an industry, a challenge in narrative building. What you see mostly from operators is a focus on success — how much value they created, how much money they made. And that's what gets showcased because those operators are looking to attract capital. But that doesn't always tell the full story. Is that what you're leaning into — that we just do a poor job of explaining that?

Ali: Absolutely. If the driver is strictly about revenue and the bottom line — and not actually about providing a community, a quality place to live — you're missing something. Think of it like music. There are artists who just write beats to sell music and have a commercial sound. But what we really fall in love with is the artist who creates something beautiful that resonates with people because they're passionate about it. When you have success that comes from that, it appeals to a much larger audience. If you do something from the heart and for the right reasons, the money should follow. If we build the community the right way — right for the resident, right for investors, right for vendors — the revenue and the bottom line should be there by default.

Host: Is there something happening right now that made you feel like this was the moment to take this stance?

Ali: What you're seeing — especially in states like California and New York — is not just rent control, but in some cities, vacancy control. I have a community now in a city that has vacancy control, and that's a real challenge. For those who may not be familiar: that's a situation where even with a vacant space, you can't necessarily bring it up to current market rents when a new tenant comes in. You still have to follow the increase schedule from the last rate. That was actually proposed — though I think it's highly unlikely to pass — as a statewide measure in California.

Ali: When you start having conversations like those, and you see more organizations lobbying against community ownership at every level, I think it's better to accept the reality and accept that if there's going to be some control, we should be part of shaping it. There should be some control to eliminate the bad actors who are making it hard not just for residents but for the rest of us as operators.

Ali: We're such a small representation of the population as community owners and operators versus the residents and the greater population. So for a politician looking for votes and Twitter likes, our agenda just isn't aligned with theirs. That's a challenge we have to deal with. And it brings up the whole NIMBY argument, the lack of tax revenue for municipalities compared to multifamily or other asset classes — all of these things work against us. But the cat's already out of the bag. It's out there in most states, most markets. We can't eliminate it, so we have to manage it. Rather than being defensive — which I don't think is working — we have to be willing to accept where we are, explain our case, and yes, compromise. Let me give you an example.

Ali: There is a city in California — I won't mention it — where there's a rent control ordinance that's enforced. And yet within that ordinance, if you dig deep enough, there's one phrase that's actually in favor of community owners. It says, essentially, that an owner-operator has the right to enjoy a cap rate of 8%. A community owner in that city leveraged that ordinance and appealed to the city for a rent increase far above the annual CPI-tied increase. They got a one-time $45 bump — probably 15 to 18% in one year — by enforcing that clause. Rather than assuming every rent control ordinance is entirely against the owner-operator, let's accept where we are and try to improve from there with the right narrative. Essentially — reframe the debate.

Host: What has the response been from people inside the industry after you published that piece?

Ali: For the most part, it's been positive. I've gotten a little bit of pushback — some people wondering what I was thinking. But others, like you, have come at it very constructively.

Ali: And by the way, that's not the only uncomfortable truth I'd like to bring to the table. We've been trying for a long time to move from "mobile home parks" to "manufactured housing communities." Even that process isn't complete. And I actually question whether "manufactured" is the word we want most prominently in our brand. It may well be a better product than stick-built, but is that really what we want front and center? I think we need to do some self-searching about how we want to reframe our position on a number of issues.

Ali: I'm especially excited to see younger generations embracing manufactured housing communities. We're seeing it in Silicon Valley, in coastal communities up and down the state. They want to be within proximity to their employment or family, and owning a manufactured home in Sunnyvale — right where all the tech companies are — is far more affordable than conventional housing, which is simply impossible for them. The stigma is gradually fading. We're making progress. But I think we need to do more.

Host: How does your approach to resident communication actually play out on the ground — especially when you're going into a new acquisition?

Ali: It's probably not different from any other good operator. Communication is key — having an open door, explaining the plan for what you're trying to do. You go in, you prove yourself. You make the improvements. You provide a better quality of life. You're still going to get pushback no matter what when you have rent increases. But it's much easier to have those conversations, and they're much more justified, when you can actually demonstrate what you've done.

Ali: We're not a nonprofit. That's the other tangent — it's not just bad actors. Government agencies are shifting the burden of the affordable housing crisis onto us unfairly. Whether it's rent control or restrictions on redevelopment, it's not fair that the entire burden falls on us. But I think we're making progress at the federal level through lobbying by MHI and other associations.

Host: What's your buy box now, and what doesn't make sense for you anymore?

Ali: Back in the 80s, you could buy in a tertiary market in California for $5,000 to $15,000 a pad. Secondary markets were $15,000 to $30,000. Today, you can't touch a tertiary market in California for less than $25,000 to $40,000. Secondary markets are averaging around $75,000 per pad. Primary markets are at $150,000 per pad. It's a very different beast compared to most of the country. I can't compete in primary markets with the REITs and larger groups — that's not an option. Even secondary markets are getting crowded as private equity pushes down. So if there's a typical category I'm in, it's two- to three-star, 100-plus units, secondary markets, value-add. But increasingly, you have to look at unconventional value-add strategies to find compelling deals.

Ali: We're vertically integrated — not just asset management and property management, but infill, and where it's legal, a financing arm to provide retail financing or at least a secondary position for residents who need help covering the gap between available financing and upfront costs like transportation and installation. You have to go beyond conventional value-add. Leveraging the rent control ordinance the way I described is a perfect example — looking for opportunities where nobody else is looking, not leaving any stone unturned.

Ali: Everyone I know in California says they're not investing here anymore, they're only doing deals out of state. And everyone I talk to from out of state says they'd never come to California. My mindset is: that just means more deals for us. Especially for someone who's had a Rolodex — over 45 years of not just brokers and intermediaries, but also bankers, attorneys, vendors, contractors, residents, service providers — all of those people are sources for deals. Opportunities are still there.

Host: What's one lever — beyond infill — that someone listening should be exploring to really maximize their investment?

Ali: Utility pass-throughs have become common nationwide — so those are something of a given. But look further: fiber optics, personal property insurance, other pass-through profit centers that can equal or even exceed a rent bump. Also, California just passed a state bill that's supposed to make it significantly easier to expand any existing community where you have the land — by 10% of your permitted spaces. It's a state mandate that no county or city is supposed to be able to refuse, with an accelerated, low-red-tape process. I don't think it's as simple as it sounds, but it's opened the conversation. We're pushing the envelope on that now.

Ali: Something I don't think most people even consider: I'm not a big fan of the traditional resident-owned community model and the adversarial narrative that often comes with it. That said, if I'm going to acquire a distressed or half-vacant community that I'm going to stabilize and then exit — and if I can sell at equal to or a premium compared to what I'd get from a traditional institutional or private buyer, while delivering a win for the residents and a win for our investors — I'm not opposed to that. We're exploring it in some communities. I'll get pushback for this. But it's not just about increasing income. It's another way to increase asset value, and it's an exit strategy most operators never consider.

Host: Walk us through your infill strategy. What's the template?

Ali: My father was probably one of the pioneers of this model. It was born from our first RV park in 1981. We discovered quickly that it was seasonal — we wanted to eat in the winter too, not just the summer. So we started bringing in permanent residents: park model trailers marketed to local farm labor, construction crews, seniors or single people who were fine living in a small space before "tiny homes" was even a term. We discovered it worked, transitioned out of the RV model entirely, and have been doing what's now called infill ever since — we just didn't have a name for it then. The logic is simple: the only reason a community sits at 50% occupancy isn't a lack of demand for affordable housing. It's the upfront cost — transportation, installation, all of it — which is prohibitive for residents. If you solve that problem by placing a three-bedroom, two-bath already set up and ready to move in with easy financing through your vertical, you go from 50% to 95% or even 100% occupied. Not overnight, but faster.

Ali: A lot of operators and lenders frown on infill because you don't want to skew income from personal property — a home is personal property even when it's in a community — with real property income. If you do, you make the asset unbankable. Lenders have about a 20% tolerance, on average. So it has to be done properly: arms length, with your community ownership separate and independent from your dealer arm, and your dealer arm separate from your financing arm. Everything in its own vertical. The funnel is inverted — getting from 50% to 100% full is the whole game, and the only barrier is that upfront cost for the resident. Solve that, and the demand is already there.

Ali: At Rise 360 Ventures, we just launched Nextly — that's the brand for our dealer arm. Nextly has licensed sales agents, and we're using AI, software tools, and a complete back-end system including Slack and everything you need for an effective team. Not just to perform, but to track results so we can keep improving them. We're recreating at Rise 360 what we had at the family office — building it properly from the ground up.

Host: Where are you looking now, and where do you see Rise 360 going over the next 12 to 36 months?

Ali: We're continuing with the same filters. This asset class is regulated state by state — you're not going to master 50 states overnight. So we're still heavily focused on California, though we wouldn't say no to a compelling deal out of state. As for the macro picture: I do believe we're in for another down cycle within the next two to three years, possibly more significant than anything we've seen since the late 70s. As a consumer in California, I'm not excited about paying $10 for gas. But as an investor, I'm very excited, because I've seen this before. Mortgage rates went as high as 20% back then. We've been through the savings and loan crisis, the dot-com bust, 2008, 2020 — I've seen at least nine down cycles. When lenders get sidelined by defaults in office, retail, or other troubled asset classes, that opens the door for creative deal structures and real opportunity. When everyone else is sidelined, that's when it's time to go. That's what Rise 360 is going to do.

Host: Where can people find you?

Ali: The easiest place is our website — rise360ventures.com. There's also a complimentary detailed market report on what I think is coming that anyone can access when they visit. You can also find me on LinkedIn. And in terms of meetups, we're doing them twice a month in the Bay Area right now — every other Tuesday. Anyone local or visiting, please join us.

Host: I love the contrarian thought process. I might not agree with every one of your solutions, but your diagnosis and your viewpoint definitely give you something to think about. Always a pleasure, Ali.

Ali: Thank you very much, Frank.