UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH): History, Ownership, Mission, How It Works & Makes Money

As a seasoned investor, have you really looked at how UMH Properties, Inc. is navigating the affordable housing market, especially with the latest 2025 numbers? This real estate investment trust (REIT) is not just holding ground; it's expanding, projecting to surpass $250 million in total income for the full 2025 fiscal year, driven by a strategic focus on manufactured home communities. For the third quarter of 2025 alone, the company reported a 10% jump in total income to $66.9 million, plus a significant rise in same-property occupancy to 88.5%. Given its $1.6 billion in total assets and a full-year Normalized FFO guidance midpoint of $1.00 per diluted share, you need to understand the mechanics behind this growth and the potential risks in their model.

UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) History

You want to understand the bedrock of UMH Properties, Inc., and honestly, it's a story of a single-minded focus on affordable housing that started way before the current housing crisis. The company's trajectory from a small New Jersey operation to a major Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) is defintely a case study in strategic, long-term growth.

Given Company's Founding Timeline

Year established

UMH Properties, Inc. was established in 1968.

Original location

The company began its operations in Freehold, New Jersey.

Founding team members

The company was founded by Eugene W. Landy.

Initial capital/funding

While the specific initial funding details from 1968 are not publicly available, the company started small, relying on organic growth and strategic acquisitions to build its portfolio over many years. This slow, steady start is what allowed them to build a resilient foundation.

Given Company's Evolution Milestones

Given Company's Transformative Moments

The company's history is defined by several decisions that moved it from a regional operator to a national player, primarily by leveraging the REIT structure and focusing on the manufactured housing (MH) sector's unique economics.

• The REIT Conversion: The move to a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) structure in 1985 was the single most important financial decision. It allowed UMH Properties to scale by offering tax-advantaged returns to investors, which fueled acquisitions. When they went public, they owned 13 communities with 2,675 homesites.
• The Rental Home Strategy: Starting in the early 2000s, and accelerating in the 2010s, the company aggressively increased its rental home portfolio through its taxable REIT subsidiary, UMH Sales and Finance, Inc. This strategy converts vacant sites into revenue-generating assets faster, boosting occupancy and Net Operating Income (NOI). By Q2 2025, the rental portfolio grew to 10,600 homes with 94.4% occupancy.
• 2025 Capital Market Activity: Even in a complex interest rate environment, UMH Properties has been active. In Q2 2025 alone, they raised $101.4 million through Fannie Mae refinancing and another $31 million from stock sales, showing strong access to both debt and equity markets. This capital is crucial for continued growth.
• Operational Performance in 2025: The operational focus is paying off. For the third quarter of 2025, the company reported Net Income Attributable to Common Shareholders of $4.2 million, reflecting the strong underlying performance of the portfolio. If you're looking for a deeper dive into their capital structure, you should check out Exploring UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) Investor Profile: Who's Buying and Why?

Here's the quick math: Q2 2025 gross home sales hit a quarterly record of $10.3 million, a 17% jump year-over-year, plus rental charges grew 8.5% to $55.9 million. That tells you the two-pronged revenue model is working exceptionally well right now.

UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) Ownership Structure

UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) is predominantly controlled by institutional investors, though the founding family maintains a significant presence in both ownership and executive leadership, which is typical for a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) of this vintage.

UMH Properties, Inc.'s Current Status

UMH is a public equity Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT), meaning it trades publicly on major exchanges, specifically the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) under the ticker UMH. It has operated as a public company since 1985, and as of November 2025, it has a market capitalization of approximately $1.28 billion. This public structure ensures high transparency, but it also means the company is subject to the immediate pressures and volatility of the equity markets.

As a REIT, UMH is legally required to distribute at least 90% of its taxable income to shareholders annually, which directly influences its capital structure and dividend policy. The company owns and operates 145 manufactured home communities, containing approximately 27,000 developed homesites across 12 states.

UMH Properties, Inc.'s Ownership Breakdown

The company's ownership structure, as of November 2025, shows a clear majority held by large financial institutions, which is a key factor in its governance and strategic direction. This institutional dominance means major decisions must defintely align with the interests of large asset managers like Vanguard Group and BlackRock, Inc..

Here's the quick math: Institutional investors hold the vast majority of the stock, with Vanguard Group Inc. and BlackRock, Inc. being two of the largest holders. This high institutional ownership-over 80%-provides stability but also concentrates voting power, so you should monitor their Schedule 13G filings for any shifts in their conviction. You can dive deeper into this dynamic by Exploring UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) Investor Profile: Who's Buying and Why?

UMH Properties, Inc.'s Leadership

The company is steered by a seasoned executive team, with the founding family maintaining a strong presence in the top ranks, ensuring continuity of the long-term vision. The leadership team is responsible for managing the company's 145 communities and its portfolio of approximately $99.6 million in loans as of September 30, 2025.

The key executives and directors, as of November 2025, include:

• Eugene W. Landy: Founder and Chairman of the Board.
• Samuel A. Landy: President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO).
• Anna T. Chew: Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer (CFO), and Treasurer.
• Brett Taft: Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer (COO).
• Craig Koster: Executive Vice President, General Counsel, and Secretary.
• Todd J. Clark: Appointed as a Class I Director in September 2025, bringing academic and legal expertise to the board.

The Landy family's dual role in both founding and running the company is a critical factor in understanding UMH's corporate culture and investment strategy. This structure often leads to highly focused, long-term decision-making, but still, you must watch for potential conflicts of interest between family and minority shareholder priorities.

UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) Mission and Values

UMH Properties, Inc. is fundamentally driven by a dual mandate: to provide a tangible solution to America's affordable housing crisis while delivering strong, sustainable returns to shareholders. This is a business built on social impact, not just profit margins, which is defintely a core part of their cultural DNA.

The company's commitment to Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) principles is significant, with 100% of its income being classified as social by key rating agencies like Sustainalytics and MSCI. This focus is why their operational metrics, like the Q3 2025 Total Income of $66.9 million, are tied directly to their mission of providing quality, low-cost housing.

UMH Properties' Core Purpose

The core purpose of UMH Properties, Inc. centers on providing high-quality, safe, and affordable housing options to the nation's workforce, primarily through manufactured home communities (Real Estate Investment Trusts or REITs). They aim to enrich the lives of everyone impacted by their operations-residents, employees, neighbors, and shareholders.

Official Mission Statement

UMH's mission is to address the critical gap in affordable housing by building and managing communities that residents are proud to call home, ensuring a positive societal impact. This isn't just about collecting rent; it's about providing a path to homeownership or an attractive rental option for families.

• Be part of the solution to America's affordable housing crisis.
• Build low-cost, high-quality, well-managed, and environmentally-friendly manufactured home communities.
• Enrich the lives of all stakeholders through a quality living experience and high corporate governance.

Vision Statement

The company's long-term vision is to be the low-cost producer of quality, spacious housing-a three-bedroom, two-bath home on a 5,000 sq. ft. lot-that consistently outperforms other housing options. This growth strategy is clearly reflected in their 2025 operational goals, which include expanding their portfolio. For example, in Q2 2025, they increased their rental portfolio to 10,600 homes with a high 94.4% occupancy rate.

• Create sustainable and environmentally friendly communities with a positive societal impact.
• Increase earnings per share and market value per share for shareholders.
• Maintain a long-term plan that includes adding approximately 900 rental homes per year.

For a deeper dive into the principles guiding their strategy, you can review their philosophy here: Mission Statement, Vision, & Core Values of UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH).

UMH Properties Slogan/Tagline

While UMH Properties, Inc. doesn't use a single, catchy, corporate slogan, their operational focus is best summarized by the phrase that appears consistently across their communications, which is their commitment to delivering value.

• Providing safe, high-quality, and affordable housing.

You see this commitment in their financial performance, too; the Q3 2025 Normalized Funds From Operations (FFO) rose 15% to $21.3 million, which shows their mission-driven growth is also financially sound.

UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) How It Works

UMH Properties, Inc. operates as a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) that specializes in owning and operating manufactured home communities, essentially providing a critical, affordable housing solution across the US. The company makes money primarily by leasing out developed homesites and manufactured homes, plus a smaller but growing revenue stream from selling homes outright.

UMH Properties, Inc.'s Product/Service Portfolio

The core of UMH's business is providing quality, affordable housing through a two-pronged approach: leasing the land (homesites) and renting the homes themselves. This dual model allows them to capture revenue from both homeowners and renters, providing a stable, recurring income base.

UMH Properties, Inc.'s Operational Framework

The operational process at UMH is straightforward but highly effective: buy, fix, and fill. They focus on acquiring 'value-add' communities-properties with low initial occupancy-and then execute a structured capital improvement and infill strategy to drive up both occupancy and value. This is where the real work gets done.

Here's the quick math: you buy an underperforming community, invest in infrastructure upgrades, and then systematically bring in new homes to either sell or rent on the vacant sites. As of Q3 2025, this strategy resulted in a 12.1% increase in same-property Net Operating Income (NOI). That's a strong return on capital. You can read more about the stakeholders in Exploring UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) Investor Profile: Who's Buying and Why?

• Acquisition and Improvement: Identify and acquire manufactured home communities, often with significant vacant sites, then immediately commence capital improvements to upgrade infrastructure and add amenities.
• Infill Strategy: Utilize a rental home program to fill vacant homesites, converting inventory (like the 188 new homes converted in Q2 2025) into revenue-generating rental units to rapidly boost occupancy.
• Revenue Generation: Drive income through two primary channels: recurring monthly rental fees from homesites and rental homes, and one-time revenue from the sale of new and used manufactured homes.
• Geographic Focus: Concentrate expansion in regions with strong economic drivers, such as the Marcellus and Utica shale regions and the growing Southeast, to ensure sustained demand for affordable housing.

UMH Properties, Inc.'s Strategic Advantages

UMH's success comes down to a few distinct advantages that protect its revenue and position it for long-term growth, especially in the current economic climate where affordable housing is defintely a crisis. They are sitting on a massive, undervalued inventory of future growth.

• Affordable Housing Moat: The manufactured housing model is a fundamentally lower-cost alternative to site-built homes, with the average new manufactured home costing around $151,000 compared to a much higher price for a site-built home. This provides a structural advantage against rising home prices.
• Massive Growth Pipeline: The company owns approximately 3,300 vacant developed homesites ready for infill and an additional 9,600 land plots available for future development. This substantial land bank provides a built-in, multi-year runway for organic growth without needing to acquire new land.
• Recession-Resilient Sector: The manufactured housing sector has historically demonstrated consistent Net Operating Income (NOI) growth for decades, even through economic downturns, due to the inelastic demand for affordable shelter.
• Financial Flexibility: Proactive capital management, including the refinancing of communities (like the $101.4 million Fannie Mae credit facility in Q2 2025) and the use of an Opportunity Zone Fund, unlocks capital for reinvestment and new acquisitions.

UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) How It Makes Money

UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) generates the vast majority of its income by operating as a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) focused on the affordable housing sector, primarily through the leasing of manufactured homesites and company-owned homes within its communities. The business model is simple: acquire, manage, and fill communities to maximize recurring, predictable rental cash flow, plus a smaller, but growing, revenue stream from manufactured home sales.

UMH Properties' Revenue Breakdown

The core of UMH's financial engine is its rental income, which provides a stable, recurring cash flow typical of a REIT. Based on the third quarter of the 2025 fiscal year, the rental segment accounts for over 86% of the company's total income.

Here's the quick math: Total income for Q3 2025 was approximately $66.9 million. Sales of Manufactured Homes contributed $9.1 million, leaving the Rental and Related Income at roughly $57.8 million. This heavy reliance on rental income is a key stability factor, but the growth in home sales is defintely helping to fill vacant sites faster.

Business Economics

The core economics of UMH revolve around the high-margin, low-maintenance nature of manufactured housing communities. Once a homesite is occupied, the operating costs are relatively low because the resident, not UMH, is typically responsible for the maintenance of their home and leased site. This structure leads to predictable income streams and strong Net Operating Income (NOI) growth.

• Occupancy is King: The main lever for profit growth is filling vacant sites. Same-property occupancy increased by 110 basis points to 88.5% in Q3 2025, driving significant revenue growth.
• Affordable Housing Demand: UMH capitalizes on the persistent demand for affordable housing, especially as the cost of traditional site-built homes (averaging around $413,000) and high mortgage rates push more people toward manufactured homes (averaging about $127,000).
• Pricing Power: The company consistently executes on its strategy of achieving approximately 5% annual rent increases across its portfolio, a key driver for the 11% year-over-year increase in Q3 2025 rental income.
• Capital Deployment: UMH invests heavily in its portfolio, with annual capital needs between $120 million and $150 million for improvements, new rental homes, and expansions, which are largely accretive (meaning they add to earnings per share).

UMH Properties' Financial Performance

The company's financial health is best measured by its operating metrics, particularly Funds From Operations (FFO), which is the standard profitability measure for a REIT. The Q3 2025 results show continued operational strength, though the quarterly net income saw fluctuations.

• Funds From Operations (FFO): Normalized FFO for Q3 2025 was $21.3 million, or $0.25 per diluted share, representing a 4% increase per diluted share year-over-year.
• Net Operating Income (NOI): Same-property Community NOI increased by a robust 12.1% in Q3 2025, demonstrating excellent operational efficiency and pricing power at the community level.
• Full-Year Revenue Trajectory: Management is on track to surpass $250 million in total income for the full 2025 fiscal year, driven by occupancy gains and rent increases.
• Balance Sheet Health: As of September 30, 2025, UMH reported total assets of $1.6 billion against total liabilities of $703.1 million, indicating a solid balance sheet, though managing its debt profile remains a key focus area.

You should also review the Mission Statement, Vision, & Core Values of UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) to understand the long-term strategic direction that underpins these financial results.

UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) Market Position & Future Outlook

UMH Properties, Inc. holds a distinct position as a growth-focused, value-add player in the manufactured housing (MH) Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) sector, leveraging its large land bank for internal expansion. The company's future outlook for 2025 is anchored by its success in filling vacant sites, which drove a 12.1% increase in same-property Net Operating Income (NOI) and a 15% surge in normalized Funds From Operations (FFO) per diluted share in the third quarter of 2025.

This growth trajectory is defintely tied to its core strategy of providing high-quality, low-cost housing, a model that is thriving amid the national affordability crisis. The goal is clear: convert vacant land into cash flow by adding new rental homes, a simple but powerful lever for earnings growth. You can see the detailed financials that support this view in Breaking Down UMH Properties, Inc. (UMH) Financial Health: Key Insights for Investors.

Competitive Landscape

In the manufactured housing REIT space, UMH competes primarily with two much larger, high-occupancy peers. While UMH's total portfolio of approximately 27,000 developed homesites is smaller, its core competitive advantage lies in its ability to generate superior growth from its existing asset base, specifically by filling vacant sites and developing new ones.

Here's the quick math: these percentages represent the relative share of developed manufactured housing sites among the three largest pure-play MH REITs, totaling over 197,600 sites as of mid-2025. UMH is the smallest of the three, but its lower starting occupancy of 88.5% gives it the most runway for site-level NOI growth.

Opportunities & Challenges

The company's strategic focus maps directly to the current economic environment, but it also carries distinct risks you need to be aware of. The biggest opportunity is simply that housing is too expensive for most Americans right now.

Industry Position

UMH is positioned as the primary growth vehicle within the MH REIT sector, focusing on the workforce demographic earning between $40,000 and $80,000 annually. This focus on a broader, underserved market segment is key. While Sun Communities and Equity Lifestyle Properties generally target higher-end or age-restricted communities, UMH is the low-cost producer, and that's a powerful position in a tight economy.

• Growth Leader: Same-property NOI growth of 12.1% in Q3 2025 significantly outperformed peers, driven by occupancy gains.
• Rental Focus: Targeting 700 to 800 new rental homes in 2025, which provides a stable, recurring revenue stream and drives site occupancy.
• Financial Leverage: The company's successful refinancing of ten communities at a fixed rate of 5.855% in Q2 2025, with an appraised value increase of 146% over cost basis, shows its ability to unlock substantial embedded value from its portfolio.

The company is effectively translating its land inventory into earnings, and that internal growth story is what sets it apart from the fully-occupied, organic-growth models of its competitors. Still, managing that $703.1 million debt load in a high-rate environment is a constant balancing act.