Who pays the commission, and when
When a park home changes hands, the buyer is the one who owes the commission.
Who the law puts it on
In England, Mobile Homes Act 1983 paragraph 7A(5) and S.I. 2013/981 regulations 8 and 10 put the commission, up to 10 per cent of the purchase price, on the buyer. It is paid to the site owner.
How and when it falls due
The buyer cannot pay until the site owner has supplied the account the money should go into. S.I. 2013/981 regulation 10 sets out the sequence that leads to payment.
- The notice of assignment goes to the site owner.
- The owner responds with the bank details the commission should be paid into.
- The buyer has seven days from receiving those details to pay.
That seven-day clock runs from receipt of the bank details. A buyer who has not yet been given those details has nothing to pay against, whatever stage the rest of the move has reached.
No other payment is owed
When a resident sells, the site owner's claim on the money changes hands only once. In England, paragraph 7A(6) of the Mobile Homes Act 1983 says that apart from the commission, the owner cannot require any payment in connection with the sale.
That one sentence covers the commission and nothing else. It means the figure set out under paragraph 7A(5) is the full amount the owner is entitled to ask for, and anything presented as a separate charge for the same transaction falls outside it.
What this would rule out
- An administration charge for processing the sale
- A fee for updating the site's own records
- A charge for agreeing to the transfer itself
A demand of this kind would sit outside what paragraph 7A(6) allows, whatever it is called on the invoice.
What happens, in order, from sale to payment
The commission on a park home sale is not paid at the moment of sale. It follows a fixed sequence, and each step depends on the one before it having happened.
-
The sale of the home is agreed
Buyer and seller settle on a price for the home itself. At this point nothing has gone to the site owner, and no commission is due yet.
-
Notice of assignment reaches the site owner
The seller, or whoever is handling the sale, tells the site owner that the home has changed hands and names the buyer as the new occupier. This is the event that sets the rest of the sequence running.
-
The site owner sends their bank details
Once the owner has the notice of assignment, they give the buyer the account the commission is to be paid into. There is nothing for the buyer to pay against until those details arrive.
-
The buyer pays within seven days
The seven days run from when the buyer receives the bank details. That timing comes from regulation 10 of the Mobile Homes (Commission on Sales) (Wales) Regulations 2014 as applied by the equivalent English instrument, S.I. 2013/981, and it is the owner's starting point.
How much is owed, and what the owner can and cannot ask for alongside it, are covered separately. This is only the order in which the steps happen.
Where the 10 per cent commission rate stands
The commission a site owner can charge on the sale of a park home has a ceiling, and that ceiling has not always sat where it sits now. The House of Commons Library records that the maximum was cut from 15 per cent to 10 per cent in 1983, and it has not changed in England since.
Why it is being looked at again
The government ran a call for evidence on the commission between 5 March and 29 May 2026. Its own account of what came back is that no clear or agreed rationale for the commission has been provided.
That does not change what a buyer owes at the point of sale. The 10 per cent ceiling still applies until legislation says otherwise, and anyone working out a figure today should check the rate that is current rather than assume it is fixed for good. The responses to the call for evidence are set out in more detail on the page covering the Commission Call for Evidence.