Mobile homes, an overlooked refuge of affordability, are disappearing in L.A. Residents fight to stay.

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Set us as preferred The small patch of dirt encircling Carmen Silverio Guardado’s home bears fruit — lots of it.There are pomegranates, guavas, dragon fruit and nectarines.

She also grows oregano and lemongrass, with which she brews into a tea to soothe stomach issues.All of this Silverio Guardado and her husband cultivate beside the two-bedroom mobile home they have owned for 12 years.They have no plans to move — mostly because they could not afford to live anywhere else.Mobile homes are the cheapest form of housing in California.On average, owners spend about $1,200 a month on housing, hundreds of dollars less than apartment renters and traditional homeowners, according to U.S.

Census Bureau data.But in a housing crisis where the working solution is to build, build, build, some of the area’s least expensive housing has been steadily dismantled over the decades.Since 1986, according to data from the state housing department, Los Angeles County has lost roughly 200 mobile home parks, or one-fourth of its stock.

1 2 1.Ian Herrera, 6, gives his soccer ball to his sister Genesis, 12, before walking into his home at the Florence Village Mobile Home Park on July 14 in Bell, Calif.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times) 2.Maribel Herrera prepares dinner for her family of four inside her mobile homein Bell, Calif.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times) In some more urban parts of the county, that decline has been even more pronounced.Santa Monica, for instance, which once boasted 11 mobile home parks, has only two.Despite state and local policies aimed at making it harder to redevelop these parks, sky-high housing prices have put huge pressure on park owners to sell.“It is the best naturally occurring affordable housing that there is,” said Stephanie Hawke, associate research director of land use and supply at the Ter...