A group of New South Wales pensioners is on the brink of becoming homeless after a developer bought the residential park they live in and served them with an eviction notice.

Advocacy groups said the desperate plight of residents at Hastings Point in northern NSW underlined gaping holes in consumer protections for some of the nation's most vulnerable people.

It is estimated 100,000 retirees live in residential parks, mainly in Queensland, NSW and Victoria.

These parks are characterised by pre-fabricated, demountable homes and residents pay a weekly fee to live in the park but do not own any land.

Among the remaining six residents living at Hastings Point Holiday Village in NSW is Judy Tucker, who has been fighting for more compensation for residents.

"The journey's been a very stressful one," she told the ABC.

"The previous owner of the park said when we all bought into the park that it was his legacy to his family that it would never be sold and that we were here for life.

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"Obviously that's just changed over the years."

Since the park was bought by developers during the global financial crisis, Ms Tucker and her neighbours have faced the grim reality that they will need to move on to make way for a new complex of units being built on the property.

She said the group has called more than 50 parks and none will take them and their homes, and that the group is not being offered enough compensation to buy homes elsewhere.

Hastings Point resident Bob Verrills told the ABC remaining residents have nowhere else to go.

"Once upon a time a park would take you," she said.

"Unfortunately now they're having homes built on site, and on-selling them for $200,000 or $300,000 so the parks are then making money on that. So they're not interested in taking anybody."

One neighbour, 74-year-old Bob Verrills and his wife Helen are among the remaining residents.

"We are all on the brink of being homeless," he said.

"The six remaining residents here have nowhere to go and not enough money to go somewhere.

"So we will be homeless in the sense that we will be living in a caravan - which is a bit rougher when you're 74 going on 75 - without toilet facilities and other things, but we don't have an alternative."

Massive changes in retirement living

Jeff Fiedler from Housing Action for the Aged Group (HAAG) said the situation in Hastings Point underlined massive changes that are afoot in retirement living.

"The retirement villages sector is expanding dramatically at the moment and particularly the residential parks area which is like a low cost form of a retirement village is expanding even further," he said.

"This sort of accommodation is really suited to people on low incomes with low assets because they can get in at a lower entry level.

"We're finding that it's the type of housing that older people are suited to if they want to live with other older people.

"They want some extra facilities like activity rooms and swimming pools, bowling greens, but at a much more affordable level than the retirement village sector itself."

Amelia Christie from the Combined Pensioners and Superannuants Association said her organisation now warns people off buying homes in parks where their tenure is not secure.

"If people aren't in a park already we do recommend they look at other options where they can, obviously we want to see the legislation tightened further so the existing residents are protected," she said.

"But it's not really an affordable housing option because you are still paying rent and these rents can be quite substantial yet you've also fronted up the money for a dwelling as well.

Retirees living in residential parks throughout the country face the grim reality of being evicted from their homes.

"In NSW, we've got a new act in place and unfortunately that's taken people in NSW a step backwards in terms of what their rights are; there are a number of things in the act that are skewed heavily towards the benefit of park operators.

"That includes things like rents being able to be linked to the aged pension increases, the six-monthly pension increases.

"There are also things in there around voluntary sharing arrangements, which are around sharing with a park operator any capital gains they might make on the dwelling once they sell it on.

"These are called 'voluntary sharing arrangements' but we fear they won't be in practice because the alternative would be paying higher rents and park residents are necessarily in a position to be doing that."

According to the NSW Minister for Fair Trading's office, under the new laws for that state, residents who are evicted through no fault will be entitled to compensation for the value of their home and loss of the lease if they are unable or unwilling to relocate the home.

People need to do their homework: advocacy groups

The ABC has spoken to almost a dozen residents living in parks elsewhere in the country, who have similar concerns about the security of their living arrangements.

In Sydney, residents from parks across NSW meet every month to discuss the issues they face.

Jill Edmonds is the president of the Independent Park Residents Action Group NSW.

"My advice to people is they really need to do their homework, and believe - regardless of what they might be told by the park owner - that there is absolutely no guarantee that they will be able to live there for as long as they wish because they do now own their land," Ms Edmond said.

"Under circumstances that can be unpredictable, your site agreement which gives you the right to keep your house on the park can be terminated, that can also happen if the owner wishes to put in a Development Application to upgrade the park.

"So there are many reasons why a site agreement can be legally terminated, and if that happens it means your house has to be removed from the park, so people need to be aware they could lose their investment.

"It is a good lifestyle when it's working well but by golly it has just fallen apart for so many people and people have had to walk away from their homes, wound up homeless and having lost their investment, or a huge part of their investment, and it's not doing a great deal to improve the affordable housing crisis."

Len Hogg is the vice-president of the Tweed Residential Park Homeowners Association.

"What we're finding at the moment is that we cannot stop people, we cannot get the information out to people before they ever think of moving into a park," Mr Hogg said.

"What I can say to anyone is please, please go to your local Fair Trading office, they've got reams of information to give you and you can avoid a lot of the pitfalls."

Mr Hogg said the situation at Hastings Point is far from isolated.

"As an ex-resident of a park, I've seen 114 residents of my park lose their homes in a similar manner and in the end when our park closed I was the only person who kept their home and the only way I was able to do that was to persuade the shire council to make available a site in their park."

NSW reforming residential park laws

In October this year, the NSW Government announced a new draft regulation for the act that covers residential parks.

Under the proposed changes, site fee increases will be limited to once a year and there will be tougher rules of conduct for park operators and sanctions for those who fail to comply.

Public comment is being sought on 12 key issues, with more information available at the NSW Fair Trading website.

Pensioners pay a weekly fee to live in residential parks, characterised by pre-fabricated demountable homes.

But Amelia Christie from the CPSA said the new act has taken people in NSW a step backwards.

"There are a number of things in the new act that are skewed heavily towards the park operators, that includes things like rents now being able to be linked to the aged pension increases, there are also things in there about voluntary sharing arrangements which are around sharing with the park operator any capital gains they might make on the dwelling once they sell it on," she said.

"These are called voluntary sharing arrangements but we fear in practice because the alternative would be paying higher rents, so park residents aren't in a position to necessarily do that."

Jeff Fiedler from HAAG said it was now time for a national look at laws governing residential parks for retirees.

"If we had commonality of legislation, then residents could work together towards improving their rights across the board, and it would create certainty for operators," he said.