STRSS 56 – From 2 to 19 STR Properties in 7 Months while in the Military w/ Anthony Gantt and Greg Rollins

Video Transcript

 

00:00:00

However, if you’re a property manager out there and you want your property up on ease as another booking platform government

 

00:00:15

It’s, I’m not talking about like Vacation rentals. I’m talking about federal travel and hotel stay.

 

00:00:25

This is episode number five, six of the short term rental success stories podcast. Are you an investor that’s looking to have your home professionally managed, go to cohost it.com for more information, welcome back to short term rental success stories. I’m your host, Julian Sage. This is a show where I talk to hosts about their journeys and starting and growing the short term rental business. My goal is that you’ll be able to walk away with practical information. That’ll help you become a better host and learn how to scale your business. Like any exceptional host. We all strive for five star reviews. So please go on over to iTunes and let us know what you enjoy is it really helped support the show if you haven’t done so already going over to our Facebook group, the host nation to connect with the community. Hey, what is going on?

 

00:01:06

Host nation? I’m super excited to back again with you this week. So Jon and I were talking earlier this week about how out of these tough situations like out of this pandemic, how people really start to get creative. And really, I think some of the greatest entrepreneurs and the most creative people come out of stressful situations. Many of the hosts that have been on the success stories podcast really have had backgrounds where they were just trying to get out of a situation. They were trying to pay for their mortgage, or they were trying to, you know, earn some extra income. And then they ended up really starting, just an amazing business myself. I tried just renting out my basement unit so that I could be able to cover my mortgage since I’m in the military, I don’t get paid a whole lot. So just being able to be able to cover my mortgage payments made a huge deal.

 

00:01:52

Even right now, during this time where a lot of hosts are hurting, there’s also some hosts that are coming outta this and they’re getting really, really creative. You know, Jon, I I’m just always inspired by what he does, just listening to, you know, the way that he handles situations. And really I ask Jon almost every day, like, aren’t you stressed? I mean, you have over 24 properties that are these arbitrage units and you’re also managing other people’s properties. Are you not stressed about your investors? And are you not stressed about all these properties that you have to pay all these leases on? And for him, he’s just like, you know, this is part of the, you know, part of the journey is figuring out how to be able to, you know, keep on hosting and keep on going. So I’m always inspired by people that are taking something that is challenging or difficult or where people maybe don’t see the opportunity and then try to really just take advantage of what is in front of them.

 

00:02:44

That expression making lemonade out of lemons, I think is so true. And that’s why in this episode, I’m super excited because I had the special honor of speaking with Anthony Gant and Greg Rawlins. Anthony is based outta Texas and is an active duty Marine who founded this website called PCs at ease, which is a direct booking site for military personnel to be able to relocate and find furnish rentals. We talk more about PCs at ease and is a really exciting thing that really you could tell in this episode, I’m really excited to be able to talk about it because again, it’s one of those unique things that is coming out of a situation where they are trying to really just get more creative. But we also had the special honor speaking with Greg Rawlins in this episode, Anthony’s partner and Greg is located out of California and he’s a Marine veteran who founded a company property management company called righteous rentals.

 

00:03:34

Now righteous rentals does have 19 properties across three states, and he’s been able to scale from two to 19 properties in the span of seven months while he was still on active duty. Now, Greg was able to scale from two to 19 properties in about seven months and majority of those still being while he was on active duty in this episode, Anthony and Greg talk about how they were able to scale from two to 19 properties in seven months, just through word of mouth. Also, they share their experience of being in the military and coming up with creative ways to build a company and help other military people invest and make money passively through short-term rentals. Again, this is a great episode because it really just highlights the creativity and ingenuity of people when they are put in these situations where they’re trying to either work something out or take something that is challenging or difficult, and really try to make the most of it.

 

00:04:22

If you like my show notes for the episode to go to shorttermsage.com slash SDR five, six, or if you like my show notes sent directly to your inbox every week, then go to shorttermsage.com slash show notes with all that being said onto this week’s conversation. Hey, welcome back, host nation to another episode of short Rental success stories. In this episode, I have the special honor of speaking with two guys today, Anthony Gant and Gregory Rawlins, Anthony and Gregory. Would you please introduce yourself to the host nation and let them know who you are and what inspired you to get into short to rentals?

 

00:04:50

All right. My name is Greg Rawlands. I originally got into short term Vacation Rental Rental while I was still in the Marine Corps. I actually bought my property site unseen while I was deployed with SP mag in two, I came back to it, went over budget on the renovations, had somebody ask me, Hey, have you thought about doing short term Vacation rentals? I didn’t. So I dug into it learned as much as I could got ready to go deploy, ran my Vacation Rental while I was deployed in Okinawa, Japan. And then when I got back, it was a success. So I started telling some people about it. And then I just started getting people, asking me if they would manage, if I would manage theirs, if I’d manage theirs. And so I just kinda started organically there. And then, so when it came time for me to get outta the Marine Corps, I was up for orders last year. And I just decided to go ahead and get out and try and pursue this full time.

 

00:05:52

Awesome. So you, you got, you, you, you were managing a property overseas in, did you have everything set up before you left or was it just like, Hey, I’ve got a property I’m just gonna wing it and then you’d go to Japan and he got this property that’s, you know, taking people into that.

 

00:06:08

No, it was, it was pretty nervewracking. Like I said, I bought it with the intention to flip it. I went over renovation, I’m actually in it right now. I went over budget on the renovation. And so I was like, well, shit, I can’t sell it. I looked at a long term tenant. Couldn’t do that because the mortgage was too high. And so while I was renovating, I was educating myself on Vacation rentals and I really just kind of winged it. And I was just over in Okinawa dealing with really shitty cleaners. She was like stealing stuff from me. It was, it was an absolute nightmare. But at the end of the day, it made me made me money. And I learned a ton about how to manage a property and how to, how to make it really kinda automated because, you know, obviously there’s automation required when you’re on opposite time schedules, you know, every time the guests are messaging me, I’m I’m asleep or whatever. So there’s automation that we built in management and all that stuff. And then making sure that you had a team on the ground to do it for you because there was no physical way. I was gonna be able to show up to the property. So they had us layers of problems, but it, it was, it was an overall success.

 

00:07:24

Wow. That, that, that has gotta be really stressful. And you know, I definitely wanna talk about that, but I don’t wanna leave Eva Anthony hanging. So where we’re in the, we’re in the timeline. So you’re managing this property overseas. You, you, you finally figured out the, you know, how to be able to systematize it. You’re other people are like, Hey, can you, you know, do this for me as well. And where did that timeline go to where you met up with Anthony?

 

00:07:46

So that fast forward I met Anthony shortly after I got outta the Marine Corps. So at the time I was managing two properties with another four coming online, I met Anthony through a, a friend of a friend referral and the first phone call we got on, we’re like, we need to team up. We need to make this thing happen. The rest is history.

 

00:08:09

Wow. Awesome. And, and Anthony, I’ll let you, I’ll let you introduce yourself and how you kinda got into the space and met up with Greg and what you guys are doing.

 

00:08:16

All right. Thanks for having us on the show today and like what you’re doing for the community. So I fell into it in, I wasn’t going to rent a property or anything. I was just doing a permit changes station, which the military does personnel every two, three years. I had a move at the four. So I was like, I’m at, I thought I could use a Vacation Rental when I moved to Austin, Texas. And it was when I used it, which was like about cheaper than what the government have to pay for it. And wasn’t reimbursed back in 20 18th of June, June of 2018. I didn’t reimbursed research and started some the, and I found out that the regulations, which by that all of us are at one time, another like bound by for the, and the joint regulations for doesn’t Vacation Rental.

 

00:09:25

So I was guys buy a, and then it put it on a site. I’ll make a site and do it like that. But I was in looking in this place called Texas. And every time I bid on a house, I was losing to people from overseas. I was like, who is buying this house at over the couldn’t compete there. Then I said, IUB arbitrage your house, right. It’s kinda hard to get military owners who don’t understand Vacation Rental. It’s crazy how many people active duty and the government don’t understand the Vacation short term rental can’t to on, on a, B and B what I was like, what country are we in? Then? Like Greg said, July, July timeframe, a third party introduced us. I won’t say third party party. And when Greg and I got on the phone, I started talking acronyms. He talked acronyms back to me, we understood the acronyms and was like, ah, we gotta do it fast forward to like, what’d I say, October, November things started coming down. He get his, so new, the the ISD, downed reengage, each I’m in Vacation Rental a things. And we said, this is something that we need to work the same while I’m building the online booking. You’re we’ll knowledge that the different type spaces within the industry able able be we’ll then And successful. more be to successful by learning a little bit of a, of what you do, but a lot of what I do. So yeah, that’s how I fell into it.

 

01:11:33

You know, I, I think that that’s, that’s so cool and what you’re doing, and just to kinda recap for those of you, maybe that weren’t following what, what Anthony was was building was this thing called PCs at ease, which is a way for the military to be able to reimburse Vacation rentals or shorter rentals. Because right now, as it stands, nobody in the military knows what they all think that what’s that BV stuff. I don’t want none of that, that people shooting each other and partying. So what you’re trying to do is you’re trying to educate the educate and work with the government to be like, Hey, you can stay and reimburse these properties if they list on the site, because they’re compliant to the, the do D standard. So you guys are making sure that all the properties, if they are gonna be listed on the site, that they meet the, the DOD department of defense specifications.

 

01:12:20

Yeah, absolutely. To date one of our team members in each of the states has gone out and expected the homes. And that’s the level of scrutiny we want to put into it. Cause it’s a lot that goes into, it’s not up to standards that can occur like five years in prison and 10,000 fine, which I don’t think Greg wants to do. So we had a lot of people tell us, you can scale really quick, cuz it’s an abundance of short term rental. We’re like, yeah, but all of ’em are in. So we are looking for other homeowners that property managers that have homes that their properties just understand that in compliance and then the registration process with the government. That’s another, that’s another podcast for another show.

 

01:13:15

Yeah. That’s that, that, that that’d be a yearlong podcast. That process is man, the coast guards still back on windows 95. Like

 

01:13:25

The important thing is we do it for you. So what Anthony left out there is that when you sign up with at ease, we actually do all the paperwork and stuff with the government to submit all that stuff for you.

 

01:13:35

Yeah. I, I think what you guys are doing is so cool and I, I wanna, you know, highlight everybody that’s listening, cuz people that are listening to this show are real go getters. And they’re really, you know, they’re, they’re thinking outside the box and you guys are thinking outside the box, the traditional, the old, old model of, of real estate investing, you know, it’s very saturated. Everybody’s kind of thought about what to do, how to do it. You know what you know, working with the mil, working with the military, doing this, doing that, but this the space in the short term rental world, there’s so much untapped markets, so much untapped niches and you guys, I love it. You guys are two military guys. You know, you guys were hustling while you’re in, you’re hustling while you’re out and now you’re taking your experience and you’re coming up with these creative ways to be able to make it easier on military people. But also this is a really great way to be able to build you guys’ management company. I think it’s really cool. And I wanna, you know, I definitely think that that’s, that’s awesome. You two are doing that. Now. I wanted to talk about your guys’ Greg you’re scaling. Cause you’re scaling really quick too. You went from two to 19 properties and around seven months, was it?

 

01:14:39

Yeah. Yeah. So when I got outta the Marine Corps in July of 2019, I was managing two properties. And then since then up to date, we have 19 total. So 17 from July to now, which should be right around 8, 8, 9 months, somewhere around there. But yeah, it’s, it’s been going really good. And the cool thing about the military network is they’re pretty tight. So we’re work passes around pretty fast. So we haven’t done any marketing or anything anywhere. All we’re doing is telling our story and you know, people that we we’re bringing on homeowners are telling their friends and it’s, it’s all been organic. So it’s been really awesome.

 

01:15:22

And the majority of these properties are in the San Diego area. You guys are both located in San Diego or you guys are remote.

 

01:15:30

So I’m, I’m located in San Diego. Anthony is up in Austin, Texas. He’s the ROTC instructor up there for UT. And then we have another team member who’s not on with us today. That’s managing our properties out in Norfolk, Virginia. So we have one in one in Texas in central Texas with a couple more on the way. And then Norfolk, Virginia, we have three listings with probably another handful on the way. And then the remaining 14 or 15 are in San Diego.

 

01:16:02

And this is all been organic through word of mouth.

 

01:16:05

Yeah. Yeah. So mutual mutual friends, other other real estate investors, Mike Foster, who’s one of the founders of ad managing in Norfolk and then just friends of friends, people in the military community, every single one of our homeowners with the exception of one is either active duty or a veteran.

 

01:16:35

Wow. So you guys are, you guys are helping active duty guys make, make more money. Can you, can you kind of talk about that? Like what are, what are the returns that like these, these active duty military guys are able to see off their properties if compared to let’s say if they were long-term renting it.

 

01:16:48

Yeah. So that, that was one of the main reasons I got into this was I was able to make a profit where there seemingly was none with short-term Vacation Rental and San Diego presents kind of a unique situation because the appreciation here is really high. But the, so the property values are going up and up and up, which, but the overall market rents are not raising with the price values of the homes. So what you’re is inversion where the, that you’re able to get for your home does not cover your mortgage. And so it’s when you’re here and you’re, you know, stationed at camp Pendleton or Miramar or Loma or wherever, and you’re covering all that. When you go, you don’t money every month. So you go into this situation where either you’re selling the home at a loss, if you, if you’re not able to get enough for appreciation, you know, to cover your closing costs time and the time that you’re here, stationed here, or, you know, you’re renting it out to try and take advantage of the appreciation at a net lost flow every month because the mortgages are too high. So I wanted to come in having experienced that with my Okina deployment and having to find that third option. I wanted take that third option to everybody and allow all the military members to be able to invest and make money passively while they’re focused on doing what they need to do.

 

01:18:15

Now, you, you guys, you guys said that you, you have a pretty, pretty diverse team. You have, you know, two are business partners. You also said that you have a regional manager and then you also have individual property managers in specific locations.

 

01:18:30

No. So we had, we had another manager underneath us here or underneath me in San Diego to kind of help me grow a little bit more, but she has since stopped working with us. And then we have another guy in San Diego or excuse me, Norfolk, Virginia. Right. Now’s managing our as many locations as we can.

 

01:19:04

And I wanna add to that real quick, the, the, the type of managers that we’re looking on our team are similar to the ones that we’re talking about that own, the homes are veteran and military spouses, not saying that’s gonna be total. I that’s a preponderance of who we bring on our team as teammates, because they’re culturally confident when it comes to speaking about what goes into like moving a lot. And then they’ll be able to have a wealth knowledge cause they, or personnel they’ll like, because they’ve, they’ve adapted to that area. So, and it also helps our military spouses. I don’t think a lot of people know outside of our community that military spouses can haves, but since so they’re unable actually use that. So we wanna make sure that we bring opportunities to them, to where they can work remotely, but still earn a decent income while they’re doing it.

 

02:20:24

You know, one, one of the big things like, like what you guys are trying to overcome is, is, like you said earlier, Anthony, there’s, you know, there’s a lot of techno babble in the, in the short term rental space. And when you’re talking with military people, you know, the everybody’s got this like mindset of, you know, just purchase a property. You either flip it, wholesale it or do something like that. Nobody really knows about the short term rental world. And that you can turn your properties into short term rental. How, how are you guys overcoming the objections or the fears in, in like the military community, you know, where, where it’s, you know, that’s very scary. You have a property and you’re gonna be moving and now you’re gonna be trusting it to somebody else. How are you guys overcoming some of those objections or those fears that military people are having

 

02:21:08

Introduction and education, right? Greg does a great job at educating people. He has a, I wanna say two different brochures that he pushes out to. Here’s the Vacation Rental industry. Here’s the return on and investment. And then here are the metrics that we put in place of safety, right? We’ve teamed up with, I don’t wanna drop no names, but we’ve teamed up with companies that provide insurance outside of what the platforms provide so that the guests can have, depending on the house. Cause we’re the same coverage for a house in California as the house in Virginia, right. To million like insurances, we start the party, right? We get that awareness. Cause the noise is too much.

 

02:22:06

I wonder, wonder what tool that is

 

02:22:09

That be. So we’re the resources that are industry don’t jargon and say, Hey, these are things that we put in place with righteous Rental. This is how we go out and manage our, like we’re setting a standard. I know other people have standards for how do it, but we’re, we’re like letting know, like you’re used to a standard for the military. This is what we’re, we’re just bringing all military into what we do in our business model.

 

02:22:40

And I, and I love it because you have the PCs where it’s like, it’s like, you can say, well, we’re, we’re working with the government, like we’re meeting their standards. So, you know, you can trust us that we’re gonna be making sure that your property’s taken care of. I think that’s a really good, you know, a really good play as well. And building your, your guys’ credibility with all these properties though. I mean, you scaled up to 19 now you guys are kind of spreading across, across the, the us. You said you’re gonna be hitting Jacksonville, Tampa area, DC, more of central Texas. How, how, you know, and these are all military communities, correct? Yes. And now how, how are you guys working with them to be able to get those properties up and running? Are you fitting everything within like a particular righteous, righteous Reynolds brand? Or how are you furnishing these properties if they are remote?

 

02:23:27

So we, we, so going on what Anthony said, education, not only on the, on the management side, but also on the investment side. So, and leading into your question, as far as furnishings and stuff. When we, when we meet with a client, that’s doing a PCs move or whatever, we have a very candid discussion on, Hey, this is how much money’s gonna to get this. And you’re, that’s downsizing, or cheaper, AFO Norfolk, Virginia, cause it’s cheaper. And then you’re moving Southern California where it’s way more expensive. You’re probably gonna downsize with, you know, whatever budget is. So here’s an opportunity for you. You furnishing all that, the entire property leave. Some of it behind. We have designers on our team that will take what you leave behind and build a cohesive image for the property. But then the overall education on, you know, what is a good investment, your loan, you know, talking about all the costs associated with it.

 

02:24:37

You’re knowing all ladies, cleaning laundry, that all that stuff. So just educating them on all of that stuff so that they have a overall cohesive image of is this a good decision or a bad decision? And I personally will refuse to go into business with somebody that it’s a bad decision. Even if they say, Hey, I wanna do this. I’m like, no, I don’t wanna put you in a situation. And I’ve actually turned people away before I told them like, Nope, better play is a long or just, you know, at the end of the day, we’re to help people. And we’re here to put them into a worse situation than they already are. So education education, absolutely

 

02:25:17

You, that that’s gotta be, that’s gotta be pretty scary. You know, you know, being military, you’re purchasing a property and then you’re gonna be leaving. You know, one of the things though that it’s it’s, you know, are you guys finding a challenge? Because if, if the military people are, you know, if their purchasing this property, maybe their, their intent wasn’t to short term rent it now they’re, you know, now they’re moving now they’re looking at their options and they’re coming to you guys saying, Hey, you know, can we turn this into a short term rental? I mean, that’s, you know, move-in can be sometimes a big expense, you know, outside of what the military gives you. Now you’re telling them like, Hey, you need to put X amount of dollars into a property and you have to basically furnish it for us to get it up to our standard. Is that what you guys are doing?

 

02:25:59

Yeah. And we, we have different options we have, as Anthony was saying, you know, we kind of offer different packages, you know, ways where, you know, righteous rentals will help with the furnishing costs, you know, and then we’ll get paid once the property’s up and running. So we’ll do like some type of deferment program or payment plan or something like that. We’re like I said, we’re here to help make, make a stressful, a situation that shouldn’t be stressful, that it really is less stressful. That’s the overall goal.

 

02:26:30

Yeah. And I wanna caveat that we’re looking at creative packages in addition to what we already do, because we’ve had homeowners who expressed, like I still wanna sell it, but I wanna not have to. And they know it’s gonna sit on the market for at least three or four months. We haven’t refined that model just yet because it’s people coming to us like, so we say, let us think about this. If we can hack it for that three or four months, where’s the short term rental we work with your real estate agent or broker when it’s time for a open house. Hopefully it’s not San Diego during the summertime it’s book, right. They come in, see a furnished home while it’s up for sale. They go, they leave after the open and then we get a guest dinner. So we try to play, we’re looking at how do we make it work during that cleaning window? It’s 10 to three that most so open house in that time window, and then get the person in. And as it’s getting ready and they finally sell at home and they close, we can extract everything. And they’re a happy customer.

 

02:27:50

So you, you guys, in, in your guys’ management model, you’ll even take properties on, even if it’s only gonna be listed for a few months, that’s

 

02:27:58

Plan. We we’re still working through the, the, it sounds good. Right? But the minutia making that, like, did we put the salt and pepper, right? Now’s a whole as like, it’s like a

 

02:28:12

Julian, the end of the day, we just gotta make sure the numbers make sense. So like, if they’re not gonna fully furnish a house for, for three months and then turn around and sell it unless they can recoup all their monies or, or whatever, the, the, the, another benefit that Anthony was kind of hinting at there with having properties that are for sale is we’ll have guests. That’ll actually stay in the house. And again, if we’re doing this correctly, then it’s probably gonna be people that military members that are PCSing may on house hunting leave already. And so we could have a sign in the house saying, you can move in right now and you can stay here and you can buy everything as is, or you can, we can move out the furniture and you can move your furniture in. So it’ll just be more exposure for those, those real estate agencies, those real estate people that are trying to sell their properties to get more eyes on it.

 

02:29:04

You know, I, I, I love that. I love that you guys are coming up with creative ways and, you know, I could, I could even see this, not even having to be specifically for military, like there’s a whole untapped market in the, in the, you know, the civilian sector where, you know, you have furnished properties and it’s like, Hey, you like what you see purchase it as is. Yeah. And now a management company can basically facilitate, you know, the short term, but then also the sale and, you know, the potential long-term tenant. So now a management, a short term rental management company can basically have this whole package where they’re taking a person, you know, through this whole, through this, I think that’s brilliant. You guys are, you guys are onto something. I love. What, what has been the most challenging part of starting your guys’ short mental business?

 

02:29:47

For me, it was cleaning lady management, again, just being, being gone, especially for those first seven months while I was over in Okinawa, I, I kind of rushed into my first cleaning lady and because I was getting ready to go out the door and deploy, and I was like, I just need somebody like, and I accepted somebody that I shouldn’t have accepted because I needed it. And I put up with a lot more than what I should have while I was gone because of the uncertainty of not being able to get somebody else in there and then having a guest show up to a dirty property. So it was, it was extremely stressful there for the start, I think, since I’ve gotten out, I, I shortly I fired her very shortly after I got back. Like I said, she was stuff and moving stuff. At one point, she actually took the microwave from my property to another one of her properties, which wasn’t mine.

 

03:30:48

And I found out about it and she was like, oh yeah, well, there was nobody there. I’m like, it’s not your microwave. You came you Like microwave. to can’t just take people’s microwave. But since then I’ve gone through probably five or six other cleaning ladies. And I think the biggest challenge has just been that standard. Like Anthony was saying, it’s, it’s very hard to hold a standard for two Marines. And we have, we have pretty high standards, which again, I think that sets apart, but also makes it challenging work I’ve experienced got outta the Marine Corps, the civilians don’t the same mindset.

 

03:31:31

So about those standards, what, what about the first cleaner did, what was the mistake that happened with there and now where have you gotten you’ve refined that to where you can now find reliable cleaners?

 

03:31:43

Yeah. Yeah. So she was just, she was missing a whole lot. She would come and she would just kind of wipe things down. There was a lot of stuff left in the corner. She wouldn’t get under the couch under the bed, those kind of things. She would, I think at one point she was actually blowing the, in my kitchen with a blower as opposed to sweeping. So that was really weird. And then the other ones that I’ve gone through have been mostly timeliness and honesty. We were probably the biggest things we’ve since moved to a property man or a cleaning lady management system we use properly, which is huge because they actually have to take photos of the property. So I’m able to visually inspect without having to drive to all of the properties. So that’s been a huge help with kinda managing them and really weeding out people that aren’t willing to be held to a standard. Because I dunno if for all you listeners out there, if you try and hold somebody to a standard, that’s not used to holding, being held to a standard. There’s a lot of tension that develops very quickly because they’re not used to it. And they like out. And so you, if you hold somebody to a standard and they freak out, then it’s probably a good indicator that they’re probably not working a good person to work with.

 

03:33:03

So it’s not so much about their cleaning ability as much as it is their, their values.

 

03:33:08

Yeah. Yeah. I would say, you know, you have to have a ton of trust to, for having somebody be in your house without you being present. Like the amount of things that they could do, you know, stealing whatever, like drugs, they could do anything in your house without you being there, unless you have it cameras or whatever. So there is a huge amount of trust that has to be there. And so having the right values and, you know, making sure you’re not lying. So there’s a couple times I caught cleaning ladies in a lie and I was just like, I’m not gonna work with you. Cause if I can’t trust you for something simple, then I’m not gonna trust you with being at my house when I’m not there.

 

03:33:48

And what, what has it been for scaling this business? And especially for you guys, because you’re a team and you’re trying to build a team, how does scaling a team as, as well as you’re growing your portfolio? What, what has been the most challenging part of

 

03:34:07

Markets, finding those people of integrity and, and what a work value work ethic that will like hold, like just hold. If you make an appointment to do it, do it, don’t cancel like five minutes before we expect you to be at the place to do it. In addition to the cleans, just general contractors to go in and get the work done for a fair price. I say again, a fair price neighborhoods. Like I’m, it’s, it’s building that team and network of individuals that you can trust in those different markets. I’ve been so far, we’ve, we’ve been fall to some really, really good people. And after you one good person, like our, our cleaning lady that Greg found in our cleaning management company, we call team teammate happened army major nine and was hardest. So what with there up she’s like, we what we, and I was like, oh my God, like, where’d you find this lady? And her team is amazing. Like we, on constant basis of talking back and forth with them, they’re giving us updates and telling us about things that need to be fixed, that we might not have seen, or, or our team haven’t been able to catch. And we get it taken care of. So it’s just finding people like that. It’s difficult, but it’s possible just call around and call, call, call.

 

03:35:55

We got the cleaning company in Norfolk. Virginia is actually run by a retired Navy, senior chief as

 

03:36:01

Well. So I love favorite to these people,

 

03:36:06

Man. Yeah. Now you just need a, now you just need a, Coasty doing something.

 

03:36:09

Yeah. Come let’s,

 

03:36:13

We’ll figure something. But awesome. And, and, but with your guys’ team, like internally, like, you know, Anthony and, and, and Gregory, both of you guys and working with a regional manager, how, how does the dynamic of an internal team work as you guys are scaling? Like, how has that been? You know, you guys are, you know, Anthony you’re, you’re still active military Gregory, you just got out and then you have another person that’s, you know, you’re trying to build as managers. How, how does that look as you’re scaling?

 

03:36:40

We have, I wanna say weekly, cuz that’ll be a lot. We have daily meetings, we go through our, our metrics, right? Like, Hey, what, what do we have to accomplish? What do we need to accomplish? What do we wanna accomplish? What’s for like a little cheat code that was given to us from the military. We’re just using that cheat code to keep those same guard last and our weekly dailys, weekly syncs. And then our quarterly syncs our month, like Greg for management aspect, Greg is outlined like, what do we have? What do we quarterly annually, which is helping on the,

 

03:37:48

You guys are actually like using like KPIs, like key performance indicators and trying to hit those numbers. Wow. What are some, what, what are those numbers like? What, what is, what are some of the things like, you know, all these, all the, all the non-military people that are listening to they’re like, what are you guys talking about? Metrics and stuff like that. You’re trying to hit numbers. What are you a sales team? But you know, in the military, that’s, that’s what you do. But what, what are some of the things that you’re doing and implementing into your business that has allowed you to be able to scale,

 

03:38:12

Figure out how we fire ourselves. Right? Like I taking very good notes of what we do on a daily basis and, and make sure it’s captured. So that one day we can build like a manual or a video of this is how you do that. And that, that is helping us identify what we need to get. So when we hit those key perform KPIs, indicator that we’re so

 

03:38:53

Yeah. And then go going along with that, you know, making sure we’re, we’re learning every day. So one thing that I, you know, Anthony was talking about takeaways from the military and stuff, being an aviator. One thing you did after every single flight was a flight debrief. Whether it’s just, you know, from here to there a, to B, you’re just transferring an aircraft, you know, what did you do? What did you do good in your position? What did you do bad in your position? What could you, what did you learn? What did you, what could you have taken away or done better next time? And so we do that every single time with every single guest, you know, Hey, what, what did they report was broken? Or what did they suggest? You know, if we, and we have, you know, metrics, you know, if something is suggested on a property, a certain amount of times, then we make the change. And so, you know, listening to people, giving them what they want, building that brand loyalty, because at the end of the day, you are your brand. And so people are going codify that make sure that we’re constantly improving improving.

 

04:40:09

How, how are you guys, how are you guys managing? Cause you’re, you’re working with a lot of, a lot of different, you know, people and things. You’re working with the DOD, trying to get the regulations, right. You’re working with all these people that are PCSing and that’s stressful time as they’re moving and trying to get it all. How, you know, how, how many people do you have or what are you doing to be able to manage all, all of this?

 

04:40:27

So right now it’s just, it’s just three of us. So it’s me, Anthony and Mike, our manager in Norfolk, Virginia, we’re getting ready to partner with another property management company that also has a Marine Corps co-founder. And so we’re looking to hand off the, the day to day management, stuff of that, so that I can focus more on the building, the traveler experience for ease, and then the owner experience, the military owner experience and investment opportunities and education, and all that’re looking to kind step away from the day to day management still, you know, we’re gonna partner with him. So like we’re still gonna work with him very closely, making sure our brand is being upheld and all that stuff. But it’s gonna allow us to focus on, on, on the growth aspect of the company. So right now, like I said, a lot of automation, we use Guesty as our property management software. So automated messages, all that stuff, streamlining, we use automatic locks. So nobody has to show up at the doors. It’s extremely automated. It it’s built that way. It was intended to be that way. But again, from the guest experience, it doesn’t feel automated. It feels very hands on. And we built that very specifically.

 

04:41:43

And what about, what about from the client experience? Like the, you, you guys are the, you know, traditional management model. So, you know, the customer acquisition funnel is, is a big part of your guys is how you’re able to scale and grow and, you know, build this, build this team, cuz it’s not just operating anymore. Now it’s taking a person, you know, a military person that’s moving and you know, trying to list their property through this funnel. So how, how are you guys managing that, that client process?

 

04:42:08

Are you talking about like the onboarding process from okay. Yeah. That’s, that’s really just kind of hands on right now. Eventually we’re gonna be hiring other team members, but mostly that’s done by me and right now finding new clients to their situation, this how we, this what, you know, yada, yada, yada, but that that’s basically it right now. It’s just me and Anthony.

 

04:42:33

A lot of coffee and burgers.

 

04:42:35

Yeah.

 

04:42:35

Lot of coffee and burgers,

 

04:42:37

Late nights and phone calls and yeah.

 

04:42:40

Are you, are you guys doing anything when trying to, because if you’re listing a property for somebody else, you have to, are you guys running the numbers for them? Are you, what are you doing to be able to analyze the property and make sure that if they are gonna be listening it with you, that it will be able to be a profitable, profitable business venture.

 

04:42:56

Yeah. We, we, we do a full property package on the property. So we use analytic data from air DNA, key data, a bunch of other metrics, but we do a comprehensive analysis on the property and we give them our best guess. And we’re very transparent about it. Like, Hey, this is a guess like could coronavirus two years ago had no idea this was gonna happen this year. So again, that goes back to the education and be like, look, this is, this is what we expect. However, it’s not guaranteed.

 

04:43:34

Yeah. And that anticipation that we give is similar to what real estate agents give. Like I think your house to sell for this much. They’re taking a guess too. So we’re using a lot of the same techniques that they do to apply it to that. But with a lot of analytics coming from other sites that Greg mentioned, one of the things that Greg didn’t talk about that he does too, is he looks at what’s in that area. That’s gonna attract people to come to it. What’s gonna make it a marketable location. And how do we make your property stand out from others before we actually say, Hey, we gonna bring you. Cause all money is not good money. And we rather have a happy homeowner. That’s working with like you guys, Tampa don’t the numbers don’t make that. It was gonna be a good thing. He was like, all we’ll do it. I’ll trust you, but I’m telling you I don’t wanna do it. So we actually go back and forth and do a better analysis. And like, like we’ll like, if it’s not a good deal, then it’s not a good deal.

 

04:44:33

You know what, what you guys are doing pretty, pretty unique that not too many other people on the show have done is you guys are really focusing on the direct booking channel. Is that something that is live currently and how, how much of your guys’ bookings are coming through direct booking channels.

 

04:44:50

So for the ease direct booking channel it’s live, but nothing’s coming through it. As of now, we just launched in January of 15. So we’re still building still shows do to continue like like yours and get to these different conferences. Like the one you recommended. And the one that I went last week and the one Greg went in Vegas, I think conference we’re meeting people and we’re saying, Hey, this, this new company exists. And it’s here. It’s here to make some. And what we’re we have spouses who have contacted us that say, we wanna be the first users, right. We want, and it’s crazy. Listen to this. We need 65 days. We need 45 days or we need 15 days. That’s not normal in a short term in industry. Right. People are looking for three, seven Vacation when military move. And they’re for something when housing is not ready when they they’re, we need months.

 

04:45:57

Like they don’t a lease when they’re still looking, when in scope it out, out check out, put new, the neighborhoods, check out the schools and then to where they wanna go don’t scene. I had, Greg did the thing. We’re, we’re changing that. We’re whoever’s listening to me now, I guess, come to you. They’re coming for a lot of days, right? When I say that, cause I hate I a minimum of three days and I’m like me too. Right. But they don’t understand that we’re not getting the three day questions just yet. We’re getting, I want it for two weeks. I want for 15. Can you for do retiring January? Yeah. That’s January 15th of this year, by the way, fifth year, 2020.

 

04:47:04

You know, I, I think that there’s just so much opportunity and I, I love it. I love what you guys are doing because you know, there there’s, you know, even in the direct booking space and, and your direct booking site can also be a funnel for your management company and can kind of talk about how the structure of, of that works. So, you know, for those of you that are listening, maybe you haven’t gotten to that point yet, but you know, we’re talking about some, some of this kind of next level stuff, but when you have a direct book insight, that’s the top of your funnel and that can be used to lead to towards different services. What what’s kind of the structure of your guys’ way with PCs and how it’s, that’s gonna fill other aspects of your business.

 

04:47:40

Go ahead, Greg, take it away from you. Manage. We manage. Yeah. So you should always, as a, as a property manager, you should always be trying to direct people to your booking site. Obviously, you know, you’re not gonna have to pay commission fees and all that stuff. The, the problem is, you know, getting that traction, getting that those eyeballs on you, it’s, it’s, it’s a lot harder, you know, when you’re running your own property management company and you’re, you know, maybe like five, 10 listings to get the attention of, you know, an Airbnb, like you’re not gonna get the amount of attention that Airbnb or people just not shopping on your website. And we’re just, we don’t have a culture right now of people going to individual booking sites. And so that’s on each individual property manager. When you have a guest stay, if they’re coming back, that’s your opportunity to send them to your website. That’s, that’s your opportunity to go into your question about at ease and righteous rentals? Absolutely. Yeah, we’re, we’re obviously working hand in hand, you know, righteous rentals is the property manager for at ease. So if there’s anybody that stays with at ease that needs property management, we’re more than happy to help. However, if you’re a property manager there and you property ease another booking platform, these government, and they’re getting paid for by the government, anybody out there can put their properties up on there.

 

04:49:06

You know, there, there there’s so much untapped market that I don’t think that people are really even looking into yet. Like, you know, like I, I, I have a friend, I have a friend that has of direct booking site in Florida. It’s I think it’s called like ABO or Florida. It’s like Florida Vacation rentals by owner. So people that are looking to stay there, they, they can stay and book directly through there, but it could be even to different types of niches. It could be like, you know, Colorado skis, Colorado ski rentals. And now you have a direct book site for people that are trying to go to Colorado that don’t wanna have to pay the OTAs, you know, Airbnb. And that 13% that you know, is from the customer and the, on, on the host side. Yeah. You know, so you’re saving a lot of money and you’re also driving direct traffic and you could potentially get a future clients through through that because you’re, you’re, you’re managing properties. You’re listening them for them. I think, I think it’s brilliant what you guys are doing. I really love it. Now. Just kinda hit on some of the last questions. What what’s, what would you do differently if you had to start from scratch?

 

05:50:09

If I had to start from scratch, I would, I would make sure that I vetted that first cleaning lady better. That that was probably the biggest pain in the butt. Other than that, I mean, I thought, I thought we did pretty well. I think the biggest, the biggest problem you see with people is analysis paralysis, where they’re just, they’re afraid to like take that leap. And I was, I was definitely afraid, especially because it was my house. It was freshly renovated. I literally finished the renovation three days before I went to my, on my deployment. So I got to live in my house for three days really. And I would hear, I was turning it over to people that, you know, were, could possibly trash it, parties, all that stuff, all the stipulations. But, you know, I just, I was forced to kind take that leap. And so my rec, I, I was forced to do that. Everybody else won’t be forced. So I would believe that a lot of people out there would kind of just be afraid to take that leap and be afraid to take that, that risk. But as long as you manage it, you know, using all the techniques out there by vetting guests, making sure, you know, you’re paying technologies there available for background, those recommend go just in and and take the leap. It’s worth it.

 

05:51:45

Couldn’t more, what I’ve done is started a lot through a couple, since I’m very startupy startup centric through some accelerators and some well not accelerators, but incubators, I guess it’s a really active duty, slow. I actually started to commanders and, and that, this is great idea. I don’t turbo and it’s a 9 billion market. I’m not talking about like Vacation Rental. I’m talking about federal travel and hotel state 9 billion.

 

05:52:50

Okay. Yeah. I thought you were talking about Vacation because the, the hotel industry, like, you know, the Vacation Rental Rental industry is like about 9 billion, which is like a six. I think it’s like a 6% of the whole hotel travel industry, but you’re saying 9 billion is just

 

05:53:04

The military

 

05:53:05

Government,

 

05:53:05

Military. Wow. Government at large. So when they do conferences and when they go to these different meetings, we have like 4,600 agencies that make up the government and they all travel across the world. When I did the numbers and said much is spent on hotels just for lodging was can’t be a B like now with a B, and then broke down. The numbers is about 4.4 in the United States. I was like, oh my God. Why, why am I taking so long that, that if I can do anything different, I would’ve got moving much, sooner, much faster with the, the booking platform.

 

05:53:43

Yeah. You, you guys are onto something. You got, you guys got my gears turning now taking direct book because you know, this show we’re, we’re also focused on just the, the operations and the scaling of the business. But we’re not thinking about the other side, which is direct booking. And, and, you know, because Airbnb, it takes up a lot, but we’re what you guys are doing is you’re looking at these creative ways. I, I love it. I think you guys are, are onto something.

 

05:54:06

What we’re doing is we wanna work with as many hosts as possible, like yourself and others that are near like federal, like you’re in DC. So like, you’re like, we can’t wait till you start listening on, on site. Right. Because we’re gonna be able to give you better daily rate for your average daily rate. Cause we’re using the perdium metrics and we’re tying into like, we’re trying, we’re not trying, but we’re, we’re making sure that when you list with us, the bank is worth it. Right. You’re gonna be like, wow, I list here for like 50. I can list here for whatever percentage more and still get people who are not gonna my house. Right. And goal Julian. What?

 

05:54:59

Awesome. Awesome. Yeah. I love it. You know, I, I think it’s cool supporting, supporting other military people. It’s it’s, you know, and where, where, where do you guys see short mentals going in the future? I mean, you guys are working with the government, which is, you know, a little prehistoric, so, but where do, where do you guys see it going?

 

05:55:14

So I it’s, it’s going, it’s not going anywhere. It it’s, it’s the same thing as Uber and Lyft industry to the taxi industry. It’s, it’s just the way that it is. And I think a key indicator was, you know, when Vacation rentals first started getting popular, you know, here at the, the beginning of the, the teen years, you saw the hotels lobbying against it and like, oh my God, we gotta get rid of this. They’re lobbying against it. Now all of a you’re Marriott Vacation, Rental Vacation Rental whatever’s key a like was me I that indicator of like, okay. They, they finally realized that they’re not gonna win this battle and they need to start changing their ways. So I don’t think it’s going anywhere. I think it’s just gonna be the way people travel. Obviously, Anthony has a phenomenal story, you know, like he has a wife and five kids and, you know, six kids, sorry, he’s just a rabbit over there.

 

05:56:18

He, you know, he was told by the government that all he could get was a one bedroom hotel. Like how does that doesn’t make any sense? Why would you do that? So people wanna be able to buy a Vacation Rental and cook their own food, you know, not eat for kids. That’s not living room for them to watch TV in, instead of all being crammed into one, four by four square room, you know? And it, you know, especially with the, the military and all that stuff, like the military, while they’re not doing any type of Vacation travel, they’re not stopping moving. So right now it’s like coronavirus and everybody else that are, you know, Vacation coming to a halt, people aren’t traveling for pleasure right now, the military’s still moving the military still. And summer is a huge move, move time. So most of the moving happens for the military in the, in the summer. So we’re actually gonna take advantage of that and go to a bunch of property managers and be like, look, we can fill all those cancellations for you. You know, we’ll give somebody, we’ll give you somebody that’s, that’s gonna be a good, responsible that’s gonna as opposed.

 

05:57:30

That’s awesome.

 

05:57:33

Yeah. You said a lot. That was

 

05:57:36

That’s. I got I like, just he’s that nothing got nothing left. Well, last, last, last, last questions here. What, what, what question would you have, or would you ask the next professional host, maybe someone that is in a similar place than you, or maybe someone that that’s at that next level, or, you know, even, even kind of specific to you guys, like in direct booking side, like how, how, how are other people building it or whatever, whatever question you might have, what would that be?

 

05:58:01

I would ask them why they doing it, right. I’m always asking them why behind the things, like, if it’s for money it’s okay. I get it. But the, this is a lot of work, like doing the management aspect of it and guest relations and making sure that you’re like, what’s that host, you have Greg

 

05:58:23

Super host.

 

05:58:24

Super host. Yeah. Yeah. See, I’m not that great at that part, right. To be a super host is a lot. I argue with Greg every day about having to buy bottles of wine. He’s like, it’s super host. That’s what we do. I was like, all I’ll buy wine, but I don’t think people should be getting wine. They don’t get hotel. Yeah. So, you know, why do, why do you do it? You have to really like this. You gotta want, you gotta be passionate about me. Passion is Vacation. What’s Rental Rental around been have rental term short for around for a very long time. There was a baby born in the short term rental in the manger. Right. He had to go get

05:59:21

Jesus was in short term rental guess

 

05:59:27

That’s was the OG for the

05:59:29

Short term rental,

 

05:59:34

Like just we’ve to like, what’s be in the community to be in the home. Hotels are too, neither one are going away. Cause you have people who wanna do different things with different styles. So I just think that more people just gotta realize it’s here to stay and it’s, and, and it saves money. It’s comfortable, but for the next guest, why you doing it? And if you are doing it for the right reasons and, and, and it makes sense we wanna work with you.

 

06:00:01

And my, my question would, would be really, how are you doing your marketing? Because like I said, we haven’t really done a whole lot of marketing. It’s all been just word of mouth and talking to people like you. And so I am notoriously bad at social media marketing. Anthony makes fun of me for it all the time. Cuz he’s like a much better at it, but really that’s a realm that I’m just not super good in. And so that would be kind of my main question, you know, what are you doing to market yourself? How are you getting, how are you getting new leads? You know, that aren’t just organic leads, you know? So that’s, that would be my question.

 

06:00:45

Awesome. Awesome. Well thank, thank you so much guys for jumping on here. I think, I think it’s just so cool. I love, I love just talking with all these people. You, you guys have such an interesting story. It’s really, you know, it’s really real. You guys are military guys that are helping other military people managing other military properties. You guys are, you know, really, really hard for the military and I love it. So I’m gonna include down below all the links, PCs at ease. Also for those of you that are interested myself and hopefully Anthony and Greg are gonna be at this thing called veterans live, which is just for military people. This is other people can come, civilians can come, but it’s, it’s catered towards military veterans. If you’re looking to get into anything about real estate, whether that’s wholesaling buying holds, fix and flips, I’m actually gonna be talking.

 

06:01:34

I’m gonna be talking about the short term rental side, talking about, you know, Rental arbitrage and cohosting, and, and introducing military people to that aspect. But if you just wanna be with other military people, it’s a, it’s a event that’s gonna all the proceeds go to charities. So the speakers are gonna be choosing which charities it’s gonna be going to all, all military charities, their favorite ones. And so it’s it, you know, come, come join us, go to veterans, live.com. I’m gonna include a link down below for that. Hopefully I can see all, all the military people that are listening to this at there as well. Cause I know we, we have a few of them. Absolutely. All right. Well thank you guys. And until next time, host nation, keep on hosting. Hope you host benefited from the show. If you found value, please going over to iTunes, leave us a review and let us know what you enjoy about the show. If you like to talk to host that have been featured in these episodes, as well as the community, going over to our Facebook group, the host nation.