Special Ops Pilot Creates a Niche STR Business in His Hometown

0:00So so Jason served as a pilot in one of the most if not the most elite Aviation unit in the world the 160th operation Special Operations unit also known as the nightstalkers so if you can imagine if you're not familiar with the military if there's ever a complex and Dangerous Mission most likely happening in the middle of the night that's why they're called the nightstalkers these are the guys that are responsible for getting the Special Forces guys and teams into to those situations and out of those situations safely so so that's where his background is and then since leaving the military he continued to serve by flying medac missions for his local hospital in Cotter Arkansas where where he's from and just retired from that a couple

0:48Months ago right I have I'm actually still part-time right now so not fully retired but I'm I'm part-time pretty close to being completely done though nice and and at the same time he was the head of the Planning Commission and also the president of the Chamber of Commerce and if all that wasn't enough the primary reason that he's been on this show is because he and his wife Cammy had and and their daughter have built an awesome Boutique short-term rental business in his hometown and just to give you an idea you know last time we did this interview he was in a church that ironically he attended as a as a child and had been abandoned had been abandoned since then but he bought it and it just

1:36Completed rehabing the whole place and turning it into this awesome Boutique short-term rental BNB so we got a tour of that on the last episode which I thought was like maybe a year ago and then I looked back and it was episode I think 78 back in 2021 so you know here we are in 2024 and time flies by pretty quickly but he he has a a wealth of knowledge when it comes to short-term rentals and building a a really cool short-term rental business and so I think there's going to be a a lot of advice and takeaways from this and then also even though it sounds like the guy never sleeps he's in the process of running for the Arkansas House of Representatives to represent his district so he's right in the middle of that race

2:25As well and the primary is coming up on that in just a couple months so lots to talk about but feel free to fill in anything that I might have missed no great great job Kirby it was it was it was an awesome career like you tons of great memories in in the military my last 10 years as you mentioned with with 160th and I just had a wonderful time there a great great group of folks that you're working with and great Mission so just really exciting that was where I transitioned and so I had the opportunity to to learn a lot through my transition and that's when I ended up coming back home to Cotter as you mentioned and was able to land an awesome job flying medac or with one of the companies here aavac and

3:14It was at our local hospital just up the road so it was only about 45 minutes and as I began that accidental real estate investment which I say it was accidental because it really was you know how it started was just needed a place to live and then that turned into tons and tons of learning which then turned into tons and tons of growing and that we grew really fast we scaled but how we were able to do it was because of systems and processes that I know you are are really familiar with as well you got to make a scalable and sellable business whether you want to sell it or not it's not really a business it's a hobby unless you turn it into a business and we were dead set on turning it into a business you know from long ago once we started down that road it was a smart hardest thing we could ever do not saying that everything was

4:02Perfect we learned a ton we made a ton of mistakes but we we had a blast while we're doing it even though sometimes it was stressful and and we really did we created a little business that was a boutique vacation rental business that ended up having by the time we were finished with it and I don't say we're finishing right now but by the time we were finished with that iteration we had eight vacation rentals of our own and we had had about seven or eight more that we were managing for other people because along the way we people saw what we were doing they loved it they wanted help with theirs and and so then we started growing that side of the business and we just put our systems and process in place like I said it was just it was organic growth but it was really exponential and it was a crazy ride and we we had a blast

4:51We really did nice so nice that's awesome and just to give people perspective then of what what your portfolio looks like of those eight that you own what what type of properties are those you bet so we the one that we started with the one that we bought a place to turn into a house was a 4,000 foot fourplex when we bought it it was an apartment building there was a fourplex but like I told you back then it was just shy of being a crack house so it was a a full gut renovation I was still actually in the Army when we bought it you know the plan was to turn it into a Triplex we were going to live upstairs turning two apartments into one and then having two apartments downstairs one of which was going to be a rental the other was going to be from my mother-in-law and then we were Building a garage there

5:39And then that's where I really started learning so that was the first one that's how we got our name for our company because when we peel back the the layers of that building we found that it had a ton of architecture and down below it it said Potter block well up above but down below all those layers that we peeled off said Potter block and there's a ton of history there of where that name came from but that became our company name Potter block.com and from there we grew picked up another single family home after that little three-bedroom one bath that was across from my father's house and the house that I grew up in and then we fixed that one up put that one you know out there as a rental we ended up picking up a couple other houses along the way as well that needed fix up fixing up various levels of of

6:28Of rehab was needed on certain ones some were more than others and then the church popped up that was another one that we got and then somewhere along the line in the middle of all that we bought the hotel which back then it was livable there was a couple rooms that were livable so we did have our daughter living in one room we rented out two other rooms to people that just needed a place to stay and the main thing we were really using that building for was we had renovated the laundry room and so all of our rentals all all of the laundry went right back into that laundry room and then we had a storage room renovated as well so we we created an awesome process and system that was able to allowed us to turn our properties really easily and streamline with our cleaning team so we had a mixture like I said of mostly

7:17Single family homes a couple of the apartments and then the church which was a larger one five bedrooms two and a half bath so that's where we were when we spoke last so that puts us kind of up to date from the last time we spoke yeah yeah yeah and that's I love that that concept too of of using the laundry and storage facility you know turning a building into a multi-usage you know it's obviously it's making you money as as a hotel but then you can use it as you know a need for a need that to fill a need that you that you have as well which kind of what I'm doing in the building I'm standing in right now you know I turn this Barn into an office space we have storage next to store for all the Airbnb stuff and my kids trampoline in there which they love my

8:05Wife shop out here got a Airbnb in one corner a gym in one corner so it it's I I love multi-use spaces like that because you can get so much value out of it it is yeah so so go ahead go well I was just going to say so our the hotel it was a great spot for that you know with that multiple use is it wasn't in great shape so it didn't look like anything great on the outside didn't it didn't look like anything great on the inside but we needed to get you know finished with a couple other smaller projects before we really started digging deep on the hotel because we knew once we started on that it was going to be huge it was going to be a big project and and we'll get to talking about it here in a little bit too but that one is now we are near the Finish Line we

8:54Have floors and Final Trim and that's really about it our floor guy has to come in and do his part and then our plumbers got to come in and do the top up but that's that's really about it and then that one will be finally finished so yeah yeah and and when we spoke in 2001 I mean that was back when the world was still a little covid crazy and the market was very different at the time and so what's been some of the biggest changes since we last spoke like is there anything you're doing differently now than than you did back then so great great question and I and I tell people this and it was something that I learned you know through my transition was be prepared to Pivot you know be prepared to Pivot because changes happen things happen you know

9:42Just like you said during covid there was the market was nuts sometimes it was just like a Feeding Frenzy you know out here and elsewhere as well but for me everything that we always did the numbers that I crunched in any project that we were picking up I knew that I was putting it online as a short-term rental but I what I did was my kind of my back stop was if I had to turn it into a longterm I wanted to make sure that it would always work and so every one of my projects we always did we always looked at it on the lens of this is what we're going to have as a short term but this is what we will do if we need to as a long term and I never really had an idea of like you know why I would turn into a longterm because I was we were really enjoying the short-term rental space and we still do but but we did we did pivot and pivoted for a couple different reasons

10:31There's there's a lot that went into the the decision to Pivot and I think I do I definitely say that God had a had a peace in it as well because I think that we don't always know all of the story until we kind of get to peel back a layer of an onion for that as well so we had kind of made the decision LifeWise that we were going to scale back a little bit and so one of those reasons that we or one of those things we decided to do is we're were going to turn some of our short term into longterm which was going to allow us a few things was going to allow us a stabilized income less work I unlike Kirby Kirby was able to one of the pro systems that he put in place long time ago was he had somebody else take care of a lot of the stuff that we continue to do and we were continuing to do it because we financially

11:19Really couldn't jump forward and have them done and I think it was really because of so many ongoing projects that we were in the middle of that we were self-funding had we brought in other funding and brought in you know investors or something else we could have we could have done the same thing easily and we could have just continue to scale and grow like that but we chose to you know financially it made made sense to stabilize the income and then the other was time it gave me a huge chunk of my time back with with turning some of our shortterm into long term the timing was perfect as well and this was another reason we were we were looking at doing it I was getting calls multiple calls in a day people needing a long-term rental there was so many short-term rentals in our area I would say it probably 4X

12:09Here for the number of of rental shortterm that were available from the time I started we still had the market on being the best I mean we were and still are you know the desired homes because of what we offer but there was still just like anything else Supply demand it's going to change things for you so the amount of money we were bringing in not that it was ever about money anyway but the amount that we were bringing in on those short-term rentals was not far off of what a long-term rental would bring in anyway and so I I looked at it like if I turn these to a long-term rental but a good quality long-term rental and actually offered them as a allinclusive so the long-term rental I gave people options you know just depending on when I found the the right renter then that right renter I have one renter

12:57That actually has it fully firm furnished the rest of them wanted it you know empty they brought their own things but they also have one check they pay me and it's got their electric their water their gas even their Wi-Fi so they love that and so it's an all-inclusive rental and as I mentioned the timing piece so because there was a huge demand for long-term rentals the renter you know profile was very robust so I was actually able to grab I would say the cream of the crop and and so I was not I didn't have to jump you know really fast to try to grab somebody to rent a place I could really vet them and find the right person and so that's exactly what we did we put the right renters in the right spot kind of like Jim Collins I don't know if you ever read the book good to Great putting the right person the right seat of the bus is

13:45Exactly what we did with this this business model so what we did was we turned ours another piece that we we kind of pushed back on and and hold up a hand if I talk too much too Kirby but another thing that we did was and it was really the time piece we gave back every rental that we were managing so we went from and I know that you never actually went and took other people's rentals you only did your own portfolio and I understood why like after we were doing it for a while it was kind of like man we're doing a great job and we're the best people to do this and I wish I could hire somebody that would do this for me because it's worth every penny but that's what we did we we let people know and they were they were sad to see us go but understood and some of them went with a larger company and

14:34Some of those that had gone with a larger company have left that company because they were really unhappy with how they were treated and others have just kind of tried to do themselves and then and yet others actually just decided to sell it because it it just wasn't worth it for them to mess with it anymore and I did advise them along the way but I told him you know I we just main thing is time the time piece is why we're not going to take care of anybody else's anymore so we're only going to do our portfolio which is where we're at now I put on on the market and filled six of our eight so we have total of eight currently vacation or eight rentals six of which are now long-term and then the other two are shortterm the church that you mentioned before it never made sense for us to turn that into a long term so that's still a shortterm and then our little garage renovation that that's next to

15:22Our old house that it was a garage that we built but turned into a little rental it's a very cute little single studio apartment that also stays right now as a as a short term but I do have people that come in and stay for quite a while in there just because they really like it so again we went you know took eight rentals six of them shortterm or six of them went to long-term two to shortterm and then now now the hotel's just about finished which will add 12 short-term rentals but it's a little bit different so it's it's and we'll talk about that here I'll take I'll take a break in a breather and let you ask questions and stuff I know I rambl I love all of that all that is so good and and the fact that this is why I like having these conversations is because they're they're honest conversations

16:11And it's it's the way actual operators are operating and in considerations that people have and and moves they're making you know I just attended last week this imn short-term rental conference and it's it's mostly like big funds and institutional investors and that sort of thing and you know that it's so different than the boots on the ground actual operators because from that perspective of of a fund they're just looking at a spreadsheet and it's like they're just going to do the thing that eeks out the the highest return but when you're you're operating your own business it's great to be able to Pivot it's great to be able to you know you can make money so many different ways in rentals in general and

16:59Short-term rentals and long-term rentals and so I'm a huge proponent of what you just talked about making sure it works as a long-term rental first and foremost so that you could pivot to a long-term rental or furnish long-term rental or a medium-term rental or so many different options as opposed to just looking through the lens of high-end vacation rental in the most competitive areas where people gravitate toward and that's the only thing you could ever use it toward or use it for so so there's so many different ways to make money in this business that's it's it's great to hear that you're you're able to change it to suit your lifestyle because that's that's what it's all about like this is the whole reason you get into this business is to support the lifestyle that that you want and

17:48So so that's that's awesome and great renters you brought up I mean from a long-term rental perspective in my opinion having owned a lot of long-term rentals in the past that is the one thing that makes or breaks a rental portfolio and and I think being able at to screen and see that okay there's this huge demand I can pick the cream of the crop now it's probably not super management intensive from that standpoint because you have great renters in place and so that's another great point that you brought up so so all that is is wonderful so I I'm always interested then to hear like when you first started this what was your what

18:36Was your vision for what you wanted to get out of it like what what did you what was your goal at that point and then after getting into the business and doing this and learning lessons learned and having these experiences how is that evolved to to what your vision is today great question and that's that's one that you know we all have to look at at and you know as I've said early on accidental real estate investor that's that's definitely what I say that I am because we didn't have this huge vision of let's create a company let's create a bunch of rentals let's you know do this or do that I literally was retiring from the Army took a job with arac which was a great job and was fixing up a place to live in and then was going to have one little apartment which

19:24I thought was great because then I was going to have a little residual income and that was when I started to watch podcasts like yours listen to see what's going on there was you know Bigger Pockets and you know tons of other forums I started reading voraciously I was grabbing you know constantly getting new books because and I was literally learning because of that one apartment you know because I saw that as well hey I want to maximize my revenue on that and I I know that there's benefits because of taxes and so you know i' I'd look into you know books that would tell me about taxes and that's when I started to to see well hey if one does this then I picked up that little three-bedroom one bath it's like okay well now two does this and then my mother-in-law didn't move downstairs you know she had

20:13To live upstairs with us so now I had two apartments to rent downstairs so it's like okay well now I have three that was when it really started kind of hitting me when we went from having one apartment to the to three everything I was reading in the books and everything I was like you know this is leaning towards a financial security for my family you know I mean our family we were at that point already our kids were gone you know out of the house as far as you know they're they're grown we don't have any any young kids so it's just my wife and I but I mean we still I think okay we started looking at like well we could have Financial stability and security where we have a retirement from the Army and then we have you know homes will be getting paid for by renters or whatever that looks like at that point and so that's when we really started to

21:01Make a goal of okay let's make a realistic goal and let's set an let's set a long-term goal because this isn't a get-rich quick scheme by any stretch you know that and anybody that's in it for at least a little bit understands that real estate is not get rich quick most of the time it is you know buy real estate and weight and but we did start really looking at it from that lens of okay what do we look like 20 years now you know we could be 60 years old or 50 or whatever and and no longer working and and so that dream of leaving the arac job was always out there for me it was it was it was hard because it was great money coming in and so I hated to give it up because I I knew we wanted to continue to grow but I really the time away from my wife

21:49And the time you know work week on week off I I wanted to give that up because it wasn't much different than what we had left in the military for so many years so our goal was always you know spending time together Cammy and I my wife and I we've been married for 27 years now and and we just we still are best friends and we love spending time together and that's what I wanted to do is get us to a point where we could you know go visit grandkids whenever they do come and we and we can't you know or we wouldn't be stuck doing something and we have that U that Fe Freedom financially as well as time and that was really our goal and so how it really changed was just opportunity if opportunity arose and it made sense then I would add that opportunity into our portfolio and just continue to grow

22:39With that with that in mind of eventually we will have that Financial Security and stability as well as time freedom and and that that goal has never changed if you look at my calendar you'd probably argue and say you have no freedom of time but it's all about how you use that time so we do we do have some time Freedom we do yeah and and with that in mind like with that being the goal how do you evaluate opportunity now when it comes comes your way yeah and it's you know now I still kind of look at them all from the same lens that I did before number one that that 1% rule which I know we've talked about before and you you've heard about before I still use that as kind of like a really

23:27Quick broad stroke right now I would definitely say I'm not on I'm not in acquisition mode and I've told that to my family for a long time however even a while back I did pick up a a property and it was just because it was it worked out it made sense right now though it's got to really really make sense because now I'm really looking from the lens of time not necessarily just money it's also time I might be able to put the money together or borrow money or whatever and you know everything would work out but it's about okay what is it going to take away from me TimeWise in order to get it done and and so I really have buckled down on what I will accept and what I won't and not being you know out hammering and looking for anything is very relaxing actually you know because there's plenty of other things that I've got that'll take my time but

24:16Not you know evaluating properties constantly you know that's one that I that I'm not doing so that's that's kind of a nice a nice thing that I get to enjoy oh