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Show Summary
In this episode of the Real Estate Pros Podcast, Joe Rohne shares his journey from entrepreneur to successful property manager and real estate investor. He discusses his initial foray into real estate through purchasing a preschool, his transition into short-term rentals, and the strategies he employs to manage properties remotely. Joe emphasizes the importance of data-driven decisions in real estate investing and shares insights on property design and management. He also provides valuable time management tips and highlights the significance of understanding the short-term rental market as a realtor.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Joe Rohne (00:00)
So the biggest thing with short-term rentals is the cash flow, right? I mean, there’s a lot of different ways in real estate investing and you know.Long-term rentals in today’s markets a little bit tougher because the prices are high the interest rates are high and you know a good deal You might be able to cash flow two or three hundred dollars a month Maybe four or or five hundred a month if you’re lucky We’re in the short-term rental game. We’re cash flowing two three four five thousand dollars a month My most recent purchase
and
have a net income of about $30,000 to $35,000. So right at about a 20 % cash on cash return. And it’s one of the few investment categories right now that you can still hit those kind of numbers.
Kristen Knapp (02:08)
Welcome back to the Real Estate Pros Podcast. I’m Kristen and I’m here with Joe Rohne, who is very busy. He is a property manager, investor, realtor. He heads up the Savvy Emerald Coast Group and he also has a mastermind called the Co-host Collective Mastermind. So we’re going to get into a lot of different areas of real estate. I’m excited to have you here, Joe.Joe Rohne (02:26)
Awesome, thanks for having me. I’m glad to be here.Kristen Knapp (02:28)
Yes, so let’s get to the beginning. You’ve obviously really diversified yourself within the real estate community. How did you fall in love with it to begin with?Joe Rohne (02:36)
I always knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur.years ago bought a preschool. That’s how we actually got into entrepreneur is we and we didn’t just buy the business we bought the land we bought the building.
You know, the whole works and that was like our first major real estate purchase. Um, it took a little while longer to be able to jump into the real estate investing side. That didn’t actually happen until about 2022. Um, I had been a realtor, uh, for about six years or five years before that. And I knew I wanted to get into real estate investing. didn’t know what avenue I did. I wanted to go in. So I was listening to podcasts and reading books and, uh, doing audible books and anything I could to just digest as much information I could. And.
I realized short term rentals is the avenue I wanted to go and when we decided to go all in, we went all in.
Kristen Knapp (03:19)
That’s amazing. So you bought this preschool to kind of get started. What it I feel like that’s a very big first project.Joe Rohne (03:26)
It is, took, you we did what everyone tells you not to do. We took all of our eggs and put them all in one basket, you know, took out all the equity of our house, our 401ks, any savings we had. We were mid-twenties and said, we want to own a preschool. And my wife had been running one for a long time and we put everything we possibly had into it. 18 years later, it’s still running really, really well. And we have about a one year waiting list for almost every classroom. So.Kristen Knapp (03:50)
That’s so impressive. So your wife had experience in it, so that’s awesome. And it’s great to have your first project go well. I feel like that can deter a lot of people if it doesn’t go well.Joe Rohne (03:54)
Yes. ⁓Yes, very much.
Kristen Knapp (04:01)
So, you know, now you’re kind of into the short-term rentals game. What is that? What about it do you like? What is the opportunity there for people?Joe Rohne (04:09)
So the biggest thing with short-term rentals is the cash flow, right? I mean, there’s a lot of different ways in real estate investing and you know.Long-term rentals in today’s markets a little bit tougher because the prices are high the interest rates are high and you know a good deal You might be able to cash flow two or three hundred dollars a month Maybe four or or five hundred a month if you’re lucky We’re in the short-term rental game. We’re cash flowing two three four five thousand dollars a month My most recent purchase
that I own is a four bedroom four bath with an in-ground pool that we bought for about 745 and we’re gonna do right around a hundred and forty thousand dollars
and
have a net income of about $30,000 to $35,000. So right at about a 20 % cash on cash return. And it’s one of the few investment categories right now that you can still hit those kind of
Kristen Knapp (05:43)
That’s amazing and you’re in very good area for short termrentals, correct?
Joe Rohne (05:47)
I am so we chose Panama City Beach and I chose the Emerald Coast for a couple reasons.coast is a regional drivable destination. So when you think about what are some opportunities down the road that we could have, know, economic downturn or, or, you know, recession, any of those types of things. Well, if you’re in a flyable market, you’re going to have a bigger negative impact in a market that you have to fly to, but in an area where 70 plus percent of our guests are driving, they may not go on vacation for seven nights. They may only go on three or four nights. And even this year when nationwide travel, I think I’ve read a report that it’s down about
12 % nationwide as far as travel this year. My properties all but one are up more than 10 % over the year before.
Kristen Knapp (06:28)
Wow. And that, mean, we talked a little before and you said you’re going to relocate there, but for the most part you’ve been doing this essentially remotely, correct?Joe Rohne (06:37)
Yeah, yeah, we, my wife and I actually reside in the St. Louis area. I’ve lived here my whole life. That’s where our preschool is. But when we wanted to invest in short-term rentals, we wanted to be in a traditional vacation room market. Now there are people that invest in suburban short-term rentals and urban STRs and all of those numbers can work.They just weren’t for us. We wanted to be in a vacation rental market and it’s about a 10, 11 hour drive for us to get to the beach. And I also, there’s also a ⁓ local airline here that I can get there pretty quickly for about 150 bucks. So we really, really like being in the Ambrod coast and that’s where we decided to invest.
Kristen Knapp (07:12)
That’s incredible. I mean, it seems like that was a great investment if you guys are up 10 % when travel is down. And talk more about managing these properties remotely for someone who’s wanting to kind of invest in an area that they don’t reside in themselves. What are kind of the hardships of it? What are the lessons you’ve learned?Joe Rohne (07:30)
Yeah, I mean, if you really think about vacation rental management over the last 30 years, it wasn’t really until the new technology came out, you it used to be you buy a house at the beach.And you have to go to a local property manager who’s going to have people there all the time and you pay them 15, 20, 25 percent, whatever it may be, because you don’t have the technology. And today I manage a total of 14 properties between the ones we either own or co-host. And they’re all well away from where I live. But I can manage everything from my phone, you know, everything from guest communication to scheduling the cleaners, local
handyman, any maintenance, everything is at the tip of my fingers and I don’t have to actually be there. Now that I do go visit my properties regularly, usually every couple months, I do put my hands on them and see them because there’s things that happen and I still want to make sure that we have a high quality product all the time, but I do rely on my local boots on the ground and they do a really phenomenal job.
Kristen Knapp (08:32)
Amazing. yeah, so property management is another area that you’re very skilled in and you’ve been able to scale. talk more about getting into that aspect of it.Joe Rohne (08:40)
Yeah, I mean, if you really think about it, it kind of went hand in hand. bought our first, actually we bought two short terminals back in 2022. Did one with just my wife and I, and then I had a business partner that wanted to buy one that didn’t really know the business very well. So he asked if I’d partner with them. So we ended up buying two back in early 2022 and I started managing them right away from afar.And I realized I was outperforming the market. Like within the six months, most people said a two bedroom, bath would max about $30,000, maybe 35. I ended up doing over $65,000 in my two bedroom, two bath. And I was able to do that because I’m managing on a daily basis. I’m managing the revenue management. was handling the guest communication, making sure we’re getting all five star reviews and these big property management companies, they’re great. But when you have a hundred, 200, 300 properties, how are
managing your property and your revenue management. So we were able to outpace the competition really quickly and started kind of jumping into what we call co-hosting which is a similar you know basically it’s property management but typically on a little bit lower scale and we started managing for some other owners and going in there and helping them perform at a very high level.
Kristen Knapp (10:25)
That’s amazing. Yeah, I agree with you. think that a more boutique approach can provide people with better service. mean, property management, it’s not really a one size fits all thing where you can just automate it.Joe Rohne (10:38)
Yep, it isn’t. And my wife and I, are very selective. So one of the things we actually do, my wife’s a designer, so we require.anyone that wants us to manage their properties for us to be able to go in and redesign and make their property stand out. Right. We only want to have what we call super properties. We only want to have the best of the best because those are the ones that are going to be able to perform at a higher level. And I’ll give an example. I have two houses side by side. We redesigned one next door. They’re both identical five bedroom, five and a half bath, in-ground pool, hot tub, and the local property manager on the property next to us, which is identical. Their design was pretty subpar. They did about $102,000.
we did 220 with the identical property by going in and doing a new design, getting really awesome photos, and making that property stand out. We made that owner over $100,000 more than their next door neighbor.
Kristen Knapp (11:27)
Wow, that’s incredible. And what are some of the design tricks that you’ve learned that really help?Joe Rohne (11:33)
My favorite word is scroll stopping photos, right?see that scroll stopping photo and say, ooh.
Look at that, I wanna see it’s more than that. And then as they go through your photos, you need to have really great design and great pictures. And we’re doing wallpaper murals in every bedroom, or doing some kind of like what you see behind me with wood and dark walls. We’re adding sunsets to pictures. We’re even doing lifestyle photos. So we’ll actually have actors, families come into our photos that go into our Airbnb and VRBO listings of them actually playing golf
the little putting green in the backyard or jumping into the pool or sitting in their bunk bed read a book and when you can tell that story and you’re creating that experience for someone your property is going to perform at a much higher level than the one that has just average photos.
Kristen Knapp (12:23)
Absolutely, mean, it’s really, it’s true that the extra care goes a long way. I mean, it’s the same way you would treat a house that you’re selling. So it’s the same similar concept for sure. And so you are also a part of, on top of all of this, you’re a part of a savvy STR group and you’re heading up the Emerald Coast group. Tell us more about getting your real estate license and how did that start?Joe Rohne (12:32)
Yes.Yeah.
Yeah, so I became a realtor back in Saint Louis back before pre COVID is when I got my license and at the time I I owned a lawn landscape business. You know just that I was doing on the side making a little extra money, but I wanted to get into real estate. I got my license in Saint Louis and.
You know, I got it because I wanted to get into real estate investing, but in the beginning I was just helping, you know, homeowners, some investors find some long-term rentals here in St. Louis. I was helping friends and family buy and sell some properties and it just kind of slowly grew. But when I bought my short-term rental in Panama City beach, what I realized is there were very few real estate agents that truly understand it short-term short-term numbers, you know, and if you own a property and you manage a property in a market, it,
Kristen Knapp (13:28)
Yeah.Joe Rohne (13:33)
Makes you much more of an expert. So if I figured out if I get my license there as well I can help investors actually truly understand how to run short-term rentals help them get their boots on the ground and make a big impact and That’s the reason why I ended up getting my license in Florida and then about a year ago I joined the savvy STR agents team, which is a nationwide team mostly in vacation real markets where we have Specific agents that they all own or manage in their markets as well and it gives us that competitive advantageto be able to take our clients and help them find good cash flowing properties.
Kristen Knapp (14:48)
Amazing. And what are some things that you find, because you mentioned that you really know the short-term game and that helps you as a realtor, what do some realtors miss? And what do they not understand about short-terms that can end up hurting someone who’s trying to invest?Joe Rohne (15:04)
So.Data is probably number one, right? I mean, there’s a ton of different data platforms, but most real estate agents don’t actually dig into the data. They’ll just call the local property manager and say, hey, what do you think this property can do? And then they’ll go tell their client, hey, they say it’s going to do this. Or they’ll go into one of these free calculators and type in the address and it’ll take all the averages of 500 properties around there and say, we think it’ll do this. We actually dig, I’m sorry, we dig into the data and say, okay, what are the top five properties doing?
And you can actually go to data sites like AirDNA or STRIQ and it is paid for data. you know, we do pay high dollar for that, but it will give us real time data on what type of revenue those types, those top properties are doing. So then we can say, okay, well, if this property is doing $200,000 and you know, the very similar property is listed for 1 million, let’s just say a million dollars. You know, we’re talking about a 20 % plus growth or 50 % growth.
ROI, is ridiculous numbers. Let’s run that, put it into a pro forum, put it into a spreadsheet, run the numbers to make sure all the numbers make sense. You know, what’s the real insurance? What’s the utility cost? What’s if there is an HOA, what does that cost look like? And make sure that whatever investor we’re working with, that we’re able to, you know, meet the goals they’re looking for. And every investor is different. Some are looking for that 20 % ROI, but in the Emerald Coast, some people are just looking for that second home loan that they can stay in five or six times a year.
and they’re just happy it pays for itself. So we just got to figure out what that investor is looking for and see if we can find a property that meets their needs.
Kristen Knapp (16:39)
Amazing, and you really can handle the whole end-to-end process of this. You really understand everything and you’re very involved in all of it.Joe Rohne (16:47)
Yeah, I think it’s what gives us ⁓ a big advantage in helping these clients. I’ve sold almost $18 million worth of short-term rentals just since January of this year.And, and it’s been a lot of clients that have found some really great properties. And I really, really enjoy it. I truly want to try to put investors in a position to be successful. You know, as they say, you can only lead a horse to water. You can’t make them drink it. You know, I’m not, I do not manage properties for any real estate clients. Those are completely separate businesses. If a real estate client says, Hey, I want you to sell me a property and I want you to design and manage it. I have people I refer for that. I want to keep those completely separate. I want to be able to focus on that client.
for whatever is they’re looking for and help them meet that goal.
Kristen Knapp (17:28)
That’s cool. I mean, that’s cool that you’re able to really focus like that so things don’t get jumbled up. And so you have so much.Joe Rohne (17:35)
Yeah, it’s really easy for someone tosay, I have the one size fits all. Come see.
you know, with one client and way too many things. And then if something goes wrong, there’s only one person to blame, right? And I would much rather, you know, put that person and I really want most people to self-manage, right? Cause if they can self-manage the property, they’re going to make the most amount of money. And I have some training videos and things that I’ve done for my clients to teach them what I do in self-managing. So they are set up for that success.
Kristen Knapp (17:45)
right.Wow, and so yeah, you have so much going on. You have the investment side, have the property management, and now you have this team under you. What are some of your tricks of time management? How do you keep everything organized?
Joe Rohne (18:16)
I definitely use a planner every single day. You know, obviously I have my Google calendar for my, do have an executive assistant. So she helped schedule all the meetings and keep me straight on my Google calendar, helped stay in my email. But then each morning, well, you know, on every Sunday, my wife and I sit down and we write out, what does our week look like? Right. And I couldn’t do it without my wife. She’s, know, my backbone, she’s amazing. And we sit down and write out, okay, what, what are our tasks that we got to complete? And then we write it out for the day. So.this
morning before I started my day or I actually did last night. said, okay, from seven to seven 30, I’m working on this and from seven 30 date 30, it’s this. And so every hour is kind of mapped out now. Of course things come up and things change. And that’s why I don’t write out every day for the week. But at the end of the day, I take 30 minutes and say, okay, I got all this done. This is on tomorrow. I need to make adjustments because I didn’t get these things done and let’s plan out the next day. And without that daily planner, I I’ll be honest. If I don’t write that out, that’s my
biggest opportunity I get really scatterbrained because I have a thousand things going on and I’m trying to do it all and ⁓ you know it’s really important to stay focused.
Kristen Knapp (19:23)
Yeah, it’s easy for things to slip through the cracks when everything feels like a priority, especially.Joe Rohne (19:28)
It is, it is, and it’s easy to say, okay, I’m doing this, but then something else comes up and I actually use the Grant Cardone 10x Planner, if anyone’s ever used that before, but it gives you that hour by hour breakdown and it really works for me.Kristen Knapp (19:41)
That’s a great resource. So just to kind of wrap this up, what would be a piece of advice that you wish you learned earlier in your career that you can share with us?Joe Rohne (19:50)
Um, you know, my very first short-term rental, uh, actually my first two that I bought back in 2022, they made money, but they weren’t home runs. And I at that time didn’t understand.how the data really worked and how to really underwrite it the best way possible. And the agent that I was working with definitely was not an expert in that area. So we did a little bit more of buying based on our gut feeling instead of the data. And I wish, you know, my newest property we did strictly on the data. And the newest property is going to get us that 20 plus percent cash on cash return, where the first one were, you know, not bad investments, but I’ll be honest,
Kristen Knapp (20:20)
Yeah.Joe Rohne (20:29)
There’s a lot of people that have done what we did and weren’t as fortunate as we did, and they made bad investments. And they went out and bought a property wrong. They overpaid for it. They didn’t do the design that they wanted. They didn’t, you know, and then they wanted to hire a property manager. And then they come to us later and say, how do I fix this? I’m losing $50,000 a year. Well, unfortunately, at that point, it’s really hard to reinvent the wheel. you know, buying right upfront is by far the most important thing that you can do. And you’ve got to have a data driven decision, notKristen Knapp (20:46)
Yeah.Joe Rohne (20:57)
just your feelings.Kristen Knapp (20:59)
And what kind of data are you looking at?Where do you source it?
Joe Rohne (21:03)
So AirDNA, STRIQ, are two, DataRabu is another one. They are short-term rental data sites that you can go in and find specific properties and look at what kind of revenue they’re doing, what kind of average daily rate. We also have some information in the dynamic pricing tool that I use called PriceLabs, and I’m able to get some data in there as well. And then some of it now because I am managing a dozen propertiesthe Florida Panhandle. I data from from real stuff t I’ve been managing for the now don’t need to neces as much because I have rea I’m the trends, I’ it’s slow, when it’s that property that did $2 get $1800 in july, but I next week for $325 a
time of year. It’s a slower time of year where July is peak season. So a lot of people say, don’t want to drop $1,000 night. And then they sit empty all winter long because if you can rent a beachfront house for less than your two blocks from the beach, then those people are going to rent the beachfront house, you know, or the hotels that are, you know, on the beach and cheaper. So you got to be competitive.
Kristen Knapp (22:17)
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it’s good advice to really look at the data and it’s like great that you have all of these tools at your access. I feel like that makes you such a good partner to work with.Joe Rohne (22:26)
Yeah, having that, mean, and we’re partners with all of those data websites. When investors go to those data websites and are looking in our areas, they actually get our information, right, from some of those data centers to be able to connect directly with me or whatever market they’re looking in. We have agents in Asheville, North Carolina, and Northeast Florida, and South Florida, and…know, pigeon forage and, you know, all the Branson. So we have agents all over in these vacation rental markets. So depending on what market you’re interested in, you know, you’re going to get, can get hooked up with a savvy agent in that area, which is great. because at the end of the day, every market is investible. If you can find, you know, a friend of mine calls it the moat. If you can find the, that unique property or that specific niche, that’s going to be the most successful. you can, you can do really, really well.
Kristen Knapp (23:13)
Amazing. Well, thank you so much. You’ve given everybody such good insight and good advice. So tell everyone where to find you.Joe Rohne (23:19)
Yeah, you can schedule a call with me at savvy.realty. I am ⁓ very, very active on social media. Joe Rohne, R-O-H-N-E. You can find me on either Facebook or Instagram. No special, you know, anything else. I’m usually out in the forums. Very, very active in those areas as well.Kristen Knapp (23:38)
Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Joe. I really appreciate it.Joe Rohne (23:41)
Awesome, thank you so much for having me today.Kristen Knapp (23:43)
And thank you to everyone for listening. I hope that you learned a lot and we will see you back next time.
