Why Experiential Hospitality Is the Next Big Real Estate Opportunity

Garrett Brown (00:00)
You know, like one of my favorite quotes is you can’t fail until you quit. And I just never quit. like that was just the one mind frame I had is just like, I’m gonna figure this out. And and I hope people listening to this have a similar mind frame because it’s gonna get hard. You’re gonna make mistakes. Like the if this was easy, everybody would be real estate multi-millionaires by now. But this and even in the past few years, it has gotten tougher. And I don’t sugarcoat that for anybody, but real estate is one of the tried and true forms of building real wealth.

Cody Crabb (02:00)
Welcome back to the Real Estate Pros podcast by Investor Fuel. I’m your host, Cody Crabb, and today I’ve got Garrett Brown with me. Garrett is a real estate investor, hospitality entrepreneur, and the short-term rental expert at BiggerPockets. He’s built a business around experiential hospitality from glamping resorts to boutique hotels, and today we are gonna dive into why he believes that’s where the future of hospitality investing is headed. Garrett, thank you so much for hopping on today.

Garrett Brown (02:26)
thank you so much for having me, Cody. I’m excited. Anytime we’re talking short term rentals and hospitality world, I I definitely get up in the morning for that kind of talk. So I’m I’m ready to get going.

Cody Crabb (02:35)
For sure, for sure. And may I say, my eyebrows certainly went up when I saw the BiggerPockets associated with you, because that excites me quite a bit. BiggerPockets is a huge deal. We hear about them all the time on our show. That’s how people get into stuff. So excited to hear your story and how you kind of came to be where you are. So why don’t you give us a little peek into that? You mentioned that you did not start out like…

It wasn’t one of those stories of like, yeah, three generations of real estate. Your story was pretty different than that.

Garrett Brown (03:04)
Yeah. No, I so about ten years ago I was I was doing music actually and I wasn’t making a ton of ton of money. so I always had a creative background, but financially it wasn’t my favorite thing. And my mom one day told me she was like, You should like get you know, she’s like, I wish I would have I started being a real estate agent forever ago and then I got away from it and she was a teacher and things. and she’s like, You should give it a shot and I was like, Okay, I can balance that with music. So I started real estate investing. I hated or started real estate being an agent.

I hated being an agent. I’m not a salesperson. I’m not just like I was good at it because I put my mind to it, but it’s just something I didn’t like. But then I met an investor one day and he was like, Hey, you ever worked with real estate investors before? And I was like, Sure, of course I have. I’d never worked with one, mind you. so I get online and I’m searching and I find BiggerPockets. This was like twenty sixteen and I like, this is really cool, like a free resource to learn about investing.

Man, I just dove into it and I learned so many things on BiggerPockets and just working with investors like trial by fire basically. A hundred percent. And so, I I saw a lot of the money was being I was being an agent for investors and I saw a lot of the money was being made for them and I was like, I need to give it my own shot. So we started trying to fix and flip houses. We were doing buy and hold. I was, trying to bird dog deals basically to, not wholesale ’cause had my license, but

Cody Crabb (04:02)
Rubs off on you, yeah.

Garrett Brown (04:21)
I was doing anything I could and I’d have some wins and some losses. I made ten thousand dollars on a flip and then I lost, thirty thousand on a flip. and so I was like, all right, I need to do something different. And I had an investor I was working with. He was selling three condos. they were really cheap, like sixty thousand a piece. This was twenty nineteen. It was in an okay area of Houston, but it was near my my my townhouse that I was living in.

But it was also at a time on Airbnb where you could put a a futon up and a and you had a microwave and you probably were making two or three grand a month pretty

Cody Crabb (04:51)
Yeah,

I remember I remember those days that was when I first found out about it and was like you could rent a room in Vegas for $25. That’s awesome. Yeah

Garrett Brown (04:58)
Yeah, it was it was an amazing revelation to me because I was like, okay, this is way better than, six hundred dollars long term rental. I was I was both all each unit was making like two two grand a month, basically. But then we all know what happened in twenty twenty. COVID came and all the institution for a couple months it just shut down and then all the institutional money came and then it was just a race to the bottom in price. And at that point I wasn’t making any money. It was a bunch of work. I was like, I gotta do something different.

And that’s when I was on YouTube University just searching around and I started hearing about this thing glamping, right? Like unique, unique nature hospitality and all this stuff. And I was like, that sounds kind of cool. Like I’m crazy enough to give it a shot, you know? And I’m I try to I think I’m creative in my head for my music days. And so I sold the condos, sold my townhouse, bought a little piece of land and with a house on it, and I started say the money I took from those sales, I started putting it into

that property. I did what’s called land hacking. It’s something I have kind of coined where it’s similar to house hacking, but instead of buying a house and sharing rooms, I bought land and then I built units on it that now I could use as rental. So I kind of, land hacked that portion. And that was my I built my first dome, my geodesic dome, which I love it. I would never build another, but it was a great way to start. And I’ve learned

Cody Crabb (07:03)
call for that, holy cow. I don’t even want to get into that. That sounds like a nightmare.

Garrett Brown (07:07)
Lot a lot of YouTube. I d YouTube is it’s it’s amazing what is on YouTube and Google when you d when you search deep into the interwebs. But but yeah, no, since then we have grown to twenty plus units. We have three resorts, we’re building our first boutique hotel. we gross revenue about one point five million every year with, you know, a a take home of about, you know, twenty to thirty percent profit margins there. but I have a whole team business. I still work a full time job at BiggerPockets, while running my business and

You know, I c my my my margins could be even better, but I actually like my job, so I don’t mind, you know, hiring more people over there so that way I can continue to try my best to educate the short term rental world in the BiggerPockets ecosphere and and on here alike.

Cody Crabb (07:50)
Yeah, yeah, that’s incredible. I mean, looking back, do you think, what do you think was the biggest thing that you kind of got right when you kind of made this jump to being all in on the hospitality stuff?

Garrett Brown (08:02)
I I really think I just saw the writing on the wall that people were like, what differentiates you? You know, I saw supply getting high and everybody had the same three bedroom, two bath house with the same Highland cow picture from Marshall’s or something, you know, hanging on the wall. And I’m sure you ha every Airbnb has them, mind you. and so I was like, you know what? And like I’ll just be honest, like I just took a big risk. Like I saw like I saw the data.

Cody Crabb (08:18)
was like, all right, I’m sure.

Garrett Brown (08:28)
My my I was trusting my gut. I saw an opportunity and I I took a risk. Like I moved an hour outside of Houston. I stopped doing music as much. I sold, you know, like, but at the same time, the biggest rewards come with the biggest risk, you know, and that’s that’s commercial real estate in general. Now, you know, I always say short term rentals are kind of the gateway drug to boutique hotels or buying a business or something like that. And like now that I’ve gotten so far in it, like I genuinely see that like

Commercial real estate is where true wealth is built. I love good residential real estate. Like obviously I am team BiggerPockets and buy and hold and fix and flip and all that, you know, forever. But I genuinely like my passion now is in commercial real estate, leaning to the hospitality side because it’s just I genuinely think that’s like one of few ways that somebody can control their wealth building as opposed to, you know, relying on comparables in the area and you know what, you know, what

electricity rates are doing and stuff like that. So

Cody Crabb (09:27)
Well, let’s dig into that a little bit. What do you feel like you get in a commercial sense that you can’t get in a residential sense?

Garrett Brown (09:33)
Because you can control it’s commercial real estate is one of the only ones that you can truly like the more you drive the net operating income, the higher valued that property it is. Like you can, you know, you could put a new fridge inside a single family home. You can add a new AC unit, right? But like you’re only like and you might be able to bump the rent that you get by fifty dollars a month, right? But it’s still in the end, the you know, when a pray when you go to sell the house.

Even on short term rentals, like I’m a huge short term rental person, obviously. But I tell people like people think, say, my short term rental made $200,000 a year. I can sell it for two times what the other one, what the other houses do. And it’s like, no, that’s not how loans and lenders work. Like they’re gonna get an appraisal and they’re gonna do the comparables in the area. Yeah. And and you know, you’re only you’re you’re kind of at the mercy of that. But with commercial real estate, if I, you know, even at like I just bought it like

What we’re converting right now is an RV park that’s on seller financing and we’re turning it into a boutique hotel. But at the same time, one, there’s a lot of opportunities for creative financing with commercial real estate, more than residential. But now, like I can go sell bags of ice at my store. I can sell firewall. Anything I sell that makes more money, my business is is it’s more profitable to when I want to sell it down the line. And I like having control over my asset.

More than being at the, you know, beckin’ beckin’ whim of everybody in the nearby area. So I d it’s just truly such a way that you can control what the value is and it’s I there’s no other forms of real estate that I’ve seen that can compare to that.

Cody Crabb (11:44)
Yeah, and that makes a lot of sense the way you explain it. mean, is it, are there ways that, it seems like it’s so much more adaptable. like, there’s only so much you can do to do value add to residential and stuff, but as soon as you get into commercial, like you said, you could start selling stuff on site, you could start doing a million things to bring.

Garrett Brown (12:03)
Whatever

you want to do. That’s the coolest part. Like even with the boutique hotel we’re we’re, you know, you know, that I mentioned that we’re working on, like, we’re gonna have dog grooming on site, right? Like at and like and you don’t get that at many hotels and things, but at the same time, that is a major revenue driver that we’re gonna have for the company. And then we could if say, you know, say the hotel side gets a little slow for some reason, or during the winter, like we can go, all right, let’s focus on getting our dog grooming

po p you know, arm of it even higher because like that’s an easy opportunity angle there. And we we just never run out of cool ways that we can make more money, which is music to my ears when I think about real estate.

Cody Crabb (12:41)
It sounds like, if I’m hearing you right, you’re saying investors should stop thinking so much like landlords and more like a business owner.

Garrett Brown (12:49)
I think so. I it you know, and and we you know, we talk about this all the time with all my colleagues at BiggerPockets because every you know, there it’s more of a traditional real estate investing style is what it’s kinda known for. But the cool thing about real estate is there’s so many avenues that you can try until you find the one that works for you. Like, yes, I’m an advocate for like thinking big, economies of scale, commercial real estate, but that might not fit your lifestyle, who whoever’s listening or watching this. So

And you could be you can take the journey of me where it’s like, try a lot of things and you’re gonna find what you like. You’re gonna fail at a couple of them, you’ll get a couple wins. But I tried every form of real estate investing under the sun. And it took me eight or nine years before I was finally like, man, like I think I’m pretty good at this glamping thing, you know? And so I like I it all depends on your lifestyle, but I do s like if you think big like I do and you’re an entrepreneurial spirit, like it definitely takes that on on any side, like

I would I would always push you towards the commercial real estate side now, but at this point, just get in and start. Whatever you feel like, just just get your feet in the fire and get going. It’s my best advice.

Cody Crabb (13:58)
Yeah, so let’s talk a little bit about kind of your first introduction. What were some of the first steps you took? mean, our listeners are literally in the exact same position. If they haven’t started yet, they’re literally listening to a podcast trying to learn more about real estate. Tell me about kind of some of the first steps you took to make that first jump.

Garrett Brown (15:00)
first jump in like we’re like my investing journey in general or like

Cody Crabb (15:05)
Well, would say the investing in general because I feel like going from not that to that is way bigger and more diverse for a lot of people

Garrett Brown (15:12)
So

it it goes back to like, man, I just said yes to a lot of things when I was an agent. And you know, I I start with this conversation all the time where I had a and I still to this day don’t know how this guy found me. I was a brand new agent. His name was Juan, I’ll never forget it. he’s I get an email and he goes, Hey, do you work with investors? Right is when I was and he like, I’m from Mexico, I just moved to Houston. I like we flip houses, blah, blah, blah. Like, you know, said this whole thing, and I was like

He’s like, do you want to meet for coffee and talk about this? Like he could have been a serial killer. I don’t know. Like, you know, like maybe not my best advice. But I said yes. I met the guy for coffee. We never did a deal. I think we talked maybe one more time after that. But it started my passion for like, all right, there’s a bigger thing out there besides being an agent. But so and so then, you know, I was working with a few people. Like we’re I went to go see a house in a in a in my hometown, which is like thirty minutes away from Houston.

Cody Crabb (15:55)
What is going on?

Garrett Brown (16:04)
I went to go see it with a buyer. We saw it. But then when was leaving, I saw a sign that said for sale by owner. Right. And I was like, you know what? And this wasn’t my first time I called for sale by owners. Again, I was an agent, so I was I was banging the phones a good bit. but I saw the sign and I was like, I’m gonna call ’cause the worst, like maybe I can list the house or, you know, I maybe maybe this would be my first fixin’ flip, right? And I called that person and and I was sitting outside their house and it they answered and they were like, Yeah, like yeah, I’m here right now. If you wanna check out the house, it’s

You know, it’s a fixer upper, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, cool, I’ll check it out. So I went and looked at the house. They wanted a hundred and fifteen thousand dollars. And I was like, and it was in decent shape. And I was like, okay. And I went on and I knew the area decently. And so I went online though to look at the comparables. And I was like, man, like it looks like it could sell for like 230 if I put, you know, like 50 grand into it. And you know, I’d learn all these things from BiggerPockets. And I was like, all right, let me give it a shot. So I went to the guy, and I’ll never forget this. He wanted, I he said one at one.

one fifteen. And I went to him, I was like, Hey, I’ll give you I’ll give you one ten. And he was like, No, I want one fifteen. And I remember I was being like and I, you know, it was in my head and my ego, like, no man, I need to get it for one ten. I need to win this. And then I’d I thought about it and I was like, Am I gonna give up like a chance to make like fifty grand for like five? And then I ended up being like, All right, I’ma do it. So then we closed on it. Lending it was it went fine. We put about fifty K into it, all in. We were about one eighty with

you know, everything under it. We sold it for about $240, I think. and it so it was a it was a freaking win, right? And I was like awesome. I was like, I’m the fix and flip king. I’ll be on HGTV next week, right? I thought it was coming, but then my next flip, we we did all this due diligence. I even started doing some repair, big learning lesson for me. Cause I it was a family friend that gave me the deal. I thought everything was going. I was doing all this stuff. It’s probably spent

Cody Crabb (17:43)
The Garrett Brown Show,

Garrett Brown (17:58)
10 or 15 grand. And this property was going to make us like 50 grand if we closed it. Right as we got to and I spent all my brain power and time and I’m sure I missed other deals. Well, right until we got to the end, a long lost brother comes out of nowhere and claims the title or like a portion of the title. It was an inherited house. And so the deal unraveled. So I lost like hard money or not hard money, you know, like in out of pocket 10 grand probably. But then from a

Opportunity cost fifty, sixty, seventy grand or something.

Cody Crabb (18:29)
Not to mention where you were at. That definitely seemed like way more to you at that point for sure.

Garrett Brown (18:34)
So

much. You know, I had just started and it was pretty much all the profits. Well, I didn’t get all my profits wiped away from that first deal, but it was very discouraging. But I was like, Hey, I I can either keep trying or like maybe I need to try another form of real estate. So that’s when I started focusing a little more on some buy and holds. I had a couple like I bought a little quadplex. I was living in one, you know, I was house hacking some of it. That was pretty good. And then I ended up selling that, going to another like I kept this trying different forms of real estate at that point.

And at the end, I finally get, you know, my my my investor, one of the investors I started working with early gave me the opportunity to buy those condos. And that started me off on my Airbnb journey. But I’d been renting those condos for him for like five years for like six hundred dollars a piece. And I wasn’t barely making any I’m you know, you get fifty percent commission. But it was the fact that I kept saying yes and like just expanding my network and like I’d get dis very discouraged, but I would never

Give up.

You know, like one of my favorite quotes is you can’t fail until you quit. And I just never quit. You know, like that was just the one mind frame I had is just like, I’m gonna figure this out. And and I hope people listening to this have a similar mind frame because it’s gonna get hard. You’re gonna make mistakes. Like the if this was easy, everybody would be real estate multi-millionaires by now. But this and even in the past few years, it has gotten tougher. And I don’t sugarcoat that for anybody, but real estate is one of the tried and true forms of building real wealth.

you know, commercial and residential side. And so just do not get discouraged. Just keep hammering away and find that that piece of real estate investing that truly like, you know, it invigorates you to wake up in the morning and make it happen. And that’s gonna lead you further than all, you know, anything else I can tell you. Like I could tell you about data, statistics, and ways to be a better landlord and all this time blue in the face. But the only way to to make it happen is to go out there, take a couple lumps and realize that the road is winding to get to the

The goals that you’re trying to get to.

Cody Crabb (20:29)
Yeah, very well put, very well put. So I would love to hear a little more about, you you talk about glamping. It’s a concept that I think just about everyone is familiar with in principle. It’s not, I wouldn’t say it’s probably, it’s not necessarily available everywhere, I would assume. It depends on the location, but I would love for you to kind of talk about what that looks like, what the kind of model that you’ve settled with kind of looks like too, because this is one of those things that like,

People haven’t even considered this a lot of times, I’d say.

Garrett Brown (21:01)
Yeah, it’s th when I first started down the path and and this is something I advise anybody that any form of real estate, but I want you to think like ten if you’re developing a project or thinking about anything like I want you to think ten years ahead of like where you would want your you know, your property to be, your life, your goals, all that stuff. Yeah. And then start working your way back because you’re going to be building and developing you know, this site and maybe more sites for a like

to a to a resort style feel over time. It’s gotta have like a a boutique hotel feel to it where it runs kind of like a hotel, but kind of has similarities to a short term rental, you know, where it’s easy check-in and all that kind of stuff too. Because the thing the mistake I made was when I first got into it, I was like, cool, I’m just gonna throw up a Geodome and hope it rents and I’m sure it’s gonna rent and then I’ll just figure it out from after there. And you know, like you have to have a little bit of a crazy mentality to like

think you know to like do this anyways, but I wish I would have started with like what would what is my piece of property going to look like 10 years from now? Because you’re essentially building out a boot you’re building out a boutique hotel, like a boot landscape hotel, I’ve heard people call them before too. and so you need to be thinking of like every aspect that goes into that and have the vision of like what the major one is. But you even if you just want to buy a piece of land, have a house on it that you live in because you like

being you know in a more rural area and you have a couple units in the back and you really are like, hey, I don’t want to develop some multi-million dollar site, that’s still a really good way to pretty much, A, get some really cool land, get, you know, get have a probably a pretty cool little house. And then you have a business on your piece of property that’s probably paying your mortgage down, probably probably making good amount of cash flow. So there’s different avenues, but if you you want to do it in my mindset,

You really need to be thinking about what that property looks like fully developed and then slowly work your way back because this is like, I believe, the new age style of boutique hotels or hospitality investing. There’s a reason why Marriott is investing in this type of stuff. There’s a reason Disney is investing in this, Hilton, all these people, because they see the writing on the wall and the data is saying that I think sixty-five percent of Gen Z travelers have said that they when they book

They are looking for things that are like an experience or very unique style stays. And I’m sure that’s just gonna keep going up, especially with, you know, the the AI waves and all these things coming, like connection with humans and nature and all that. It’s not going anywhere anytime soon. It’s gonna be more valuable than ever, I believe. And yeah. And and it’s just a new way to do commercial real estate that hasn’t been, you know, that the the institutional money isn’t there yet. It’s slowly getting there, but it’s not like a self-storage where it’s like

All the all the big boys put money in self storage now because it’s super easy returns. R V parks and glamping and all that, it still takes some effort, so us little guys still have a good shot of, you know, like getting it and making doing some damage and then when the institutional money comes they can buy us out and we can go from there. So

Cody Crabb (24:06)
Gotcha, thank you. This breakdown is really fascinating to me. I would be curious to know, you said that a lot of it is based on the experience. Now, when you’re talking experience, you’re not just saying the experience of glamping. You’re not talking about just staying in the location is the experience. What other things are added? And we can also bring in, you mentioned your other project that has a lot going on in this arena.

What other stuff is there to kind of add to the experience?

Garrett Brown (24:34)
So my main lamping company is Cameron Ranch Glamping, the one that we have about 20 units. And we’ve built those to be basically romantic couples getaways. And so every facet of these stays are built to feel that way. We have the private saunas, we have the private hot tubs, we have you know, like we have different like masseuse packages you can add on. We have like romantic pack, like all these things that are catered to romantic couples getaways.

Like, does everybody that come out there, are they a rom is it a romantic couple getaway? Not necessarily, but a vast majority are. And the reason we have developed such a known brand in Texas is because we know we we didn’t if you market to everybody, you market to no one, right? Especially in a sea of like this where it’s you know, at first, you know, five years ago when we started, we were very like health and wellness, this is all about health and wellness, because we were kind of early into that.

But now when you blink your eyes, every day there’s a new health and wellness place popping up everywhere. So like we have truly leaned into like the human connection and our and our marketing speaks to that. Our branding speaks to that. All the little de like we provide big comfy robes inside of every unit. Like every single detail is truly catered to our guest avatar. And when we talk about the boutique hotel we’re building.

It’s another one where it’s like the concept is, you know, dog first luxury nature hotel, where instead of being pet friendly, like we are building this for the dogs and their humans to come. And there’s not I haven’t seen much like it around, but we’re speaking to one audience, right? Like we’re not trying to go, Hey, everybody, we got cool places on the lake. And it’s like, is it for families? Is it for couples? Is it for girls’ trips? Is it for like the business traveler? Like, what is it for? But like

If you can talk if you can figure out what what the market you’re in is craving from a demand standpoint for an audience, that is always like a key to truly making like a successful model. Again, my you do not if you market to every person, nobody is gonna care about your property. But if you can can pick a pick a niche where it’s not super small, where you don’t have enough like people coming out, but a big enough one, you know.

Pet friendly is huge. You can steal my ideas. I didn’t I didn’t come up with these things. you know, couples are huge, like big family escapes. Like I know some places that crush it and all they build is big barndominiums with like, you know, the play the game rooms in it and all this stuff. And they and they crush it because they are designed for like big family events and they’re charging five hundred five thousand dollars a night and stuff, you know, and they’re yeah, they’re booked 60% of the of the year, you know. So you just gotta figure out your niche.

And what is demanded in that market and and come up with something that fits that and you can crush it. You know, it’s it’s definitely available.

Cody Crabb (27:19)
and especially in the terms of what you’re talking about because you’re saying too, the glamping stuff, this could be anywhere. That’s really interesting because some things can only be built certain places. This is one of those things that sounds you could pretty much sneak in just about anywhere and you’d find a crowd that would be kind of local to it as well.

Garrett Brown (27:42)
I have a

I have a rule called the sixty thirty ten rule to find to make sure you’re gonna be in an area that has a chance. Sixty is sixty minutes from a major metro hub, one million plus people basically, more bonus points if you’re near more cities. 30 minutes from some type of state, regional, or national attraction. because that means people are constantly going out there. You know, bone national parks are obviously better, but they’re more expensive. So state parks get a lot of repeat visitors. so that way you have

Two different forms of guests, people going out there to the attractions and people inside those metro hubs that you can say, Hey, come out the city and get it and have a getaway. And then the 10 is ten minutes from civilization, gas station, Dollar General, something like that. Because otherwise, like good luck getting cleaners, good luck getting handy people, good luck getting packages, like all this stuff logistically. And if you can hit those rules pretty close, you know, like I think my place is about seventy minutes ish, you know, depending how fast you drive from Houston.

But if you can hit those, you have a good shot with glamping. And there’s a lot of other aspects to it, and that’s like a quick and dirty way to frame it. But if you check check mark some of those, you have a shot. I can definitely say that.

Cody Crabb (28:49)
I love that, that’s super clear, because I think sometimes when you put it in terms of how I even begin to imagine that, that really kind of gives you like a, well, it’s this far away, but it also isn’t that close to this, and yeah, I like that. What’s something you believe about hospitality investing that you think a lot of real estate people,

won’t agree with for a few years. Like it’s not necessarily true yet, but you think it’s going to be.

Garrett Brown (29:14)
I I it’s kind of like a a a two sided thing a little bit ’cause it’s like I was gonna say, you know, with AI, it’s you know, ex hospitality is not going anywhere because this is one of the few human interactions I think is powerful. But I will say that the investors or the people that are not utilizing AI as a tool that it should be are gonna get left behind pretty quickly. And I guarantee you my company if is probably already making that progress fast.

far past a lot of people ’cause I I like to say our company is like human led but AI assisted. Our a we use a ton of AI tools. The one thing we don’t outsource on AI is we still have a ton of assistants and managers that are doing phone calls and dealing with the guest and all that. Like there’s guests still want to know that there’s somebody on the other end of the line. Like I call it a a digital hug, like when they’re calling about like

Hey, what hey, what’s the Wi-Fi? And it’s like, we’ve told you 20 times, there’s literally a placard in there, but they just want to know somebody’s on the other side. And that’s gonna get even more prevalent as AI becomes, you know, more prevalent as well. But I do truly believe the people that are against figuring out how to adopt AI into their business and use it as a tool are gonna get left behind pretty substantially in a few different ways. but

But the you know, the other side of that too is the people that lean too far into AI are gonna crash and burn in hospitality. There’s gonna be a very fine suite space between both sides of it and and I’m hoping at, you know, both of my properties that we we’re able to kind of pioneer something that truly helps everybody. Customers, guests, I mean, you know, guests, employees and you know, the the people that are hopefully making the profits. So

Cody Crabb (30:57)
I think I heard it explained one time as so picture the internet right like you we see it as this daily thing that we use constantly There was one time where nobody had it at all It was just something you don’t have and so if there’s just picture how things could go wrong if you Leans too hard on the internet or not enough on the internet. That’s a that’s a really great way to frame it. Yes well, so this has been a super valuable episode you’ve given us like

10 individual things that I’m like, that right there would have been worth the whole episode. So thank you for joining us. So you’ve given us a lot to think about today. If somebody wants to kind of dip their toe into this world, what would you recommend? Should they do something, reach out to someone, to you? mean, I’d be curious to know.

Garrett Brown (31:44)
I’ll give a shameless plug. I did write a book for BiggerPockets called The Glamping Investor. that’s about it’s like $9.99. It’s less than a Chipotle burrito. So I believe it, you know, it might have more value than a Chipotle burrito. So I would start there. I even though Yeah. I was I was gonna say I’m hungry right now at lunch, so Chipotle burrito does sound valuable. But I would start there, but then you know, I have a channel at BiggerPockets called Bigger Stays. It’s on a YouTube, it covers all things short term rentals. We teach it all for free there.

Cody Crabb (31:58)
Probably.

Garrett Brown (32:12)
[email protected]. Anybody can send me an email. I’m always happy to chat, you know, and and help as many hosts as possible and investors as possible in the short term rental world or in any side of real estate investing. And yeah, @garrettbrownre Real Estate is my Instagram, TikTok, all that stuff too for personal. And yeah, feel free to reach out to me anytime and I’m happy to help and happy to keep pushing the the the short term rental world ahead.

Cody Crabb (32:37)
Fantastic. Garrett Brown breaks it down. I really appreciate you. Hey, podcast title, you can have that for free. Well, thanks so much for your time today. And listeners, thank you as well. Make sure you catch another episode if you liked this one, and we’ll see you next time.

Garrett Brown (32:43)
I like that.