RG 335 – The Real Hidden Gems: Luxury Short-Term Rentals with Dr. Rachel Grainsbrugh

What it’s like managing a demanding W-2 job and a full-blown rental business? How can you create a unique experience for your short-term guests that will give you an advantage over the traditional hotel stay?

Dr. Rachel Grainsbrugh and her husband ground through their early careers, paying off hundreds of thousands of dollars in student loans and raising five dogs. Then, she realized that sticking with her W-2 alone won’t be sustainable in the long run—and the rest is history.

Today, she owns and manages 18 luxury short-term rental properties, all while raising a family and managing a full-time career. What’s her secret sauce? How did she get started in real estate with no prior experience? How does she leverage her resources to only have to work on her rental business for 2 hours a week?

Interested in becoming an Investor with Reed? Click here to join his Investor email list.

In this week’s episode, Dr. Grainsbrugh gives us a crash course on creating unique, short-term luxury rentals based on her own experiences as an investor and business owner. Whether you’re set on creating an Airbnb or still on the fence, Dr. Grainsbrugh has some essential insights to share with you.

Key Takeaways

• Leveraging your W-2 income and history can help you start investing.

• It takes a long, long time to learn about investing and transition from a W-2 into full-time real estate investing.

• Curating a unique experience for your Airbnb guests can create an edge against hotels.

• When you’re not in the top 5 or 10%, you’re going to be competing with everyone, including bargain shoppers.

LINKS
https://www.shorttermgems.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-rachel-gainsbrugh/

Be Bold, Be Brave and Go Give Life a Crack!

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Reed Goossens (00:00):

Good day Good day guys. Now, before we dive into today’s show, I want you to let you know that some of you may be aware that over the past eight years, I have built a substantial multi-family real estate portfolio here in the US worth over half a billion dollars. And in that time, my passive investors have received fantastic double digit returns. And now you too can invest directly into my deals for as little as $50,000. So if you’re an interested investor, head over to reedgoossens.com to find out more. That’s reedgoossens.com. Now, back into the show,

Rachel Grainsbrugh (00:41):

A lot of people are actually encountering some issues with, uh, a low occupancy rate and a lot of vacancy because they’re in either a market that’s not gonna be traveled to, or they, they pigeonhole their properties in a way that they are in that middle tier. And so, let me explain that. If you’re not the top 5%, if you’re not the top 10%, you’re gonna be competing with everyone. And not only are you competing with everyone, you’re competing with bargain shoppers. I’m a bargain shopper. There’s nothing wrong with that, I wanna deal. But when you’re the top tier, a lot of those folks are still traveling. A lot of those folks, they seem to not be, um, impacted by the inflation. It’s, it’s a conversation between you with a top tier property and these individuals with top tier finances.

Speaker 3 (01:48):

Welcome to investing in the us, a podcast for real estate investors, business owners, and aspiring entrepreneurs looking to break into the US market. Join Reid as he interviews go-getters, risk takers, and the best in the business about their journey towards financial freedom and the sheer joy of creating something from nothing.

Reed Goossens (02:08):

Good day Good day, a ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to another cracking edition of investing in the US Podcast from Los Angeles. I’m your host, Reed Goossens. Good as always, Debbie with us on the show now. I’m glad that you’ve all tuned into it. Learn from my incredible guests, and each and every one of them are the cream of the crop here in the United States when it comes to real estate investing, business investing, and entrepreneurship. Each show I try and tease out their incredible stories of how they have successfully created their businesses here in the us, how they’ve created financial freedom, massive amounts of cash flow, and ultimately created extraordinary lives for themselves and their families. Life by design, as I like to say. Hopefully these guests will inspire all of my cracking listeners, which are you guys to get off the couch and go and take massive amounts of action.

Reed Goossens (02:56):

If these guys can do it, so can you. Now, as you know, I’m all about sharing the knowledge with my loyal listeners, which is you guys, and there’s absolutely no BS on this show, just straight into the nuts and bolts. Now, if you do like this show, the easiest way to give back is to give us a review on iTunes, and you can follow me on Facebook and Twitter by searching at Reed Goossens. You can find the show wherever you podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud, Stitcher, and Google Play. But you can also find these episodes up on my YouTube channel. So head over to reedgoossens.com, Click on the video link, and it’ll take you to the video recordings of these podcasts where you can see my ugly mug, but the beautiful faces of my guests each and every week. All right, enough outta me. Let’s get cracking in into today’s show.

Reed Goossens (03:43):

Turn the show of the pleasure of chatting with Rachel Grainsbrugh. Rachel was born in Haiti and then migrated to the United States where she was raised in Miami, Florida. Through a lot of hard work, Rachel became a doctor, but was unfortunately left with over $500,000 in student loans. So she decided to work hard to pay off those loans. And along the way, she discovered Airbnb investing and it became a complete game changer for her because she was able to make 15 times the amount on a short-term rental compared to that of a long-term rental. Now she is a healthcare professional by day and a real estate investor By night, she’s the owner and manager of 18 luxury short-term rentals, with a lucrative cash flowing rental portfolio. She’s a mom, a wife, and to top of the off, she’s actually a real estate coach. So I’m really pumped and excited to share her incredible knowledge with you today. Spread enough outta me. Let’s get her out here. Goodday. Rachel, welcome to the show. How you doing today?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (04:35):

Hey, Reed, I am doing so good. I cannot tell you how honored I am to be here with you today. I just thank you for putting all the energy and effort and putting in years and years and getting this podcast out to the community because it’s information that we all need to hear. I know as a w2 uh, worker, I always look for inspiration and motivation from those podcasts, and so I thank you for being amongst the top ones.

Reed Goossens (05:00):

Hey, what can I do my best? Right. You know, just keep keep, keep grinding and it’ll eventually get there, . Um, but to start the, to start the show, I like to ask all my guests the same question. Rewind the clock and tell me how you made your first of a dollar as a kid.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (05:13):

Yeah, that’s a great question. You know what, I came from Haiti, like you mentioned a little bit earlier, and my mom, she made it a point that she didn’t really want me working, uh, because the stigma was once you start working, you start making a little bit of money. As a kid, you don’t really go all in on your education. So she really wanted me to focus on education and not get pigeonholed into being like a seamstress or something like that, which is what a lot of, you know, those who were my age would get pigeonholed into. But when I was 17, I got my first part-time job and I was a telemarketer. Mm-hmm. So I would call people and try to sell them this insurance product in a box. I lasted two days, I cried and walked home. I got fired. I was so bad at it. ,

Reed Goossens (06:01):

, I know a lot of people who’ve been fired from telemarketing jobs. It sounds like the worst , right? There’s all this, there’s all this promise of making these commissions and you can do really, really well. And it sounds great, particularly as like a student or a uni student or something like that. But yeah, at the end of the day, it’s like, oh God, I gotta sit and and talk to so many people in a call center. That sounds terrible. So, oh,

Rachel Grainsbrugh (06:22):

Yeah. And they hang up on you. They were like, no, if they would talk, that’s one thing, but they would just hang up. They would be angry. I was like, I can’t handle this .

Reed Goossens (06:31):

But I mentioned in the intro, your clearly you, you have a grind or ha a work, sorry, a knack for, for grinding and a hard, uh, work ethic because you became a doctor. Yeah. Walk us through that. You, you’re an immigrant. Parents are immigrants. Clearly this, I’ve had a lot of immigrants on this show. I’m an immigrant myself. I obviously came here a lot older. But, you know, there’s that stigma, what you said earlier of like, you, you’ve gotta be a doctor, a lawyer and engineer. Yes. So what ha did that, was that a big defining, um, sort of elephant in the room as you were growing up, you know, going through education and, and, and starting to flap your own wings?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (07:07):

Absolutely. Absolutely. It was, it was, you know, it was education and a faith. It was a constant reminder, and it was the norm. There were only two careers. There was a doctor, there was nurse, uh, if you wanna go the um, uh, the reading and writing route. There’s attorneys, but there was not much more, you know, so real estate investing was never on the table. We never had conversations about investing in anything, really. It was, you’re gonna punch a clock, you know, and walk into work every day and generate revenue by punching a clock. Uh, and it depends on how far you get go in school, what type of clock that would be. So it was expected of us to excel. And so I went the doctor route. I wanted to do healthcare, specifically a pharmacist. And I, I just, I really, really loved it.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (07:59):

But the student loans debt was, was so burdensome. And eventually between my husband and I, we really grinded it out between the both of us. At one point we had two job, five jobs actually, between the two of us. Wow. You know, just going from hospital to hospital and just working. And so that’s when I realized that that is not sustainable. I can’t do this till I’m 65 years old, you know? And so if when I read Warren Buffett’s comment, um, he has a quote, if you don’t find a way to make money while you sleep, you’ll work until you die. mm-hmm. . And that really struck a chord. And when we realized like we, we had to do something, we wanted to get rid of the debt, but afterwards, you know, what are the next step? Are we going to rely on pensions and social security, or are we going to, you know, create a life that we want and do some of the things that we want? And that came through real estate investing for sure.

Reed Goossens (08:56):

And tell me, just paying off $500,000 in student loans like that is as an, as a non-American myself. Like, I went, I went to uni in Australia where we had, um, hex debt, a higher education, something, something blown, like, I don’t remember what it is, but like, you always hear about the multiple, hundreds of thousands of dollars of debts that the, that Americans, you know, take under. But $500,000, that’s a lot to be burdened with coming straight outta uni. Like how long did it take you to pay that off?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (09:25):

Yeah, that’s a great question. So between my husband and I, we actually, thankfully, um, within a year or two, we really started to generate some good revenue and start to take on that debt. The biggest mistake that I made initially is coming from, you know, a household with n not a lot of, you know, finances. So we couldn’t really talk a lot about financial literacy. There were not, no finances, really . It was small. And then graduating and, you know, being a student, not a lot of finances there. As soon as I completed school and we graduated, um, I thought, wow, the world is my oyster. That was, you know, the thought process. So the first thing I did read was what any intelligent, responsible human being woulddo. I went and got a big car, I got a big house. I put the kids in .

Rachel Grainsbrugh (10:14):

I did. It’s so wrong. And it’s not even funny, you know, so it took, it was a learning curve. I quickly realized that the revenue you expect to generate and you need to take out taxes, you need to take out social security, fica, all of those things. And once you’ve taken those things out, what do you have left? Is it enough to live a, you know, a decent life and really, uh, get those student loans paid off? And it wasn’t mm-hmm. Reed, it wasn’t. We were going through a tough time. It was around 2008. There were a couple of employment issues and crashes. And it took my husband a moment to get his, uh, job going. And so when we really sat down, we looked at the numbers, and he’s more conservative with the numbers than I am. He, you know, he was just very, very stressed.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (11:07):

And I knew at that moment, if I didn’t do something drastic, our marriage would be in jeopardy. Our family would be in jeopardy. So we sold everything, Reid. We sold the car, we sold the house. We moved down from a six bedroom, gigantic house for the, for three of us down to a three bedroom apartment, uh, the square foot from almost 6,000 square feet down to 1300 square feet. And then we took every dime that came above our basic means, and we paid off the student loans, and we were able to get rid of it in about two and a half, three years. Which that’s incredible. Is really incredible compared to, you know, most people, um, you know, will hold onto it for 10, 20 years.

Reed Goossens (11:53):

Yeah. No, that, that, it is incredible. And it’s funny that you say that you came out with the idea that you thought you had to have the big car, the big house keeping up with the Joneses. It’s such a, it, it’s, it’s a, it’s a byproduct of wanting to have everything and thinking that you’re wealthy, but actually you’re not. If that makes sense. Like, yes. Do you think because you’re driving around in a big car, that you are better off? Well, there’s a lot of people who drive around in cars that they can’t afford, right? Yeah. So having, you know, and that goes back to not understanding financial, being financially literate. You know, you just think you wanna, you know, what society tells you to consume, consume, consume. But at the end of the day, you can still be a very, you know, a doctor earning incredible money, but you might be living paycheck to paycheck because you gotta support the $6,000 house.

Reed Goossens (12:38):

You gotta support the two bloody BMWs. You gotta get the kids in the best school. And it’s not about like, living within your means in order to, to, to build up the nest egg to then go out and invest and have, you know, true financial freedom. So talk to me about how you stumbled across the, the, the, the, the real estate investing piece. And because you mentioned 2008, so it’s obviously quite a long time ago. Was it recently that you came across, you know, the discovery of, of real estate investing and wanting to be more financial literate and, and and, and put your money to work?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (13:07):

Yeah. So around, I wanna say 2018 or so, we started to really study it. And so again, listening to podcasts like yours and bigger pockets, and really trying to get a feel of what it means to be an investor, what it means to generate revenue outside of the w2. And so I binge consumed them, and I started to learn. And in 2019, we invested in our very first property. It was a single family home. Uh, initially we thought to ourselves, okay, let’s start off, you know, we had the frugality, we’d bitten the frugality bug. So we tried to go into something that was extremely frugal, but when we looked at the time capital, you know, you have to weigh it out, right? The time capital, the time commitment. Am I better served managing a project, a whole renovation, or am I better served doing a wholesaling strategy, or am I better served clocking into my nine to five, generating a good amount of revenue and, you know, supplying, uh, the, you know, that revenue to purchase property. And so my highest and best use was to stay in my W2 and to, uh, purchase property by leveraging my W2 history and leveraging my W2 income. And so that’s, that’s why we went into that strategy. We, we actually looked at, you know, what is the best way to get into investing to generate revenue? And we looked at cryptocurrency, we didn’t understand any of it. We looked into all the different aspects of real estate. And the only one that really made sense to us, based on the numbers perspective, was Airbnb short-term rental.

Reed Goossens (14:46):

Right. I, what you just said, just there, I think I wanna reiterate for so many people, is that you didn’t go off and shoot the golden goose. Right? And so many people get, they, they, they go to a conference, they read a book, they hear a podcast, they, they just think, oh my God, I’m gonna go and become a real estate investor tomorrow. But my story is, your story is, a lot of people I’ve invested, interviewed on this podcast, it takes a decade or longer, it’s gonna take a long period of time to transition out of a w2. Particularly if you’re earning six figures or more, like I’m sure you are being a doctor salary to replace that income. It’s not gonna happen overnight. And the fact is, you get, you, you kept to keep the roof over your head, the the kids fed in the car full of petrol, so you can’t go shoot that golden goose.

Reed Goossens (15:33):

Yeah. And so many people don’t talk about that balance of trying to manage the entrepreneurial side of them. They’ve got the bug, they want to go and, you know, buy all the deals, but they need to still keep the home base a home, otherwise we’ll be on the street. Uh, I personally, you know, did, did something similar. I, I, I actually was in an engineer and instead of going I really wanted to be, uh, in, in the real estate game, instead of going and quitting and trying to, you know, make with no money, I went and became, uh, a property man, a project manager for a real estate development company here in Los Angeles, continuing to learn the, the game whilst being paid the most amount in the corporate world. And that is just a lesson that I wanna talk, you know, just hit on before we continue that everyone has their own story, but it’s not about quitting the day job tomorrow. It’s about using it as a tool to leverage you into more deals. In the interim, before you get to a point, we can say, I’m at a point where I can go off and quit the w to actually don’t need that anymore. So just wanted to drive that home there for, for, for a lot of people listening. Um, so Airbnbs, tell me about the first one. Why does it, why is it so lucrative for you guys? You, I mentioned 15 x in the introduction mm-hmm. , right? What are you doing differently?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (16:45):

Yeah, so what we’re doing differently is we’re really focused on not just the property or a place to stay. We’re focused on the experience. And so we provide a luxury accommodation. And the best part about modern luxury is that it doesn’t have to break the bank. It’s not the accumulation of things. I don’t know if back where you’re from, Reed used to watch Lifestyle of the Rich and Famous, where we would watch his show and the guy, he had the gold toilets and all, that’s not luxury travel. It’s the individuals wanna connect with nature. So luxury, our luxury is not the same as our parents and grandparents luxury, right? And so how do we curate a stay where they can connect with each other, where they can reconnect with nature as well as, um, connect with, um, you know, have the convenience of the, the space, right?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (17:41):

As, as compared to other accommodations. And so for us, modern luxury has been such a great way to create that X factor in the properties. And again, when I studied it, I realized, wow, it really doesn’t have to break the bank. It’s in the communication. It’s in the connections, and it’s really in the convenience. If you can provide that unique space, unique stay for your guests, it can make all of the, the difference. And, uh, on the side, we also like to purchase, um, bigger homes that are within our budget. Because when you have the larger homes, you can then host a larger group, say, you know, your family, your siblings, adult siblings with their spouses and their children, and then the grands and their, you know, and so on and so forth. So I just counted about four or five paying adult units, you know, that can split that nightly rate and still get a better deal than staying in a hotel. And you’re, you’re thereby able to get those 15 x returns because you’re charging a higher rate, but you have multiple adults that are sharing a space, they’re connecting with each other. You’ve created a, an experience for them to come together. And, um, and it’s just been such a blessing and an honor to, to be able to curate that. Cuz that’s the way I travel, you know, I travel with my siblings and the fact that we’re pet friendly also adds the cherry on top. So Yeah.

Reed Goossens (19:08):

Talk to me about you. You, you mentioned reconnecting with nature. So, and, and design. Um, my wife’s an interior designer. Mm-hmm. , I’m a former structural engineer. I’ve worked a lot with architects, building stuff from scratch. Design is such a, people overlook it so easily and don’t spend any money on it when they’re planning out a project, but yet it’s so cheap in the long run because the return on investment, if you just think about it for 30 seconds and about how you wanna curate a space, it, it makes all the difference and can achieve 15 x. So what are you doing when you say connecting with nature and, and, and how you staging your homes in a way that that creates, that, that x factor to you, what you said earlier, to entice those people to come and think this does feel like luxury.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (19:53):

So yari, that is a great question, and I bring on the professionals for sure. So I have my ideas of things, but like you say, you and your wife, you all are the professionals. I bring them on, let them know what my vision is, and they will come behind me and kind of course correct, which I love. I’ll, I’ll put out these chairs, I’ll put out the sitting in the outdoor, I’ll do a fire pit, like, no too many chairs. We’re gonna break it up. And, you know, they give me some great ideas because that’s their area of expertise. And so outdoor living space is, we can live in the outdoors too. It’s not just indoor living space, but we wanna transition that to the outdoor living spaces, especially when you have breathtaking views. When you’re in an area where there’s a really great, you know, backyard, let’s create a space, you know, and, and create a, a, some intrigue a things Reed, no, no joke.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (20:49):

An inflatable, um, movie screen, right? Something that you can add on as a rental and you’re still generating more, I call that passive revenue in this property that you already have. So although our portfolio has grown, I tell my community and I teach, you know, when I consult, how do I own and operate the fewest number of properties that generates the highest profitability? And that’s how we squeeze the juice out of each property. Outdoor, inflatable, you know, movie theater rental. How fun would that be? You know? So each area has their own personality leveraging that and making the most out of that property. Because we’re not going out and getting 20 math social properties. It’s one at a time, and we can really pour into it and create the systems around it and really make it into something special. So that’s really what’s important to me, and that’s what I really teach, because that’s the X factor right there.

Reed Goossens (21:48):

For those of you who are interested in staying up to date with all the latest happenings in my business, or to learn more about passively investing directly into my multi-family value add deals, then head over to reedgoossens.com and sign up for my monthly newsletter. By signing up, you’ll automatically be notified about my new up and coming investment opportunities. You’ll be able to stay up to date with all the latest real estate news here in the United States and much, much more. So head over to reedgoossens.com and sign up to date now, back into the show. And I think there’s attention to detail at the end of the day, right? You can, you can, to your point, you can make, you can maximize outta one or then just do it mediocre over 10, you know? Right. So, um, gimme in a sense of where these properties are, you know, which states they’re in. Are they on the beach? Are they in the mountains? Are they, you know, in the desert? Like what, what, or do you have all of them ?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (22:44):

Right. So right now it’s a combination. We have mountain and lake houses in the Pocono region. Mm-hmm. of Pennsylvania. We have, um, a beach house that we’re building right now on the Florida panhandle. And we actually have homes in a suburban area in Georgia, outside of the city, uh, where we stumbled upon an, uh, a group of, or rather an avatar that we, we didn’t expect at all. So we have the movie industry here. I know you’re in California, but there’s the Hollywood of the South with, which is Georgia. And it’s been interesting to host a lot of the casting crew, but additionally, we’re hosting what’s called midterm rentals. And midterm rentals are, uh, those who are staying with us for 30 nights, whether it’s cast and crew or, uh, you know, uh, a movie that’s coming out. Uh, so they’re staying 30 nights or more, three months, six months stays. But there’s a, a, an entire demographic of those who are business travelers who are doing that as well for a number of reasons, as well as those who are displaced from their home due to an unfortunate disaster where there’s a national natural disaster or a fallen tree. And those stays are actually paid for by the insurance companies. And those have been really, really, um, just great guests and very lucrative stays as well, because the insurance pockets are deep . Yeah. I hate to put it that way, but it’s the truth.

Reed Goossens (24:16):

Yeah. Are you seeing any kickback or lag because you’re in the space of travel, right? You know, besides the insurance stays, are you seeing anything in terms of a pullback with this high inflationary market that people aren’t gonna go out and have that discretionary money to go and take the holiday with the family and they might have to put that on pause, pause this year and, and do it next year?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (24:39):

That is a great question, and I know a lot of people are seeing that read, and I’m not going to, um, just gloss over that a lot of people are actually encountering some issues with, uh, a low occupancy rate and a lot of vacancy because they’re in either a market that’s not gonna be traveled to, or they, they pigeonhole their properties in a way that they are in that middle tier. And so, let me explain that. If you’re not the top 5%, if you’re not the top 10%, you’re gonna be competing with everyone. Mm-hmm. . And not only are you competing with everyone, you’re competing with bargain shoppers. I’m a bargain shopper. There’s nothing wrong with that. I wanna deal. But when you’re the top tier, a lot of those folks are still traveling. A lot of those folks, they seem to not be, um, impacted by the inflation.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (25:35):

It’s, it’s a conversation between you with a top tier property and these individuals with top tier finances for whatever reason, for better or for worse. That’s just an observation that I’m making. However, if you succumb to have a mad property, then you’re like everyone else. It’s just a race to who, who can give me the cheapest deal? And that’s what I’m going with. So I say, stay in the blue ocean, get out of the red ocean where there’s a feeding frenzy. You want to set yourself apart. What are you doing every single quarter to set yourself apart? And it could be small things, you know, that really, uh, gives individuals who stay with you that extra nudge. We have a direct booking campaign after a guest, you know, stays with with us, and they leave, we collect their email, and we, we reach out, we say, Hey, you know, it’s been six months.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (26:32):

Remember how much fun you had come on back? You know, so you, you do want to take that extra step. It’s not as, uh, set it and forget it. Mm-hmm. , and when I say we, I mean my one virtual assistant that helps with that , I’m not gonna take credit for thank you, Christian, but you know, just so you can understand that it’s figure outable, four or five emails a year, you’re top of mind, right? So it’s not a spamming situation, it’s just your top of mind. And if you can name their kids, oh, oh, I really hope so and so enjoyed their birthday, and it’s that time again, come and enjoy this, you know, free ice cream coupon and stay with us. That’s, these are the things, you know, that makes the difference. And this is what no one else is doing, I don’t think. And so that’s how you’re going to stay with top of mind.

Reed Goossens (27:17):

I, I love that. And, and I was actually, I was thinking as you’re speaking, when you had all your multiple different properties, the Poconos, you know, Atlanta, um, you know, down in the, for Panhandle, I was thinking to myself, I wonder if she, you know, co advertises other stays or spaces in your co when someone’s there. So if you’re in the Poconos, there’s a flyer for, Hey, if you like this, we also own something down the road. And nearly you could create a, um, and I’m, I’m such a, a geek when I, I a geek out on sort of stuff like an ecosystem of, you nearly become a, a boutique hotel at that point because you’re offering certain mm-hmm. , you know, flavors for certain times of the month. And, you know, oh, you, you want rainforest, we’ve got rainforest, you want Poconos your hills, we’ve got this, we’ve got beaches, we’ve also got desert. You know, like, and you can start to create a, an ecosystem around that. Do you, do you try and cross-promote other properties that you own?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (28:05):

We actually, so for the one that we have in Georgia, we have a lot of individuals who go to Florida. So we do cross-promote that one to the one that we’re building Florida, Hey, stay up to date on this. But yes, that is the ultimate goal, and that is what we’re building on the back end of our, of our site to cross-promote using whether it’s a hashtag or something like that, like you said, to almost keep the branding, you know, specific to all of the properties. So Yeah, for sure.

Reed Goossens (28:34):

Um, quickly pivoting before we come to the end of the show, I’d love to just quickly touch on, you know, medical professionals, right? You’re, you met, we mentioned in the green room that you are still working somewhat smaller, but you’re still working at w2. Yeah. Are you having conversations with other medical professionals, high, high income earners that want to shelter taxes or anything like that, you know, and get involved in real estate to, to, to maybe even to, to potentially you may raise money from them for your own deals?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (28:59):

Yeah, that’s a great question. And so since, like you said, I am looking to transition, I’m now consulting, and so not having the, the robust W2 , you know, anymore, I am looking at ways to pivot, to start to raise capital, uh, for, uh, upcoming deals. Right now we’re actually finishing up a construction, but after that I’ll be looking around like, okay, how do I leverage, you know, my tools, my skillset, my resources, my team, my systems, my processes to, you know, create an offer for other me medical professionals who want to get into the game and not necessarily, uh, want to, you know, do any of the heavy lifting. It is, medi medicine is an intense, you know, demanding, um, job. And so I have figured out a way to work on my short-term rental business and less than two hours a week, but it didn’t happen overnight, right?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (29:56):

It was a lot of bumping, you know, against the road and kissing frogs and just trying to find the right people, make sure they’re in the right seats on the bus. But yeah, I am looking to do that, um, within the next upcoming year. And the great thing about short-term rentals, similar to multi-family syndications, is we have cost segregation studies that we can do as well. We have bonus depreciation that we can leverage as well. So just such an amazing asset. And my favorite thing, Reed, is it’s also an asset that you get to enjoy from time to time. So right.

Reed Goossens (30:30):

, you get, you get, you get to enjoy the spoils of your, your hard work. So, um, but I could also imagine having that conversation, knowing being in the medical world, that you just, you know, what other medical professionals are going through. It’s, it’s a very, uh, laborious career. You’re not laborious, I shouldn’t say it’s, it’s, it’s intense in terms of the demanding study and then demanding in terms of getting into a, a hospital and you’re doing all the work and working 12 hour shifts, and just not having any time to think about, well, how am I creating financial freedom from me and my family? And using your story and your experience with that to have other communication and, and, and conversations with other medical professionals in your space. I, I, I, I could only assume that would be very, very powerful.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (31:09):

Yeah, absolutely. I look forward to delving into it. It’s not something that I’ve done yet, but it’s something that’s always, you know, top of mind because I’m always looking for the next great deal. So, awesome,

Reed Goossens (31:19):

Awesome stuff. Well look at the end of every show. We love to dive into the top five investing tips. You ready to get into it?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (31:26):

I’m ready.

Reed Goossens (31:27):

. Question number one is what the daily habit you practice to keep on track towards your goals?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (31:32):

Ooh, so I have a morning routine, and it probably doesn’t look like everyone else’s, but I keep to my own morning routine where I task plan, I drink my water, I do my walk, and a little bit of meditation. So keeping a morning routine really sets the pace for my day.

Reed Goossens (31:48):

I could only imagine I’m, I’m a morning routine type of guy as well, that if you don’t do your morning routine, your whole day’s screwed. Right?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (31:54):

totally derailed.

Reed Goossens (31:56):

Yes, totally Dera. I love it. I love it. Question number two is, who’s the most influential person in your career to date? Both, both, not, not necessarily just in real estate, just in general.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (32:06):

Oh, in general. I would say it’s my mom, to be honest with you. Her work ethic is like, no other mom and dad are great. She takes care of my dad now. So she’s recently retired, and so she’s, she, I, I admire everything about her.

Reed Goossens (32:19):

I’m sure she’s just created such a work ethic within yourself to go, you know, become a doctor, then pay off the $500,000, you know, and build an Airbnb business. It’s, it’s, it’s pretty freaking awesome. So well done mom. If she’s listening in. , , question number three is in, uh, what is the most influential tool in your business? Now, when I say tool, it could, could be a physical tool, like a journal or a phone, or it could be a piece of software that you just can’t run the business without. What is it?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (32:46):

Ooh, that’s great. So for me, the tool in my Airbnb short-term rental business is actually my dynamic pricing tool. Mm-hmm. . So I have a tool that I use that helps with pricing to make sure that I’m not missing out on a major concert or occupancy, you know, that’s happening right now. So it’ll help increase and decrease the pricing. And I, you know, you don’t set it and forget it again, but it, it really was the big aha moment for me when I turned it on. It’s called Price Labs.

Reed Goossens (33:17):

Price Labs, because I could assume you could use it in multi yourself or could use it in any, anything that needs dynamic pricing.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (33:25):

Yeah, dynamic pricing, for sure. Yeah. And it’s similar to what the hotel revenue managers are using, so it’s, it’s just been amazing. Yeah. Price Labs, there are other competitors as well. Um, but I love Price Labs,

Reed Goossens (33:38):

, I’ll have to, I’ll have to definitely check that out. It’s, uh, interesting. I’ve always, I’ve always been really intrigued. We, on the multi-family side, we use, um, lro or, or Costa to, to have that dynamic pricing. It’s probably all based on the same fundamental software , but it’s, uh, but, but it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s great to hear. So Price Labs definitely gonna check that one out. Thank you so much for that. Uh, question number four is in one sentence, what’s been the biggest failure in your career and what’d you learn from that failure?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (34:06):

Ooh, not doing my due diligence on a deal. Yeah. So I had a deal where, um, there was a regulatory restraint and I didn’t do all of my due diligence. And we had to sell, uh, sooner than expected. We didn’t lose a whole lot, but we didn’t make as much as we had hoped for. So lessons learned, do your due diligence. i.my, I and I crossed my t’s every, every single time, and it dealt with an H hoa. So buyer beware, . Right,

Reed Goossens (34:38):

Right. No, so many people I think who listen to this show who’ve been on this show, myself included due diligence in the beginning. You trip and fall, you gotta get back up on the horse and learn lessons learnt, and hopefully you don’t lose too much money in, in those, in those lessons. . Yeah. So, uh, last question is, where can people reach you to continue the conversation that wanna be in your sphere? Where do they go?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (35:01):

Yeah, I actually have a resource, a question that I get asked all the time, Reed, is, where should I invest? What cities should I be looking for? So if your listeners want, uh, that resource, if you go to 75gems.com, that’s 75gems.com, you’ll get access to it. It’s an ugly spreadsheet, but everyone loves it. And, uh, it’ll provide you also my links to all of my social, um, short-term gems on all of the social media sites.

Reed Goossens (35:29):

Love it. Short-term gems. Awesome stuff. Mm-hmm. . Well, look, Rachel, I wanna thank you so much mm-hmm. for jumping on the show. I just wanna reflect some of the things that I took away from today’s show. I think obviously your hard work and ethic, you know, your hard work ethic, uh, to, to, to pay a $500,000, there’s no mean feat in student debts. You know, it’s, it’s, it’s a cumbersome thing to come out of uni. Um, but also around the idea of wanting to keep up with the Joneses and, but also realizing that you didn’t, you, you’re still probably living paycheck to paycheck and knowing that there’s another way, even though you were a doctor, you had the big house, you had the big cars, you know, you go in the private schools, I think that is so poignant for people who are listening today, building that wealth, that sometimes you have to take a step back before you can again, take a step forward in terms of living within your own means.

Reed Goossens (36:12):

I think that’s, uh, uh, super, super important. I also love what you’re talking about in design. The design of a space can make or break and being in that top 10% by just taking a few seconds to think about the short term rental and, and, and spending a few dollars on matching pieces and not having a hodgepodge of a, you know, excuse people who have this, but I, it’s my, it’s my pea pet, a crappy picture of a, of, of a, of a beach with a bunch of shells on it. Like , you know, the stock’s down in stock photos with doesn’t match any of the decor. Like, just having a little bit of self-awareness around design, and then knowing you may not, you might not have a design, you know, aesthetic that people like. So go and hire the right people, right? And then creating those little bit of extras like the lop in inflatable movie screens, or the, uh, whatever it might be, the ba the gas barbecue, heating the pool to add more revenue to your, um, to, to, to, to your rental. And then finally, I thought you would have an awesome opportunity to co-brand the whole thing together and bring it in ecosystem. Sounds like that’s where you’re headed. And I’m excited to see you, um, move on in the future. So did it leave anything out?

Rachel Grainsbrugh (37:18):

No, no. You got it. That was awesome, .

Reed Goossens (37:21):

Awesome stuff. Look, again, thank you so much, Rachel. Uh, enjoy the rest of your week and we’ll catch up very, very soon.

Rachel Grainsbrugh (37:27):

Thank you, Reed. I appreciate you having me, and bye-Bye for now.

Reed Goossens (37:30):

Well, there you have another cracking episode. Jem Pack was some incredible advice from Rachel on short-term rentals and how she’s doing it differently to the average person out there trying to get that top 5% of short-term rentals to insulate her from market downturns. If you do wanna check her out, go to 75gems.com. Um, and, uh, we will have all the li all the links from today’s show up on my website@ reedgoossens.com. But if you are interested in getting your hands on that spreadsheet, it’s 75gems.com. That’s 75gems.com. Look, I wanna thank you all again for taking some time out eDay, to tune in, to continue to grow your financial iq, cuz that’s what we’re all about here on this show. The easiest way to give back if you do like this show, is to give it a five star review on iTunes. And we’re gonna do this all again next week’s. Remember, be bold, be brave, and go give life a crack.