Tag Archives : Coeur d’Alene ID

In today’s episode of the St. George Real Estate Morning Drive, Jeremy Larkin and co-host Jesse Poll invite Matt Green, well-known Utah Real Estate Investor, Keller Williams Realty Franchise owner, and all around family man, to talk about a bill that’s ready to pass at the Utah Legislature, HB 121, and how it may improve the home buying and selling process in the Beehive state!

Below is the actual St. George Real Estate Morning Drive show, hosted by St. George Real Estate Agent Jeremy Larkin, word for word! Enjoy and please share if you find it valuable! 

Jeremy Larkin and The Larkin Group @ Keller Williams Realty can be reached by calling 435-767-9821, or emailing sales@gostgeorge.com.

Andy: News radio 94.9, 890, KDXU. It is time for the St. George Real Estate Morning Drive with Jeremy Larkin. Jeremy, how are you, man?
Jeremy: Good morning everybody. Jeremy Larkin here. How am I? I have never been better.
Andy: That is good.
Jeremy: I have maybe been better.
Andy: That is really good.
Jeremy: I have got somebody very special in the studio today. Besides you, Andy. You are special.
Andy: I am special.
Jeremy: You are special. And Jesse is lurking in the shadows today. Right? There he goes. There is his hand. There is his hand. So any of our folks that are watching this on the live feed this this way. Hey, and guys today, just so you know, we are not broadcasting Facebook Live. So if you are listening right now, always remember that this show is available on 94.9FM, 890AM or what I like to do is I just Google the phrase 890 KDXU Livestream. That is the easiest way to just stream it live if you do not want to listen on the radio. 890 KDXU Livestream. I have got, and we are going to talk about a little bit of real estate first, but I have got someone special here. I have got Colby Neilson here.
Colby: Hey, do your thing, man.
Jeremy: What is it like to be back in the studio?
Colby: That means that we got a race coming up. That is all it means to me.
Jeremy: That means we have a race coming up. We are going to be talking about said race. I want to talk about. There are a couple of things I want to talk about today, by the way. I want to talk about the volunteer element.
Colby: Yes.
Jeremy: I want to talk about some history. I want to talk about the bid for the World Championship for 2021. Right?
Colby: All right.
Jeremy: Is that the year?
Colby: Yeah.
Jeremy: Is that the year? So, kind of fun. Gang, so let me run some real estate out of here though. And this will be fun because you can join in the conversation, man. I love it. So we have talked for some time about our instant offers program. I want to actually give some background as to why we are doing an instant offers program. So for all of our listeners out there, if you visit our website, which is Sold in St. George dot com, you will see something that says, and I will just pull it up, and I think it says get an instant offer. Jesse, does that sound right? Something like that?
Jesse: Yep.
Jeremy: Get an instant offer. Okay? Should I what my actual, my own website –
Colby: Yeah, check it out.
Jeremy: — says. Get instant offer. All right. Here is the background. So Zillow is the big national, and Andy, you know you have had your home on the market. You know what this is about right?
Andy: Yep.
Jeremy: Zillow is, just so people understand, it is the most trafficked real estate website in the world.
Andy: Wow.
Jeremy: An interesting side note is that Zillow is only in North America, excuse me, in the United States. So Zillow does not exist in Canada. I went to British Columbia a few years ago, and I was like oh, I wonder what houses are. There is no Zillow. So it is the largest, most heavily trafficked website in the world for real estate, but it is only in the United States. I realize we think that we are the world’s, like we are the biggest, best thing in the world. But there is a big world out there outside of the US. Canada is giant. China is giant. Europe is giant. Okay. So what has happened, guys, is Zillow and a company called Open Door, another company called IBuyer, all these companies are coming in and here is what they would like to do. Do you remember when there was a thing called travel agents?
Colby: Yes, yes I do.
Jeremy: And there still are. And what is funny is a couple years ago I booked a cruise with a travel agent and it cost me nothing over what I paid for a cruise, but the way that it is booked is they get their commissions built in by the company on the backend. It is little bit like selling a home.
Colby: Okay. Right.
Jeremy: My life was ten times easier. She figured all the dates out, all the scheduling out, ran it all for me, and I gave her a credit card and it was fantastic. But a little company called Expedia came along and Travelocity and they changed the whole process. The consumer wants to go online. Right? And so what these companies are doing is they want to eliminate people like me from the process. And to some level, there are some things you do not need me for. Right? Which would be similar to, at some point, they just go we are just going to go all online learning, Colby. Like you have been great. Appreciate you. Thank you for your service. Right?
Colby: Yep.
Jeremy: But here is a Chuck-o-Rama gift card for you and your family, and it is all online now. And the students just want to get it 24/7, when they want to get it. Let me ask you a question because I have got him in the studio. He is not prepped for the conversation. Is there a difference, my friend, between the experience of a student, and there is online high school in Washington County.
Colby: Correct.
Jeremy: What is the difference, toot your own horn for a second, between doing online high school and coming into Mr. Neilson’s classroom? Because there is a difference.
Colby: Well, there is a big difference. Number one, you are getting someone who is sitting with you, showing you how to do, well, I teach math. Showing you how to do just this certain math concept.
Jeremy: Right.
Colby: Okay. With you, speaking back and forth. It is not someone else’s tutorial video that you are trying to watch and figure out. You are getting maybe a handout, some extra practice, something that –
Jeremy: Right.
Colby: — something I can physically give you and watch you work on, and plus, in my class, we have a great time. There is some social interaction –
Jeremy: And by the way, this is huge.
Colby: — that you do not get otherwise.
Jeremy: How many students do you have total? Because you are a math teacher, so they are circulating all day.
Colby: 120, 130 kids.
Jeremy: How many do you know by name?
Colby: All of them.
Jeremy: Let’s just all just have what we call the power of the pause. He said all of them. Right? You know 120 kids by name. How many of us remember our high school teacher, right, middle school teacher? And everyone has a different one. Like some kids who are really drawn to you will not be drawn to, there are other kids that are not drawn to you. Right? They have their other favorite.
Colby: Oh yeah.
Jeremy: I know that is hard for you. I understand. But I know this guy. He is a good friend of mine and has been for decades, but that element. You know them by name. They like going in your class. They like you coming up to their desk and saying hey man, I see you are struggling. Why don’t you stay after school and let’s talk about this. You know their names. A lot of them you probably have like a pretty cool friendship with, like you know what they are doing in sports. Right?
Colby: Oh yeah.
Jeremy: You know what they are doing around the school. Hey, how is the family?
Colby: Well, I was going to say, not only do I know their name, but you learn more about them as the year progresses. Some of them are involved in extracurricular activities, so you see them. You go to the games. You see them. You try and build that rapport with them because they are doing these other things, and you want them to feel comfortable in your class so they will be more willing to accept your –
Jeremy: Let me ask you a question here. Andy, I know you are at least like, you are over 30.
Andy: Barely, barely.
Jeremy: Who is your favorite teacher? Who do you remember? Name a teacher.
Andy: Mr. Bickmore, Mr. Johns, Mrs. Robbins. I have a bunch of them.
Jeremy: Okay. Pause. How many years ago were you in school? Just give it up.
Andy: I graduated high school in 1984.
Jeremy: Okay. Think about this. Class of ’84. My sister Tiffany same age.
Andy: Great year.
Jeremy: Do you see this impact though? Instantly, he listed, he is like naming them off.
Andy: I could have listed ten more.
Jeremy: They impacted your life and here is the funny part. They are just regular people with families trying to figure it out. So let’s bring this back around, and I think you can kind of see where I am going. What is happening with these big, massive real estate engines, like Google is a search engine, so Zillow is an engine. They would like to eliminate the agent from the process. They would like to make it so automated that you go online. You say I want to see this house, and this is what they would ideally like. You show up, you plug a code into your phone, the door unlocks, you walk in, you tour it yourself, you leave. That is what they would like. That is great for them. The issue is the human element is completely removed from what is an insanely emotional process. Right? Trying to decide what your home is worth. Trying to digest the fact that it is worth less than you think it is because virtually every home is worth less than the seller wants it to be worth. Moving your family. Dealing with a death or divorce or a marriage or a new child. Upsizing. Downsizing. Which side of town should we live on? All sorts of contract issues. You sell your house and you think it is all done, and then the buyer, who you thought they were nice people, and I say that with a tone because they are probably nice people, but now they come back with a home inspection list, repair list that says hey Colby, I want you to fix 21 items. And you are like I thought they were good people. What? That is where you agent comes in and says, puts their hands on your shoulders. Let me give you a little massage. Just relax. Okay? They would like to remove the human element from the process because it makes them money. I am all about automation. We are continuing to automate our business in every way we can, but the reason we launched this instant offer program over at Sold in St. George dot com is because they are trying to buy homes now. They not only want to remove the real estate agent from the process, they also want to pull this one. Hey, Andy, do you want to sell your home? It is real easy. Just plug your address in and a few details about your home in this app and we will send you an offer. Well, if you guys would like to have to some fun, google Zillow Consumer Affairs. I saw 1100 reviews. Guess what the average review was from dealing with Zillow as a consumer? One star. One of five. You would have thought three, maybe four.
Andy: Yeah, that is what I would have said.
Jeremy: One star at the Consumer Affairs. This is for the official Consumer Affairs’ website.
Andy: Wow.
Jeremy: Because you are dealing now with this national entity. You are not dealing with human beings. Right? This is like outsourcing all of your kids’ education to a website, and I think there is an element of helpfulness to that. Right?
Colby: Definitely. Yeah, it is helpful to have tutorial videos or whatever. But who do you really ask your questions to? And how quickly can you get your feedback?
Jeremy: Correct. Let me tell you one of the number one complaints I have had speaking to new real estate agents right now is currently in Washington County there is no live class for the real estate exam. It is all online now. I went to Stringham Real Estate School 15 years ago, and I took it all in a classroom, and man, I still remember B. King. That is who it was. B. Carmen. Her name changed. I remember her. She was awesome. And you learn very differently. Yeah, there is no feedback. There is no nothing. So here is what I just want to encourage our listeners to do and then we are going to talk about Ironman. Understand that there is a big massive shift afoot in the world, and when we get so disconnected that we think our best friends are on Facebook, I am going to soapbox for about 60 seconds. You think about how much you interact with people on Facebook versus the last time you called your close friend and said hey, how have you been? It is scary. It is really scary. And as we get disconnected, it will hurt the economy. It will hurt our businesses. It will hurt our kids. It will hurt our families. There is a level of connectivity. So the instant offer program, by the way, is we offer either maximum value or either maximum convenience. And maximum value is we put your home on the open market and we sell it at retail value. Maximum convenience is you have our investment group, who are local. Not Zillow. We walk over. I or Jesse or Jeff or someone comes to your home and we walk through it, and they make you an instant offer, which is definitely going to be below market value because we cannot make sense of buying and selling homes, talk about full disclosure. What am I going to buy your house for 100% of value and sell it for 10% more? 100% is the only possible.
Colby: Yeah, right.
Jeremy: There is no more than 100. Give 110%. There is only 100 available. Right? It is the famous John Wooden story. You talked about that. Where he pulled his team in it and he said guys, I know it looks like you are pretty tired and some of you were probably out with your girlfriends last night or maybe you had a few drinks, and you are thinking Coach, I do not have it all today. I will give 110% tomorrow, and he said there is only 100% ever available. So you cannot make it up tomorrow. Right? So what we are trying to do is keep a human being in the process. If you want to sell your home and you do not want to put it on the market, and you do not want to repair it and you do not want to stage it, and you do not want to show it, and you want to take an instant offer, we have got an investment group that will buy it from you. And it is not Zillow headquarters in Seattle. End of story. Fair enough?
Colby: Fair enough.
Jeremy: Keep teaching. How long are you going to teach for?
Colby: The rest of my life, Jeremy.
Jeremy: I know you are.
Colby: The rest of my life.
Jeremy: I know you are. We are twelve minutes into this. I have done my soapbox.
Colby: It may not always be in a classroom, but always teaching.
Jeremy: I love it, man. So we have Colby Neilson here. Goes by Bags for those of us who know him well. Good friend of mine. You have now been, you have been involved with Ironman, what was the first year you raced Ironman?
Colby: Did I do my race in Arizona in 2005?
Jeremy: It would have been something like that.
Colby: It was right around 2005.
Jeremy: Yeah, down at Tempe. I saw that venue when I was there last week, two weeks ago.
Colby: Or 2008. 2005 or 2008.
Jeremy: Yeah.
Andy: That is a big gap, Bags.
Colby: I did not prep on that information.
Jeremy: No he did not. So he and his brother-in-law –
Colby: It was right about then.
Jeremy: Yeah, and a lot of you guys know Jeff Gardner. Jeff is no longer involved, but he was really involved in Ironman for a while. So these guys used to race Ironman. See, I was, we cycled together, but I never had the courage to actually go do the Ironman race. I do not know. What am I going to say about it?
Colby: You were always invited.
Jeremy: I know I was. Colby has been involved, he was a participant and then you took over as the director of all the volunteer director for Ironman St. George. What, 2010, right?
Colby: When it started. Yeah.
Jeremy: I saw that banner last night with Michael Vice of Austria on it. That first year. Remember when he won that first year?
Colby: Yeah.
Jeremy: That was pretty cool. So tell us about what it means to be the volunteer director. Because we know that he is teaching kids math at Pineview High, but his side job.
Colby: Yeah, so it is busy. What I really have is a good group of captains that are all each over a different area of the event. Right?
Jeremy: Right.
Colby: So you have registration. You have packet stuffing. You have aid stations. You have everything out at the lake and wet suits and gear bags and bikes. There are all kinds of areas that need someone to be in charge.
Jeremy: Think of what is involved. How many athletes will come this year to race? 2000?
Colby: 2000 at the start line. Yeah.
Jeremy: 2000. I love that at the start line. Oh, we do not know what happens thereafter. If you think about the Ironman event, and so a lot of people out there listening do not know a lot about it. As a matter of fact, they not only do not know a lot about it. It just seems like a burden because it shuts down traffic for day. Do you remember, man, if we had Kevin Lewis here, he would give us the numbers. $9-10 million or something like that being brought in off the race to the community?
Colby: Yeah, and you are talking not just that week. People, since that initial year –
Jeremy: Nine years ago.
Colby: — it just generates more and more interest. Right? So now people that have come here and raced are now returning and training and visiting and touring and whatever else they do when they come and visit.
Jeremy: Yeah. This is how we feed our kids.
Colby: They will come work out. They will practice on the course. They will come race and they will come back.
Jeremy: I see them as early as, probably earlier, but typically by February the first reasonable weekend you see Ironman athletes here doing training weekends.
Colby: Oh yeah.
Jeremy: Right. Getting familiar with the course. So it drives, so a lot of people do not know what it is. You are talking about let’s say $8-10 million coming in off this event. Off the event. Annually, they are putting tons of revenue into our economy. The event, of course, let’s walk these people through what they are doing. They are at Sand Hollow Reservoir. They are going to swim 1.2 miles. Right?
Colby: Right.
Jeremy: They are going to get out of that water. We are going to help them strip their wetsuit, one of our 40, 50 volunteers there because it is hard to get your wetsuit off when your hands do not, no longer work because you have been swimming for 1.2 miles and it is cold water. They are going to hop onto their bike damp, and they are going to race, ride how long?
Colby: 56 miles.
Jeremy: 56 miles. Which is from Sand Hollow to where?
Colby: Sand Hollow, it is going to go up and over the Red Hill, out towards Ivins, back up through Snow Canyon, which is –
Jeremy: Up Snow Canyon.
Colby: Up Snow Canyon, right.
Jeremy: Up Snow Canyon. It is a treacherous climb.
Colby: And then once you get to the top, you just coast it on it. All the way back into town.
Jeremy: Yep. And so, cool. So they have already swam 1.2 miles, and they have ridden their bikes 56 miles, and then they are going to run a half marathon.
Colby: Marathon. Right.
Jeremy: 13.1.
Colby: Up the Red Hill and back.
Jeremy: So think about the number of volunteers for all of our listeners out there. It requires so many people to make that happen.
Colby: Definitely.
Jeremy: And to pull it off. And the competitors I have heard regularly saying we think St. George has the best volunteer community ever. Like we have never seen an event come off so clean.
Colby: Oh hands down. You have to realize there are a lot of events that Ironman owns or puts on around the country, and I have a traveled to a few others and worked as a crew guy, and I see what goes on. I see volunteers. I see the work that that certain particular town puts into their efforts, and I look back at what we have, and I am like we have people that really understand what it means to go help out and go bring this thing hear and make it something special.
Jeremy: And it is super community-based. And I will point something out.
Colby: It is not like that in other places.
Jeremy: It not like that in other places.
Colby: No, it is not.
Jeremy: That people that realize this, this is part of, man, it is my show. I can say what I want. Part of the benefit of a really, quite honestly like a pretty religious-type community is you have a lot of service going on. And it does not mean that religious people serve, are better than non-religious people.
Colby: (Indiscernible)
Jeremy: What happens is a lot of these kids are raised doing service. They do not even want to do it. Remember you are a teenager. You are like I have got to go rake leaves for the neighbor? But in this kind of community in Utah and in St. George, what has happened is quite a few thousands and thousands of the residents were raised, against their will at first initially, to serve. Right? And so it has created this mindset that what we do is we go and we serve. It is really normal. Check this out. By the way, do people want to know where these guys go? How about they race in Boulder, CO, China, Calgary, Alberta, Ireland, France. I am just highlighting. Santa Cruz, CA, Imperial Beach, CA, India, Sweden, Coeur d’Alene, ID, and where is the national championship?
Colby: For a (indiscernible)
Jeremy: Yep.
Colby: I think this year it is in France.
Jeremy: It is the World Championship. World Championship.
Colby: World Championship. Yeah.
Jeremy: So the World Championship. Right? Then you have the World Championship, but the North American Pro Championship is St. George.
Colby: Exactly. Yeah.
Jeremy: So the reason I point this out is to impress upon people like Ironman is everywhere. They pick the most beautiful locations on the planet and they are having their North American Pro Championship here.
Colby: Right.
Jeremy: So, let’s talk about volunteers and then let’s briefly touch on trying to be in the World Championship. But we need volunteers.
Colby: Oh yeah, we need many. We need about a couple thousand to make it work like it should.
Jeremy: Yep.
Colby: With enough people so that it is not overly burdening others. Right?
Jeremy: Yep.
Colby: But right now, we are at about 350 that have signed up.
Jeremy: Yep, and we need way more.
Colby: And we are a month away.
Jeremy: And we are a month away. So guys, the race is May 4th, and you can volunteer anywhere from the lake, which you are going to be out there bright and early, like 4 or 5 in the morning early. The race is going to be over over, like the last competitor is coming over the line at what time of day? Downtown.
Colby: Downtown. It will be done by 5.
Jeremy: Okay. I was going to say 4 or 5. So I want to tell people where they can volunteer, and I just want to make my own personal plug because I have been that involved. Visit Ironman St George dot com, Ironman St. George dot com. Is it Ironman St. George dot com?
Colby: Yeah.
Jeremy: Yeah, it is. It is just going to send you over to their page. But you will see a link to volunteer. Go in. Pick any freaking thing that sounds fun to you.
Colby: Yeah, just scroll down and look through it.
Jeremy: Yeah, scroll down. Hey you want to be involved in athlete drug testing? Maybe you want to be involved in athlete registration? How about this? Athlete registration happens on Thursday, Wednesday, Thursday. You get to hang out at Town Square in beautiful weather and meet people from all over the world.
Colby: Yeah.
Jeremy: It is pretty fun. Right?
Colby: Yep.
Jeremy: I am going to make my plug. I was involved in 2010. I was involved in the first five years, and then I kind of went MIA. And I am back this year.
Colby: He is back.
Jeremy: As I was one of volunteer captains. Guess who is back? I am just going to tell you something. If you have got to the St. George Marathon finish line that is the feeling. You go to the St. George Marathon finish line and you start crying. You are like I do not even know these people and I am crying right now. And then you want to race. It is that kind of electricity at the event. And to volunteer, it is just such a blast. Yeah, you get a free t-shirt, but you feel like, you do not feel like, you are part of something that day. And the athletes, the thing that is cool. The average Ironman competitor is they are wealthy. They talk about the demographics. These people, they are doing well for themselves, right, all over the planet financially, and they come here, and they are very, very appreciative. The athletes are high-fiving. They are thanking you. Right?
Colby: Right.
Jeremy: It is kind of an incredible experience.
Colby: It is an incredible experience. A lot of these athletes, you do not know if this is their first time for this type of major endurance event or their fifth time.
Jeremy: Yep.
Colby: But either way, it is a goal. It is a dream of theirs, and we as volunteers, we are helping this dream become a reality. Right?
Jeremy: Yep.
Colby: We are encouraging them. We are offering our services if you are at an aid station or if you are helping them with their bike or whatever, you are a part of this dream of theirs.
Jeremy: Of this, I love this, and you have always said this, man. This is like your great case. Right? The sales pitch to volunteer. And by the way, the benefit of volunteering is you get the incredible prize of feeling really happy. Right? Which is better than any fee. But you do not realize that every athlete that comes to town, they have a story.
Colby: And like American Idol –
Jeremy: This is Jim Smith from Travers City, Michigan, but there is a story.
Colby: Yep.
Jeremy: Every one of them. They do not have to have this crazy life story that they came out of a fire and raced Ironman. They all have a story.
Colby: They all have some pathway that got them here.
Jeremy: Yeah, it is a dream, and a lot of people are just two minutes, perfect, hoping to finish the race. Right? Most of the competitors are not competing. They are finishing. They are completing. I talk about competing versus completing. 2021, this week at Town Square, we had the little pep rally. St. George is bidding. We call it bidding to become the World Championship host in 2021.
Colby: Right. So it is coming back to the North American continent that year, so we are going to try, we did our best. There was a lot of excitement and a lot of fun downtown, just trying to sway them, let them know hey, we have the people that is going to make this work. Which we do.
Jeremy: We do.
Colby: So whether we get it or whether we do not, either way, we have got the folks that make this happen.
Jeremy: Yeah, we have a volunteer community. We have a service community. Guys, please.
Colby: You just need to go sign up and get started.
Jeremy: Visit Ironman St. George dot com or if for whatever reason, if you are just cruising along, just google Ironman St. George.
Colby: Hey, if you have got a group, that is even better because we have, Ironman donations that you can apply for. If you have questions, my email is right there when you go to sign up to volunteer.
Jeremy: So you are saying a service group, like scout troop, a Boy Scout, a Girl Scout troop –
Colby: Yeah, a church group, community groups –
Jeremy: — a church organizations.
Colby: — clubs.
Jeremy: They actually get financial support, right?
Colby: They can, yeah.
Jeremy: They can. So guys, Ironman St. George. Colby Neilson, volunteer director, always love having you, man.
Colby: Always a pleasure.
Jeremy: Visit and sign up to volunteer today. Sign up your office. Sign up your family. Sign up your parish, your ward, whatever you do. Get a group and come on out. May 4th. It is going to be fun. All right. Over and out. Thank you.
Andy: All right. News radio 94.4, 890 KDXU. This has been the St. George Real Estate Morning Drive, Jeremy Larkin, Bags Neilson here, and Jesse behind the scenes.

Today, Jeremy Larkin brings guests Ty and Pam Isham of My2ndHomeVacay.com to talk about the Vacation Rental boom in Southern Utah! The Ishams manage dozens of nightly/weekly rentals, interface with the owners and of course, would-be buyers of these properties. Tons of amazing info on the market, enjoy!

Below is the actual St. George Real Estate Morning Drive show, hosted by St. George Real Estate Agent Jeremy Larkin, word for word! Enjoy and please share if you find it valuable! 

Jeremy Larkin and The Larkin Group @ Keller Williams Realty can be reached by calling 435-767-9821, or emailing sales@gostgeorge.com.

Andy: 8:35 on News Radio 94.9, 890 KDXU. Every Thursday we get a little taste of St. George Real Estate. It is the St. George Real Estate Morning Drive with Jeremy Larkin. Jeremy, take it away.
Jeremy: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, ladies and germs. Ladies and germs, right, Tai? Tai is in the background. He can yell. Hey, I have got some fun guests here today by the way. I like to go with the lady’s name first, which is Pam.
Pam: Hi, good morning.
Jeremy: Yeah, and Tai Eisham. And on the Facebook Live you are going to like this because we always put a title. And I said this morning, let me pull it up, guys. If you are not watching Facebook Live, you had better be. So you can listen to this show 94.9 FM, 890 AM, Facebook Live, YouTube Live, shoot, man, I think we might even have just the government downloading it straight into your brain. When we figure that out. I said Pam –
Jesse: If you pay them enough money, they might.
Jeremy: Yeah, I said how cool is that and a glass of milk?
Pam: And a glass of milk.
Jeremy: Yeah, like how cool is that? So we are going to have Pam on momentarily after we listen to ourselves talk. Right, Jesse?
Jesse: You love to listen to yourself talk, that is for sure.
Jeremy: That is why I started a radio show. Let me go ahead and do something. Guys, I am going to do something live on the air. I am going to encourage you to do the same. I am going over to, I am letting my fingers do the walking. Who remembers that? Who remembers what company that was? It was one of the phone companies, but which one was it?
Jesse: I cannot remember.
Jeremy: Let your fingers do the walking?
Pam: AT&T?
Jeremy: Was it?
Pam: Was it?
Jesse: I cannot remember.
Jeremy: Okay. Let your fingers, Yellow Pages. It is just Yellow Pages. Let your fingers do the walking.
Jesse: I was going to say that but then you said phone company, and I am like phone company, they are not a phone company.
Jeremy: Yeah, yeah. Hey, Jess, kick that door because we have got guys, I think, they are having a drunken party down at Devin Dixon’s office on the ESPN radio right now, which is really early for those guys to start drinking. Right? 8:37. Thank you. Guys, visit Sold in St. George dot com. Jesse, will you tell them what you are doing by the way?
Jesse: This is so exciting.
Jeremy: I am going to cast my own vote for myself right now, for us.
Jesse: We are going to do that. So we actually have been nominated for the Best of Southern Utah, the Larkin Group. Actually twofold, Jeremy and the Larkin Group.
Jeremy: Best Realtor and Best Real Estate Team.
Jesse: So we would love your help in that. Jeremy posted that thing the other day that said the last time I won anything was in high school.
Jeremy: It was the Class of 1993 yearbook, and I hope, I hope some of the people that I care about are watching right now. It was when I won Biggest Comedian for the Preference, ’93 Preference. Okay? No, Andy, it is real. Go to Facebook, man.
Jesse: He did. In all seriousness, if you know who the Larkin Group is and you know who we are, we are all about trying to do the right thing and be the best that we can be. So if you have done business with us or if you love what we deliver and the value that we give, we would love the opportunity to win that contest.
Jeremy: Thank you, man, for that description. So you just visit Sold in St. George dot com and the way that we rigged out website, it is so fun. It pops right in front of you and says vote here. And here is the cool part. Two clicks. You click it opens. You click, you voted. There is no email. No phone. No nothing. It is one of the most killer platforms. I did not build it. Another media company in town did, a competitor. So please vote for us over at Sold in St. George, Sold in St. George dot com. You can actually vote every day until March 15th. I know we will not count on that for most of our listeners, will we now? Will we now? Thank you, Robert for posting that. Morning to our listeners, viewers, watchers. I have always wanted to start a watch party. Can we try that sometime? Let’s start a watch party.
Jesse: A watch party?
Jeremy: I do not know.
Jesse: Is that on Facebook?
Jeremy: It is on Facebook. Guys, momentarily, we are going to have Pam Eisham on, and Pam and Tai, they manage short-term weekly rentals. Some of you might have heard on Tuesday I landed here with Andy in the, whew he is giving me the thumbs up, I landed very last minute on the Open Mic Show and we talked about vacation rentals and short-term rentals. I wanted to give you a teaser, okay? Because yesterday she asked so responsibly what questions, and here are the questions I asked her that we are going to talk about today. Thirty seconds, what do you do? In one minute or less, how did you get into the business? How many units, vacation rentals do you manage? Who are your clients? Who are the people who buy vacation rentals and need them managed? What kind of income do they bring? How much money can they make? What are the biggest concerns owners of vacation rentals have? What does it cost to have it managed? What is the biggest challenge you face managing short-term rentals? How does someone contact you? And what is your general opinion of the short-term market? This is like, and I have said this on the air, this is the news at 10:01. They go hey, stay tuned for the most important story, which will be on at 10:29PM at the very end of the broadcast. But we will not go that long. So momentarily we will have Pam on, but I am Jeremy Larkin, host of the St. George Real Estate Morning Drive. I have got Jesse Poll here, who has really become, he has become my co-host.
Jesse: That is right.
Jeremy: Andy Griffin, we took his microphone and headset away as part of a punishment. He is in a timeout this morning. He has got his headset. We just took his microphone away. And if you will please cast your vote over at Sold in St. George dot com for the Best of Southern Utah. And I would be curious, see, I am trying to track, do you know what I did. I created a Google document yesterday with all of my favorites companies that I am voting for, and I am actually voting for daily. Literally. I have my own list.
Jesse: So where do you go to find the whole list of all the companies in the different categories?
Jeremy: So, this is perfect. So if you want to go over to Best of Southern Utah dot com. Best of Southern Utah dot com.
Jesse: Okay.
Jeremy: And you can vote. My gosh, you can vote for just about anything. I think there were 900 companies nominated in I do not know how many categories.
Jesse: (Indiscernible)
Jeremy: I do not know.
Jesse: I am going to go look at that.
Jeremy: Yeah. Let’s talk about short-term rentals.
Pam: Talk about short-term rentals.
Jeremy: Let’s do it. So I have got Pam here. She is lovely. I have Tai just lurking in the shadows, probably like he has done most of their marriage. I do not know. Is this a metaphor? Is this a metaphor? He is back there. He is sckulking around. I love it. I love that he is in the studio. I have Pam Eishman. And Pam and Tia are actually past clients of ours –
Pam: Yeah.
Jeremy: — that we have worked with in the real estate world. So thank you for, I always say, helping us feed our families because literally you did and you do and you guys have referred us business, and we are working on referring you business now.
Pam: Yep.
Jeremy: Which is going to be awesome. So, give us a 30-second synopsis like we talked about earlier. What is your company and what do you guys do?
Pam: Yeah, essentially what is our company? So we are vacation rental management company. But then I thought hard about what do we do, right? So what we do is we provide great experiences for our owners and our guests. It is our ultimate goal that people build memories when they are with us. Right?
Jeremy: Absolutely.
Pam: People come to our area for many things, and what we want them to do is be able to come and put their feet up when they come into one of our units and feel like they have just come home. It is their second home. It is a place to kick back and have all those comforts.
Jeremy: It really is. When I was on Tuesday, I actually relistened to the show. Andy, it was funny. Yesterday, I (indiscernible) doing something else, and I was even giving, getting a kick out of myself. I said I am user. Dot, dot, dot.
Pam: I heard that.
Jeremy: So that is why I do it.
Pam: Right.
Jeremy: I saw the funniest story the other day. It was a Facebook story. A guy, I do not know how it got in the news, but KSL had it on their Facebook feed, and the guy is looking at long-term retirement housing. Like when Mom and Dad get too old and they put them in, not a care facility, but more like –
Pam: Assisted living.
Jeremy: — like assisted living. And he was talking about the cost, and this guy had written blog about it. A blog or a Facebook post, and he said here is the deal. It is X number of dollars per day to stay at one of those things. He said I am actually going to go to the local Hilton, whatever it was, and his city was $59 a day, and it had free breakfast and they have a pool and everything. And he literally had said that is where I am going to retire to. And it is comical because there is no reason he cannot do that. But what it brought up is for me a hotel is not like a condo, a home, a vacation rental.
Pam: No, not at all.
Jeremy: It just feels like a hotel.
Pam: Right.
Jeremy: Like they are going to come in and change the sheets in the morning. I guess that is fine. I hope they change them. There are a lot of horror stories about that. Isn’t there, Jesse? So home away from home.
Pam: Home away from home. And I have actually had older people talk to me about that very thing. Like maybe they want to travel. They want to give up their home, so they just vacation home hop. A month here, a month there.
Jeremy: Yeah, have you guys ever, and I mentioned it yesterday, Jesse. Would you raise your hand? No. Have you ever checked out at all what we talked about Tuesday which is the home swapping?
Pam: Yes.
Jeremy: Yeah, that is kind of cool.
Pam: Yeah, I actually have had a couple of owners talk to me about that. If somebody is interested, hey, I would swap.
Jeremy: I want to do it. I want to do it. I really am going to do it.
Pam: Yeah.
Jeremy: So how did you get in this business?
Pam: Actually, I started in hospitality way back when I was in college. Having that need to have a little extra money, so I actually worked at the local Town & Country in Cedar City as a housekeeper, and then when we moved here, Tai was actually in the car business selling cars for one of the local dealerships here. And kind of half stay-at-home mom at the time, an opportunity came up just around the corner at Timeshare. So I said why not? So I started there, kind of lower in the ranks.
Jeremy: Where were you at? Like Worldmark or something?
Pam: Yep. Worked my way up through the company and worked in Housekeeping, became the Assistant Resort Manager and then into the General Manager position.
Jeremy: So it is in your blood.
Pam: It is in my blood. I was raised in the restaurant business.
Jeremy: Here is the thing. She is good on radio, isn’t she?
Jesse: Yep.
Jeremy: She was nervous about it. I just want to tell you that.
Pam: Yeah, I was.
Jeremy: She is very comfortable. Very comfortable. But what I love about this is you actually do have experience in this realm. Right?
Pam: Right. It is a big difference because of what a guest expects when they stay at a place, even though it is not a hotel, they a lot of times expect the same type of treatment that they would get at a hotel, so having that hospitality background is something that we bring to that so that we can create those great experiences for people.
Jesse: That is really interesting because how many of other property management companies treat it like a long-term rental and it is just not.
Jeremy: It is not.
Pam: It is not at all.
Jeremy: How many? I do not know, but I guess what you are asking. Right?
Jesse: Right. That is interesting because that is a lot different message than I have heard before.
Jeremy: Yeah. Have you done a vacation rental? Have you stayed in one?
Jesse: No. But just talking to different people. We do not, I was going to say you want to make some really good money? How to package for people that want room service to come in.
Pam: Yeah.
Jesse: The reason we do not typically stay at a nightly rental is because my wife wants them to come make the bed. And I do not want to do it.
Jeremy: When you said room service, I thought you meant you wanted the $18 cheesecake.
Jesse: Well, that too.
Pam: That is what I thought he wanted, too.
Jeremy: You mean changing the linens. Okay.
Jesse: Yeah.
Pam: We actually offer that. For a price, people can actually schedule that in advance. We will actually even go get their groceries for them.
Jesse: There you go. So there you go.
Pam: Have them set up.
Jeremy: There is so much.
Jesse: I did not know that. I was not a read-in.
Pam; Yeah, we can do that.
Jeremy: Yeah, why don’t you stop being such a, what is the word here?
Jesse: ESP?
Jeremy: Man, isn’t it funny that my brain just fried out.
Jesse: Once in a lifetime.
Jeremy: Why don’t you actually practice what we are talking about and actually go stay in a vacation rental? You are such a hypocrite. That is the word.
Jesse: I stayed in one in Boston.
Jeremy: Did you really?
Jesse: Yeah.
Jeremy: That is cool.
Jesse: I have stayed in them.
Jeremy: Okay. You did.
Jesse: And then we come home, and my wife says man, the bed is not made.
Jeremy: I know. I know. She is like this just feels like home.
Jesse: Yeah.
Pam: It is awesome.
Jeremy: So, Pam, kind of segueing along here, your company name is?
Pam: My Second Home.
Jeremy: My Second Home. Bingo. So you guys now manage, I said 30 on the Facebook feed. I do not know. What is it?
Pam: Yeah, we are at 26 right now and quickly growing because we are involved in a couple projects here in town. So everybody kind of knows that new area out there in Ivins where you have got Arcadia and Paradise. Well, we are actually one of the management companies managing for Ocotillo Springs, just behind those.
Jeremy: I know exactly.
Pam: We have got units selling and opening up so there will be a lot of those to manage here soon.
Jeremy: So here is what I want folks to do here this morning. By the way, I was just looking at our Facebook feed. If you have got questions or comments and you are watching this Facebook Live, please do ask.
Pam: Yeah, absolutely.
Jeremy: We would love it and that would be remarkable. So you have got 26 units and what does, if I am an owner and I want to have a vacation rental, but I wanted it managed because I do not want to fiddle with it, what does someone pay? Like what is general standard?
Pam: Yeah, standard is pretty much in our area is 30%, but it is pretty much across the board. If you look around the United States, when I have looked at other areas, it is 30%.
Jeremy: Yeah.
Pam: Some are a little bit higher than that, but I feel that that is fair.
Jeremy: Yeah, and that is what I have heard. I have heard 25-35 across the (indiscernible) –
Pam: And that is off of net nightly.
Jeremy: Yeah, net nightly. If I have, okay, in a year, what is a typical owner that you have here bringing in annually? I am going to narrow it down momentarily.
Pam: Yeah, annually, it could be, it just depends upon where the unit is, too, and what the nightly rate is for it.
Jeremy: Okay, let’s talk about somebody that has got a Las Palmas unit.
Pam: Okay. So Las Palmas unit, they could be bringing in anywhere from $15-25,000 in a year.
Jeremy: Annually. Okay. What is the most expensive property that you manage?
Pam: Most expensive property that we manage currently is at Estancia.
Jeremy: Okay, so what would they bring in in a year?
Pam: Actually, close to the same.
Jeremy: Isn’t that funny?
Pam: Because here is the thing. Because here is what people want. They want bang for their buck. Right?
Jeremy: Yeah.
Pam: So, when you tend to have a property that is higher-priced, sometimes maybe it does not get quite the occupancy that one does that is more fairly priced.
Jeremy: So Estancia, really quick. Describe the Estancia unit compared to the Las Palmas unit for the listener.
Pam: Okay, so basically the Estancia unit, the most expensive one that we have would be considered like a Presidential suite. So it is like a four-bedroom, four-bath unit, top floor unit, over looks the pools. Right? And one of the neat things about this property compared to some others that we do is we do rent it as a three, a four or a one, which is like a hotel room. We have a lockout on it. So we can actually divide the unit up. Our biggest units over at like Las Palmas, they are actually equally as nice. We have second and third floor units that are three bedrooms, three baths. Beautiful units with lots of square footage. What would you say, Tai? About 1500-2000 in one of those? Yeah.
Jeremy: Yeah, that sounds right.
Pam: Yeah.
Jeremy: Marlene asked a question. What is a normal occupancy rate for Arcadia, Paradise, and Ocotillo? Like for annually?
Pam: For annually, I am going to say it is going to be between, because they are still fairly new properties, you are probably talking between 30 and 50% occupancy in those.
Jeremy: I heard, and you guys know Kendall, and I was commenting about Kendall on Tuesday because he was texting me while we were on the air. So Kendall has done a lot of vacation rentals, and we are in this conversation, by the way, of creation versus competition. So, hey we are talking about their competitor. But he is a great guy. These are great people. He was commenting that at some of those places that you are seeing about 60% kind of max. But you have not seen anyone with more than probably 50-60%.
Pam: No, absolutely not. Not with as many rentals as we have in the area right now.
Jeremy: Yeah. There are so many. Are there, and you get to be opinionated here –
Pam: Okay.
Jeremy: — and well remember the reason I say that is because I think people are afraid –
Pam: Right.
Jeremy: — and I have gotten quite opinionated on this radio show.
Pam: You have.
Jeremy: It is fun. It is fun. I am not quite Rush Limbaugh, but do you think there are too many units being built, vacation rentals being built and zoned?
Pam: I think the zoning is a great thing. I think that we probably have too many being built right now because the problem is with the amount that are being built, they are still a very costly piece of property compared to what an average home is. Right?
Jeremy: Yeah, that is what you said, Jesse, when you commented.
Pam: Except for what that ends up doing is driving down the nightly rate because we all compete. Every single company here is going to tell you that they do like market analysis, right, and we are watching what the prices are. Well, you have got to compete with your competitors and where people want to stay. So that drives down the price, the nightly price.
Jeremy: Yeah, and I have been, strongly think that we are building too many, and I am, remember the litmus test is the notice, did you notice test, and did you notice when you drive around town that everywhere you look there is another billboard or 8×8 sign in the ground that says we are building new units that are nightly, weekly zone.
Pam: I heard you say that the other day, and I see them too. We drive around to see them.
Jeremy: What is going on here?
Jesse: The opposing opinion about that would be is that the City just trying to offset all of the private owners trying to do the nightly rental in places that are not zoned. They either open it up to the City or keep it where they can control it.
Jeremy: Right.
Jesse: They are going to be here either way.
Pam: Correct.
Jeremy: Correct. We have 1000 new hotel rooms right now. So 500 just this last year and another 500 coming online. That is a lot of hotel rooms.
Jesse: That is.
Jeremy: This becomes challenging. One of the strongest opinions that I have is I do not really advise for most locals that they are purchasing a vacation rental in St. George. If I were purchasing a vacation rental, I would be purchasing it in Park City, Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. In a place that I want to go. Right? And I want to spend some time in, and then allow these tenants to offset my costs at 30-50% per year.
Pam: Okay.
Jeremy: That is just me.
Pam: So here is –
Jeremy: I do not know.
Pam: — here are two little tidbits for you.
Jeremy: Yeah, go.
Pam: So first one is even though we have that many hotels already, and I know we are building so we may reach that cap to where all of a sudden, we have got too many vacation rentals, too many hotels. But even right now, President’s Day weekend, and you can talk to other managers and they will tell you the same thing because we call each other to help each other. Our phones are ringing off the hook. There is no place to stay.
Jeremy: There is no room at the inn.
Pam: There is no room at the inn because we have got sporting events going on. We have got Parade of Homes going on, and –
Jesse: That is true.
Pam: — we are just packed to the gills. You heard people on the radio complain about the traffic issues and stuff.
Jeremy: Oh, it is, yeah.
Pam: And then the other end of it is as far as locals owning, now I have had several people come to me and I have actually had people that have purchased, and you can talk to other realtors about this as well that are kind of into selling the vacation rentals, but what is really, really interesting is that there are locals that want them. Why do they want them? This is a retirement community.
Jeremy: Yeah.
Pam: So now all of a sudden I find myself in a really small home. Our home is not very big, and we do not want to get bigger because our kids are grown. Now, all of a sudden, the families are growing. I have got three children, five grandchildren, ten children, everybody comes for Thanksgiving –
Jeremy: Oh, I see this. And you want to invite them in.
Pam: Where do I put them? So they buy one to make a little money, but they also can put the family up there when they have got big holidays or summer or whatever it is.
Jeremy: I do not hate that, and I like this alternative opinion. So here is a question. At 30-50% occupancy, let’s call it 50% occupancy because remember, all of our listeners out here, we have got Pam Eisham with My Second Home and they manage second home vacation rentals, basically, right, short-term rentals. Remember that the rate that you are paying per night is high compared to like a long-term, meaning a long-term lease on a Las Palmas unit is $1400 a month. But per night, it is $150 a night.
Pam: Right.
Jeremy: So could someone cash flow and even make, not just break even, but be profitable at 50% occupancy in their unit here locally?
Pam: Locally, I think if they buy right. They have got to buy in the right place for the right person.
Jeremy: Yeah.
Pam: For example, one of the units in Las Palmas, three bedrooms, three baths sold for like 260-something.
Jeremy: Yeah, it is getting expensive. Paradise Village we talked about. I used Paradise Village for the event posting on Facebook. That stuff is expensive. Pam, who are your owners? Who is an owner? Not by name, but who would be an owner? How much time, Andy? Three minutes. Perfect. Thank you.
Pam: So who would be an owner? So, like you said, a lot of owners are from out of the area. And interestingly enough, a lot of the owners actually are maybe snowbirds themselves, so maybe they want to come for a month or two down here. So they are from Idaho, from Washington, from all over, Oregon, whatever. Right? Northern Utah. We have several from Northern Utah. But, an owner is someone that maybe they want a place to stay themselves or be able to put their kids up, their brothers, their sisters. I have people that do that all the time. Share it with the family, but they want to make a little money on the side, too. Maybe they want to cover their HOA fees or all of their power bills and stuff. They may not always cover their mortgage –
Jeremy: So all of your owners independently wealthy people who just have $500,000 to buy a unit?
Pam: Absolutely not.
Jeremy: Say it with a grin.
Pam: They are people just like us.
Jeremy: The coolest thing about rental properties as we start to wrap this show up, and the coolest part is that, so Jesse, if you have a Roth IRA or a 401K, your employer, if you had a good employer, might match it, but the issue with your Roth IRA is who funds it? Who puts the money in every month?
Jesse: I do.
Jeremy: You do. Right? The cool thing about investment properties is that somebody else pays for it every month.
Pam: Correct.
Jeremy: That is the zinger. By the way, you might, a listener out there might be somebody a dual-income family and he runs a Jiffy Lube and she is a teacher at Heritage Elementary, those folks would be incredible investors.
Pam: Right.
Jeremy: And you know what is funny? Those people –
Pam: And there are a lot of them out there.
Jeremy: And a lot of them, there are, and yet a lot of them do not think of themselves as investors.
Pam: Right.
Jeremy: It is like whoa, go get a property. Pam Eisham, thank you. So how do people reach you? Tell us how they contact you.
Pam: You can reach us at My Second Home Vacay dot com.
Jeremy: My Second Home Vacay dot com.
Pam: Vacay dot com. And you can also reach us at 435-313-5143. Glad to answer any questions.
Jeremy: Okay. I am going to give it again. 435-313
Pam: 313-5143.
Jeremy: Yep, 313-5143. Guys, thank you so much for listening. Thank you for being on the air.
Pam: Absolutely.
Jesse: Thank you.
Jeremy: You are amazing.
Pam: Thanks for having me.
Jeremy: We are going to have to have you back, and of course, listeners, thank you. If you have got questions about your own real estate situation, buying a rental, selling a rental, or you want to give us a vote for Best of Southern Utah, visit us at Sold in St. George dot com. Sold in St. George dot com. Over and out.