Gregg Rapp: Thank you. It's great to be here.
Christine: OK so tell me first a little bit about yourself.
Gregg: OK. I have a unique job where I can live anywhere in the country here in the U.S. I do menu engineering for restaurants, typically chains.
Christine: OK Wait. Wait. Menu engineering. There's a job I have not heard of. What is it?
Gregg: It's a little niche that I developed about 26 years ago where I help restaurants figure out how to lay their menu out for the restaurant.
Christine: Oh, interesting.
Gregg: Just like a grocery store is laid out so people will choose the more profitable item, I go in and I help the restaurants figure out what they want to sell and how to sell it and so I am traveling all the time and I was living in Seattle. Well, I wanted to move somewhere warmer so I came to Palm Springs.
Christine: Nice.
Gregg: And ten years ago, the housing market was way down and I happened to buy a home that was a 60s home and that was before the 60s were cool.
Christine: [laughter]
Gregg: Now we call it mid century, right.
Christine: Right.
Gregg: How I got into it, there were three of us that bought the home together and eventually I bought the other partners out and the mid century home was built in 1964. It was in Architectural Digest in 1967.
Christine: Oh neat.
Gregg: It's up on the hill in the gated community with Bob Hope's house.
Christine: Oh, well la de da. Did you ever get to meet him?
Gregg: Oh yeah. He would come down in the golf cart with his butler.
Christine: Oh.
Gregg: Who took care of him. I got to introduce him to my mom the very first day she got to Palm Springs.
Christine: Oh what a thrill.
Gregg: Ten years ago.
Christine: Oh, wow.
Gregg: So it's been fun and lucky. Like I said I could move anywhere. I just happened to land in Palm Springs at the right time and then once I bought my partners out, I set up the house as a rental and then when I had someone that wanted to spend, at that time we were asking about $7,000 a week which is at the high end of course.
Christine: Right.
Gregg: or $25,000 a month. When I had someone that wanted to move in, I would put my stuff in the owner's closet and I would run down and stay, I had a couple of condos as vacation rentals also. Anyway, I, in a sense, would sleep around—
Christine: [laughter]
Gregg: Until my guests were gone.
Christine: OK so wait a minute. This was your primary residence—
Gregg: It was my primary residence.
Christine: That you then decided, Oh wait a minute, my primary residence is really nice and I can command a pretty good rental.
Gregg: Sure.
Christine: You started renting your primary residence, moved out. That's even interesting in itself.
Gregg: When I stayed at the local hotels, I would meet the guests and they would say, "What are you doing here?" I became a tour guide. But yeah, it was a unique situation and then eventually, I always believe in making crazy, low offers on real estate and, oh gosh, back then my friends and I were making all kinds of offers and we thought well if they get accepted then we will have to deal with them.
Christine: [laughter]
Gregg: We really were looking for other properties and back then it made sense. Now it makes sense to buy properties, of course, because the market is down but when I moved here, just to give you an example, I bought two condos, eventually three condos that were one bedroom in Palm Springs for $32,000 a piece.
Christine: Oh my goodness, $32,000 and how many years ago was this?
Gregg: This was about 11 years ago.
Christine: OK. 11 years ago.
Gregg: OK.
Christine: Those same condos are worth what today?
Gregg: Well, we sold the last one at $165,000 about two years ago.
Christine: Oh goodness.
Gregg: Those condos are now back down to $145,000.
Christine: Right. But still.
Gregg: People think the market is where it was, [but] no. When we moved here it was incredible.
Christine: Right. Right and you used them as vacation rentals during those 11 years that you owned them, correct?
Gregg: Yeah, with a cashflow of $1,000 a month on top of it.
Christine: [laughter]
Gregg: when we could rent them. At the low end, it is always easier.
Christine: OK. I'm sure people are listening and are like "Oh gosh the $30,000 condo just does not exist anymore. This guy is pie in the sky. I will never see those again." But what we have to realize is the same thing happens over and over and over again with real estate. If you buy that property today at $150,000, $175,000 or even $200,000, 10, 11, 12, 15, 20 years from now, you are still going to have people go "You bought it for what?" So I think as long as you are in this for the long term.
Gregg: Right.
Christine: I think you are pretty good.
Gregg: And I agree fully, long term is the way to go and as you look into these things it is like how do you hold on to these properties as they appreciate. Now I have to go back one second and tell you those condos are also on leased land. Throughout Palm Springs we have leased land and sea land where you own the land under the condo. So things on leased land are cheaper. We don't need to get into that here.
Christine: Right.
Gregg: There are some good opportunities on leased land but you just have to be careful.
Christine: Oh neat. Just good information though when you are looking in Palm Springs certainly.
Gregg: I recommend buying on sea land but that's another story.
Christine: Right. Right.
Gregg: Moving on.
Christine: Now with Palm Springs, it's in the middle of the desert. You went from Seattle down to Palm Springs and I imagine it gets pretty doggone hot in the summertime. Is that so?
Gregg: Yes but I love the heat in the summer. Of course, it's a dry heat and I like the summers. The winters to me are too cold. My brother lives down in Costa Rica and does vacation rentals down there and so I like to go see him in December and January—
Christine: [laughter]
Gregg: Because it's a little bit colder than what people think. The summers are great and we are getting a lot of traffic through here in the summer too. On the condos people will come and they will say I want to rent August because I want to see if I can stand the summers before I move there.
Christine: Oh, good idea.
Gregg: Great idea but I didn't take my fees down for the summer months because I was booked all year round.
Christine: Oh my goodness.
Gregg: And you would think that you would have to discount in the summer but I never did. Now in the condo market, it was the Europeans who would come back year after year. The Americans would come in, they will rent and then they will go buy something.
Christine: Right.
Gregg: We also found that Europeans would use the kitchen and we had to clean the oven—
Christine: [laughter]
Greg: Whereas the Americans come in.
Christine: They go out to eat.
Gregg: We would have to dust the kitchen after they left.
Christine: Oh, that's so funny. You have had pretty good shoots there, magazine shoots.
Gregg: Sure.
Christine: And some television or movie or something has happened. Tell us a little bit about that stuff.
Gregg: We did a commercial shoot.
Christine: There you go. That's what it was.
Gregg: Which was a little bit hard on my neighbors and when you do filming, remember the crew is 65 people.
Christine: Oh, my goodness.
Gregg: They have buses and makeup, and catering and carpenters and everything. We filmed a 60 second commercial. We have it on my website.
Christine: What's your website address?
Christine: OK.
Gregg: It's under the photo shoot section of the website and you can click on it and see the commercial they did for Brand Beer which is Heineken‑owned.
But I don't recommend doing that unless—The best thing to do if you are going to do movies and commercials and big shoots like that is if you need to remodel your home, they’ll come in and they will put it the way they want it and then they’ll put it back to the way you want it.
Christine: Oh, wow.
Gregg: So it's a great tool to use and the way to do that is to list your home with the local film—Call the Chamber of Commerce and ask them where the film people are, if it's in your state or if it's in your city. All you have to do is send them some pictures and they will keep them on file and the scouts, the location scouts, come and look for that.
Christine: Oh, neat. Could you hold on one second? We need to take a break for a word from our sponsors.
Gregg: Now, I do a lot of photo shoots which are much easier. It's ten people. They do fashion magazines. They come in—
Christine: Get some pretty models.
Gregg: Oh yeah, I just got one yesterday for a catalogue shoot which is great because they are a number of days and they basically just need a spot to shoot from. It's not necessarily about the house. They use different features because they are featuring their clothes. We've done Bloomingdale's. We did Talbot, Women's Wear and William Sonoma has been in.
Christine: And all these found you from you submitting your photos to the Chamber?
Gregg: No, I also have agents.
Christine: Oh OK.
Gregg: They are called location agents.
Christine: OK.
Gregg: Check in your area for the location agents and ask around.
Christine: Gotcha.
Gregg: Photo shoots are fun. It is usually a day. Oh guys, you have a lot of celebrities come in when they are doing that. I did turn down Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.
Christine: You did not. You turned down Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie?
Gregg: I did because they wanted to come up Easter weekend to shoot and I said if you can limit it to 20 people or less, we can do it because I didn't want to bother my neighbors with a lot of traffic.
Christine: And all the paparazzi that come along with it, right?
Gregg: We are behind a gated community and that's one of the reasons they want to keep that security but I couldn't do that to my neighbors on Easter weekend to have—
Christine: Aren't you considerate.
Gregg: A lot of activity. Well, have you heard of anyone turning down?
Christine: No you are the first.
Gregg: Yeah, I do sound like...
Christine: It's OK. I'm more the George Clooney type anyways.
Gregg: It's perfect. It's been fun, and Palm Springs brings that element. I'm just a kid from Dayton, Ohio. I'm still in awe of all this stuff, and my Ohio friends say: "Hey, go down on the name‑dropping. I'm breaking my back trying to pick up all those names."
Christine: Yeah, right.
Gregg: I have to keep myself in check on this stuff.
Christine: Yeah, you have to remember where you came from, right?
Gregg: Oh, it's just fun. And this vacation rental, after reading your book and getting your help at your seminar... It's all working and the more I can help other people by telling them some of these... You know, I've been doing this 10 years now, and you do learn. And I do trust people coming in, and I've only had one problem with a messy condo.
Christine: In all those years and all those properties—That's not really so bad?
Gregg: No, it's not. You have to be careful, but I do let people know that it's my home.
Christine: Right.
Gregg: I also am very nice to them, and I don't give them a lot of rules. You just treat them as your guests, and then they tell their friends.
Christine: Right. Now getting back to shoots and stuff, when you have all those people coming in, do you have to have a special contract? Have you ever had any problems with that, besides, obviously the neighbors and the buses and all that stuff?
Gregg: Well, like I say, the film‑shooting is a whole different animal. There are contracts... Let me go back to that film‑shooting. Six days worth of work took care of a whole lot of mortgage payments.
Christine: Oh, this is true.
Gregg: Like over half a year.
Christine: Wow.
Gregg: So, there is big money in it, and if you can get into that, I highly recommend it. They're looking all over the country... Like Mississippi has a great film board, and they're doing all these incentives.
So I do recommend that people contact, ask around. I think there are some websites that you can go for if you Google "location scouts." Those are the people that you want to let know that you have a property that might be good in whatever niche it is.
Christine: And to be clear, you do have a beautiful home. It is a very high‑end home.
Gregg: Oh, thank you.
Christine: You've got a gorgeous pool, and the mountains in the back. I mean, it really is film‑quality background that you have there.
Gregg: Well, thank you. And if I can drop another name? Robert Redford calls it the quintessential Palm Springs home, because it's all glass and it's a mid‑century home.
Christine: Robert Redford stays at your home?
Gregg: Of course!
Christine: Oh my goodness!
Gregg: Then he lets me stay at his place in Sundance. His guest house up there. So, I don't charge Bob.
Christine: Oh, well, you know.
Gregg: But that's what people are looking for. This all‑glass... And then, for my work, for the menu consulting, I keep a fully‑stocked bar. Because it's right in the middle of the living room, like we do in Palm Springs. And then my clients who are restaurant chains and restaurant people, they can come and stay there also, and we can work on their menus while they're here in Palm Springs. I've used that...
Christine: So to clear their mind as they're getting into their creative zone...
Gregg: That's right.
Christine: Wow. I mean, what a great thing. You're coupling it together with your business.
Gregg: It's just the blender. When it's going, it makes a loud sound. You have to get over that real quick.
Christine: That's so funny. It's just so interesting, and it's so fun to talk to different home‑owners and hear their perspectives and hear about what they've done. Obviously, you can feel the joy in your voice as you're speaking. This is not a burden for you at all. This is like a part of your life.
Gregg: It's fun! For me, it's fun because I like to be around people. All kinds of people are from different backgrounds. Church groups will come up to have a little mini‑retreat. I get the casting directors from L.A., and who wants to be around casting directors? All the unemployed actresses.
Christine: Right!
Gregg: Yeah, it's been good, and it's worked well.
Christine: That's really, really neat. Gregg, it's getting past our time. Of course, I always run out of time whenever we get really interesting guests. So guess what? We're going to have to bring you back on again sometime and hear the rest of your story, because—
Gregg: Oh thanks!
Christine: It's just so fun and interesting to hear about different perspectives, how you came into this. You started off just wanting to move somewhere where it was warmer. You bought this great house. You probably did a bit of fixing up. Is that so?
Gregg: Oh, sure.
Christine: Fixed it up a little bit and then decided: "Hey wait a minute! I could rent this out." And move out when you have renters there, which is a little unconventional and probably not for everyone.
It's funny. I was talking to my husband. We have a big film festival. It's the South by Southwest Festival that comes here to Austin each year. I said: "You know babe, do you realize how much money we can make if we rent our house for that week?" He said: "You know, we're fine with renting our vacation homes. It just would be too much work to put away all of our personal things."
So it's not for everybody. However, you seem to make the best of it and really have fun with it.
Gregg: Oh, it's been fun!
Christine: Again, Gregg Rapp is his name and his website is...
Gregg:
Escape2palmsprings.com.If you need to email me any questions, or call looking for something, I'd love to talk to people.
Christine: That's awesome. We can get your email from your website, right?
Gregg: Yes.
Christine:
Escape2palmsprings.com.
Gregg, thanks so much.
That wraps up this episode of the How To Rent Vacation Properties by Owner Podcast. I'd love to hear your feedback. Remember, my email address is ownercommunity@homeaway.com. Thanks to homeway.com, our producers Leah Carroll and Kristin Dorsett, our announcer Amy Ashcroft Greener, and our sound engineer Larry Seyer.
Happy renting by owner! And don't forget to take some time to enjoy your vacation home yourself.