Enlisting the Army of Local Community
By Isaac French
People talk about this all the time, but one of the greatest assets of your property is your connection to the local community. On the flip side, the one of the greatest liabilities can be estrangement of your local community.
Everybody knows the stereotypes: wealthy corporate investors coming in from such-and-such-a-place and dumping tons of money into a project without even bothering to get to know any of the locals. Raises the adjacent property values (not always a bad thing:) and low and behold, property taxes are killing us!
Developers get a bad rap, and I get it.
But what if you engaged the local community from the onset? Made friends. Had a BBQ. Rallied their support and legitimately solicited their input. "OK, that's a waste of time," some would say.
Or is it?
If you are planning a project in an area you don't live near, or are not from, then perhaps you should partner in some capacity with someone who does/is. Not only is having the benefit of public support or not in question, but entitlements: whether or not you're even going to get approved by the zoning committee or through the public hearing, if one is necessary.
So a lot of times this is an existential question. And you should take it seriously.
It's a beautiful thing to take detractors and win them to your side. They can become huge mouthpieces for you, not against you.
Recently I met my friend Ben for a site tour of his new Oasi Hill Country property. He had recently announced it on social media, and the posts had performed really well, jumpstarting his fundraise. He shared an interesting anecdote with me.
Oasi Hill Country Renderings
Though the reception was overwhelmingly positive when he made the posts, there were also a couple less-than-positive comments. One lady was more than a little anxious about potential impact to water, which is scarce in that area. Instead of dunking on her publicly, or just ignoring, Ben wrote a thoughtful response and offered to meet with her in person and give her a tour.
She took him up on it, and he gave her a private tour and explained their plans to actually build water-neutral through various methods of construction like appliance efficiency, rainwater collection, water reuse and treatment, etc.
Guess what? She was converted.
Now, a fierce and vocal skeptic has turned to a fierce and vocal advocate.
This is one tiny example, but illustrates my point. My friend Sean Sweeney writes about this well—along with the entire step-by-step process of real estate development—in his weekly newsletter, The Bright Build (I highly recommend it if you're interested in real estate development).
If you invest in effective community buy-in, it will not only pay huge dividends down the road, but may even be the difference-maker in whether a project gets off the ground or not.
And that brings me to my other point:
What if you could enlist the local community through actual financial buy-in? There's nothing like incentive alignment, and offering people an ownership stake in your property is a terrific way to align incentives.
Crowdfunding has become a popular vehicle for financing real estate development through platforms like WeFunder, Fundrise or CrowdStreet. I think the idea is great, though I've never participated directly in it.
Allowing guests to purchase equity is such a beautiful alignment of incentives. They become owners in your property and brand, stay there more often, and advertise to their family and friends for free. They even treat the property better—you're winning all the way around!
I think this could tie in beautifully to a membership model, which I've been thinking about a lot and will write on soon.
But first, I want to hear your thoughts. Do you have experience investing through a crowdfunding platform like this? If you don't, what ideas do you have around how this could work?
As always, thanks for reading!
By the way—
My masterclass cohort launch was supposed to close last night, but because this launch was much shorter than those before, I decided to give it one extra day. This is your chance to unlock everything you need to know if you're serious about creating your own experiential, one-of-a-kind stay. Find out everything you need to know and sign up here. Don't forget, doors close tonight at midnight CST.
Also, I'll be speaking at Automatic, a placemaking, brand-building and real estate meetup by my friend Eric this Wednesday in Houston. Would love to see you if you're around.
—Isaac