Brick & Cedar Homes

Since I love real estate, I also love talking about it. I’ll share my stories, my opinions, research, and my advice. Who is this for?

Those who are generally curious about real estate and real estate investing.
Home owners who aren’t sure about when or how to sell their home.
Home owners who don’t want to go the traditional route in selling their home.
People on the fence about buying or selling.

Enjoy! Feel free to share any of these posts on your social media accounts and share your stories too!

Celebrating 3 Years! 6 Benefits of Owning a Short Term Rental

October 13, 2024

Every year in early October, I reflect back on the start of this journey. It’s one of the times in my life where I’ve felt VERY alive, so I remember many of the details. Last year I shared my craziest stories and my favorite things about my STR experience so far. The good news is that I don’t have any crazy stories from this past year to share! Less humor for you; less chaos for me!

This year, I’m focusing on sharing the benefits of owning a short term rental. I still get questions from people about the “weirdness” or “danger” of hosting guests in my house, or about the workload, or simply why in the world I would want to do this.

However, every year, there are more people who like the concept, understand the model, see the value, and are actually jump

2 Years & Counting!

October 10, 2023

2 years ago this week, I was hosting my very first guests. They booked through Airbnb and were in town to attend Eastern Michigan University’s Homecoming weekend.

I had closed on my house in late August of 2021. I made countless mistakes in my earliest adventures of posting my listing on Airbnb. Regardless, my first guests arrived on a Thursday in early October.

I greeted them when they arrived, letting them know they were my VERY first guests (and hopefully buying some flexibility with their review!). They walked in and said, “OH! You mean like, fresh paint kinda new!” Yes, indeed. The painters had just finished the previous day (love them btw: C.D.D. P

My approach to Open Houses

January 21, 2022

One of the things I found really interesting about searching for a home was how to approach open house and why do every day people attend open houses? I landed on these reasons:

To explore - to see how it feels to house hunt; to get a feel for it. Basically, the “I’m just looking” crowd.
To research - to answer a set of pre-determined questions by viewing homes through the Open House model, often done early in the buying process.
To make an offer - to get into the house first thing, confirm they like it (or can at least work with it) and make an offer very quickly.

Agents schedule Open Houses to market the home they have listed and to jump start the buyi

The rest is strategy + execution + relationships

January 21, 2022

While my last post touched on luck, this is a post dedicated to looking at the three pieces of real estate I love the most: Strategy, Execution, & Relationships. These are the parts over which we have more control. So, let’s dig in.

The story I want to share is about how I found a house to buy in under a month of searching during the hottest market we’ve seen to date (spring/summer 2021). That might look like luck, but I’d argue it has more to do with the other three. Why?

After an agonizing couple months of decision-making about whether or not to sell my first home, I finally closed on it June 24, 2021.

I wasn’t sure I was going to begin looking right awa

Luck plays a part

November 28, 2021

So, how much does luck play a part in real estate? Plenty.

Outside of every day luck - finding the right house at the right moment, getting a great referral for a floor contractor, or standing next to a contractor in line at Lowes who offers to help you buy your paint samples - the most important place to study luck in real estate is in the market.

Mostly, luck comes into play because no one is able to fully predict future markets. When we buy a home, we don’t know exactly how certain areas will evolve, grow, or appreciate.

Sure, during the financial crisis of 2008-2009, there were many, many owners who were in over their heads due to really unfortunate lending practices, bad advice, and FOMO (the fear

Why I love real estate investing

November 28, 2021

I got lucky and fell into real estate. Whether you have luck on your side or not, I want to help you do the same.

It took a perfect storm to allow me to buy my first home: A global recession in 2009 + just enough savings for a down payment + learning to negotiate on the fly + a government incentive of cash.