Feasibility

Hi {{first_name|dear builder}}!

In the summer of 2023, I came alarmingly close to buying a hotel in Estes Park, CO.

Actually two hotels.

Here’s what happened.

I’ve carried a dream for a long while to create a retreat center purpose-designed for teams. Retreats have been foundational for our team at OpenTent, but the hardest part is figuring out the housing. The choices are mostly either a block of hotel rooms somewhere or a crammed Airbnb that feels a bit weird. Neither are great for crafting a transformational values-aligned immersive experience for a group of coworkers trying to build culture together.

What if there was a beautiful retreat center that was perfect for small teams, 10-50 people? In nature but not too far from a major airport. Affordable for the company yet filled with nice touches that make everyone feel great. Good healthy food, onsite activities. Ample meeting space and all the A/V needs handled. It would be available just for exclusive buyouts so you’d have the space just for your team the week you’re there.

Is it possible?? I couldn’t get the idea out of my head.

One day in late June 2023, our family was on vacation in South Haven, MI, on the shore of Lake Michigan. Near our Airbnb, I saw an inn with a For Sale sign in front of it. When I got back to my computer I looked up the property and discovered Loopnet, the major database of commercial real estate listings. For some people (cough my wife cough), Zillow is their addictive scrollable phone-based media of choice…and for me, since that fateful day, it has been Loopnet. I just can’t quit.

Browsing that night, I spotted something that hooked me. There was a 20-cabin resort in Estes Park, Colorado for sale, and a 30-room hotel also for sale right next to it. The properties directly bordered each other and Rocky Mountain National Park, on a stunning hillside a few minutes from town.

These two together would be perfect, I thought.

On Loopnet they often post recent financial statements for the property, which I pulled up only to find I didn’t know what several of the words meant. This prompted me to research how hospitality property finances work…and by the end of the night I had subscribed to three podcasts and downloaded two new books on my Kindle.

Back home the next week, I couldn’t get the idea out of my head. The properties seemed ideal. There was just one small problem: I did not have $10mil in the bank to purchase them. So I researched financing options, and found the SBA 504 program which guarantees real estate loans for banks and enables buyers to only put 10% down. I didn’t have $1mil either but I figured that was a lot closer and I could find some partners to split that with me.

I met with an SBA advisor, who told me a formal Feasibility Assessment would help my application for the loan.

So I found a real estate Feasibility Analyst, who would make a comprehensive report for me for $15k. Expected occupancy, cost of room improvements, regional travel statistics, rate comparisons, etc.

The properties had everything we would need for the retreat center except for a large gathering room, so I found a general contractor, an architect, and a designer who could help make that space happen and update the property in general.

I found a commercial real estate broker I liked, who started talking with the sellers to gather more info.

At every step, in every conversation, I fully expected each of these professionals to hear my idea and laugh me out of the room. I could barely say out loud “ten million dollars.” I had zero real estate experience. I think I was hoping that all these experts I talked with would tell me to quit it and go back to Salesforce consulting.

But they never did. Instead they all seemed to love the idea and take me seriously. Admittedly, they all stood to make money from this, whereas I was the one carrying the risk and the debt. “Feasibility” pretends to be a data-driven objective science but is more truthfully a contextual subjective art.

So I kept going, because I wanted them (and me) to be right. I had insomnia many nights of the week throughout this period, mentally leaping around between my over-optimistic vision, the size of the monthly debt payments, the enthusiasm of the vendors who wanted to help, the image of a wildfire attacking the property before we had paid off the loan…back and forth, back and forth.

Everything built up to a site visit for the whole group on September 21, 2023. If I didn’t have this photo I would start to doubt that any of this really happened.

We gathered in a circle in front of the lobby, and everyone looked at me to kick it off. I felt totally out of body but managed to give some framing and goals for the day.

We had a blast together. Strolling around in one of the most gorgeous places I’ve ever seen in Colorado, we let dreams stretch even taller. We imagined how teams would gather amid the wildflowers and pine trees, where the light from the setting sun would enter the dining room, how to keep a yoga area usable all year round.

“Whatever happens with this, that was the most fun day of ‘work’ I’ve had in a long while” my friend Josh said as we drove back to Denver together that night.

What ended up happening is we submitted an LOI (Letter of Intent) to the sellers, which they accepted. Eeee!! That gave us a week to send them a first contract, which would be the moment at which money would go to escrow and there was no turning back (without losing that money).

Two days after the LOI I was in Chicago for a conference when our general contractor called me: after several conversations with the town of Estes Park, they calculated it would cost $200k just to get the plans and permits done for the new construction we needed to do - and that money would have to be spent before the SBA loan would be funded, so we couldn’t finance it.

It was too big an upfront cost. That was the end of that. I emailed the crew to call it all off, which was so hard to do because I had become fully wrapped up in the vision of it all and I loved the team we had assembled.

I felt crushed. I left the conference to walk along Lake Michigan, just a couple hours south on the same shoreline that kicked off this whole escapade four months earlier. I called Sara to debrief. Always full of wisdom, she said:

“We got further than we thought we would. The truth is when we ran the numbers it was always going to be very tight to make it work, and that’s if everything worked out perfectly. We are on the path to making this feasible - we’re just not there yet. Three years ago you couldn’t have come close to attempting this. This year you came close…what will you be able to do three years from now?”

Brilliant advice for an impatient person: take a minute to remember how much progress you’ve already made.

So. Here we are exactly three years later. Am I closer to being able to pull this project off? Yes, undoubtedly.

AND, I would never ever attempt to do this right now!! What the hell was I thinking!!???!!! Owning and operating a 50-room hotel while raising two kids and running other businesses with zero hospitality experience and needing to pay off a massive loan…my goodness. I can’t believe I thought for a moment that I could pull that off.

But wow what a delightful moment it was.

In the end I spent $15k on the whole endeavor, for that Feasibility Analysis (a long PDF which basically concluded it’s doable IF zero things go wrong 🤣 ). Plus $60 on hospitality management textbooks. Plus ~300 hours of time.

It was so worth it. I would do it again.

Just not right now.