Rebuilding a $4.5M Resort: My Million-Dollar Partnership Mistake

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0:00 Several years ago, I bought a resort for
0:01 $4 and a half million dollars seller
0:03 financed and I made the mistake of
0:04 thinking this would be an easy project.
0:06 Today, three years later, I own this by
0:08 myself without any partners and we are
0:10 revitalizing the Robin Hood. I'm going
0:11 to be walking you guys today through
0:13 some of the projects that we've done and
0:14 more importantly what we are doing to
0:15 revitalize the Robin Hood. This Robin
0:17 Hood project is one of my favorite
0:18 projects I have ever done and I am so
0:21 excited to be back here in Union,
0:23 Washington. Let's check it out. Hello
0:25 and welcome to Multif Family Strategy.
0:27 I'm Christian Osgood. Today you are here
0:29 with me at the Robin Hood Village
0:31 Resort. I'm going to walk through our 13
0:33 acre boutique hotel. I'm going to share
0:35 the upgrades that we're doing to turn a
0:36 business that was stagnant into [music]
0:38 a thriving boutique hotel. When we
0:40 bought this, it lacked personality. It
0:42 lacked the operations and it required
0:44 the owners to live on site to make their
0:46 model work. Today, Danny and I run this
0:48 from Texas, and it runs better than it
0:50 ever has in its 100redyear history.
0:53 First, a little history, the Robinson
0:54 was built in 1934. It has gone through a
0:57 lot of changes over those years. In the
1:00 last 5 years, it had seen a little bit
1:02 of a decline. There was some maintenance
1:04 that [music] was not done. The
1:05 reputation of the Robin Hood was the big
1:07 thing that was really hurting us. They
1:08 had shut down the pub and the
1:10 restaurant. This used to be a community
1:12 hub and it had lost that feel throughout
1:14 the years.
1:19 So, we're in the Robinood Pub. There's
1:20 about to be an event here. This used to
1:22 be one of the best music venues in the
1:24 greater Seattle area. It was a little
1:25 known secret, but this pub used to be
1:27 packed with music. Now, when I bought
1:29 this thing, it was just an empty space
1:31 that was doing absolutely nothing. The
1:32 crew here with Robin Hood Revival has
1:34 leased out the space and has totally
1:36 booked out the event space. So, we're
1:38 [music] about to have a packed event
1:39 tonight here with the local chamber.
1:40 There's going to be a concert and
1:42 they're prepping to take this to a whole
1:43 new level. But, it's really cool seeing
1:45 the new renovations come in and some of
1:46 the amazing artwork that they're adding
1:48 here into the pub. [music]
1:50 When I first bought the Robin Hood
1:52 Village Resort, I thought that it was
1:53 going to be an easier project than it
1:54 was. I thought, "Hey, this is amazing
1:56 location. We're in the Olympic Mountains
1:58 on the Hood Canal." So, it's right where
1:59 mountains meet saltwater. It's the most
2:01 Pacific Northwest place on planet Earth.
2:04 However, it completely lacked
2:05 personality, which means we have to
2:06 reimagine the entire thing. Now, we
2:07 added several events. Behind me is where
2:08 food trucks go at some of our larger
2:10 events. We do a whole farmers market
2:12 through the resort, [music] and we have
2:13 concerts on the lawn out here. Hundreds
2:16 and hundreds and hundreds of people
2:17 filter through here for multi-day
2:19 concerts and events at the Robin Hood,
2:21 which is fantastic through most of the
2:22 summer. We have our wedding season,
2:24 which is usually full pretty much every
2:27 single weekend. [music]
2:33 Major upgrade. We're replacing the
2:35 wedding tent. This is really old. I
2:37 don't know if you can tell on YouTube,
2:38 but this thing is very, very, very beat
2:41 up. What we want to do in here is put
2:43 chandeliers down the middle. In the
2:45 summer, we have all the tables all set
2:47 up. It's actually a beautiful area.
2:49 We're going to redo the lights and we're
2:50 getting new canvas quoted right now. So,
2:52 we're going to bring this all the way
2:53 in. Brand new canvas all season. And
2:56 we're going to add sides to the tent.
2:58 Originally, we were thinking about doing
2:59 a hard permanent structure. The feedback
3:01 that we got is people actually really
3:03 like the wedding tent look. We just want
3:05 to go a lot higher quality. So, we're
3:07 going to completely deck out this space,
3:08 enhance it. But it's these little fixes
3:11 that actually make the biggest
3:12 difference, especially in the event
3:13 space at the Robin Hood. In the summer,
3:15 we run our concert series here. So, off
3:17 this stage, we have some amazing bands.
3:19 Last time, we had Christian Bush from
3:21 Sugarland as our opener, but we run
3:23 multi-day events right here. We're going
3:25 to continue to upgrade this space. This
3:27 is an extension of our wedding tent
3:28 project. Follow me to my favorite
3:30 project we're doing, though.
3:34 [music]
3:39 We're slow in March, April, and May.
3:41 This is our ramp up season in the year.
3:43 At the back end of March is when all the
3:46 bulbs come up. And we actually have some
3:47 here. But we're going to plant 20,000
3:50 flowers all over the Robin Hood. [music]
3:52 We're going to do them in patches in
3:53 these stumps in the grass. Hyens and
3:56 daffodils specifically. Why those?
3:58 Because deer don't like to eat them. And
4:00 pretty much anything else, the deer are
4:01 going to munch. When we bought the Robin
4:03 Hood, it doesn't have a really unified
4:05 theme. If you see all this in here, it's
4:08 all just kind of plants put here and
4:11 there. There's not a real garden feel to
4:13 it. We're going to tie in some of the
4:14 bigger plants. We're going to do beauty
4:16 bark, but the landscaping at the Robin
4:18 Hood, which is already a pretty
4:19 incredible space, is going to be
4:21 amazing. Our target as business owners
4:23 is by having the peak season with
4:25 flowers. We're going to extend our
4:27 wedding season earlier. And on the back
4:29 end, we have a creek right over here
4:30 that I'm going to show you in a second
4:32 that has a huge salmon run. We want two
4:34 months added to peak on the front end
4:35 with the beautiful garden feel and an
4:38 extra peak month with the major salmon
4:40 run here at the Robin Hood. [music]
4:48 [music]
4:49 We're upgrading the wedding ceremony
4:50 area. We are looking at doing a new
4:52 arch. This thing has been here since we
4:54 bought the Robin Hood, and it looks
4:56 beautiful when it's decorated well.
4:57 However, [music] if you look at it
4:59 really closely, it's not the most stable
5:01 thing that we've ever had. This is going
5:02 to be one of our major upgrades. It's a
5:04 focal point for a lot of weddings. We
5:06 actually have some beautiful, beautiful
5:07 decorations on it, but doing a permanent
5:09 structure that's going to be much more
5:11 sturdy [music]
5:11 is going to be a huge upgrade. And
5:13 behind the arch, we get to the creek.
5:14 I'm actually really excited about this
5:15 project. So, we have a salmon run that
5:18 [music] comes right through here every
5:19 year. Massive salmon run comes up our
5:22 river out of the Puget Sound. [music]
5:23 They come down the Hood Canal, roll up
5:25 our river. One thing that we have failed
5:27 to do with the Robin Hood is let people
5:29 know how cool this little natural
5:30 [music] event is. When we have marketed
5:32 it in the past, a lot of people have
5:34 actually come out here and stayed. We've
5:35 done a bad job of telling the story.
5:37 Part of being a resort owner is
5:39 correctly telling the story, letting
5:40 people know what's cool about the Robin
5:41 Hood. [music] So, we'll be doing a much
5:42 better job of telling the story, putting
5:44 events around the Salmon Run. There's
5:46 going to be a ton of infrastructure.
5:47 [music] Stay tuned for more on this.
5:53 [music]
5:54 Believe it or not, one of the most
5:55 important parts of running a business is
5:57 you do actually have to make money,
5:58 which means you have to know which
6:00 cabins [music] are actually working and
6:01 where you're making your money. We use
6:02 software called Logify. Now, Logify will
6:04 help me track all of our incomes, manage
6:06 my guest, push out to all the platforms,
6:09 Expedia, [music] Booking.com, Airbnb,
6:11 you name it. But I know which cabins
6:13 don't perform the best. The two behind
6:14 me are do okay, but they're not great.
6:18 What we want to do is massively [music]
6:19 upgrade those. So, one project that
6:21 we're hoping to do within the next year
6:22 is actually put two brand new, [music]
6:24 very nice, tiny homes there. So, massive
6:27 cabin upgrades. There are some mobiles
6:29 up the hill. See if you guys can see
6:31 them here. Up the hill. If you see there
6:33 and there, those are mobile [music]
6:35 homes. We actually used to have staff
6:37 live in those, but they're kind of ugly
6:38 and it's not highest and best use. What
6:40 we want to do is actually take these
6:41 cabins, which are mobile, move them up
6:43 the hill, and then put the nicer cabins
6:44 here. So, we'll actually have more
6:46 [music] net cabins while we shut down
6:48 the Robin Hood suite and turn it into
6:50 permanent event space and shut down
6:52 cabin 15 and turn into our store.
6:54 [music] We're going to add two more
6:55 cabins and move them up the hill. In
6:57 addition, we get a lot of requests for
6:59 camping out here. However, we don't
7:02 legally have any campgrounds yet.
7:03 [music] I plan to fix that.
7:11 Now, like everything else, if you add
7:12 anything that could make money, the
7:14 government wants to know about it and
7:15 wants to approve it. So, we're working
7:16 on the permitting to add the camp spots,
7:19 but we're thinking about doing it back
7:20 where our trail system is. So, we
7:22 actually have 13 acres here at the Robin
7:23 Hood. Behind me, I just leveled a bunch
7:25 of black bushes and trees, clearing this
7:27 area for a landscaping project. We're
7:29 actually thinking about leveling it,
7:30 marking it, and turning it into one of
7:31 our [music] campsites. As you go through
7:33 the Robin Hood, we have this whole trail
7:34 back here that will go off into the
7:36 woods. We're installing a Frisbee golf
7:38 course back here, uh, which I just got
7:40 in. So, I'll be working on that project
7:42 later today. But, as you go back in
7:45 here, there's a few different locations
7:47 that may work as long as the city
7:48 doesn't think we're too close to our
7:50 river that runs through over there. If
7:52 you would have told me before I started
7:54 my career that buying a $4.5 million
7:56 resort was something that anyone could
7:57 just do and you can do it on creative
7:59 financing, I would have thought you're
8:01 insane. That being said, I don't
8:03 recommend starting with hard hospitality
8:05 projects as your first deal. There's a
8:07 lot of unknowns, and boy did I learn
8:09 that the hard way.
8:13 [music]
8:14 Another little project we picked up. We
8:16 found a leaky pipe down here, so we're
8:17 fixing it right now. But we picked up
8:19 this little excavator. This is $6,000 at
8:22 Walmart. Brand new. Not too bad.
8:26 [music]
8:27 We're in cabin 15. This cabin is a
8:30 problem. So, this used to be a liquor
8:32 store. They converted it fairly poorly
8:35 into a cabin. This does less revenue
8:37 than any other cabin in the Robin Hood.
8:39 And we have a fix I'm really excited
8:41 about. So, right now, we're all
8:42 touchless, no contact resort. So, it's
8:44 almost like an Airbnb. You come in, you
8:45 go directly to your cabin. There's no
8:47 person here or lobby. We're going to add
8:49 vending machines, high-end with good
8:52 food in here, and Robin Hood apparel.
8:54 We're going to put a big TV either on
8:56 that wall or possibly over here on this
8:58 wall that will cycle through the
8:59 different events you can do, introduce
9:00 you to the Hood Canal and otherwise just
9:03 greets you for Robin Hood. So, you come
9:05 in, this is your first stop. You can get
9:07 food, apparel, coffee, all of that will
9:10 be held right here on site. This will be
9:12 an amenity instead of a space that is
9:14 underutilized and put together really
9:16 weird. Also, these beds are weird and
9:18 too close together. This causes tons of
9:20 problems for us.
9:25 These are kind of cool, but they're
9:26 about to be very cool. These hot tubs at
9:28 the Robin Hood Village Resort, they're
9:30 pretty nice. They're about $700, but
9:32 they're not super fancy. They're
9:33 high-end inflatable hot tubs, as
9:35 high-end as inflatable can be. We're
9:37 going to switch these with solid tubs.
9:38 So, one at a time, we're bringing in
9:40 nicer tubs. We're talking jets, hard
9:42 tub, way easier maintenance. The
9:45 beautiful thing is this actually makes
9:46 us more money. Not only is it a better
9:48 user experience, but when we replace
9:50 these, they'll last a lot longer and
9:52 they're easier to repair.
10:02 Biggest mistake I made was the wrong
10:04 partnership structure, and it cost me
10:06 over a million personally to buy out the
10:08 other partners. Now, on the flip side, I
10:09 do own 100% of the resort. It's going to
10:11 get about another $500,000 of
10:14 renovations. This is going to include
10:15 interiors and everything we showed here
10:16 on the video. Improved wedding spaces,
10:19 potential campsites if we get them
10:21 improved. We've already done the
10:22 restoration work on the pub and we're
10:24 expanding that massively. We're going to
10:26 do interior cabins. It's going to be a
10:28 brand new resort. But I want to point
10:29 out this took a lot of money and we
10:31 started with $0 in the account which was
10:34 a huge mistake. So, if you're going to
10:35 do a similar deal, get the right
10:37 partners if you're using partners or if
10:39 you're going to fund this yourself.
10:41 Really calculate the full cost. The
10:42 Robin Hood is one of my favorite
10:44 projects I've ever done. It's also been
10:45 the most painful because of the way that
10:46 we set it up. And now here I am in my
10:49 third or fourth year of operating the
10:51 Robin Hood. Finally getting to the
10:52 projects I would have liked to do in
10:53 years one or two. So let this be a
10:55 lesson to you. If you're investing in
10:56 these projects, come up with the entire
10:59 business plan and the cost before you
11:00 buy it. This should be obvious. It's
11:02 what I preach in multif family. I failed
11:04 to do it correctly in the hospitality
11:06 space. I massively underestimated
11:08 [music] the work and aligned partners
11:10 who had no experience in this space. If
11:12 you're watching just because you're
11:13 excited about the Robin Hood, the good
11:15 news is it is going to become
11:16 progressively more epic. It is already a
11:18 beautiful place. We are done with phase
11:21 two of our community improvement. We
11:23 want to re-engage Union Washington and
11:26 the Greater Hood Canal in a way that the
11:27 Robin Hood used to do and more. Working
11:29 [music] with Robin Hood Revival to bring
11:31 the pub back to the community is a huge
11:33 win. We've also worked with Rob Hill and
11:36 Hoodstock separately to run multiple
11:39 multi-day concert events in the summer.
11:41 I have a few more projects that I'll be
11:43 announcing soon, but this is stage 204
11:46 of our community re-engagement. Our goal
11:48 is that the Robin Hood remains a hub for
11:50 music and events, and we're going to be
11:52 doing some cool things to [music]
11:53 continue to expand that. Well, thanks
11:54 for watching. This is another episode of
11:56 Multif Family Strategy, even though we
11:57 didn't talk about multif family at all
11:58 today. If you enjoyed this or want to
12:00 know more about how we're running
12:01 business, how you can do these projects,
12:04 and how you can utilize creative finance
12:05 to do deals with a better structure than
12:07 I chose for this deal, like, subscribe,
12:09 and I'll see you on the next episode.
12:10 [music]