Two years earlier, when a developer I knew got overextended on a gorgeous modern build near Briar Glen, I saw an opening. The property was beautiful—white oak floors, black-trimmed windows, wide sliders opening to a deck—but the timing was bad, rates were high, and the developer was sweating. I created a small LLC called Blue Cedar Holdings and took a master lease with an option to purchase. I used rental income to carry it.
Traveling nurses, corporate relocations, one family displaced by a disastrous renovation—slow, boring, legal money. My name was nowhere obvious. That was the point. In real estate, once family thinks your name is attached to an asset, they start discussing it like community property.
The night before I left for Key West, Savannah stopped by.
She looked around the house like she was inspecting a boutique hotel. “This place is very you,” she said.
“Organized?”
“A little boring.”
“It’s a rental.”
She chewed gum, leaned on the island, then asked, “Can you Venmo me six hundred? Business thing. I’ll send it back Tuesday.”
“No.”
She blinked. “Wow. Immediate.”
“Because the answer is immediate.”
“It’s six hundred dollars.”
“It’s never six hundred dollars.”