In this episode, you'll discover how a single ultra-niche lodging unit can outperform a full hotel on cash-on-cash returns and what that signals for boutique investors paying attention.

A treehouse designer whose work has been featured in the New York Times, Architectural Digest, and HGTV joins us to break down the real numbers behind experiential lodging. Dustin Fighter has spent two decades building one-of-a-kind suspended structures, and his original pine cone treehouse, 60 feet in the air and $600K to build, is now generating over $200K per year at $850/night.

In this episode, you'll discover:

• Why a single $600K unit can deliver 30% cash-on-cash returns unleveraged, and whether it actually scales
• The 3 biggest obstacles that kill treehouse hospitality deals before they start: permitting, insurance, and bank financing
• How crowdfunding raised $600K from 700 investors and why equity outperformed revenue share
• The pre-booking capital strategy that lets you fund the build before you break ground
• Why banks won't touch tree-supported structures and what builders are doing instead
• How tariffs are driving up construction costs and forcing a pivot back to high-end custom builds

If you're interested in high ADR niches where limited supply drives outsized returns, don't skip the unit economics breakdown. The math speaks for itself.

If you found value in this episode, take 30 seconds to leave us a review here. It helps more people find the podcast and keeps us bringing on great guests.

Connect with Dustin Feider

Website: https://www.o2treehouse.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dustinfeider

Connect with Michael on Instagram or LinkedIn.

Email Us at info@hotelinvestorplaybook.com

Visit the Hotel Investor Playbook Instagram

Invest with Malama Capital

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What if the most overlooked apartment deal in your market is already built, it's just flagged as a hotel?

In this episode, you'll discover how a valuation gap between hotels and multifamily creates forced equity of 40 to 50% before you change a single wall, and why most investors completely miss it.

A CEO who has completed over 30 hotel-to-apartment conversions across six states joins us to break down the exact strategy his firm has used to generate a 20% annualized return since inception. Ryan Sudeck and his team at Sage Investment Group turned an $8.5M distressed hotel into $18.9M in 19 months with a 38% annualized return and have since scaled the model to over 3,000 units and 500 investors.

In this episode, you'll discover:

• Why a hotel trading at a 12 cap automatically becomes more valuable the moment you convert it to residential, and how to calculate the forced equity before you buy
• The exact buy box Sage uses: room count, location signals, and the zoning step that most investors skip, which kills deals
• How to identify hotels in the "death spiral" before they hit the market and why Sage rarely buys on-market
• The invasive due diligence process they use to eliminate budget blowouts behind the walls
• Why the evergreen fund model outperforms syndications for this strategy, and how distributions work from day one
• The community impact case study in Tacoma that took a street responsible for 10% of Washington state murders to zero violent crime

If you're a hotel investor, a multifamily operator, or someone sitting on capital looking for a differentiated real estate strategy, this episode will change how you look at every distressed property you drive past. Don't miss the valuation math breakdown in the first ten minutes; it's genuinely one of the clearest arbitrage setups we've had on this show.

If you found value in this episode, take 30 seconds to leave us a review here. It helps more people find the podcast and keeps us bringing on great guests.

Connect with Ryan Sudeck

Website: http://sageinvestment.com

Email: ryan@sageinvestment.group

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryansudeck/

Connect with Michael on Instagram or LinkedIn.

Email Us at info@hotelinvestorplaybook.com

Visit the Hotel Investor Playbook Instagram

Invest with Malama Capital

Submit a deal

Experienced real estate investors make the jump into hospitality every year. Most of them underestimate what they're getting into.

In this episode, you'll hear what it actually looks like when a seasoned commercial operator buys his first boutique hotel, and what he'd do differently.

A commercial real estate investor who built a $75M portfolio across retail, self-storage, flex space, and adaptive reuse projects shares the unfiltered story of acquiring, renovating, and opening Salt Ranch, a 48-key boutique hotel in Nashville. Tyler Cauble had zero hospitality experience going in, and he's not shy about what that cost him.

In this episode, you'll discover:

• How he got financing after 50 lender rejections by redesigning a $17M project down to $10.5M
• Why old buildings will always surprise you, and how to protect yourself with the right contingency
• How tariffs added $150,000 in unexpected costs and what he'd build into his underwriting today
• The partner debt strategy he used instead of a capital call when costs ran over budget
• What he learned from interviewing 25 hotel management companies before selecting one
• Why does he say investing $50K in education before your first deal will outperform almost any return

If you're considering making the jump from commercial real estate into hospitality, or want to learn from someone who did it with eyes wide open, this one is worth your time.

If you found value in this episode, take 30 seconds to leave us a review here. It helps more people find the podcast and keeps us bringing on great guests.

Connect with Tyler Cauble

Website: https://www.tylercauble.com/ & https://saltranchhotel.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tylercauble/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/tylercauble

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/commercial_in_nashville/

Connect with Michael on Instagram or LinkedIn.

Email Us at info@hotelinvestorplaybook.com

Visit the Hotel Investor Playbook Instagram

Invest with Malama Capital

Submit a deal