42. The Right Place To Land - Finding the Best Nest

"There's no place like home!" In the Wizard of Oz Dorothy said these words and clicked the heels of her ruby slippers three times. Instantly she was transported back to her farm home in Kansas. This makes for an enduring story...but getting into the right home presents a little more of a challenge today. Especially if you live with an intellectual and/or developmental disability. You have many obstacles to contend with, such whether you want a roommate(s), where you will live...house, apartment, condo. Is it better to buy (if the funds are available) or lease? What is the appropriate level of support needed and who will provide supports? How will I fit into the community? Do I want a job or volunteer work to live a full life? Just to name a few. Just about all of these decisions need to be made by the person with disabilities along with their family and other valued advisors. Sound like a lot of work, doesn't it? Well NESTIDD is an organization that has some good news to share with you! When it comes to selecting the right house, at the right location, with all the needed structural modification, that also meets YOUR definition of "affordable" NESTIDD can make the process much easier for everyone! NESTIDD will even mow the lawn, shovel snow, fix the leaking faucet and provide regular home maintenance. Our interview today is with Andrew Parker, a co-founder and CEO of NESTIDD, a Chicago based company serving the disability community with affordable housing options! Andrew has some exciting information to share with us!

Transcript

Steve: 0:13

Hi, this is Steve. Welcome to navigating life as we know it a podcast series about celebrating ability, embracing diversity and living inclusively. I have with me today, my co host, Carrie Johnson.

Kerry Johnson: 0:26

Hello,

Steve: 0:27

there. My guest today is Andrew Parker, the co founder and CEO of nested any st add.

Kerry Johnson: 0:35

So Steve, how did you hear about nested?

Steve: 0:38

You know, I'm racking my brain I can't remember. I think it was a Facebook post or something on social media and I mentioned the real estate method. Well, that's kind of interesting, because we're talking about housing for people with disabilities all the time.

Kerry Johnson: 0:50

So we're going to get into a little bit more of how they developed and what they exactly do in the interview, right? Yes, we are. Excellent. Let's go to it. Absolutely.

Steve: 1:10

Hi, this is Steve Johnson with navigating life as we know it a podcast series about celebrating ability, embracing diversity and living inclusively. Today, we're talking once again about housing a different alternative than the ones we have talked about in the past. We're speaking with Andrew Parker, who is the managing director and co founder of nested First of all, welcome, Andrew.

Unknown: 1:33

Thanks for having me, Steve.

Steve: 1:35

You have a statement on your website, which is profound in its simplicity. And I want to just read that. We buy houses, customize them for people with disabilities, lease and maintain them affordably. Most of we're talking about today will be the different parts of that one sentence because it is profound in its implications. And it's pretty simple in its construction. But first I want to talk a little bit about the history. nest is located in Chicago, which is where I hail from in home for you is in Pennsylvania, but you and your co founder Tad Ritter have a Michigan connection. Explain what that Michigan connection is about?

Unknown: 2:16

Sure. We are college friends not in college at the University of Michigan about 10 more than 10 years ago now. I grew up in outside of Philadelphia, I found myself at Michigan. Tad is from Ohio. And I moved out to Chicago after after school. And I've been a Midwesterner ever since.

Steve: 2:37

What was your major in college?

Unknown: 2:39

I was in the Business School Business Administration.

Steve: 2:44

Why nested? There's got to be a story behind how you selected to form nested in sort of that particular market?

Unknown: 2:51

Yeah, sure. So Todd and I were in the real estate world together. We were partners on some real estate projects that we did back in 2012 2013 2014. And those were what we generally call market rate real estate sort of typical, multifamily and single family residential projects. We bought small buildings in Chicago, renovated them and lease them out. They're mostly leased about two recent college grads. We didn't we did some, some renovations as we went. Then 20 1415. Two things happened. One, the recession from the recession was sort of nearing its end, and we found it more and more difficult to find the kinds of properties that we wanted to buy for the prices we wanted to buy them. And secondly, more importantly, Chad has some few family members in the IDD world. And we in a family friend, who was in her 20s was entering the post school funding, where are you going to live long term decision, and we were helping her sort of figure out that was her family. And that is how we learned about all the Medicaid waivers and Medicaid licensed care providers who are out there in the world providing various services to adults with IDD. And we were just our real estate company had a property management arm. And we helped a few of these care agencies with their property management because that's what they needed help with. It wasn't really a business idea on our part, we were just sort of lending some of our property management resources to help them out. And as we did that, we learned and noticed that these care agencies were pretty amazing organizations that were being asked to do a lot of real estate work, which wasn't their forte was not what they wanted to be doing. They were We're really good at providing individualized care and setting up plans and creating good outcomes among their, their clients, their residents. But they also needed to go buy houses, fix the dishwasher, make sure the roof wasn't leaky, get a mortgage, pay the mortgage. And we noticed that they also wanted to be in one place for a long time, which from a business perspective for us was, it was refreshing. We were, we were tired of leasing our properties to recent college graduates, young professionals who would live there for eight months, and then move out. So we started that was sort of our first inkling of this space. And we started up, we found a care agency who was who was kind enough to take a chance on us and allow us to buy a couple houses for them. And we went from there.

Steve: 5:48

I appreciate the fact that you and your partner were able to see there was an opportunity and a very great need there. Like you said, care agencies really are not real estate concerns. And that's a total different skill set. They probably had a farm a lot of that out anyway, to many different sources, like a real estate agent and maintenance is you could come in with one solution, and make it a lot easier for them to do the job that they do well. Who are your primary customers and their care agencies?

Unknown: 6:17

Yeah, our primary customers are care agencies that offer services to those on various state Medicaid waivers. So we work with I think we're up to 50, almost 50 care agencies that we lease properties to some we lease up the 4050 houses to them, some we just have one house, but any care agency that is licensed by Medicaid is our our bread and butter. And we are starting to and we'd love to get into more of the private or family base and providing housing for individuals whose housing needs are set up by their their family rather than care agencies.

Steve: 6:56

And that's why we're talking today. Cuz that's primarily I have people that listen to this podcast and the families that I know, it's a matter of they want to have something in the community, not part of a group home in have some choice in where that might be and do it for a long term. Andrew, what happens when let's say a service agency that you're dealing with, or maybe a new one, contacts you and talks about what their needs are currently, and maybe in the near term future for housing? What's the process you take and working with them?

Unknown: 7:30

So we start with what are they looking for? What are the things that the ultimate residents are looking for? Where do they want to live? Do they want to be near a certain bus route, for example, or near a certain shopping center where a couple of them they have may have jobs? Do they want to make sure that the house is a single storey property do they need to they definitely need to have a big backyard that doesn't back up against anyone because they have individuals who like to be outside a lot and want to want a lot of space in the yard. You know, the little just just sort of like, if anyone else came and said what I'm looking to buy a new house by fiance and IRA or my Sorry, my with my new wife has two weeks are are looking for a house right now. And, and we have certain things we're looking for. And, and that's that's where you have to start. And often the things that the care agencies are looking for, as you can imagine are similar, we need parking space, but no space in the driveway, an off street parking space, if they need to have a van or they have a lot of transportation needs. Often single storey often want or need at least one accessible bathroom. And they want to be in certain areas, certain zip codes. And so we start with that. And we say that's great. We often when they come to us, we've already you know, purchase or look to purchase properties in those areas. So we can give them a sense of cost and what they're looking for and timing. And, and we go from there. And we have a team on the ground, who goes out and generates what we call a home menu, and we'll send them 25 houses that might meet their criteria. They pick 567 that they like, and we go out and see them and once they find a house that they really feel is what they're looking for. We purchase it for them agreed to do certain renovations that they that they need. And they and they move

Steve: 9:30

in. Well, that makes it easy, somewhat easy, at least. Like

Unknown: 9:34

you said earlier. There's enough complication in this space and facilitating the care and and in the case of care providers dealing with licenses and inspections that are we really try to keep it very simple. We're going to take the real estate burden off of your plate. We know that the real estate's not the only thing that you need to have in place in order to create a good living environment and a long term solution for you individuals who are living there, but it's a, it's a piece of it, and it's often sort of the last piece that needs to fall into place. And we have, I think we've developed a, a process that we can systematize it as much as as much as possible to make it one fewer complication or sort of ambiguous step that needs to be taken in what's uh, what is always a, a long and sometimes convoluted process.

Steve: 10:27

What I see as being a great advantage to working with nested on that is that quite often, we end up settling for something which may be acceptable, but is not optimal. And it doesn't mean that you could probably always deliver on every single thing somebody wants, but you can show them a selection of homes is a potential that is closer to what they're looking for than just settling for something that they happen to come across. It's nice to be able to choose from a wide variety, or at least having some options. There's some things you can, you can make an unaccessible bathroom accessible, but you can't read, you can't change a bus route. You can't move a house closer to a shopping center. Being able to provide that service is very helpful to organizations and to individuals. I want to revisit for a minute the opening statement on your website says you buy houses, customize them for people with disabilities lease and maintain them affordably let's talk about the maintenance homes are notorious for demanding attention. At times there's no removal lawnmowing leaking faucets, refrigerators that that stop working furnaces, all kinds of moving parts inside a home. So you guys provide that service to also?

Unknown: 11:45

Yes, absolutely. That's a big part of what we do. And we take that we take that seriously, we take that as a sort of a core tenant of the business like we, like I said, when we sort of first learned about this space, it was because of these care agencies, we were we were meeting with to help our our family friend. And their big challenge was property management. And that's sort of how we, we got into this space in the first place. We are responsible for the repairs and maintenance on all of the properties that we own, we and because of that we are we have sort of we have shared incentives with the care agencies and with the residents. So when we buy a property, we want to make sure that that refrigerators, we want to minimize the chance that that refrigerator is going to go that we need to make a bunch of trips over there to to fix things. So we are buying properties, and delivering often all new appliances, new AC systems upon move in If not, we're making sure that everything's up to date and up to code. And if something goes then we then we go and fix it. We've actually developed a app that's available on on phones and on online called nesta 360, which is a ticketing system for care agencies and the DSPs who work in work for those care agencies to flag issues in the in the house so that we are aware of them and can get out and fix them.

Steve: 13:15

So for direct service professional or a care agency happens to be in a house and they notice there's something wrong, they can just whip out the phone and make a report and it goes to you guys. Or goes through the process to get on the list to be fixed. Is that

Unknown: 13:31

Yeah, exactly. And that's and that's a good way You said you described it as they noticed something wrong. And that's sort of exact. That sounds simple. But that's exactly what this app is designed that the DSP in the house doesn't need to determine whether it's wrong because it's a real estate issue or it's wrong because, you know, some someone's TV fell off the wall and, and it needs to go back up. You know, we're nested as the landlord is responsible for all the real estate items. But the staff and the people on the families who are who are in the homes, you know, don't aren't shouldn't be expected to decide that. Johnny's Johnny's out of his, you know, his medicines, his medicines running out next week and aid needs a refill. And the roof is leaking. You know, one of those things that the roof is a nested issue, that the medicine is the care agency, but our app allows that DSP to just, you know, either take a picture of the leaking roof or send in a note that says Johnny's medicine is due and when it's the medicine, the care agencies team in their in their, in their main office will will see that message and respond accordingly. And when it's the roof it comes into nested and we will respond accordingly.

Steve: 14:47

So in other words, the athletes, the 360 notifies you It also notifies the care agency depending upon what the need happens to be. That's pretty slick. Yes, yeah. That makes reporting a whole lot easier. And it also Keeps gives you a good place to track what's going on and who's taking care of it.

Unknown: 15:05

One thing I often tell families who end carry disease, but their agencies are starting to, to understand this, probably because I'm telling them as much as they will listen is that there are certain, you know, you said earlier in the podcast that a lot of people would run from this kind of asset class. And the reason why they would run it is because they don't understand it, when you really sit down and think about it, there are a lot of, for lack of a better word advantages to a company like us owning property that is occupied by individuals with disabilities who have care providers in the house all the time. So we always, there's always or almost always a staff person on site. So they can identify when there's issues right away, they're always there to open the door, if the plumber needs to come over. In a lot of real estate environments, that's not the case, you have to figure out when someone a residence home after work, or when you can get in the door to do it. So and the other big advantage is obviously stability that care agencies and families want to have the residents in these houses for a long time. So we know that if we do a good job and maintain the property and provide a good experience, that we're going to have long term tenants, and that's a big business perspective, that's a big advantage. And something that I wants care agencies to realize that they can have a have a better home than they could have otherwise, because they're offering to be there for a long time. So there are things like that are actually uniquely suited to leasing property and can can allow you to find great houses or for maybe even less than you'd expect.

Steve: 16:45

In today's environment. We're talking about people being evicted near the end of this pandemic, hopefully the end or the end of it because of lack of payment of rent. I don't imagine you run into many cases where the rents not being paid.

Unknown: 16:59

No, not at all. And we have great tenants.

Steve: 17:04

How many how many states do you work in? You mentioned having quite a number of houses at this point?

Unknown: 17:09

Yeah, we own over 300 houses we manage. We've managed I think 200 more? And we are in 17 states now.

Steve: 17:21

17? Wow. Yep. And how long you been in business?

Unknown: 17:26

We started almost exactly four years ago, four

Steve: 17:30

years. So what do you project your growth to be and let's say 10 years,

Unknown: 17:36

we want we want 10,000 houses. We want to make this available to show care agencies that did just like, if you're opening a restaurant or a store, or you are a pharmacy, you don't, you know, those operations don't own their real estate, they lease it. And they focus on their core business. And we want to show all the every care agency in the country, that that's an option. And sometimes it's it doesn't make sense for them because they you know, they they've had properties donated to them, or they've, they've owned certain properties for a long time. And that's great. But in a lot of cases, it doesn't make a lot of sense. And it's not something that is on the radar for a lot of care agencies. And as you know, families and we're spending a lot of time right now trying to get the word out that we're in 17 states, we will go to 50 states. And and we're here as an as an option to consider.

Steve: 18:34

Well, when you consider the fact that the disability population is growing quite rapidly in, there's a significant a high percentage of the individuals who have intellectual or developmental disabilities are living home with mom and dad, when they're in their 30s and 40s. And 50s, even mom and dad are in their 50s and 60s and 70s. At some point in time, those parents are going to pass and when they do, there is going to be even a greater tidal wave of need for housing. It's mandated today in terms of Medicaid supported that they be in the community. So there's a tremendous growth opportunity to serve that population. And I think nested is very well positioned to do that.

Unknown: 19:21

You know, one thing that I've that I've learned in these four years is that the parents, the families, who have adults in their 20s and 30s with intellectual developmental disabilities, just providing the knowledge that there's a an alternative to figuring out entirely on your own. It takes that whole it simplifies the whole process of how are we going to get care into the home when when we're no longer here as parents or when we're not able to provide care anymore. Even if you don't even if you know you're not you're not acting on it right now. But you know, you know, it's an option.

Steve: 19:57

There's no easy set of instructions for that and it's very different depending upon the level of ability. So, yeah, you're right, knowing that there is a source of housing and it may be appropriate, or it might be that something else is appropriate. But knowing that there is an option to turn to where the real estate can be purchased and adapted, and leased back and maintained, takes a whole set of concerns off the plate for families, as well as service providers. So it's really quite a service. Andrew, you do have in your website, a tab that says think a DSP, a direct service professional, what's that about?

Unknown: 20:38

Yeah, so that's, that's a program we put together. We've sent 1000s of postcards to DSPs just handwritten notes that you can go on our website and click on that link and write a note to a DSP you can you can address it to a specific direct service provider or you can you can just write a general letter to a DSP and we'll we'll make sure it gets to gets to someone worthy. And it's a simple program, we're not doing anything more than providing handwritten thank yous. To the people who work in these properties. It's an attempt to just show that their work is appreciated, you know, as you know, there's there's a challenge and staffing these houses and handling turnover of the DSPs they do a lot of times it's a it's a difficult job, it's a low paying job. And we are we are just trying to show them that that people are are out there, thinking of them and, and that their work doesn't go unnoticed. We we've also started a nonprofit called assisted, we raise the $100,000. And we're starting to put vegetable gardens, in group home yard, some of the homes we own some we don't it's not specific to nested houses. And those vegetable gardens provide an activity for the DSPs and the people in the homes to do together to tend to the garden that can provide food for you know, healthy nutrition. And there's often a resonant challenge and a DSP challenge. And it stimulates the DSPs having something to work on while while they're there. And and we just think that, you know, we know that real estate is a big challenge for our clients. But so staffing, and we are we are trying to showcase some of the great work that's done by the 10s of 1000s of DSPs out there,

Steve: 22:36

you know, and they do perform a tremendously essential task and you're right there, they're not paid very well, certainly you can get low paying jobs in private industry that pay better than many DSPs.

Unknown: 22:49

The turnover is really a big, big thing there too, because you I'm sure you know better than me, you have a good DSP, who's who's connecting with the residents well and doing good work with them. You want that person there for years and years. So any anything we can do to to facilitate that we're we're all over

Steve: 23:10

assisted Is there a website for that or something?

Unknown: 23:13

That's Yep, we're doing our focusing on nutrition. And the first wave of what we're doing is, is is gardens. We were starting it in Georgia. And do we're building several gardens right now. We're working with care agencies. We don't have a website yet that is in the works. So stay tuned.

Steve: 23:33

So I got I got a question. Is that spelled assisted with an add at the end?

Unknown: 23:39

That's right,

Steve: 23:39

I guess.

Unknown: 23:41

Okay, maybe smarter or smarter than we look? Yeah,

Steve: 23:45

that's clever. I like that. We're gonna take a short break right now. And when we return, we'll be speaking with Andrew about real estate prices, the shortage of affordable housing, and how nested works to create a solution to provide affordable housing for the disability market.

Alex Johnson: 24:17

Thank you for tuning in the navigating life as we know it. Our podcast today is brought to you by nested Next week, we'll be running a special introduction to our new monthly Saturday short with Shannon L. Hart, our mindfulness minutes. These are short episodes made by Stephen Shannon to discuss small ways we can take care of ourselves so we can recharge and be ready for whatever life throws at us next. If you have a topic you'd like us to research, please drop us a line at contact and Locky calm and stop by our Facebook page and leave us a review. Like, comment and subscribe to our podcast. All these little things help us develop our show and find new people to talk to and top Extra discuss. Thanks for listening. And now back to the episode.

Steve: 25:16

Welcome back to our discussion with Andrew Parker from nested. Andrew, real estate is crazy. prices have gone up and up, shortages seem to be in every area of the country, especially with regard to affordable housing. And you guys are in the business of finding these homes, adapting them to the needs of the individuals who will be living there, maintaining them and leasing them back to people at affordable prices. How do you do that?

Unknown: 25:46

Yep, it's the markets are hot. And in some places, they are really crazy, crazy hot. So one advantage, we can we provided we have a spot we have, we just raised another $50 million into our into our fund, and we buy all the properties in cash. And we we buy them fast. So we go to the sellers and say we're the best buyer that you're going to find we would like to buy this property for 4x. And we're going to close on it in three weeks, and pay and pay an all cash. And that allows us to keep the cost down, you know, at least make sure that we're we're able to buy it for you know, the the list price were lower. Secondly, we can live with some crazy high prices, frankly, because we know we have tenants coming in for a long period of time. So our business, unlike a lot of real estate firms where they were, you know, the traditional real estate firm is buy something low, and either flip it or refinance it, and sort of get in and out as fast as as fast as they can. We don't we're not we're not selling any properties, we're long term holders. So the the monthly fluctuations of real estate prices, while you know what's happened in the last six months with prices has certainly been a challenge in some ways. For us, it's also been a little bit of an advantage because you know, if we buy a property today, and and it turns out that the price is a little a little frothy and we you know, maybe we paid$20,000 more than it's going to be worth in six months, you know, we want to avoid that. But if that's the case, not the end of the world, because we're going to hold on to the property for 10 years. So we're a little less sensitive to those kind of real estate fluctuations, then then individuals buying properties with with residential agency mortgages, and, and especially less sensitive than, than the market rate single family rental firms out there buying properties.

Steve: 27:50

And if there should be a not that anybody wants this, but there should be another disaster in the real estate industry. And there's a lot of foreclosures, that probably would be golden opportunity in a way to put those homes back into service at a discounted price for an organization like nested. That's right, that's right. Now for people that might be listening or in individuals thinking about what do we do because Johnny now is like, say 21. And we would like to have mout independent by 23. And a couple years or so. They're valuating different ideas. Can you give us a ballpark price? by today's standards? If you could find a house that had three bedrooms for 250,000? I don't even know that's possible today. What would it cost two bedrooms for let's say two people with significant disabilities and a third bedroom for a care provider?

Unknown: 28:46

It's a 250,000 is actually about exactly our average purchase price. And the rents are going to be in the in the ballpark of $2,000 a month.

Steve: 28:57

Okay. So it was two people it's about $1,000 a month in.

Unknown: 29:01

That's right. Yep. Okay. We have our care agencies, they don't have live in care. So it would be three for the care providers. Whatever the purchase price is, yeah, the monthly rents would be eight 9% of the purchase price. Okay, sorry, per year, so divided by 12. So I think that gets to about $2,000 on a $250,000 property.

Steve: 29:27

And your leases are for longer than one year, correct?

Unknown: 29:31

Yes, most of our leases are five years. We've done we've done three years and we've done 10 years. Our standard is is five

Steve: 29:39

years is that five years at a fixed rate. We do

Unknown: 29:43

one and a half percent escalators per year and and will we provide you know, we of course paid property tax and insurance and provide the maintenance on property and the property taxes go up 10% the rent still only goes up one and a half percent.

Steve: 29:59

Okay, so why half percent of somebody's paying $1,000 as an extra $15 a month. It's not too horrible. it's manageable.

Unknown: 30:08

Yep. And our leases often have tenants options in them. So they're five year leases with a tenant up Jen for an extra another five years. So we kind of would like to extend it for five more years. And that would be the same, the same rent escalator. So you have this ability to know that you can be there for 10 years, with a one and a half percent annual escalator or if you decide after five years that you want to do something else, or, you know, the we're in the middle of a recession and our our escalators no longer viable, and then we can look at it again after five years. So I

Steve: 30:45

got a question. I haven't been in business long enough to encounter this yet. But what if somebody is planning on living there for 25 or 30 years?

Unknown: 30:52

That's great. We would love We would love that. We would we'll sign will sign a 25 year lease. The only reason we have five year leases is we actually started doing we did 10 year leases early on. And our lenders, the banks were just sort of like we're just sort of used to seeing one year leases on residential properties. And that 10 years was just a little bit too too crazy for them. So we we kind of back to five years just to just to make that case to the banks, but we have no, we only leased to care agencies and families in the IDD space. And that's what we're going to be doing and we're not selling the property. So we we will leave especially to families will lease for as long as they they'd like to.

Steve: 31:32

And you mentioned raising money.

Unknown: 31:35

That's right. Yep, we have. We've raised money from family offices from private equity firms from individuals, we've raised a total of just under $100 million. And some of the family offices and some of the investors have children, adult children with IDD, and they're familiar with the space that way. And a lot of our investors don't, and they're they're looking at, you know, they appreciate what we're doing. And they want to make an impact investment that that does well in the world. But they also want to invest in real estate and generate a market return and, and our pitch to them is is look, we're these tenants, these are the these are the best tenants you can you can find. They want to be there for a long time, we have the process to provide them great housing, and we're gonna want to keep owning these houses, they're not going to want to leave, and we will continue delivering, delivering market return to you year after year. And when we started, the money raising was was certainly a challenge. explaining what we were doing and selling the concept. One of the things that I did I measure our success with is how mainstream can we make this kind of investment? I mean, there's really no reason why if you are a pension fund investing in real estate, there's no reason why you wouldn't want to invest in in disability focused real estate even for just a pure dollars and cents perspective, it's a it's a, it provides solid risk adjusted returns just as well, if not better than in any other residential real estate.

Steve: 33:10

And it makes you feel like you're doing something worthwhile. I think it's very attractive for some people to be able to make that kind of investment. And it's a good proposition.

Unknown: 33:19

Yep, absolutely. And there's a concept called the Community Reinvestment Act that banks, banks are subscribed to that they need to make certain communities focus lending each year. And, and what we do has, has qualified for that in a lot of cases. So that's another impact advantages to some of our lenders and investors.

Steve: 33:42

So have one family or a group of families, we're interested in securing a house for their adult children with disabilities to live, they should probably just go on your website and see what information you gather there to help give them an idea of what is available, or what could be available. Is that the best way to go about this?

Unknown: 34:03

Yep, that would be the best way to contact us just through the website. And, and let us know that the situation that that you're in and what kind of property you're looking for. And, and we're here, I mean, what I'd normally tell families is, we have the real estate components covered for you Come come to us when you've put together the group of people who are going to be living in the property, come to us, tell us what you're looking for the form on the website, it's just simply give your name and email address and then it asks for some criteria. So tell us where you where you'd like to be. And we'll get back to you with one of those home menus, no obligation or just send you a bunch of houses and tell you what the what the lease rates would be on those and you can take a look at it and see how it fits into your plants.

Steve: 34:51

And so and there's no cost involved in any of this so they can actually get out good idea what's available for no cost whatsoever. So I don't know why. Somebody wouldn't do that, for families to get an idea what these properties look like, I know you have some photos on your website, but you have other ones available that we could post to, for people to see. It looks like you've done such a great job in fixing these houses up even just good paint jobs and innovations that it looks like they're moving into practically a new house in many cases.

Unknown: 35:24

Sure, yeah, we have we have some we have a bunch of photos we can send you we have a great team, a operations team that with everyone, every time we purchase a property, we have the inspection report, we have a list of items that that we want to repair or replace or improve. And they come in right after closing and, and sweep through the property and, and make it make it move in ready.

Steve: 35:48

Now there are organizations like simply home and some others that provide enabling technology for individuals living with disabilities that involve stove sensors and different ways to alert, again, care providers and families that there might be an issue that needs to be addressed. In terms of providing care. In other words, someone fell down, they can't get up or there's a flood in the laundry room, those sensors are able to notify a company like simply home, I would imagine you guys would be more than happy to work with them to place those sensors in the homes.

Unknown: 36:26

Yep, I've actually, we have a relationship with simply home and we've done. And then a lot of our houses we've done in home technology. And that can be part of the upfront work that we do. Philadelphia, for example, there's a technology that alerts when a window is open. And one of our care providers has had a problem with residents, opening the window and throwing either throwing things out of it or trying to get out the window. And and so they came to us and said, Hey, we need three houses. We need them all to have accessible bathrooms that we need this technology and you know all of the homes, so we bought them three houses, renovated the bathrooms right up front and put that technology and before they moved in.

Steve: 37:10

Andrew, thank you for your time and letting us know about nested in what you folks do I think it's a great business model and is one of great value to families that need help. What are some other steps that listeners can take to learn more about what you do? I know that your website is nested, any STI dd.com? It's rather short, easy to remember. And on that, do you have a place where people can fill out the contact you in addition to the information on your website, if families wanted to get more information about nested? Who could they talk to?

Unknown: 37:45

Yeah, I and my team are happy to talk to families who are who are out there in the process. Any anywhere in the in the 50 states who are starting to put together groups of individuals who are who are looking for a long term home contact us via the website. We'll we'll give you a call. And we'll talk you through what we do check out the different sections of the website, check out the nested 360 section which shows the the the maintenance app. And we this is myself and my team. What we do all day is talk to care agencies and families who are in different stages of the the housing process. So we are more than happy to discuss any any of this space with with anyone out there.

Steve: 38:32

Thank you very much, Andrew, this is very helpful. And I would be very surprised if you didn't get some context based upon your time with us today.

Unknown: 38:41

Thanks feed.

Kerry Johnson: 38:53

Hi, this is Carrie and welcome to the chat cafe portion of our podcasts. This is where Steve and I recap some of the interesting things that we heard during the podcast. And Steve's here with us now I certainly am very interesting. It kind of took me a second to catch the IDD portion of the nested. But yeah, intellectual developmental disability. How cool. And I think it's really interesting how they got into this by starting with care agencies.

Steve: 39:30

Yeah, I mean, originally, they were in real estate and renting to recent college graduates. The trouble is that is such a mobile time and the SEC, right I mean, they were there for like eight months in the route then they gotta repaint, fix up and know the turnover for the people I know that do real estate rental, the turnovers is it's terrible. You might get something moving in fast but as a lot of costs involved in that the longer you have someone more efficient it is

Kerry Johnson: 39:57

and you know, I love how it was a personal experience of helping a family member through that process that got them interested and excited about bringing and, and wanting to get into family owned and not just service agency owned properties, it was

Steve: 40:18

easy for them to get start with service organizations that have group home is because they have a very present and ongoing real estate need and a growing one. The idea of getting into individuals, there's there's a huge market there because many people don't want their son or daughter living in a group home. Right. So they're trying to break into that, and they'll do a great job. But his partner, Tad Ritter had a family member with a developmental disability they were working with, all of a sudden light went on with these guys, and they realize this is a heck of an opportunity and a great need. So why not move into that area and help plus the stability? Long Term tenants?

Kerry Johnson: 40:55

Exactly. Because, you know, while in our instance, Liam is autistic, he really does not like his routine changed.

Steve: 41:07

And you notice that I just took 33 years, but I've noticed that too.

Kerry Johnson: 41:12

I know. So you know, once you find something that works with him, just stay just stay with it, it'll just go much easier. And so yeah, we would be looking for something based on his physical needs.

Steve: 41:24

If you are like us, like Harry and I and have a son or daughter that doesn't quite fit into what you see the profile for group home might be. Because there's there's greater amount of independence they want to have. You're making your own decisions. But you know, you can't see them just living on their own with Liam, because the communication concerns he's got to have somebody there. So you get this little higher need type thing in not conventional group home? Well, that's what if you have one other family and other two families that you're working with, rent a house. And instead of you going out there and taking turns on weekends mowing lawns, and shoveling snow and fixing water heaters and stuff. Yeah, one organization that can do that yet, would it be a little more cost effective? Have you went out and purchased your own home and financed it? And went through all the other hassles? Maybe. But do you really want to do all that long?

Kerry Johnson: 42:17

You know, as he gets older, so do I?

Steve: 42:21

Yes. And those tasks get harder, especially if you have your own home and then you have this other home to take care of. And you could pay somebody else but then you're you lost the savings factor in that why not have nest to do

Kerry Johnson: 42:32

it? Right? Well, then they I see that they keep evolving. I love that piece of it as well. They have an app a nested 360 so that somebody in the home, it could be it could be a caregiver, and they notice something is going on with something in the home. They just fill out this nest nested 360 app, and boom, it goes to the appropriate person the appropriate you know, whether it's Liam needs his meds reordered, or, you know, the dishwasher doesn't seem to be working? Well. It goes and the right person gets it and it's resolved. Correct. cool is that that's another burden off my head

Steve: 43:11

is very much like something simply home has the organization for technology, that CLS workers, direct service professionals could make a report or somebody else could also in this case, it goes not just to family or supports organizations. It can go to nested if it happens to be a real estate issue. Right? There's one place to report it and it gets divided out where should go. So from a point of contact, that's fantastic, really, and it gives you a peace of mind that things are noticed right away, and they can be taken care of immediately not put off for weeks and weeks.

Kerry Johnson: 43:46

Yep. And that they also nested works with simply home. Yes, getting the place ready for somebody to come in again,

Steve: 43:56

all part of the initial assessment. Yeah, it's great, lovely. And it's a really clever idea that they have assisted ADSs i s t. Id supplying the funds for development of gardens and getting

Kerry Johnson: 44:13

that nutrition piece to the home.

Steve: 44:17

And depending on the neighborhood, it could be one of those areas where they don't have a farmers market close by but they could actually grow some food there

Kerry Johnson: 44:24

and integrate them into the community because then they would have possibly some produce to share with neighbors. It's a great concept really cool. Very cool. I also love his enthusiasm for his expansion and they're, you know, we're in 17 states we want to be in all 50

Steve: 44:44

I love what is a neat and all 50 so I know but

Kerry Johnson: 44:47

that you know they're not limiting. You know, they're not saying well, you know, we got enough to handle right here.

Steve: 44:52

But again, they they're making this really easy for the family where the individual with disability living there. I love

Kerry Johnson: 44:59

how They will give you options. You don't have to. It's not like well, this is the one thing we have for you. It's just another option out there. As a safe and great place for your child to go to your young adult. It's another option for parents to look at. And that is such a relief. Sometimes I feel like we just get you get a or you get a

Steve: 45:23

the average person I think moves every seven years and you forget about the process but they can come back with seven or eight or 10 options right now go out and take a look. This is what's available. Some of them can disappear pretty quickly. But for us to make that list we would be spending a lot of hours and a lot of time and running around. Just to be given a list you can work off this list is really sweet. because it saves a lot of time right there

Kerry Johnson: 45:49

envied and that they'll do the modifications to get it ready for your kiddo to get in there. It's so wonderful.

Steve: 45:56

And our son being in a wheelchair, there's some significant modifications to make for other people there might be less right, really excited. And I had forgotten to mention when I first talked to them. He was getting married the next week and then I interviewed him for the podcast two weeks after that. He had some significant things going on in his wife at that time. Right busy man. Yep, pretty busy man. Well, if you like this podcast and you think someone could benefit from it, please send a link to them. Tell them to listen to it for any comments that you have. Send us an email at contact at and lucky calm. And until next time. You Well,

Kerry Johnson: 46:30

thank you.

Alex Johnson: 46:33

Thank you for tuning in to navigating life as we know it. Your hosts Evan Steve and Carrie Johnson. Alexander Stark, aka me is your producer and editor. Holly Johnson maintains our website and helps write our blog articles. And Daniela Munoz helps with research outreach and social media. We couldn't do what we do without every person here, including you, our listeners who give us the most important thing of all purpose until next time, and Locky is a production of envision Media Group, LLC.