The Big Break Show Podcast

Avery Carl started The Short Term Shop in 2017, a real estate brokerage that only does short-term rentals, with offices in about 20 markets. They've helped over 5,500 investors and will cross $4 billion this year.In this episode, Rafa and Avery get into what she buys now, which is cute, clean, comfortable properties, how the short-term rental tax strategy works and who it works for, why she has to talk people out of buying a bad deal just for the tax break, and how she teaches buyers to self-manage with simple systems and AI.CHAPTERS0:00 Meet Avery Carl1:50 From touring musician to real estate investor11:23 Short-term rentals before and after COVID20:04 What she buys now: cute, clean, comfortable26:02 The 20 markets The Short Term Shop covers28:34 The short-term rental tax strategy, explained37:01 Don't buy a bad deal for the tax break40:37 Self-managing with simple systems and AI49:20 Where to buy right now53:51 Reserves, furniture and your first year57:41 Does rental history raise the sale price?1:01:21 How to reach AveryFind Avery: https://www.theshorttermshop.comAvery on Instagram: @theshorttermshopAvery's YouTube channel: The Short Term ShopHospitable (25% off for 3 months): https://hospitable.com/partners/rafaelTry HelloHost (30-day free trial): https://hellohostai.com/rafaJoin Rafa's community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/aboutFollow Rafa on Instagram: @itsrafalozaWe're not CPAs and this isn't tax, legal or investment advice. Check with your own CPA. This is not an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any security. Any investment is offered solely to verified accredited investors through formal offering documents. No returns are guaranteed.The Big Break Show drops new episodes every week. Follow the show so you never miss one.

Sam Primm built a $40 million rental portfolio in St. Louis using none of his own money. He grew up middle class, inherited nothing, and was earning $250,000 a year in sales when he and his business partner Lucas started buying rentals.In this episode, Rafa and Sam get into why 35 rentals still left them no closer to quitting, how flipping and wholesaling paid the bills while the rentals built the wealth, and where the money actually came from: refinancing, and private lenders who turned out to be teachers and engineers.CHAPTERS0:00 Intro0:28 Who is Sam Primm3:31 Why he flips some, wholesales some and keeps the rest9:54 Rich Dad Poor Dad and the first deal12:02 The refinance that gave his money back13:42 35 rentals and still no closer to quitting17:27 Scaling the team and the first hire21:20 12 years with the same business partner24:18 Half his deals cost $0 in marketing26:03 COVID and today's interest rates30:30 How he teaches beginners34:02 The first question to ask yourself36:21 Private lenders are normal people39:06 Masterminds and coaching49:06 Why real estate is how you get ahead50:00 What AI actually does for his business53:29 Social media, then and now57:45 Where to find SamFind Sam on Instagram: @samfasterfreedomSam's YouTube channel: Faster FreedomTry HelloHost (AI guest communication): https://www.hellohostai.com/rafaHospitable (get 15% off your first 30 days): hospitable.com/partners/rafaelJoin Rafa's community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/aboutFollow Rafa on Instagram: @itsrafalozaThe Big Break Show drops new episodes every week. Follow the show so you never miss one.

Most people have never heard of the business Jason runs, and that is exactly why it works sowell. He takes old, dead buildings, empty offices, dead retail, whatever is sitting there, and turns them into salon suites that he rents out to hairstylists and beauty pros. It cash flows,it scales, and almost nobody is competing for it. Here is what got me. His tenants are business owners who do not want to give 40 to 60 percent of their money to a salon owner, so they happily pay him for their own space. He buys these buildings around 1.1 million and sells them for over 2 million, and keeps the cash flow the whole way. Then he runs a system on the back end that keeps those tenants for years, so the income does not churn. I have spent my whole career in short-term rentals and this conversation still made me rethink what a scalable real estate business can look like. If you have ever wanted cash-flowing real estate that is not another Airbnb, this is the model to study. TIMESTAMPS0:00 - Who Jason is and the business nobody knows about3:45 - From a college painting franchise into real estate7:16 - What salon suites actually are8:15 - How he stumbled into the model10:15 - Why marketing makes or breaks any business model12:35 - Why beauty pros pay for their own suite16:22 - How this is arbitrage for commercial buildings18:24 - Why it scales faster than buying rentals19:16 - How he raises capital for each deal20:39 - Buy for $1.1M, sell for $2.1M: the spread31:19 - The first 100 days system that keeps tenants for years40:29 - The exact market he looks for42:28 - How he uses local partners as boots on the ground1:00:11 - Where to find Jason CONNECT WITH JASONInstagram: @jasoncousineau The Big Break Show with Rafa Loza every Thursday.Real operators. Real numbers. No fluff. Instagram: @itsrafaloza | STR specialist.Wondering how and where to start your STR journey? Join the community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/about New episodes every week! subscribe so you don't miss them.

I have made just about every business partnership mistake there is. Some of my partners became people I now call family. Others cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars and a lawsuit I am still cleaning up. In this solo episode I break down everything nine and a half years of both taught me.I walk through how I structure the deal end to end: how I split equity, how I vet who I let in, active versus money partners, partnering with friends and family, and how to catch a partnership that is drifting before it ends up in court. The thread through all of it, and I say it flat out at the end, is that almost every problem traces back to roles. Clear roles, in writing, with people who give as much as they take.CHAPTERS0:00 Why I'm doing a whole episode on partnerships2:24 Every partnership problem traces back to one thing3:37 The 3 things a partner must bring: time, money, or experience6:23 The principle that keeps a partnership from breaking10:15 Define the roles before anyone does anything12:36 The deal I did with no contract, and what it cost me13:02 How to structure equity splits fairly15:00 Why aligned goals matter more than the money21:40 The partner who wanted 70 percent, and why I walked26:53 The partnership that turned into a lawsuit31:16 The red flags I ignored38:05 What to actually put in your contract42:49 The clauses that protect everyone45:02 Why I always pay my investors back47:12 It all comes back to rolesJoin my community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/aboutFollow me on Instagram: @itsrafalozaThe Big Break Show drops new episodes every week. Follow the show so you never miss one.

Guest messages never stop. Check-in times, the wifi password, is there a blow dryer, the door code, something is broken, and it all lands on you at the worst possible hour. That was my life for years, and it is the exact problem Annie set out to kill. Annie is the co-founder of HelloHost, and before she built it she answered more than 10,000 guest messages herself while running a 16-unit retreat in Ontario. So this is not a founder guessing at what hosts need. She lived it. HelloHost is a team of AI agents that answer your guests in your own voice, around the clock, and quietly pull the maintenance tasks out of those conversations sonothing slips through. What sold me was not that it replies fast. It is that it replies well. Her team got the error rate down to 0.01 percent, and when they studied 1,800 guest reviews, almost none of them could even tell an AI was answering. It knows about 80 percent of your property from day one with no training,and it asks you before it guesses on anything it is unsure of. If you run rentals and your phone still buzzes at 2am with a guest asking how to get in, this is the conversation that shows you the way out. TIMESTAMPS0:00 - Intro and who Annie is0:41 - From management consultant to Airbnb host2:25 - What HelloHost actually is2:40 - The 16-unit retreat and 10,000 guest messages5:42 - Why she went all in on AI guest communication in 20236:51 - What makes the message quality stand out8:27 - The multi-agent system and the edge cases9:56 - How it learns and asks before it guesses17:01 - The 1,800 review study23:10 - Getting the error rate down to 0.01 percent26:42 - Setting your own confidence level33:48 - 80 percent ready on day one, no training35:25 - The 30 day free trial and 2 day setup45:10 - Why Rafa calls it a no-brainer59:07 - Where to find HelloHost and Annie Tools I use to run my STR business:Hospitable (Get your 15% Discount on your first 30 Days!): hospitable.com/partners/rafaelHelloHost (AI guest communication): https://www.hellohostai.com/rafa The Big Break Show with Rafa Loza every Thursday.Real operators. Real numbers. No fluff. Instagram: @itsrafaloza | STR specialist.Wondering how and where to start your STR journey? Join the community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/about New episodes every week! subscribe so you don't miss them.

Dan Rivers and I are in the same mastermind, and his team runs the pricing on some of my own properties, so this one is personal. He came up blue collar in Brockton, got thrown into managing 600 units with zero experience, and built Synergy Stays into one of the sharpest revenue teams in short term rentals. But the part that stuck with me was not the business. Most people treat their nightly price like a slow cooker, set it and walk away. Dan makes the case that in 2026 that is exactly how you quietly lose money, because the platforms change the rules every month and an algorithm nobody is watching will happily underprice your best weekends. Then he flipped the whole conversation. He asked what feeling your goal is actually chasing, and once he started building toward calm and presence instead of a number, everything got clearer. I have hit numbers that meant nothing the day I reached them. Dan put words to why. CHAPTERS0:00 Meet Dan Rivers1:56 His first big break: 600 units, zero experience3:28 Two open-heart surgeries and his second chapter11:48 The breakfast meetup that rewired how he thinks20:03 Thinking 100K a year meant he had made it22:12 You only learn when you start losing (the 150K lesson)24:38 Why he killed 6 businesses to focus on one31:58 What Synergy Stays actually does35:35 Why set it and forget it pricing is dead39:47 The client who netted 38K more in a year43:35 Goals vs feelings: the reframe that made the episode50:00 Why he will never retire51:52 Where to find Dan and Synergy Stays Tools I use to run my rentals that saved me 10 hours a week:Hospitable: hospitable.com/partners/rafael - 15% OFF your first 30 days!HelloHost: https://www.hellohostai.com/rafa Want to learn how I actually use AI in my short-term rental business? Join the community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/about 🎙 The Big Break Show with Rafa Loza every Thursday.Real operators. Real numbers. No fluff. 📲 Instagram: @itsrafaloza | STR specialist.🔔 New episodes every Thursdays! subscribe so you don't miss them

Carl Dumesle survived the 2010 Haiti earthquake at 15, then raised his three younger brothers before he ever touched real estate. I wanted him on because he builds at a level most people call impossible, and he treats it like it is nothing.That is the thread through this whole conversation. Carl runs his development, architecture, construction, and management all under one roof, and the reason is not ego, it is control. Every piece he brought in-house was a failure point he refused to hand to someone else. If you have ever had a deal die because a contractor vanished or a permit dragged an extra year, this is the mindset that fixes it.The part that stuck with me was not the buildings. It was how he handles hard things. When you have watched your school fall floor by floor in 50 seconds, a late permit stops feeling like a problem. Most people build a giant mental gap between where they are and where they want to be. Carl came in with no ceiling because he never knew one existed.We also get into the two F's, feelings versus facts, the cleanest decision filter I have heard on this show, and why owning fewer, higher-quality assets with low leverage beats chasing doors you will spend years wishing you could offload.CHAPTERS0:00 Who is Carl Dumesle2:30 Surviving the 2010 Haiti earthquake at 157:00 Becoming head of household for his brothers9:16 Why he still does not feel successful11:00 The first thing you have to predict is yourself14:00 Why business problems are not real problems16:13 The slingshot, the deeper the low the higher the launch17:41 You are closer than you think20:16 From a student-housing startup into development22:55 The 25 percent margin rule26:00 What actually makes a deal work28:23 The two F's, feelings versus facts31:00 How he flies under the radar on approvals34:49 Controlling every pillar in-house44:00 Partnerships, hire slow and fire fast59:00 Extreme ownership with investors1:03:47 Own less, higher quality, lower leverage1:07:00 The takeawayConnect with Carl Dumesle:https://www.instagram.com/carldumesle/Tools I use to run my rentals that saved me 10 hours a week:Hospitable: hospitable.com/partners/rafael - 15% OFF in your first 3 months! HelloHost: hellohost.com/partners/rafaelWant to learn how I actually use AI in my short-term rental business? Join the community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/about🎙 The Big Break Show with Rafa Loza every Thursday.Real operators. Real numbers. No fluff.📲 Instagram: @itsrafaloza | STR specialist.Wondering how and where to start your STR journey?🔗 Join the community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/about🔔 New episodes every week! subscribe so you don't miss them

Most investors chase the wrong kind of income. They buy a door, watch a couple hundreddollars trickle in every month, and wonder why the freedom never shows up. Patryk ran thatmath and made a hard pivot. He walked me through the moment it clicked. He owned a rental he bought for 306 thousandthat was worth 465, with a pile of equity just sitting in it, netting him around a thousanda month. Then he looked at buying a co-hosting business for 165 thousand that was throwingoff close to fifteen thousand a month. Same money out the door. Completely different life.He bought the business, kept buying more, and now runs 150 properties he does not own asingle one of. We get into how he found and bought those companies, why he still works in the businesseven though it runs without him, and what he plans to do with the money now. I have builtthe operator side of this for years and this conversation still made me rethink where I putthe next dollar. TIMESTAMPS0:00 - Intro0:57 - From corporate tech to short-term rentals3:46 - Why he could never work for someone else4:42 - Buying the co-hosting company in Joshua Tree5:04 - Why passive income was never going to be enough17:28 - Scaling the company and what happens next19:15 - Why he still works in the business by choice24:05 - The math that changed everything36:44 - The takeaway that stuck with him58:42 - Why he gave his team equity1:05:17 - His big break moment1:12:43 - What he actually wants to do with the money1:13:32 - Where to find Patryk CONNECT WITH PATRYKPatryk Swietek, Owner of The Cohost CompanyInstagram: @patryk_swi Here's my Tool stack i use for my STR Business:Hospitable (Get your 15% Discount on your first 30 Days!) : hospitable.com/partners/rafaelHelloHost (AI guest communication): HellohostaiHelloHost | Rafa Recommended The Big Break Show with Rafa Loza every Thursday.Real operators. Real numbers. No fluff. Instagram: @itsrafaloza | STR specialist.Wondering how and where to start your STR journey? I build and share my STR strategies by implementing AI and test them out for a free trial without spending anything for a week! Join my community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/about New episodes every week! subscribe so you don't miss them.

Most operators do not lose their business to the market. They lose it to a team thatwas never set up to win. In this episode Rafa sits down with Scott Hanis, co-founder ofFortitude HR Solutions and the man Tim Bratz brought in to build the structure behindhis company. Scott has scaled organizations, run HR for over a thousand employees, andspent years fixing the exact team problems that quietly stall real estate operators.Rafa gets honest about blowing up his entire virtual team, and Scott breaks down whythat almost always traces back to the leader, not the people. They get into the firsthire you should actually make, how to know when you can afford it, why culture andvalues are worthless until you live them out loud, and the two lines from this episodethat will stick with you. People live up or down to your expectations. What you permitis what you promote.If you are trying to grow past doing everything yourself, this is the conversation thatshows you where it really breaks and how to fix it.TIMESTAMPS0:00 - Intro0:50 - Who Scott is and what Fortitude HR does5:06 - How Tim Bratz convinced him to go all in9:03 - Why he walked away from a corporate HR salary11:52 - The first hire every operator should actually make15:04 - When you can really afford to hire full time19:29 - Rafa: why I blew up my entire team21:41 - What culture and values really mean27:03 - Mission and vision, and why most people skip it29:51 - The three solutions rule33:38 - People live up or down to your expectations39:10 - Setting expectations in your personal life47:05 - How faith shapes hiring and firing51:25 - How to actually become a better leader54:52 - What you permit is what you promote56:34 - How AI is changing HR and where it gets dangerous1:01:43 - Where to find ScottCONNECT WITH SCOTTFortitude HR Solutions: https://fortitudehrsolutions.com🎙 The Big Break Show with Rafa Loza every Thursday.Real operators. Real numbers. No fluff.📲 Instagram: @itsrafaloza | STR specialist.just a note please add this tmoving forward for podcast description:Tools I use to run my rentals:Hospitable: hospitable.com/partners/rafael - 15% OFF in your first 3 months!HelloHost: hellohost.com/partners/rafaelWondering how and where to start your STR journey?🔗 Join the community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/about🔔 New episodes every week! subscribe so you don't miss them.

Most people think running an Airbnb is passive. You list it, go to the beach, and themoney shows up. Anyone who actually does it knows the real job is the coordination. Themessages that never stop, the maintenance that has to get scheduled, the vendor who hasto be found and called, and the ten different tools that somehow have to talk to eachother.In this episode Rafa sits down with Jan Sahagun, co-founder of Trellis, a Y Combinatorcompany building autonomous AI agents for short-term rentals. Trellis is not anotherchatbot. It sits on top of the tools you already use, pulls all your operations intoone place, and runs AI agents that actually do the work. The agent talks to your guest,figures out the problem, and if nobody on your team can fix it, it picks up the phone,calls an outside contractor, and gets it scheduled. You just approve it.Jan went from professional ice hockey in Europe to building one of the most talked aboutAI companies in the short-term rental space. He and Rafa get into how you keep an AIagent from going rogue, how much work it really takes to train it on your business, thefirst thing smart operators should automate, and why you cannot just vibe code a realsoftware business. If you own or manage rentals, this is the conversation that shows youwhere the next few years are going.CHAPTERS0:00 - Intro2:06 - Meet Jan and what Trellis actually is3:20 - From pro hockey to short-term rentals5:51 - Why he built an AI that runs the business itself8:03 - What happens when you plug your rentals in15:39 - The agent that actually calls your vendors and staff17:14 - How they keep the AI from going rogue19:37 - How much work it takes to train it22:44 - The first thing smart operators automate23:38 - Zero to 3,000 listings in under three months38:12 - What AI will replace and what it won't50:40 - Why you cannot vibe code a real software business56:09 - Jan's story: a broken ankle that changed everything59:26 - Where to find Jan and try TrellisTRY TRELLISWebsite: https://trellistech.comConnect with Jan on LinkedIn: Jan SahagunApps that i use for my Airbnb Business:Hospitable: https://hospitable.com/partners/rafaelHelloHost: https://hellohost.com/partners/rafaelIf you want to apply AI in your business to save time and earn more..Join the community: https://www.skool.com/the-airbnb-blueprint-rafaloza/aboutFollow Rafa on Instagram: @itsrafalozaThe Big Break Show drops new episodes every Thursday. Follow the show so you never miss one.