Koloa Wolfgramm: He Bought Hotels When Everyone Was Scared | DSH #1732

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Digital Social Hour – Koloa Wolfgramm: He Bought Hotels When Everyone Was Scared | DSH #1732

Date: January 4, 2026
Host: Sean Kelly
Guest: Koloa (Aloa) Wolfgramm

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Overview

In this episode, Sean Kelly sits down with entrepreneur and investor Koloa (Aloa) Wolfgramm to explore his journey from humble beginnings to building a $500 million hotel portfolio during the pandemic. Wolfgramm shares his strategies for hotel acquisition, capital-raising, and value creation—even when the market was gripped by fear. The conversation ranges from personal philosophies on ambition, early marriage, and family, to tactical business insights and unforgettable stories from the world of hospitality and real estate development.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Humble Beginnings and Ambition

• Wolfgramm’s roots: Grew up as the child of Tongan immigrants in a modest, crowded home in California.
  • “I think I'd rather have that than have a bunch of stuff and not have ambition. I do think that there's a benefit to coming from humble beginnings that gives you kind of that ambition and drive.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 00:01, 10:07)
• Family story: Father worked his way up in hotels; Aloa grew up around the hotel business.
• Education: Became the first Pacific Islander to graduate from Yale Law School in 2022.
  • “Which is shocking considering it was in 2022. The law school’s been around for like 300 years.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 11:15)
• Views on legacy and merit: Finds more satisfaction in self-made success and addresses imposter syndrome issues common among peers from privileged backgrounds.

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2. Entering the Hotel Industry During Crisis

• Pandemic pivot: 2020–2021, Wolfgramm saw COVID-19 as a rare buying opportunity for hotels, with the industry three times harder-hit than during the Great Financial Crisis (01:18; 02:15).
  • “If there was a time to buy hotels, to invest in hotels, like 2020, 2021 is it.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 01:23)
• Conviction despite fear: While others hesitated, he doubled down, confident that travel and tourism would return (02:15).

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3. Creative Capital-Raising Strategies

• Non-traditional approach: Lacked deep Wall Street connections; leveraged proximity to hotel-adjacent industries (e.g., insurance agents, lawyers specializing in hospitality).
  • “We solved for finding people who already want to invest in hotels, and then we just have to convince them to invest in our hotel.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 04:38)
• Results: Bought over $100 million in hotels in the first year; total acquisitions now exceed $500 million, with $100 million+ in equity raised (05:45).

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4. Scaling Up and Portfolio Growth

• From small to large deals: Started by buying multiple smaller hotels, now recycles capital into larger projects, including a $750 million development in Houston (06:15).
  • “Now we're looking at larger acquisitions...We've done a couple nine figure acquisitions in the last 12 months.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 06:15)
• Goal: On track to reach $1 billion in company size within three years (06:44).

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5. Balancing Ambition, Family, and Identity

• Early marriage and family: Married at 20; has five kids.
  • “I've gotten to do that [travel and grow] for the last 10 years with, like, my best friend.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 07:35)
• On staying grounded: Grew together with his spouse through ambitious years; values shared growth and mutual support (08:28–09:25).

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6. The Ivy League Experience & Critical Thinking

• Yale Law takeaways: The greatest value was in relationships and networks, not just academics.
  • “It was shocking to me how little the academics mattered and how much the other stuff mattered...You want to get to know the people, the professors, the speakers.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 11:56, 13:32–13:54)
• Thinking like a lawyer: Law school trained him to think critically and manage risk, essential in multimillion-dollar deals.
  • “People take your calls, people take your emails that they might not otherwise. That is actually, I think, less than the skills that you learn in a law degree...be able to manage risk and judge risk.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 15:13)

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7. Evolution of Hospitality: COVID Aftermath and Trends

• Hospitality’s recovery: Banner years before COVID, crash during the pandemic, followed by a surge due to pent-up demand, and now, stabilization as international travel lags (16:35–17:29).
  • “Coming out of COVID, hotels could almost charge whatever they wanted...I think as some of that has waned...areas like Vegas...drop their prices to pick up demand.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 16:35–17:36)
• Portfolio strategy: Mix of limited/select service hotels (like Courtyard, Fairfield, Holiday Inn Express) for stability and luxury hotels for upside (18:09–19:41).

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8. Technology & Automation in Hotels

• Slow adoption of AI: Major U.S. brands (Marriott, Hilton, IHG) don’t yet permit fully AI check-in; Wolfgramm predicts eventual adoption (20:35).
• Robotics: Testing cleaning robots—hallway vacuums, bathroom cleaners—to reduce staff needs and lower operating costs (21:03–22:03).
• Labor realities: Large hotels can have thousands of staff; automation could reshape economics, especially with high turnover in convention cities like Vegas.

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9. Diversification and Urban Development

• Beyond hotels: Invests in mixed-use urban projects to recreate a sense of city community in suburbs—flagship $750 million Houston development (23:06).
  • “We’ve been really interested—can you recreate that feeling of Manhattan in a suburban area?” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 23:06)
• Manufacturing pivot: Acquired a manufacturing company, now making aerospace (e.g., Space X, Blue Origin) and defense components (24:31).
• Houston’s future: Sees the city pivoting toward aerospace and defense, away from oil and gas.

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10. Best and Worst Deals

Best Deal: Patent Litigation Hotel in East Texas (30:54–32:32)

• Insight: Discovered a legal quirk placing major tech patent litigation in a small Texas town.
  • “Turns out in the eastern district of Texas, there's only one Marriott in the entire city...so we ended up buying that hotel...increasing revenues 2x in 18 months, profitability 7x.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 30:54–31:23)
• Tactics: Added legal “war rooms” and rented out spaces to law firms for premium rates.
• Memorable moment: Renting out the breakfast area by the hour to keep opposing counsels separate (32:01).

No Outright Losses, But Real Estate Delays

• Biggest challenge: Timeline risks—e.g., a neighbor with ties to an approval board delayed a suburban housing project by a year (33:37–34:59).
  • “That was a project we thought we’d be done...in 18 months. Now it’s going to be like 28 months.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 34:56)
• Lesson: "Talk to the neighbors, ask who their daddies are." (Aloa Wolfgramm, 35:01)

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11. Real Talk on Airbnbs vs Hotels

• Hotels still dominate: Predicts ongoing legislative and logistical advantages for hotels versus Airbnbs (26:00–27:44).
• Brand consistency: Travelers value predictable experience with hotels; Airbnbs better suited for groups and specific occasions (27:36–27:44).
• Wolfgramm's investment: Always invests his own money—often at least 10% and sometimes provides 100% of equity for deals on tight timelines (27:53–28:49).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On risk and obsessing over success:
  “On those big deals, you're—it's all out there. One wrong deal can ruin everything you've built.” (Host/Guest exchange, 15:42–15:52)
• On early marriage:
  “I've gotten to do that [adventure] for the last 10 years with, like, my best friend.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 07:35)
• On finding hidden value:
  “Instead of selling the room for $100 a night to the local truck drivers...we got to reserve 80% of these rooms and sell them to Gibson Dunn, Kirkland Ellis...all the big law firms.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 31:23)
• On bad deals and unpredictability:
  “You can't predict that...his dad [was] on the board. You think it’d be a conflict of interest.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 34:08, 35:01)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:01–00:51 — Humble beginnings and ambition
• 01:09–02:44 — Entering hotels during the COVID crisis
• 04:38–05:51 — Capital-raising strategy with industry insiders
• 06:15–06:44 — Scaling up: from small hotels to $750M developments
• 09:41–10:19 — Early marriage and its impact on growth
• 11:12–11:21 — Being the first Pacific Islander at Yale Law
• 13:32–13:54 — The real value of the Ivy League: networking over academics
• 15:01–15:42 — Law school skills translating to business risk management
• 16:35–17:36 — COVID aftermath and current hospitality trends
• 18:09–19:41 — Hotel portfolio mix: select service vs. luxury
• 20:35–22:29 — AI, automation, and the economics of large hotels
• 23:06–24:41 — Urban development in Houston
• 30:54–32:32 — The "war room" hotel deal
• 33:37–34:59 — How a neighbor delayed a land deal for a year
• 26:00–27:44 — Airbnb vs. Hotels: the long-term outlook
• 27:53–28:49 — Putting personal money into deals

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Where to Find Koloa Wolfgramm

• Instagram: @aloawulfgram
• Website: wolfgram.com

“We’ve been moving in quiet the whole time. We didn’t have any socials until a couple weeks ago...now you can find us at my name.” (Aloa Wolfgramm, 38:26)

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End of Summary

Transcript

[Aloa Wulfgram]

I think I'd rather have that and have a bunch of stuff and not have ambition. I do think that there's a benefit to coming from humble beginnings that gives you kind of that ambition and drive.

[Podcast Host]

I agree there's pros and cons, but a lot of the most successful people, you and I talk to, them have some similar stories to what you just explained.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

And I think also part of it is like a self confidence thing where it's like, you can look back and think, like, I wasn't necessarily given. So when I was about Yale, right. Ivy League, there's a lot of kids of governors and judges and billionaires and whatever else it is. Right. That's, like, very, very common. And one of the things that I did notice, like, interacting with some of them, was that it was hard for them to feel like their success was their own. It always felt like. Was I just given this imposter syndrome? Yeah, exactly. So. So I do think that there's something that was like, I didn't have any legacy admissions. Right. I knew I had to get it on my own merit. And so when you have some of that success, it does feel maybe a little bit sweeter than.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

If you're always questioning like, well, did I get it? Because, you know, someone gave it to me.

[Podcast Host]

All right, guys, we are here in Las Vegas.

[Sponsor/Announcer]

We got Kaloa on the show today.

[Podcast Host]

From Houston, Texas, doing some big things out there. Thanks for coming in today, man.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, thanks, man. Thanks for having me.

[Podcast Host]

Super excited to be here. I know you've got a history with Vegas. Done some business out here over the years.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yep, yep. Love, love the. The hospitality out here. It's good to be back.

[Podcast Host]

That's how you made your bread and butter, right? The hospitality industry.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. Hotel's a big partial portion of our investment thesis and continues to be huge for us and building, buying, acquiring, managing, all that kind of stuff for hotels.

[Podcast Host]

Have you had that viewpoint the whole time? Cause I know when Airbnb kind of got in the mix, there was a little uncertainty.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah. No, we. So a lot of it have to do with, you know, we started a company. We've been in hotels a long time. Grew up. My father, immigrant, you know, worked in hotels, all kind of things. So I grew up in hotels. You know, first time I ever ate a steak was at a hotel. All those kind of things. Right. Yeah. And so I've been around hotels, worked at hotels. And then in 2021. 2020, 2021, when Covid hits, was like the prime buying opportunity for Hotels. Right. It was Covid was about three times as bad for the hotel industry as like the great financial crisis. Wow. So if there was a time to buy hotels, to invest in hotels, like 2020, 2021 is it. And so I was doing some other stuff the time and I was like, this is, this is, this is it. This is the time to get into it, like full feet. And so we, we kind of pivoted and raised a bunch of money and started buying hotels. And then since there we've, we've grown.

[Podcast Host]

Well done. I mean, first of all, you make it sound easy, but to have that conviction in a time like that is not easy.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, it's a lot of folks are, you know, scared about what's going on and you know, is there going to be ramp up, I mean, depending on where you lived, especially on the coastal cities, it still was not ramped up by like 2020 or 2021. Right. People are still uncertain, are vaccines gonna happen? Is any travel gonna come back, like all these kind of things. And so we, but we had conviction that, you know, travel would return, tourism was going away. And so we were able to buy hotels as they were kind of on the decline. And then fortunately we were able to write it up on 2021, 2022, wave as kind of things returned back to normal.

[Podcast Host]

Wow. So you were able to just raise some money through friends, family.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Raising capital is very tricky. I think that's the question that I get asked the most is how to raise capital, especially when you're trying to go after big deals. And so the way that we approached it was a little bit maybe non traditional. So like traditional way of raising money, especially in private equity or venture capital, the same way is you'll have someone who spent 30 years on Wall Street, 20 years on Wall street, they're a VP, managing director, or whatever else it is. And then they'll go and they'll take all those experiences and connections and they'll go and they'll go raise, you know, $300 million billion dollars fund. Right. That's like the classic model. And so we were, we didn't necessarily have those, those connections at the time. I was at, in law school, went to Yale for law school. And we have some connections, you know, from that, but not all those connections. So instead what we said was, we're going to raise a bunch of money to buy hotels. We don't necessarily have the institutional deep pocket billionaire friends. Right. That like is traditional. What I had come up with on our fundraising strategy was let's look at the areas that are adjacent to our area. So if you have hotels, when you're raising money, you kind of have to solve for two issues really. One is you got to convince them to invest in the industry. Why should you invest in hotels instead of tech startups or other types of real estate? Right. So why hotels and then why specifically your hotels deals? Right. And so when we first started raising money, we were kind of trying to solve both those at first, and it was super difficult because we'd spent a lot of time educating people on the hotel industry, how it works, all that kind of stuff. And then we get to it and they're like, okay, well I'm not convinced that like I still want to buy hotels. I just want to invest in my like fix it and flip it type houses or apartment buildings, whatever else. Wasted a bunch of time. And so I thought, I was thinking, could we solve for one of those easier and could we solve for finding people who already want to invest in hotels? And then we just have to convince them to invest in our hotel.

[Podcast Host]

Smart.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

And so way we did that is we just kind of looked at all the different adjacent industries of the hotel industry and looked for like the small to medium businesses in that industry and try to target those folks.

[Podcast Host]

That's so smart. So you were very targeted with the approach.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, super. So, so for example, it's like insurance industries, right? There's insurance. Those guys who run insurance companies, agencies, whatever else it is, they're making like three, four, five million dollars a year. They're in like 60s. They're in their 60s. Right. They've been making this for decades. And all they do is they specialize in hospitality insurance. Right. And they're not running these huge billion dollar companies, they're running these small companies, but they know hotels. They've seen all the risk factors, they've underwritten a ton of them. They know the difference between underwriting a hotel and coastal America versus mountain America or whatever else it is. And so going to them and saying, hey, look, you guys already know hotels. And we're looking for 500,000 million, 2 million for this specific hotel. And this idea and this plan that we have, that was a lot, lot faster. So we did that with like hotel for insurance folks in the hotel industry, for lawyers who they specialized in hotel both contracts or litigation. So they knew kind of the, the things to look out for and the risks. They're already comfortable with that. And so we did that, which is all the different industries. And you know, the first year we raised first year, we bought over $100 million of hotels.

[Podcast Host]

Holy crap.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. To date, We've bought over $500 million worth of hotels. We raised over $100 million of equity.

[Podcast Host]

That's nuts. And have you slowed down since you said it was better to buy them during the pandemic? Right.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. So now we're kind of in a. We're, we're in a recycling phase where now you're trying to sell a bunch of those assets. You buy a bunch of them when they're, like you said, in that underpriced, undervalued stage. You stabilize them, improve them, and then you sell them and you recycle that capital for the next thing. And so I would say that our acquisitions, we're not buying as much, but we're also buying some larger projects.

[Podcast Host]

Got it.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So rather than buying, you know, one hotel for 5 million, other hotel for 10 million, other hotel for 15 million, other hotel for 10. Right. And putting together a bunch of that, now we're selling that. Now we're looking at larger acquisitions. We're looking at. We've done a couple nine figure acquisitions in the last 12 months. We're working on a project in Houston that's a $750 million deal. And so we're looking at some of those larger deals now.

[Podcast Host]

And people say get rich quick doesn't exist. You did 100 million in a year, you said. Yeah, that is nuts. And that's just in acquisitions.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

That was in acquisitions. Yeah. So we're doing. As of today. We are, yeah. We're well on Track to hit $1 billion in company size probably in the next three years. Holy crap.

[Podcast Host]

So within six years, $1 billion.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

It's unreal, right? For someone that's self funded and was crappy.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. I mean, I started a company. I was 26.

[Podcast Host]

So that's straight out of law school. You were probably in debt, right?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

I was still in law school.

[Podcast Host]

Oh, you still were.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, it was my last year of law school. Wow.

[Podcast Host]

And you had the time to juggle both. That's crazy.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

I didn't have the time. But try to figure out how to make. Yeah, I know. It was, it was, it was actually wild. Like, it was, it was. The most painful time was during that time, really just of how you're going to law school. You're trying to do well there. You know, I have, I'm married, I have kids. So, you know, you obviously have time commitments there.

[Podcast Host]

Wait, so you were married before?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Sponsor/Announcer]

Holy crap.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

I got married when I was 20 years old. Wow. I have five kids.

[Podcast Host]

That is young, man. Well done. That's. That's super rare these days. I feel like.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah, it is. I mean, dude, it's. You know, it's funny, you know, a lot of people say they're like, you know, I want to go live my life, I want to go have fun, you know, experience whatever it is. And I get it. Like, I get there's some. Maybe less freedom or something like that that comes from, you know, having responsibilities and those kind of things when it comes to family. But on the other hand, it's like, rather than going out and having 10 years, 15 years, whatever it is, and doing, you know, traveling, whatever else it is, like, I've gotten to do that for the last 10 years with, like, my best friend. And so rather than have a bunch of that time. And we also got to grow together, so she got to see me as a freshman in college all the way through to graduating from law school and starting a company, and she was with me through it all. And so it was really cool to kind of grow together and that sometimes I feel like if you get married too late, some of the problem with that is that you've grown so far that when you try to add something else to that mix, it needs to be a little bit challenging.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, I agree. Especially with what happened yesterday with Charlie Kirk. You really never know when your time's up, you know?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, that was shocking. I mean, I went to undergrad at byu, so just right by, you know, the UVU campus. And so that was, you know, incredibly tragic. Shocking. We know a lot of folks that were at the. At the rally and, you know, students, and my sister lives, you know, 10 minutes from there, and so it was. Yeah, it's shocking how fast some of that stuff can.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, I would have never expected Utah, like.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Right. I know, right?

[Podcast Host]

Utah. It's pretty conservative over there. Right?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Pretty conservative. You know, very family friendly. Everyone's very religious. And so, yeah, it was a shock. I'm sure it was a shock to them, obviously, in terms of. In terms of risk factors, of what geography is going to be the most risk, you know, I don't think you expect, Utah, probably the bottom of that list for real.

[Podcast Host]

Rest in peace, man. But, yeah, I like what you said because I. I've been with my girl for similar for eight years. We're getting married next month.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Oh, congrats, man.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, there's been so much growth, you know.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

And we've been in it together. Like, that's hard to replicate.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, you can't. I mean, you can't. Like, I was talking to a buddy of mine who he's. He's done very well for himself and he's like, it's just different. The girls that I meet and like our conversation stuff, when it's like ready after the fact.

[Podcast Host]

Right.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Versus, like doing it through it and seeing and the growth and. And there is something about, like, that growing together through it that I think is super valuable, 100%.

[Podcast Host]

Did you have some pretty humble beginnings?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. My dad. My dad comes from a little island in the South Pacific. It's called Tonga, survived by Samoa, Fiji Islands. And so he came over here and, you know, work, started working hotels, you know, went to school on the side, all that kind of stuff. And so we grew up. There's five. I have five siblings, or there's five of us. And we grew up in a, you know, 1300 square foot house.

[Sponsor/Announcer]

Holy crap.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Sharing bedrooms, all that. And in California, which is like super expensive.

[Podcast Host]

That's nuts.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Didn't have much, but I don't know, I think, I think I'd rather have that than have a bunch of stuff and not have ambition. I do think that there's a benefit to coming from humble beginnings that gives you kind of that ambition and drive.

[Podcast Host]

I agree that it's hard to. There's pros and cons, but a lot of the most successful people, you and I talk to them, have some similar stories to what you just explained.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah, exactly. And it's, you know, some of it is. And I think also part of it is like a self confidence thing where it's like, you can look back and think, like, I wasn't necessarily given, like, so when I went to school at Yale, right. Ivy League, there's a lot of kids of governors and judges and billionaires and whatever else it is. Right. That's like very, very common. And one of the things that I did notice, like, in interacting with some of them was that it was hard for them to feel like their success was their own. It always felt like. But did they. Was I just given this imposter syndrome? Yeah, exactly. And so. So I do think that there's something that was like, I didn't have any legacy admissions. Right. I knew I had to get in on my own merit. And so when you have some of that success, it does feel maybe a little bit sweeter than.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

If you're always questioning like, well, did I get it? Because, you know, someone gave it to me.

[Podcast Host]

Right. You were the first Pacific Islander to graduate from Yale Law School, Right?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. Which is. Which is shocking considering it was in 2022. Right?

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. It's been around for a couple years ago, so you might still be the only one.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Exactly. And there's, you know, the law school's been around for, like, 300 years, 200 years. I think even before the founding of the United States, it was around. Wow. And so every, you know, every racial category has had a graduate. Lots of them. Right. Black, white, Hispanic, Native American, all that kind of stuff. And, I mean, Polynesians are small populations. That probably relates to some of it. But almost every other law school had had a Polynesian graduate. So it was just kind of one of those things where it was weird. And so you kind of get in there and you're the first, and you find that out from the admissions folks.

[Podcast Host]

And you're like, oh, very interesting. Going through the full Ivy League experience. Now, looking back on it, any big takeaways? Would you recommend it for your kids? Like, what do you think?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Overall, I think it's good for them to not. I think if they're going to go to school, I think it's good for them to have a non Ivy League experience. And, like, I like that. I did my undergrad at a private school, and it was a private school, but it wasn't, you know, I went to Brigham Young University in Utah. And so I like that I had that experience and then had the other experience. I think if you had only one, you kind of Ivy League. Yeah. Yeah. And so. And part of the experience is, like, it was shocking to me how little the academics mattered and how much all the other stuff mattered. And that took me, like, a while because I think. I think it's true for most colleges.

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[Aloa Wulfgram]

You go there to like, get good grades, right? So you get a good job. Yeah, like at Yale it was like, yeah, do the school stuff if you have time. But really it's like you want to get to know the people, the professors and the people, the speakers coming and do the dinners and go to the event.

[Podcast Host]

So a lot of politics.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Oh, well, it took me a while to figure that out because I was always like, put my head down, you know, get good grades, like. And I was like, oh, like I'm missing something if that's all I do here.

[Podcast Host]

Interesting. I did not know Ivy Leagues were like that.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Oh, man, it was. I don't, I didn't. I thought it may be the opposite. I thought I was like, oh, you know, if you can be the top of your class, then that would be really impressive. Whatever. And it's like, no, no, dude. It's like the guy who goes around and, and goes to the speakers and says, hey, you know Hillary Clinton, she spoke our first day of law school. Hey, Hillary Clinton, I loved your speech or whatever. Do you think I could come talk to you in D.C. someday? And she's like, yeah, sure. And then they go Drive to D.C. two months later and you go talk to her and she offers you an internship and then chief of staff. That's how a lot of these kids started. When you look at a bunch of their staffing, including really, really high level staffing, it starts from Meta Metal Law School campus. Met em on campus and they go to the, mainly the Ivy League campuses and stuff.

[Podcast Host]

That's nuts. Was that kind of intimidating your first day there? Hillary Clinton's there speaking.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, it was super intimidating. Super intimidating.

[Podcast Host]

I mean, no matter what political beliefs you have, that must be like, holy crap.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. Yeah. And it was like, it was, it was also during this is 2020. So this is like right after like the election stuff. And there's a lot of just like angst in the air. And so, yeah, it was, it was intense. And I think it was also like eye opening to me of what kind of opportunities could come from, from it.

[Podcast Host]

How much, how much of your success in the hotel industry do you attribute to your law degree?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

I think that a law degree, not necessarily from Yale, I think, I think there's two Things, there's success that's I think I can trace back to having a Yale law degree and with the name brand of Yale. And that does help get in certain doors.

[Podcast Host]

Right.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

People take your calls, people take your emails that they might not otherwise. That is actually, I think, less than the skills that you learn in a law degree. So when you learn in a law degree, they teach you how to think linearly, to think critically, be able to manage risk and judge risk. I mean, when you're looking at $100 million deal, you have to be organized in your thinking. And there's no way to get around that. And most people just aren't trained to do that way. And so when you go to law school, they train you to think a certain way. That in that. And a lot of our success I would attribute to the critical thinking skills.

[Podcast Host]

That come from a lot of interesting. Yeah, because a hundred million dollar deal, if it goes south, I mean, you're cooked, right?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah. On those big deals, you're, you know, it's all out there.

[Podcast Host]

One, one wrong deal can ruin everything you built.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah. You can build it up for decades.

[Podcast Host]

You see that a lot in real estate.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. Especially in real estate, people get a little.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. People have success at a certain level, and then once they get to the higher level, they mess up once and everything they work for is gone.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. I mean, and that still happens with big. I mean, Donald Trump, a good example, where I think he was in the 90s, where he was ready, like the guy was a billionaire ready. And he's like talking about how I think he has a story about him walking down the street and seeing a homeless guy and being like, oh, that guy's in a better position than me because he's not in $900 million worth of debt.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Like at that time, things were kind of struggling to turn some things around, the real estate side and then eventually, obviously turn it around. But even, even on that level, billionaires, you know, have the same.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, yeah, I grew up in Jersey. I think he got wrecked in Atlantic City, right.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, that's right.

[Podcast Host]

With the casinos, right?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

That's right.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. They're saying, I don't know if you've seen this on social media, that Vegas is struggling right now.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, I think Vegas is coming back to market, I think. So Hospitality had this, like, hospitality does have some ups and downs. And so like 2018, 2019 were banner years for hospitality. Highest prices ever. You know, room rates kept going up basically just like this for a decade. And then Covid Hits, right, Resets a ton of stuff. And then when Covid hit though, it created a bunch of like pent up demand. Right. Anyone who's, you know, sat at home for a year, two years and wanted to get out. And so then coming out of COVID like hotels could almost charge whatever they wanted to and people were willing to pay it. Those, those are the days of, you know, $8,000 a night in some of these resorts and that kind of thing, people. And it was still booked up 100% occupancy, those kind of things. And I think as some of that has waned a little bit now, people have gotten that out of their, out of their system. In addition to some of the pricing, I think challenges that are happening right now and with, with, and also with some of the international tourism hasn't fully rebounded. We still are a lot lower than we were pre Covid when it comes to Asia, specifically traveling to the United States, we for tourism.

[Podcast Host]

Interesting.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

I think that is putting pressure on areas like Vegas, things like that, to drop their prices to try to pick up some of that demand.

[Podcast Host]

Do you focus on the US Only?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

We are US only right now.

[Podcast Host]

Okay. Do you have plans to expand or are you just focused on America?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

We're pretty opportunistic when it comes to international things. So I think if something comes along that was really interesting, we'd look at it. And we've looked at things internationally, but so far it just never made sense.

[Podcast Host]

Okay.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Part of the problem with international is as soon as you get into certain countries, like the ownership of land isn't always certain and how the laws treat that if you're an issue and then you just have to have a local partner. So it just gets more and more complicated. So we've looked at stuff internationally, but right now we're, we're super focused on America.

[Podcast Host]

And do you have a certain pricing tier like of hotels that you go after, like the luxury, the. I don't know what to call it.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Everyday ones, but yeah, like the limited service ones. Yeah, yeah. So we do, we, we like, we like a little mix of them both. So we like to have a bunch of the limited service or they call them select service hotels. These are like your Courtyard Fairfield, Holiday Inn Express, those kind of ones. And those things are nice because they're pretty simple in terms of running them. They're usually anywhere between 8 to 12 million unless they're in a big, big city. Right. And so you can buy a bunch of those up. And the nice thing is when you buy a Bunch of them up. You can often sell them from more, it's called multiple arbitrage, to bigger groups that are trying to buy big portfolios.

[Podcast Host]

Got it.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So, for example, if you were to sell, if you were to buy 10, $10 million hotels just for the fact of going through all that effort, usually these big companies are trying to acquire 10 or 15 or 20 packs at a time because they don't want to go through and buy 10 different hotel, 100 different hotels at a time. Right. And so we'll buy like 10 of these individually, package them up, and then sell them as a package from 10 or 15 or whatever to the next group.

[Podcast Host]

Makes sense. So you're 10 million per year, you're.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Saying, no, sorry, 10 million per hotel. Per hotel. And we'll group up a bunch of them, Maybe we'll do 10 of them, 15 of them in a year, and then we'll package them up. So we do that on that side. And those, those have different economics because those hotels you're running to construction folks that they're traveling to and from, consultant or whatever else it is. And then on the other side, we like to do luxury. And luxury has, especially when we do construction or value, value add, construction or luxury has huge upside. So you can, you know, like, like take Waldorf, Ritz, Carlton, Weston, the addition, any of these big hotels, luxury hotels, you can go into them and sometimes with just a slight, you know, tweaking of strategy, you can increase room rates by 400, $, 500 a night without doing anything to them.

[Podcast Host]

That's nuts.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

You can't do that for a hotel. You're selling $100 a night.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, right.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

You might be able to squeeze out an extra three or four dollars.

[Podcast Host]

I mean, I just booked my honeymoon and I think we spent like 2,000 a night. So I can't imagine their margins. It must be like 70% if I.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, on the room side you're making a lot. Yeah, on the room side, you can make anywhere between probably 50 to 70%. Like you said on thing, the problem with luxury, where you start to get into trouble is you have a lot of staff to try to make a luxury experience. A lot of times you drive in, when you go to that hotel, you drive in, someone will be there to greet you at the door. Then a different person will be there, take your luggage. Then a different person will be there to point you to the front desk. And so you start to get some staffing. But areas that do really well, especially this is why actually international luxury hotels do really really well because they charge American prices but their labor is in local labor. Yeah. And so like Mexican hotels, like in Cancun or whatever else, they're charging $2 an hour. Right. For some of those labor. But they're, but they're still charging two grand a night.

[Podcast Host]

Got it. Yeah. That makes us in Mexico. Yeah. How many of your hotels are using AI to check in people right now?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So we have zero branded hotels that are using AI to do full on check in. So the hotel brands have a lot of back end stuff that use AI. They manage trends and other things and you can do like the virtual check in and all that kind of stuff is managed. But, but right now none of the brands that we, that we own, this is across Marriott, Hilton and ihg none of them allow fully AI check ins.

[Podcast Host]

That's coming, that's coming. I just stayed in Miami last a few months ago. All AI.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

I couldn't believe it. Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

What was the check in experience like?

[Podcast Host]

So you walk in, you type your name on like a computer thing and it pulls.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

No. And no one's there.

[Podcast Host]

No one's there. There's a guy like on the side to help if, if you like can't figure it out and then you, you get a blank card. Then you have to scan it and then it gives you your room number and everything. Yeah, it was nuts, dude, because it was like 2am too. So to be fair, I guess it makes sense at late hours, right?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah. I mean there's like certain busy hours, right. Like the check in hours busy and the checkout hours are busy. But there's a lot of stuff that come like we've, we've done tests right now with fully automatic cleaning robots for example, that can go and clean, get, put itself on the elevator, get up to the new floor. Holy crap. Yeah. Go out and mow, or not mow, vacuum all of the hallways. And there's one that's being prototyped right now that we've been looking at that goes in and has this little like whirls around like a car wash and cleans the bathroom.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

That way the cleaners only have to come in, just strip everything down, remove it and the robots come in and clean everything.

[Podcast Host]

That is fascinating. I'd imagine the cleaner cost is pretty high at these big hotels.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, that's a big one. You know, it can take them 15, 20 minutes, sometimes even 25 minutes depending on the size of the hotel to clean each room. Imagine a 700 room hotel, especially these big Vegas convention ones.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

700 room hotel. Right. 30 minutes maybe, depending on the size of the room and layout, probably closer to 15, 20 minutes per room. And if you're having a lot of turnover, like people aren't staying in the room for five or six days, they're staying for a night or two.

[Podcast Host]

Vegas. Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

So there's like a hundred cleaning ladies in these hotels now.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah.

[Podcast Host]

Holy crap.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

A lot of these big hotels have over a thousand staff.

[Podcast Host]

Oh my God. That's insane. Yeah. I'm sure you studied these line algorithms extensively when you're looking at these deals.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah.

[Podcast Host]

You invest in any other stuff or just hotels right now?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So hotels is our biggest portion of our, of our portfolio. We also invest in non hotel real estate. So we'll do especially mixed use developments. So something that we're really bullish on is the idea that I think that there's a natural idea and for maybe those. If you've lived in more urban areas, you'll feel this feel there's like an energy where you're not just living in a suburb somewhere. Right. Where when you live in the suburbs, it's kind of you always have to drive everywhere.

[Podcast Host]

Right.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

And it's, and it's. And you don't necessarily feel connected to the community. And so we've seen a ton of demand from folks to live. That's why people like to live in downtown areas. If you live in New York, you can look outside and you see people milling about and you can go to Central park and have a picnic and then you can go to your favorite cafe down the street and then go get lunch and do that all within walking distance and kind of seeing other people. Right. And so we've been really interested about can you recreate that feeling of Manhattan, but maybe not 500 story buildings, but can you create that feeling of community in Manhattan, but can you do that in a suburban area? And so we're building one right now in, south, south of Houston in Frenzo, Texas. $750 million deal. We're building apartments, condos, office building, restaurants, hotel, convention center, all the rest of that. And so that's something that we're super excited about is, is that kind of development. And then on the other side, we also have been making a couple of big bets into manufacturing. So we were a little bit fortunate that we were early to manufacturing. We started, we bought a manufacturing company about two years ago and we took it from doing oil and gas, you know, Houston's big oil and gas area. And we started moving them into more aerospace and so, like, right now, we make parts for Space X, Blue Origin, Lockheed, NASA, Boeing, like all the big companies, and they have huge margin right now. It's a bunch of production going on all the rockets. And then also we're working on getting contracts into the Department of Defense, because I think that's the next area that you're going to see a lot. There's a lot of overlap between Aerospace and Department of Defense.

[Podcast Host]

That's amazing, man. So you're really going to change the future of Houston.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

That's what we're trying. I think we are seeing it pivot from, you know, oil being a traditional oil and gas to being really aerospace and defense focused.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Like, we just saw a. We saw a demo of a company out in right by us, down by NASA, where they can get from. I think it's from Houston to Paris in two hours. Supersonic commercial jets, dude. And they have, like, a working prototype.

[Podcast Host]

It's crazy because right now that flight is how long?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Oh, man, that's probably like 8, 9, 10 hours, something like that. Wow.

[Podcast Host]

So they cut it by 80%.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. It's Matt. It's wild.

[Podcast Host]

That's nuts. How many people could fit on it?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

I think they said they can fit like 40.

[Podcast Host]

Oh, that's not bad at all.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So, I mean, it's not like it's not gonna be for everyday Paris traveler, but for, like, business folks, time is money. Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

That's why I fly JSX when I can.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. And although Vegas is a huge one, they come out to Houston all the time. Yeah, exactly.

[Podcast Host]

I think Houston's every couple days. Yeah. Have you been on it?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

I've been on jsx.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. It's like a little more exp. So easy.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. And you can pull right up and you can get on there. Sometimes the start time is a little bit. Can move a little bit, but as long as you're not trying to get something within a half hour or something like that, then yeah.

[Podcast Host]

I mean, there's so many commercial delays lately, I just assume my flights gonna get delayed at this point with how often it happens.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. I think JSX goes out to Phoenix too, right?

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, Phoenix. I'm going to Phoenix for my bachelor party.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Nice.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. You like it out there?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. We have a hotel in Phoenix.

[Podcast Host]

Oh, nice. Which one?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

It's a midtown, so it's going to be a courtyard. We're converting it from unbranded to a courtyard.

[Podcast Host]

Sick. So still in renovation? Yeah. I. I did an Airbnb this one, but sometimes I like getting like you said, that local vibe.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

Versus a hotel just depends on the city, I think.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. And, and I think, I think Aaron, like Airbnb definitely took market share from the hotels for sure. Right. But I think there's a couple of things with Airbnb that is, that is interesting one. I think they're gonna have a collective action problem. So the hotel lobby is huge.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Right. Like when you're talking about if, when, when, when cities and stuff like that are trying to figure out the, the, the, the folks that are lobbying those, those laws behind making Airbnbs not allowed, for example, like in Hawaii, when it became illegal for a little bit. And a lot of cities are passed.

[Podcast Host]

Vegas, too.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Oh, Vegas. Is that. Yeah, yeah. I didn't know that. Not surprising though, right? The hotel lobby. Airbnb doesn't have an airbnb lobby necessarily. They have, they have a tech. They have a couple of tech companies that lobby for sure, but they pale in comparison to market size. I think Airbnb has something like 5 or 6% of the total, like transient market, whereas hotels, like 95%.

[Podcast Host]

Wow.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So if you're a lawmaker or you're anything. And also Airbnb employs a lot less employees than hotels. And so as soon as, like labor laws start getting a Airbnb, when there's issues on the hotel side, you have massive collective action behind keeping hotels in power. And so I do think that's a, that's a long term struggle that Airbnb has. The other thing is, I think if you're gonna stay somewhere real quick for a night or two, Airbnb can struggle a little bit with branding, because when you stay at a Marriott, you kind of know generally what you're getting. A courtyard. But I've stayed at Airbnbs before, especially if wanted to stay at night or something like that. I wanted it and I go there and it looks nice. In the picture, you get there's like bullet holes in the door and you're.

[Podcast Host]

Like, they're so hit or miss. I'm gonna be honest, like, most of the times my expectations are let down.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah.

[Podcast Host]

With Airbnbs, but with hotels it happens. But there's so many reviews you can read.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

I feel like it doesn't happen as much.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

Because a hotel, you're just expecting a room.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, exactly. And I think Airbnbs do well for like that, like family reunion, bachelor party. Like you want to get a bunch of people together. Yeah, I think that's an Airbnb makes 100%.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. But if you're just solo dolo, like, yeah, hotel all day, Right. Less work too. Yeah, don't have to cook. I saw you on another show. You put your own money in every deal.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah. We're usually around 10% respect of the equity. So sometimes we're more. There are a couple of deals that were 100% of the equity because basically our thing is like, we'll put together good deals, right? And if investors, for whatever reason, you know, don't want to invest in it, maybe there's some investors that are like, look, I don't really like manufacturing. I'm just, I want to do the hotel stuff, whatever else it is, then the deal is good enough that we'll put our money into it, all of it, if it needs to be, to finish the deal. So we have, I think we have like four deals right now where we are 100% of the equity. Wow. And some of that had to do with sometimes it's with timing where it's like, if you don't have time to raise the money, sometimes these deals are just, you need to close quick. We had a deal, it was a nine figure deal. We signed the psa, the purchase sale agreement, and we had to close within 48 hours. Geez.

[Podcast Host]

For a nine figure deal.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So all cash, no debt. Like no one has the time to. You don't even have the time to put together a contract to raise money, let alone actually go and start talking to people. A wire takes, so it can take two days, you know, literally. And so we, we had to close out like all cash.

[Podcast Host]

Holy crap.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Without any investor.

[Podcast Host]

So best and worst deals that you could talk about.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Best and worst. Oh, yeah. So best deal, we had this deal in, out in East Texas and it actually came up when I was in law school where we found out that, you know, like when you get on your phone or whatever else, and it has the terms and conditions, right, that you just put agree on it, you go through. Every tech company has them, right. There's a little clause in there called a form selection clause which basically says if you sue us, you have to sue us in a certain venue. A lot of companies will put it where their headquarters are, so that way they don't have to find their CEOs out somewhere random. But what this entrepreneurial judge in East Texas said is, hey, look, patent cases, when it comes to patent and IP litigation, they can be really long because complicated. Okay. You know, how does this little, you know, part of the patent and this engineering thing comply with this? You can Imagine how complex that gets. Oh, do we, do we, you know, breach the patent or broach on it or whatever else? And so this, this judge in East Texas said, I'm going to make this court in East Texas be the place where we're going to try to fast, fast track this. And so then what ended up happening is basically every single tech company started putting in their, in their closet. This is like in the 90s that we're going to, if we're going to litigate over patent or ip, we're going to litigate in the Eastern district of Texas. Turns out in the eastern district of Texas, there's not a lot of hotels, but the hotels that are there have a ton of lawyers, like tons of them. Because you can imagine Google, Apple, Facebook, Instagram, every single one of them are litigating in this one little city. And these are big litigation. This is bet the company type of litigation, where if you're suing Facebook for their matching algorithm, this is where it's happening. Look, started looking around and found out that guess what? There's not only are there not that many hotels in this area, there's only one Marriott in the entire city. And if you're the only Marriott in a city like that that has a ton of corporate business, you can strike corporate deals with those law firms because they all have, you know, their reward points and everything else.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, like a group rate.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, exactly. And so we ended up buying that hotel, and turns out it was for. It was going to be for sale. You know, most hotels are for sale if you have the right number.

[Podcast Host]

Right.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Ended up buying that hotel and started marketing more toward the law firm side. We ended up doing, took out some rooms, turned it into a war room where lawyers could come. Lawyers could come and set up all of their, you know, desks and everything. We even had a storage container on site where we put, like couches and desks and chairs and all that, and so they could rent it from us. And so we kind of made the hotel very, very friendly toward litigators when they're coming in. And so ended up, yeah, ended up increasing revenues, like I think it was 2x in the first 18 months, and increased profitability like 7x.

[Podcast Host]

Holy crap.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Because, you know, as we were increasing prices and stuff like that, it wasn't adding any extra costs. Just instead of selling the room for $100 a night to the local truck drivers that, look, we got to, we got to reserve 80% of these rooms and sell them to Gibson, Dunn, Kirkland Ellis, like all the Big law firms.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

At a group rate.

[Podcast Host]

That is brilliant. So, so that was more. Was that pre planning or was that kind of go. As it went on?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

It was as we were, as we were thinking about buying it. That was the plan was to be able to do that. And so we had some of the stuff came along. Like as you talk to a lot lawyers. Hey, what do you want? Oh, by the way, for example, one of the things they wanted was the breakfast area. It's really awkward when they're all in the breakfast area and you have like opposing council.

[Podcast Host]

That's so funny, bro.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

And so they said, could you. Can we, can we put doors on it? And normally Marriott doesn't allow it, but they allowed us for this. Can we, can we basically block it off?

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

And can we rent it? Well, first they said, can we block it off? We said we can't block it off. They said, well, what if we rented it from you guys? Okay, yeah. And so then, so now our breakfast area, which is like a bunch of seating and all kinds of stuff. You've been to those?

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Breakfast, little buffet things. Now it can be blocked off and we can rent it by the hour.

[Podcast Host]

Wow.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

And they can have their team there for a little bit and the next team comes in and just small stuff like that. I mean that's what adding the doors was. What, maybe 8, $900? You can rent it out for a thousand dollars an hour.

[Podcast Host]

Holy crap.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Pretty good return.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. That is nuts. Let's talk about the worst deals because I'm sure you haven't won on every single one. Right?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So right now we've. We've never lost money on a deal. Really good.

[Podcast Host]

Holy crap. So that's, that's impressive.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, we never lost money on a deal. I would say the worst deals have to do with timeline. So the hardest part, especially in real estate development, the hardest part is getting the timeline right. Because on real estate everything moves slowly. Sometimes that's a good thing because it means that you're not going to buy a. Take crypto. Right. You can buy crypto and a day later it can crash. Now a day later it can also 500x. Right. Real estate doesn't move like that. It basically is going to move slowly up or slowly down and so you have some time. And so I think we have a deal right now where. And this is all public, so I can share this. We have a deal where we're buying and we bought a neighborhood and we're going to put some houses in the neighborhood and it was a big tract of land. And so you buy the truck of land and you're going to divvy it up into different tracks. So let's say it's 40 acres and you put in one acre tracks and you sell the one acre tracks to be able to build homes on.

[Podcast Host]

Got it.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

And you got to put in roads and utilities and lights and all that kind of stuff. And so we bought that and everything was going through the process, got approvals, all that kind of stuff. And then it turns out that the son of a drainage district is the exact next door neighbor to that tract. So a drainage district has to approve in Houston, drainage has to approve your drainage plans to make sure that the water Houston has a lot of flooding. And so they have to approve your plans. And so it turns out that one of the guys on that board, his son, was the neighbor to this project. And he didn't want this project to go on because he goes, I don't want 40 new neighbors.

[Podcast Host]

Wow.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

I like this big tract of land. Literally, this is what happens.

[Podcast Host]

And this is like, you can't predict that.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, you can't predict that. And so he sued the city to stop it. The city figured it out with him, you know, worked a deal out where, you know, there'd be some certain amount of distance away from his house that we would build and that kind of stuff.

[Podcast Host]

What right does he have to do that, though? That's, that's like mind blowing to me.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. And it's not even a right. It's more of a nuisance thing. It's like he could, when he litigates it, he could just cause an additional, you know, six months of just delay while they litigate it out.

[Podcast Host]

Oh, okay.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

And so they said, okay, we'll just figure it out. Okay, fine, we'll give you an extra 30ft where we won't build kind of thing.

[Podcast Host]

So it's like a tactic.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. But then his dad votes against our project and turns the board against the project.

[Podcast Host]

No way.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So then we have to go bring a lot. So there's a whole like now, now that's all been, you know, figured out. But, you know, that added a year of figuring out. And so that one was. That was a project that, you know, we thought we'd be done by the time we bought it and we finished. I think it was like 18 months.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

And now it's probably going to be like 28 months. Right.

[Podcast Host]

I guess the lesson there is to.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Talk to the neighbors, ask who their daddies are.

[Podcast Host]

I mean, to Be fair. No one, probably. If they're living there once. Extra noise and.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah. And I think. And that's like a fair. It's a very fair, like, like idea. Like, why would you want more 40. The problem is, if you don't want that, then you should go buy that. Go buy that land. Right. Like, because you don't have the right to stop other people from buying that land.

[Podcast Host]

Facts.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So long as it's allowed within the city ordinances.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. You put down a ton of money in that deal.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

Wow.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

So that was just kind of figuring it out. But it's one of those things where it's like, how do you predict?

[Podcast Host]

Can't. Right.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

Holy crap. Well, thanks for sharing that, because that's. That's a very interesting lesson. I would have never thought that if I'm buying land somewhere, like, someone's going to sue the city over it.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah. And that. And that their parent is on one of the approval boards. Yeah. You think it'd be a conflict of interest. And that's one of the arguments that we made.

[Podcast Host]

But how do the boards work? Like, who selects those people?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

They're elected.

[Podcast Host]

From the citizens.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. From the people that live within their district.

[Podcast Host]

Interesting. I wonder if they're. So they're in every city. Like, I don't even know about that.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

I don't know if every Texas. I think every county has one county.

[Podcast Host]

Okay. So Clark county in Vegas probably has one.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah. Especially if there's areas that have issues with, like. So this is like a drainage thing. And so, like, in Texas, we have a lot of journey. So there might be, like, a water district, like a water reserve district, for example. In Vegas, it's pretty common, and it gets created by state code, and they're given certain power into that state code, and then they're elected.

[Podcast Host]

That's my fear with investing in land, because I see these ads all the time and I hear horror stories of, like, oh, you can't get the approval. You already put down all the money.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

You know what I mean?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. So there's different types of approvals. This is something like, we think about a lot. So there are a couple of things when it comes to approvals, and people do this. There's an entire, like, sector of investment where they invest in land that's not worth much because it doesn't have any approvals. And they get the approvals and it's.

[Podcast Host]

Worth a lot, and they sell it.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

It's called land banking. And so we typically will not Invest in land that isn't fully approved and entitled. The only thing. And same thing with this one. This one was already approved and entitled.

[Podcast Host]

Got it.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

The only approval that we didn't have was the approval of the actual engineering plans. And the nice thing about engineering plans is, like, there's no, like, wishy washy. It's like, does the engineering plans get rid of the water in the way that the water, you know, laws require it to be done. And so there's not like, I don't like that color, you know, kind of thing. It's just like it comes down to the math. And so luckily we were able to overcome those concerns they brought up. I think it was really a tactic. I think they were hoping that we would kind of back away or whatever else it was. And then we doubled down and let's go.

[Podcast Host]

What'd you name the street? Because that's been a bucket list goal of mine. Oh, to name a street.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

We named it after some family members.

[Podcast Host]

Oh, nice.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Podcast Host]

What's the process for that? I don't even know what I mean. I just want to say, like, yo, that street's mine.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

You know, digital social.

[Podcast Host]

What's the process for getting a street?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

You submit it as part of your plans. So you have like a plat which shows basically where the lots are going to be, what size they're going to be, how the roads are going to be, where the lights are going to be, how wide things are going to be. And so as part of that, they usually will let you submit names.

[Podcast Host]

That's cool.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Sometimes the city has naming conventions. Like if you're in an area where it's like 51st, 52nd, you can't go in there and name it. Like, go on Wolf Graham Street. They're not going to like that.

[Podcast Host]

Because some cities have two of the same names. That's always confusing to me.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah. And that probably was they were under different approval areas or they'll have different appendages at the end. So Sunset Lane instead of Sunset instead of Sunset Avenue or something like that.

[Podcast Host]

That makes sense.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

And sometimes the streets actually at one point they did connect. And then something got built in the middle of them, or a lot of stuff got built in the middle of them. And so now you have like, you know, 57th street here. And it used to be one big 57th street, but then right in the middle someone built a massive. And now it's like 2 57th Streets that used to be connected.

[Podcast Host]

I could see that. Well, dude, I'm excited for your future. The future of Houston's looking bright thanks to you and some other people. Where could people find you, support you and learn from you and all that?

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, I just. We just. You know, it's funny. We. We. We've been moving in quiet the whole time. We don't. We didn't have any socials until, like, a couple weeks ago. Um, and then we just thought, look, there's a. There's a benefit to being a little bit more public about some of the projects we're doing. We've had a lot of times where we've talked to people about stuff and this and even little things. Oh, we found about your website. And then, you know, some city guy calls us, hey, we have 500 acres up here. And, you know, Dallas, whatever. We want to do something. We heard about your project. So we. You cannot find us. Just my name. Aloawulfgram on Instagram. Wolfgram.com is our email. That's beautiful.

[Podcast Host]

Link it below. Thanks for coming on, man.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Yeah, thanks.

[Podcast Host]

Check them out, guys.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Peace.

[Sponsor/Announcer]

I hope you guys are enjoying the show. Please don't forget to like and subscribe.

[Podcast Host]

It helps the show a lot with the algorithm.

[Aloa Wulfgram]

Thank you.