Why I Sold the Richmond House After Two Years (It Wasn’t About the Money)

Two years after closing on my first short-term rental, I sold the Richmond house at a thirty percent profit. Everyone assumed the sale was about cashing out at the top of a hot market. It was not, not really.

The truth is I had learned everything that particular property had to teach me. I understood the local STR rules cold, I had built systems for turnovers and guest communication that ran themselves, and the spreadsheet had done exactly what I built it to do. What I wanted next was different. I wanted to build things, not just manage them. Somewhere between the Lancaster arbitration and the beach house that never closed, I realized the part of this whole journey I actually loved most was not the rental income. It was walking into an ugly, unloved room and figuring out how to make it work.

Selling at thirty percent up gave me the capital, and honestly the permission, to make a real leap. I packed up, moved to Northern Virginia, and started the design business that eventually became this website you are reading right now. It felt reckless at the time. It has not felt reckless since.

Next up: what the first year of building this business actually looked like, mistakes included.