Onsite Insight Podcast by RV Housing Group

Hospitality in Disaster Housing

• RV Housing Group • Episode 10

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What transforms a temporary shelter into a true lifeline for displaced families? The answer lies in hospitality—not as a luxury, but as the essential foundation of effective disaster housing solutions.

In this revealing conversation, RV Housing Group CEO Brad Iturriaga unpacks how his lifelong attention to customer experience shapes every aspect of temporary housing placements. From his teenage years working at a grocery store to now leading a company serving families in crisis, Brad's commitment to hospitality runs deep. "I've just always had that knack for caring about how a customer is taken care of," he explains.

We explore how principles from luxury hospitality brands like Four Seasons can be thoughtfully applied to temporary housing situations. Brad emphasizes that creating hotel-quality experiences not in sterile corporate environments but in personalized settings gives displaced families both comfort and dignity. The conversation reveals how seemingly small gestures—placing a rug before entering a unit, conducting one final cleaning sweep, or simply taking five extra minutes to ask how a policyholder is coping—can profoundly impact someone's recovery journey.

Perhaps most compelling is Brad's insight into hospitality as a business strategy rather than merely a nice-to-have. While acknowledging there are more immediately profitable ways to operate, he maintains that genuine care builds the sustainable partnerships that drive long-term success: "I'm not interested in making a bunch of money right now... it's always been about longevity for me." This philosophy transforms how temporary housing providers can approach their mission—serving families better while creating lasting value for insurance partners.

Whether you're an insurance professional, housing coordinator, or simply interested in how businesses can lead with empathy, this episode offers practical wisdom on making a meaningful difference during life's most challenging moments. Subscribe now and discover how hospitality becomes the cornerstone of effective disaster response.

Speaker 1:

When disaster strikes, families need more than just a place to stay. They need stability, comfort and a solution that works for them. Welcome to Onsite Insight, the podcast that gives insurance reps and housing agencies the tools, strategies and insights they need to make temporary housing simple, effective and stress-free. I'm your host, drew Powell, and each week you'll hear from Braddy Turriaga, ceo and founder of RV Housing Group, how we can streamline housing placements, serve families better and take the headache out of temporary housing, because when people need help, the right solutions make all the difference. Let's get started, brad Allen. What's up?

Speaker 2:

Hey man, how are you?

Speaker 1:

Good, how are you?

Speaker 2:

Doing well.

Speaker 1:

How's your summer kicked off here, man.

Speaker 2:

It's been busy but good. Yeah, I saw you had the boat out.

Speaker 1:

But good, yeah, yeah, I saw you had the boat out.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, it's great, because last summer, uh, I didn't take the boat out at all.

Speaker 1:

So Wasn't in the shop a little bit last summer.

Speaker 2:

It was yeah, yeah, yeah, sure was.

Speaker 1:

Man, I want to have a followup. So last episode we got some great feedback on this episode talking about just hospitality, and you may not even remember what we talked about. You have so many conversations but we talked about just your experience going in. You know nordstrom's versus what was the other company where you? We were talking about? Yeah, that's right, even marcus.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and so much of this business and so much of who you are centers around hospitality and customer service and I don't know if I don't know if you would say that's your highest value, but that's when I hear you talk, that's you care deeply about that. Yeah, I've, we've eaten in a lot of good restaurants together and you pay attention to detail when we're at these places. It matters to you. Presentation matters to you. You know, you see things and I'll be like man, I didn't even notice that, but you have an eye for that kind of stuff and it transfers over to your business. I guess the first question is how did that develop? Like, where did that come from? And you have you always been that way, or is that? Is that an acquired thing, just noticing how organizations treat people and specifically around hospitality and culture?

Speaker 2:

No, I think it's. It's been in me for a long time. I mean, I remember working, you know, when I worked at the grocery store as a teenager, I would always find things that, uh, that were out of place or, um, you know, paid attention to the way people, you know, to the way my colleagues treated customers, and you know, and I just remember thinking when, when it wasn't good wasn't good or it was questionable, I was just like, oh man, that can't be good. I don't know, it's been in me for a long time. I've just always had that knack for caring about how a customer is taken care of.

Speaker 1:

In the context of just RV housing. When you hear the word hospitality, what does that mean in our context?

Speaker 2:

I think for us, it's just making sure these people have everything that they need to have to make their life as good as it can be, right being they're not in their home.

Speaker 2:

You know, whether, whether it's us being available to just be a listening ear Sometimes that's the case whether it's, hey, they need a new mattress because they're not the one that we have, although that one may be new, it's just not comfortable to them, right, and it's just it's just being willing to, um, to say, all right, we'll take care of that, we'll fix it Right. Whatever that is, we just want you to be happy and comfortable, you know, and that comes at a cost. You know what I mean. Like, that comes at a cost often, um, and you know it's, it's not a cost that's passed on to anybody, right? So I just kind of chalk it up, you know, as a cost of doing business. But I don't think everybody would do that, you know. I think that, uh, I think there's a lot of people that would, um, that would bulk it at some of the things that we do to take care of our customers.

Speaker 1:

Sure, what do you think our industry specifically could learn from companies or organizations like the Ritz Carlton or four seasons right, you're talking about living RV versus living in some of the or or staying not living, but staying in some of the top. You know hotels and all that kind of stuff but how do you take some of those principles and apply it to RV housing and what do you think we can learn from them?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you know, I stay in hotels a decent amount, as you know, and, um, you know, and I've stayed in some some you know mediocre ones and I've stayed in some really nice ones, right, I'll say, my expectation always goes way up, uh, on the nicer hotels and, and you know, sometimes I'm, I'm, I feel like my needs were met and sometimes I'm very let down, right, but you know, as it pertains, as it pertains to us, you know, kind of compared to that, we just want to give them.

Speaker 2:

You know, I, I, I kind of liken it to a hotel. We want to give them a hotel experience. We're just not there, right, so it's going to be on the phone, you know whether it's, you know, on a ball or a video, um, but we want to give them that hotel experience from from jump right when they walk into it. You know it's, it smells good, it's clean, it's, you know it just feels fresh and feels comfortable and really, you know it feels like home, yeah, and and so I think that I think more people are being are much more just kind of in tune to being on their property and and wanting that. Whereas you know, hotel, obviously you're going to, you know, you're kind of stuck in the box. But at least with this you know you're on site and you can have room on your property and all those things which you obviously know?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, how does this transfer over to like even training our team to really think like hospitality professionals and not just housing vendors? How does this transfer to the team you lead?

Speaker 2:

so, um, I think, I think, because, because we're empathizing, right, I think we're, I think we do a job of, of putting ourself in their shoes, um, and, and I think that, as long as we do that, it's more than just a job, whereas some people could see it just as a job.

Speaker 2:

They're clocking in, right in at 9 am, done at 5 pm, they're doing their job, saying all the right things, you know, um, checking off all the boxes. But with us, and you know, as a staff, we're, we're just locked into to their situation and we empathize, man, you know, and, and it makes a huge difference. You know, I don't think that, I don't think that we could afford to have somebody on our team that just clocked in, clocked out, right, and they do a phenomenal job on the computer side, right, and you know, back end. But when it comes to dealing with these people who have, you know, dealt with devastation, we have to be able to to be personable and to help them feel, to help them feel like we really care, and I don't think that's something you can really fake, because these people are at, some of them are at the bottom of the barrel and yeah, and, and so I think they would see. See through that stuff yeah, yeah, that's good.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it definitely wouldn't fit our culture otherwise, I mean that's for sure, like the clocking out thing, it just doesn't, and you know, because leads don't work on a nine to five schedule, sometimes these needs pop up in the evenings or weekends and we have to be able to respond, and sometimes it's it's how we respond in, like small ways, small gestures, and that's one of the things I noticed about some of the brands that we love the most. We talked a little bit about that last time. Some of the brands that we like, but you know you go to these. These, whether it's a nice hotel or any nice experience, they've paid attention to small gestures, small details, and usually that's the stuff that you remember I mean Disney, historically, has been good at this like really little, small things that they notice and it makes someone it's the thing that people talk about later this experience.

Speaker 1:

What kind of small gestures or examples of those can we do specifically for our stressed out policy holders? They're freaking out there, you know they could be in some, even some, trauma. I mean, it's just a lot of stuff going on. What are some of the small things that we can do that makes a difference in their experience?

Speaker 2:

Yeah. So, um, I think first. First of all, what is your first impression you? Know, what is, uh, when we pull up on on site right, what is, what is the first impression? Like, um, get out of the truck, you're meeting them, right.

Speaker 2:

Yeah big on first impressions and I mean you can't, you can't mess that up. You know a lot of people don't pay attention to it so much, um. But man, when you get it right, people notice that's right, that's right, um. But uh, you know it's, it's things like that. It's, it's um, it's putting uh, putting a rug out before we walk into the trailer, right, right, putting a rug down. It's almost like that, like putting uh, putting uh, like like those things over your shoes, like some companies.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, or like a white glove surface type thing, yeah exactly Exactly.

Speaker 2:

Um, it's, uh, you know it's. It's keeping everything clean as you're, as you're doing stuff, right, it's. It's, uh, you know, maybe one more sweep out before, before we at the end, when we've kind of done an orientation right, like it's just all these little things that people pay attention to you know, um, and we're we're always looking at that stuff and we're always adding.

Speaker 2:

You know, it's like I think we need to do this. Um, you know, or we learned something the hard way and it's like, ah, man, we just got somebody that wasn't a big fan of this, and so I'm like, well, you, you know, you always have a decision. Do we need to change it? Um, or uh, or not? And you know, yeah, we decided, yeah, we need to, we need to change that up because we think it'll be better. So, you know, there's just so many little things and nuances that we're always looking at to try to make, to try to make sure our experience can be better, cause I'm always, I always believe that the experience can be better. There's always something you can do to make it better.

Speaker 1:

You know, one thing I've noticed too that makes a big difference and I've heard you talk about this quite a bit is sometimes it can just be taking an extra five minutes on one of the initial calls and just human to human, just caring about what they're going like. Hey, before we jump into, you know all our questions how are you, like, how are you doing, are you? How are you holding up, like, and just giving them a place to listen and vent a little bit? We're not trying to be therapists we don't have, we can't fix all their problems but I think sometimes we can be one of the first people that actually care or ask about how they're doing. And man, some of these people just pour their heart out, I mean they just absolutely tell you.

Speaker 1:

I mean, and I think that's a, that's a small way. I'm curious too how does hospitality play out when it comes to improving the reps experience as well? You know so we talked about the, you know the insured, and but how does that, how does that work in making the reps life easier and kind of rolling out the red carpet for them as well?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I mean, we're always going to try to do everything we can to make their lives easier, you know, and a lot of times it's just about feedback, right, just asking their feedback, you know, or listening when they are, you know, talking about a certain situation and maybe how we handled something, or you know, and so it's just having an open line of communication, being willing to make changes, right, um, and that's something that we're we're very, um attuned to because, you know, we obviously exist for our clients and so if there's something that we can do better, we're always going to listen to that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah Well, last question I wanted to kind of just to ping over to you when it comes to hospitality for the reps. Talk a little bit about proactive communication and how. That is a way, something that I've heard you stress. Our our VP, he is big on this, he preaches this big time and, and I'll be honest to say, when I was new to the company, I didn't fully understand. I didn't understand the business enough, and now that I've been around a little bit, I understand the importance. So we were even meeting with some partners a couple weeks ago and they were joking about being away from their computer for even a couple hours and how that like they had to get back because it's like they were away from their computer for even a couple hours and how that like they had to get back because it's like they were away from their email. So, like, talk about that as far as hospitality and just being proactive in our, in our communication yeah, I think we always try to stay ahead of things.

Speaker 2:

You know, um, it's like we can kind of almost like we're seeing things happen before they actually happen, um, and that's great, because we, you know, because of how long we've been doing things, because of our knowledge of the industry and this, you know, in the process and onsite housing and all of those things right, it's allowed us to kind of, uh, squash issues before they actually happen, and then we're going to communicate that right to the reps, you know we may read and say, hey, we had a right to the reps.

Speaker 2:

You know we may read and say, hey, we had a conversation with the, you know with, uh, with the assured, and you know this is kind of how we're feeling about that conversation. They said a couple of things that kind of piqued our you know our interest and you know, kind of took us back a little bit and we're like, yeah, I'm not sure really what to what to think of this. But here's our thoughts around it and what we think they're thinking.

Speaker 1:

Right.

Speaker 2:

And oftentimes we're right and you know we can save, uh, save them time, save, save both of us money, right, save, save the insured headache, um, and so, yeah, I think, I think it's just uh making sure that we're listening really well and because we, you know, have done this for so long, you know, we just kind of know all all of them are different, right, every placement we do is different. However, so many situations are the same and so so many insureds are kind of thinking the same things, right, and and so, yeah, I I think that, uh, I think that us being more proactive in communication has been really good for our clients and they appreciate that so much and that's what we hear from them on a regular basis.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I know I said last question, but I lied. I have one more just follow up Cause I want to know from your perspective hospitality how does this play for you as more of just like a? It's kind of nice to have value add to actually being a long term like growth strategy for for companies. Because even if someone's listening to this and they're a business leader or you know, I know a lot of people listen to this or watch, are in the insurance industry, or watch are in the insurance industry but even if we're just to zoom out outside of the industry that we're in and talk about this idea of hospitality from a, this is really a long-term play. This isn't just like, oh, it'd be nice to have it, but this is part of the strategy to retain business and acquire new business and I just would love to hear your thoughts, almost just philosophically, on the why behind doing business this way.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so I think that it really just has to do with making sure that we can create long-term partnerships, right? We've talked about this before. I am, you know, I'm not interested in making a bunch of money right now. You know, there's a lot of things we can do differently to be more profitable right now, but in the long run, I don't think that we, you know, we're as successful, and so I just think that we're always looking out into the future and trying to see what we can do, what we can implement. How, how can we treat our clients? You know, what do we need to, what do we need to do to treat our clients better? Um, to keep them, you know, to retain them and continue to get business from them. And you know, it's always been about longevity for me, right? And so I think that as long as we focus on that, and rather than right now and making every opinion we can, I think that we're going to be, you know, much better for it.

Speaker 1:

Well, thanks for joining us on Onsite Insight, where we break down the future of temporary housing and how you insurance reps and housing professionals can make the process easier for your clients and your team. If today's episode gave you new ideas or insights, we'd love to hear from you. You can connect with us online at rvtemphousingcom or reach out to us directly on LinkedIn, and if you found this valuable, don't forget to subscribe and share this episode with someone who needs it. Until next time, I'm Drew Powell and this is Onsite Insight, where housing meets solutions.