Dreaming of the Swiss Alps and want to learn how to invest there? Learn from Rick Steve's Ireland travel guide and American expat real estate pro how to do well for their local communities and build a life they love connected to the Outdoors in some of the most magical places in the world.
On this Summit Roundtable we discuss the ROI and lifestyle of hospitality investing in the Swiss Alps and Italian Dolomites and Italian home buying from USA. Featuring Rick Steves’ Tour Guide and Swiss Hotelier Stephen McPhilemy and expat Italian real estate pro and social advocate Dave Waters.
Check out Hotel Oberland or Connect with Stephen on his website.
Connect with Dave on his Youtube Channel.
Sponsored by: Sustainable Investors Group
Stephen is Ireland’s foremost travel expert and tour guide and featured on the PBS show Rick Steves’ Europe. He decided to create a “pension plan” and pooled investor funds to buy a historic hotel in Dingle, Ireland and a mountain chalet hotel in Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland.
Dave grew up in Idaho but moved to Lombardy, Italy where he has created an amazing Youtube channel informing and inspiring American investors to find their dream vacation or retirement home off the beaten path.
Today we’re going to listen to them brainstorm about how to integrate and give back to the communities in which they are investing. Also great discussion on how to size your hotel for optimal ROI and how to create a lifestyle you love.
If you dream of retiring in the Italian countryside or skiing the Alps out of your back door, then this episode is for you!
INSIGHTS AND IMPRESSIONS
We dig deep into the key features of what makes good investment on hotels, even now during covid times. A few key insights are to avoid smaller hotels as the time, money, and work required is about the same for a 10 vs 30 bedroom hotel.
Unlike America, most European countries and even states or counties have very distinct personality, language and cultural preferences. Both guests are avid language learners and suggest you dive into the culture and avoid the “us-vs-them” mentality as an expat.
Getting involved in local sports clubs or hobby clubs as a sponsor is also a great way to show support outside taxes.
If you’re ready to take the leap into Europe for your real estate business, then this episode is for you!
“The word heaven comes to mind, when looking out my backdoor.”
Learn how your green can grow more green for your portfolio and the planet! Visit us here for everything you need to know: www.sustainableinvestorsgroup.com
Schedule a call where we can discuss your investing needs, outdoor adventure plans, or just to get to know each other.
Special thanks to Stephen McPhilemy and Dave Waters for taking the time to share so many great insights with us.
If you enjoyed this podcast, there’s a couple of things we need you to do right now:
Then, please share the show with whoever you think it will inspire.
Until the next time, Climb Your Mountains.
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Expat Investing in Swiss Alps & Italian Dolomites
morgan: [00:00:00] welcome to the summit round table merging people you wouldn't expect to bridge sustainability and investments. Here we create and collaborate to help you make better and less biased decisions to build financial and outdoor freedom.
We connect a social or sustainably advocate with a motivated and mindful investor to battle confirmation bias and bring about profitable solutions to fight climate change. And today I'm very [00:00:30] excited to connect Dave waters and Steven Dick Bellamy around the topic of hospitality, investing outside your home country and community integration.
Steven. Thank you so much for joining us today. Pleasure. Yes. can you paint a picture of what it's like to drink a cup of coffee looking out your window in Lauterbrunnen?
Stephen: Well, yeah, it's definitely, you [00:01:00] know, having would be one word that Springs to mind. Uh, I I've been here for the best part of a year now. And. There isn't a single day that it doesn't cease to blow my mind looking at it.
Like it never ceases to impress. So yeah, I feel very fortunate. Um, a lot of my friends will look at my social media and say, Oh, you're so lucky to have that view. And then I always say, yeah, but it's not an accident. You know? Uh, I didn't, it's [00:01:30] not an accident. I'm in this beautiful place. I, I uprooted myself and came here and chose to be here.
So, um, It's part, no, it's part of a purpose or it's part of a plan. Uh, you know, I, I grew up in, uh, in, up in the North of Ireland in a, what we call a housing estate. I think Americans might call it a housing project and, uh, nearby was some very beautiful places. But the immediate area, we had probably a 100 families in about 10, [00:02:00] 10 square acres, you know, and, um, or 10 acres and, uh, The hoses were very small and, and, uh, like there were two bedrooms upstairs, two bedrooms downstairs.
And I read an article once that describe these houses as being built for proletarian elves, you know, they were just tiny and there was no view or anything. And I think that that, that made me want to, uh, purposely move to places with spectacular views [00:02:30] and to be amongst incredible nature all the time.
Can you tell us what it was like growing up in Northern Ireland? I don't think a lot of us have that understanding of the time when there was sectarian violence and division.
Yeah. for every 10 people who get involved in violence, there's probably 10,000 who don't.
So it was very, uh, there was certainly violence around a lot, but there was also lots of fun. And, um, you know, it was, it was a divided [00:03:00] community that was so, uh, I I'm from the Catholic community and we identify as Irish and, uh, the other community was, uh, are, is Protestant and mostly identifies as British overwhelmingly does, but we went to different schools and.
Uh, different buyers when we were older and different nightclubs, discos, whatever, when we were teenagers and we played different sports, even it's because we went to different schools, they learned to play rugby. I learned to play a sport called Gaelic football, and we just didn't mix. And, [00:03:30] uh, but occasionally there'll be some like government initiatives to bring us to gather, or there might be at a rock concert, you know, which would bring us together.
And, uh, most of the phones. That we weren't all that different in some ways. And we were very naturally very curious about these other people, this forbidden fruit, and in some ways now I find that has set me up well for Switzerland, because in Switzerland you have Swiss French, you have Swiss Germans and you have Swiss [00:04:00] Italians and you don't always like each other that much.
I personally don't know how Switzerland works, but it works very well. But every time I step, step back and look at it, I think, how does this place work? They speak three different languages. They have different cultures. Uh, the Swiss Germans don't particularly like the Swiss, French and vice versa. Um, even within the Swiss Germans, they have local, um, rivalries between the cantons and it just blows my mind, but just going [00:04:30] back to Northern Ireland, I made that, that, that prepared me well for, for, for coming over to Switzerland, but yeah, in Northern Ireland also, uh, We D we, there wasn't a lot of money around, you know, the economy was almost non-existent.
I think the last big thing built in Northern Ireland was the Titanic in 1912. You know, after that, after that industry started dying away, we, we built DeLorean cars for a while back in the 1980s in Belfast, but that when we put it after I think a [00:05:00] year, so there was no real big industry. My mom was a teacher and my dad worked in a, in a shirt factory.
All those factories are not gone. So is that, you know, he grew up in an ER, he worked in an industry that's gone, so there wasn't a lot of money around and we never had any, any holidays, you know, abroad or never any vacations we'd have holidays. We traveled within Ireland, but, uh, never would we go to the Swiss Alps or the dollar nights?
I remember once because my mom [00:05:30] was a teacher, her teacher friend. And, and her family went to France on a camping trip and we all thought, who the hell do they think they are? You know, going to France on a camping trip. Yeah. What the hell? And so there wasn't a lot of money in there for there.
Wasn't a lot of trips and I hear you guys talking about. Growing up in Idaho skiing and snowboarding, we didn't do that because there was no snow for a start, but we didn't know we had no boating trips or no canoeing, cause we didn't have the money to buy the kayaks or anything. So it [00:06:00] was a very happy time, but there just wasn't a lot of equipment around or a lot of, um, access to foreign trips, but there was access to very good education, uh, and free education, um, at, at uh, what you call elementary level and then high school and then university also.
But when I was there, it was free. Um, so we had a chance to learn and to dream about the outside world. So, yeah, when I came to Switzerland, I was already well aware that there was three different or [00:06:30] four different cultures here. You know, wasn't something new. I had to read about it all my, all my years. Is it true?
I hear that the S the, um, in one part of Switzerland, they won't allow the cheese that's made in a different part of Switzerland to be imported. And they re. Only allow cheese from that particular region to be served at some of the restaurants.
. I'm not sure if that's true, but I, I would not be surprised at that. You know, you know, it's, it's funny [00:07:00] when the lockdown cam here. They brought it up in the rule that you had to have two meters of social distance and there's a good.
Yeah, have a good Swiss German friend here in the Valley. And he lived in America for a long time. I said, what do you think about this? Really? He said two meters. He said the two meters real brings the Swiss closer together. Okay. That's interesting, actually. So I just looking at your social sites, I noticed that you studied history.
How does that [00:07:30] inform how you work in the tourism industry and connect with people from around the world? Well, I think it set me up perfectly for it after. Well, the reason I studied history was first of all, I love the subject and secondly, I wanted to be a journalist. And, uh, I, after high school, I was going to go straight to journalism school and I did a work experience, like [00:08:00] an internship with a journalist and he said, don't whatever you do, don't study journalism.
None of us have studied that. He said, go study history or something like that. Okay. So I studied history and then I went to journalism school, but. Before I went to journalism school. I met this American called Rick Steves. He's at a travel writer and travel TV guru. And so I became a tour guide with him.
And I thought, Oh wow, this is a cool kind of job. You don't get into getting to travel all over Ireland. And then he said, could you, [00:08:30] you said, would you like to do a tour of Europe? I said, you can just be the assistant, you know, and you can learn a lot and maybe be the guide someday. I thought, yes, I went on a 21 day tour of Europe, you know, uh, the varia for October, from October Fest, we were in Paris.
We came into loader. Yeah on this tour, I was probably 25 or something stayed in this hotel. So you, you stayed in the hotel that you purchased. Yeah. And, [00:09:00] uh, I thought, Oh, this is cool. This is the Swiss Alps. You know, I just come from this housing estate in Northern Ireland. I thought a lot that I'm getting paid to be on vacation with Americans and correct.
All having fun. There's no grumpy people, they're all drinking German beer and, and, and try and frog's legs for the first time. And they're just enthusiastic. And, um, So then I had two great summers of that. And then I went to journalism school and they were all stressed and they were all [00:09:30] working to deadlines and I thought, Oh the hell with this game, I'm not going to continue in that.
So that was a tour guide with, with Rick, Steve for many years and still am, but you know, pandemic has put an end to that. Um, and tour guiding is the best career ever, as long as there's tourists and tourists. And then. Like the last year of the pandemic has proven it's not a sustainable career. If the, you know, what hits the fan, right.
Because there's no work and you don't, you don't do the tour, you [00:10:00] don't get paid. Right. So a few years ago, you know, with, with the 2008 crash and then, you know, various things over the years, uh, I thought I need to start getting a little bit of a pension plan. And, um, I love welcoming and hosting people in one place as well as traveling to other places.
So I thought I need to start investing in some hotels here because I grew up in a very small house. I, uh, I [00:10:30] ha I have this, uh, What's the word, like a phobia about small houses. So I will always want it a really big house. Like we used to watch Dallas as kids, and we always wanted to have a host at South fork ranch, and I, I can't really afford to have a South fork ranch, but.
If I have 30 people a night sleeping with me in the house, then I can afford it. Yeah. That is pretty awesome. The transition from his historian to tour [00:11:00] guide makes a lot of sense, but then this idea of moving into the investor side, that's, that's quite a jump. Do you, has that pandemic or the lockdown changed your business plan?
Uh, well, it obviously hit things hard because we, we bought the hotel in Switzerland one month before the pandemic. Um, we came over to Switzerland, it's myself and two American friends who I met when I was tour guiding. Uh, I was [00:11:30] their tour guide, you know, uh, when they were backpackers two years ago. Yeah.
Uh, Patrick and Cyrus and, um, they, they, they bonded with me cause they were the only people on the bus who were actually interested in the history. I was telling them in Ireland, we had, we had to America, uh, and we had like 25 crazy Australians and, uh, They liked the pubs in Ireland, but they weren't that interested in the history because they were coming from a different background.
You know, they were from [00:12:00] the very new world and they had no real interest. And, um, so, uh, yeah, so we, we came over here and we, we bought them hotel and just as we were signing for it, you know, I was watching the news that Dan, I said, should we be worried about this pandemic in China or not that pandemic this virus?
And they're like, ah, you know, it was, remember bird flu went away after wild sours went away. There'll be no big deal. And then suddenly we're landed with this hotel in Switzerland and lockdown, [00:12:30] and we thought, Oh God, here we go. Um, we have a hotel in a small hotel in Ireland too. And, uh, it was worse because we had really no summer there, but in Switzerland they kind of reopened again by may.
And we had a bumper somewhere with Swiss people who were trapped inside Switzerland, nowhere else to go. Yeah.
I have one final question for you, Steven, and you know, with your story, it's so diverse. Um, if you could sum it up in a sentence or two, what does wealth [00:13:00] mean to you? Yeah, well, Wealth to me is the ability to pay for my lifestyle.
And it's basically, uh, the ability to, to live in a multitude of places and pay for my lifestyle. Yeah. So I see you like to, you know, make others around you feel comfortable and have good experiences. That's true. I mean, I would not like to live in a beautiful place on my own. My wife is [00:13:30] Brazilian and, you know, I could.
Probably survived just me and her, but I know both of us like to have other people coming into our lives and having dinner with us and talking to us and yeah, w w w larger Bruna is the most beautiful place in the world, but wouldn't be, if it was just us here. Yeah. It's nice to have nice to have local people to talk to and fresh people to come in as well.
It's nice to meet new people and new ideas. Absolutely. How has your German. [00:14:00] Well, I've been in an intensive German school for the last two months. So Dodge yet. I'm getting okay at it, but they're Swiss German too, which is an entirely different scenario.
Okay. Dave, welcome to the show. Thank you for coming on. Well, thank you for the invite. Yeah. We share an experience that is quite unique. And it's not very often you meet someone else from Idaho living as an ex-pat in [00:14:30] Europe investing.
Okay. I have to agree. You're actually the first one that I've met. That's great. so can you share a little bit about growing up in Idaho and how that shapes you and your strategy here in Italy? For sure. Uh, well, without going into insane detail,
I grew up outside in kind of a, more of a, a rural area outside of a community with about 25,000 people off and on, depending on the season. [00:15:00] And the things to do were basically to be outside. ,
I did a lot of camping as a teenager. I spent a lot of time in places like. Near West Yellowstone, Yellowstone national park. It's about an hour from my home and a family members had cabins up in the Island park nearby.
And so we could take advantage of those moments, Jackson hole, sun Valley, things to do. There are things like skiing and snowboarding and snowmobiling. As well as all the [00:15:30] other extracurricular things to do in the summertime. That's great. Yeah. I, I remember wearing, shorts and snow boots in the winter.
And if we got, if we got 12 inches of snow overnight, then we would get the first period of school where we could just go out and throw snowballs at each other. Still had to go to school, but we could back then we could whitewash each other and throw snowballs and. Our superintendent of schools was a little bit more strict.
It had to be definitely called in order for us to get out. But I understand [00:16:00] you those days were the best. And where are you in Italy? Right now? We are just South of Milan. And real small community in the province of Lombardi.
Can you share a little bit about your model is an investor and real estate, um, person in Italy. Sure. So, uh, it all kind of started with our first house purchase where we wouldn't have to pay a mortgage or pay a rent each month.
Uh, and from there it's branched off [00:16:30] into right now, mainly just, uh, long-term rentals, uh, residency for local residents. And, uh, we're, it's, we're just. Kind of starting out of the last few years, because I've only been here since 2013, coming from a background in the U S of land development and construction.
Something that really drew me to you was your YouTube channel where you kind of avoid the sort of flashy, Hey, come spend your money in Italy and drink [00:17:00] red wine on the beach.
And, but you kind of really get into the villages. And when we talked, I was really impressed with your model of. Considering, you know, investing from abroad, but also the community impact. Can you share what kind of impact you're trying to make? Well, you know, it's hard to imagine what's going to happen when you move into a new country.
Um, I've always loved real estate and always wanting to work in the category. And so when coming over here and experiencing what I did. [00:17:30] I still want it to speak to people in my own language. I still wanted to reach out to people. I felt like I could relate to. And so that kind of led me to the YouTube channel.
Right. Um, it was the best way for me to speak my thoughts and gain feedback from other people on that subject. And so you're right. I actually do avoid, uh, luxury property. I avoid, uh, Pretending like you have to be a millionaire or more to [00:18:00] live here because I think the majority of people aren't, and there's this whole, from my perspective, this whole, because of film and because of everything that happens, culturally, we experience about Italy from outside of Italy.
We have this. General idea that that's, I can barely afford to visit once a year. And so my, my goal was to teach people that those who do come. Don't [00:18:30] necessarily have to waste money on hotels over the year. They could buy their own place and go stay there and rent it out or whatever they need to do to maintain it.
And so with that kind of focus, that brought me to the more of the residential lifestyle. You still want beautiful locations, but in my opinion, Italy, just a panoramic masterpiece. And so if you like mountains, go to the mountains and you like close the cities, you might have to be a little bit. Not with the sea view, but you could still find real, [00:19:00] relatively affordable property.
So that's where it all started. Italy has that magic of the mountains and seeing meeting. Yeah, it is beautiful depending on which coast actually there's certain people don't know this, but there are other coastlines that also have kind of a more desert desert landscape, all flat and a little bit more.
Less panoramic from that perspective, like you're describing, but a lot easier to, to live because you can access your houses a lot easier. [00:19:30] Yes. And one of your YouTube was focused on the ROI of, or even the acquisition of a hotel in the Dola meaty. Is that something you've been continuing to analyze? Yeah, that's kind of a behind the scenes project.
Um, if we're doing that kind of project, the intention was to bring other people. Kind of group my mind with like-minded people and see if we can't create something out of a [00:20:00] guy kind of a little bit different than the typical Italian hotel experience. And so that's still under development. And I did find a property that used to be a hotel that we analyzed and was still contacting the owner about that and trying to find the exact best solution.
But I definitely am at the beginning of my stages of, uh, investing in short-term rentals, hospitality, uh, real estate. Yeah. There's a lot to learn for sure. Um, [00:20:30] what's something that people get wrong about the ex-pat lifestyle. Well, uh, being someone that probably got it wrong, I can answer this, the idea that, uh, you want to come over and.
And think that everything should be the same as what you had before. Right? It's not going to be the case. Cultures are different products are different. You can't even find what you're typically looking for because they just don't sell sour cream in every grocery store. Right. So that's [00:21:00] one thing. The next thing I'd probably say is The us versus them. You got to kind of get rid of that and just decide, Hey, you're here be part of the experience
if possible, don't expect to go live next to other Americans or other people from your country go and actually live. I had, this is the one thing I did, right. Is go live where absolutely nobody is used to an American around and they call me the American. And so that forced me to kind of adapt to the lifestyle a bit more.
. Definitely. What'd you, do [00:21:30] you have any key takeaways? If someone is considering the ex-pat lifestyle on how to integrate into the community? Just a couple, top two things you could think of?
Well, first thing I'd like to say is, uh, Try something first before, for example, I talk about buying stuff all the time. Before you buy a house, go and experience the area. First, very first thing, just spend three months there. If you don't like it rent a place out or whatever, if you don't like it and move to when you do, like, because there's [00:22:00] chances that you won't like the, the residential lifestyle that maybe you do want to be right there in the middle of Milan.
Right. So don't. Kind of don't dedicate yourself to one cause cause when you get there, you might change. The second thing I'd say is don't depend on other people to translate for you, . Absolutely. Thank you very much.
All right. Let's open up the table. Um, and we'll just let you guys have a natural conversation and I'll step out here. Hopefully we can bring about some new insights [00:22:30] and, you know, an aspiring hotel owner in Italy to a hotel owner in multiple countries. Maybe we could just open up the floor and maybe Dave, could you start.
Sure. Uh, actually it was really fun to hear about your, your lifestyle choices. , how, how do you choose which locations.
You would invest in like, what are the criteria that you require? ? Yeah. Well, there there's a lot of places where we would like to buy a [00:23:00] small hotel and our hotels are always small and we won't, we only have two at the moment, but you know, you're, you're probably averaging 20 to 25 rooms.
There's a lot of places. We would get good deals on good property, but the task of getting people to go and stay there would be huge. And you'd have to pump and huge marketing budgets were kind of good at gorilla marketing because we're good at it. But also because we have no real choice, we can't afford any other big type.
Uh, you know, we can't be, we can't be [00:23:30] buying a place in, in rural Italy where nobody goes or less. Yeah, no, it could still work, but yeah, we're, we're larger. Brunin Harris, huge amounts of tourists. We have a place in Ireland in a village called Dingle. Again, huge amounts of tourists go there. I grew up in a place called Lyford.
I could buy a hotel there for 10 times cheaper than Dingle, but would I be able to get people to go there? I wouldn't just the numbers wouldn't add up [00:24:00] and, uh, maybe one day, but. It'd be hard, hard work, uh, to do that. So, yeah, we, we, we were last year just before the pandemic, my wife and I headed over to Scotland and there was a good hotel for sale there.
25 bedrooms that numbers added up. Um, but then in the pandemic camp and now we're going to hold off, but I think there will be good deals coming up. This is a time for us. It was a good chance [00:24:30] for us to expand. And, uh, my dream would be to have 10 little hotels like this, you know, and in some of the most beautiful places in Europe.
Awesome. That sounds like a dream, honestly. You touched on my next subject, actually, because I wanted to know what it would take for you to consider investing in an area outside of these tourists. I call it the tourist belt.
, first of all, th the type of place that I think you were describing, there sounds like it would be a beautiful place, so that already kicks out a box. Um, [00:25:00] I would, uh, I would imagine or hope that the property there would be slightly cheaper than in the middle of a hotspot and. The the, the third thing I think that would be needed, there is the passion to make it work.
And I've seen it. I've seen it in Ireland and I've seen it in Switzerland, in different places to really can work. Like if you, if you have the, the passion for it. And if you have, if you have enough bedrooms to make it work, because if it's only like, say five or 10, [00:25:30] it can be a struggle to pay off the. The bank loans and whatever, and to pay for staff.
We also find the cost of operating a 10 bedroom hotel is not much different to a 30 bedroom hotel in terms of housekeeping and reception and all the different insurance and whatever else. But the profits can be, can be a hugely different just with maybe 50% extra bedrooms. So, um, yeah, and I also [00:26:00] like kind of have a daydream of.
A place like that, where you could get somebody, maybe yourself or somebody. Who's really passionate about cooking to have a little restaurant there as well. So then you get people coming to the hotel because there's a beautiful restaurant there. And maybe you have an organic garden there and everything is sort of suddenly coming together.
Maybe you have a yoga school there and suddenly, Oh, there's four reasons to go to this place. And then it starts to pencil. [00:26:30] But Hey, if you need the yoga teacher, I've been doing it for 10 years. I got you. Yeah. I just think yoga is such a cool thing to be associated with. I don't, I don't really do yoga or anything, but I, when I do, I love it.
And I always think, wow. Imagine in the middle of nowhere or some beautiful place with. It doesn't have to be a Michelin star chef, but a good chef will cook you some amazing food and imagine in the middle of Italy, somewhere where there's wine, either locally [00:27:00] sourced or even on sites. And I mean, it definitely can be done.
is that, is that what your, what your plan is? Well, uh, just one thing, something like that, something like that in Italy. Would be much different than something in the middle of Slovakia or Slovenia or somewhere. Like I have friends in Slovenia and they, you know, they would like to do that, but they don't think they can get Americans to Slovenia as, as easily as it would be in, in Italy.
They always say that they say Americans think it's, [00:27:30] they just love Italy, but Slovenia is just as good, but they don't know about it, you know? So that's the question. Is it easier to get them to go 15 kilometers from one hotspot to slightly near the hotspot or an entirely different country they'd never been to before?
You know, I don't know the answer to that. The reason I was asking is because I spent a lot of time, uh, going to kind of a, the abandoned cities of Italy. But I have been, uh, I was talking to a friend who had actually invested in an area. I'm not sure if it's your, [00:28:00] that area you're in, but, uh, he has a house in the Alps as well.
He suggested I check out the Dolomites. I went to the Dolomites. With the intention of finding something a little bit more broken down a little bit, not in the hotspot area. And I came across this, uh, five level hotel that two, three of the levels were finished to the levels were not the point is, is that it's not in the hotspot.
I do think that the concept of, [00:28:30] of experiences is really rising. Like. If, you know, say we had a place in the, in the middle of the Dollarmites and then it was just a beautiful, old building and people went to stay there and, and they experienced Italy that way.
That'd be nice. But if they went up there was 20 kilometers off the beaten path. Yeah. But yeah, like if they know that they go there and they're gonna, um, Connect with some Italians and, and, uh [00:29:00] ex-pats but I think there has to be a dimension of meeting the locals there too. And if they're going to have a wine tasting, and if there's going to be a yoga class on offer, or if there's going to be, um, I don't know if you guys do truffle hunting there anywhere nearby, but, you know, I know if my wife and I were going to Italy and we find something like that, When we Googled, uh, exp Dolemite experiences, we'll be straight there.
You know, I think there's a [00:29:30] huge market for really cool, uh, experiences, authentic experiences. And also just generally cool on, you know, where we're involving food and involving history. Well, just everything. Um, you have the advantage to have good weather there. So know people can sort of die in Alfresco.
I imagine in the summer, these are, these are things we can do in Switzerland, but in, in our place in Ireland. Yeah, the [00:30:00] Irish government is really pushing us. We were we're closed at the moment because of the pandemic. Can't be open. But they're saying when, when we do open, everything has to be outdoors, dining and socializing, and the Irish climate is just not good for that.
So we're, we're all, we're all. We're all thinking. What the hell are we going to panic? Now I have another subject I'd like to chat about before I will lose time, actually. Um, So I mentioned the places I go, places like Jackson hole [00:30:30] and Yellowstone and chord. Elaine I've lived in Coeur d'Alene Idaho, all the locations I just mentioned are bit touristic.
Um, sun Valley, Idaho. Um, Morgan knows these places for sure. Well, growing up so close to them, I had the opportunity to witness from a local perspective, what happens to the economy? And this is kind of what influences me from the social aspect of things is that, uh, [00:31:00] hotels come in and they buy lots of property.
They build really big buildings. They have 30, 40, 50 rooms, whatever. I don't know. Anyway, the idea is that, uh, they attract a lot of really rich clientele. The cost of living goes up and the locals that are actually working in these locations, you know, some of them do earn more, but a lot of them don't work in necessarily the tourism industry and they're a teacher or something.
Those teachers, they get kind of forced out, you know, they have to go move to the villages next door [00:31:30] so that they can afford to live taxation, food, all the housing rental prices. Um, and I'll connect this to Italy in a second, but first I want to ask you, uh, do you notice this kind of stuff as a hotel investor, because wanting to do, wanting to invest in hotels, but still having that perspective kind of acts like a block for me, you know, the idea that I don't want to have a negative impact on the community [00:32:00] doing hospitality, but I know very well if it's good hospitality, Likelihood is that people are going to come spend more money and it's going to affect the results.
Yeah. It's such a critical balance. It's I guess it's good that we're even addressing the issue because I think a lot of hoteliers don't, um, I know back in, in, uh, in Ireland, uh, you know, Airbnb really [00:32:30] had a huge impact on the village because. You have almost everybody now who has a spare property, puts it up on Airbnb.
I'm talking pre pandemic, but I know this will come again. When, when connected to my next thought to it. People would say, but it's good for the community. Cause we're because of the tourists and to me, tourism's only good if everybody's benefiting. If I'm the only one benefiting, that's not good. That's not good for me [00:33:00] either, because some people might not like me then, you know, it's nice to be popular or I have a yearning for some degree of popularity and, uh, I don't want to be the person coming in, making all the money.
Uh, especially in a community where I'm not from, you know, you want to, you really want to, I want to be seen to give back. And, um, yeah. And what Airbnb, what is the good a solution or is there anything you've thought of already? That is a good balance [00:33:30] that helps you reach that balance? Well, a couple of things like, um, I think there has to be some, some, uh, legislation has to be in place to that to help with this, like in Dingle, uh, local people couldn't afford to rent an apartment anymore because, uh, tourists were renting it for.
$150 a night where it used to be $150 a week for, for people, local people don't rent. Um, some years ago I suggested and Dingle that there should be [00:34:00] a tourism tax for people who come in because it gets these huge bosses of tourists who come in, don't stay there. Or they come in from outlying areas and they tour around the peninsula and they don't spend any money there.
But no, I don't think you should force people to spend money in your place, but it's nicer. Because unfortunately, a lot of these things come back to money, but people would come in and spend no money to tour around in the bus, take photographs and then go back 20 miles away to where they were staying in the big hotel.
And I suggested that there should be a little tourism tax [00:34:30] of a dollar or two or a couple of years ago. And I got a huge backlash against the idea. You know, a lot of people were in bananas and I said, no, but the tax should then be used to, uh, sand local people, uh, young people to. To a tourism school, you know, maybe get some qualifications as a chef or as a marketing manager or a hotel manager, um, you know, reinvest that money back in and then it didn't go down very well.
And then arrive here in Switzerland and here, everybody who comes and stays in this hotel has to pay [00:35:00] three Franks and 40 cents tourism tax and all, all that money we're living in the most amazing infrastructure. After this interview, I'll, I'll go out and take a cable car up to. Up to 2000 meters and then I'll take a train up to 5,000 meters and I'll go skiing.
And there's all this infrastructure. How has it been paid for? It's been paid by the tourist and tax. So at least the local community are feeling they're getting something back.
. No, then of course it's on, there was, there was an onus on [00:35:30] hoteliers, like me to invest in the local community, such as like sponsoring the.
The local team or, you know, helping the local festival. Uh, and of course you help with taxes as well. But yeah, if, if, uh, it's such a critical thing for tourism for the local communities to feel that there's, they're being part of the investment, not just to get a big bag of cash, but to feel that something's been tied, something tangible has been built [00:36:00] with the tourism spend.
. . All right. So I'm just going to wrap it up here. We're getting towards the end of the time and because this is a show for outdoor lovers, I wanted to ask each of you and we'll start with Stephen first.
What role did the outdoors play for you as a kid growing up? Well, uh, so I grew up in an urban area and, uh, so it was a lot of concrete around, but then I joined the Scouts when I was probably 12. [00:36:30] To get to get out into the countryside. Cause I saw the, they had tents and did camping and things and Irish people didn't really do that when I was growing up.
So I joined the Scouts and we got out to these camps and we would sleep in tents by the Lake and stuff for the idea of stuff. Oh God, what a great life, you know? And uh, and then that's kind of, uh, Uh, jailed with my, my fledgling hotelier career because we're in Ireland and Dingle where [00:37:00] we're we're right on Dingle Bay, looking at the, the Atlantic it's on a stretch called the wild Atlantic way.
And there's mountains there and it's beautiful and here and low to Bruton. I guess the population here is only 2000, same as Daniel. So it's all the Alps everywhere. And it's really, um, like being out in the countryside all the time. I don't have any desire to own a hotel in the middle of Dublin or.
Middle of Zurich or, I mean, if it comes along sure. But [00:37:30] I've never had a daydream about it, whatever, but I do have a daydream about a hotel in Sicily or somewhere who knows the dunk. The Dolomites are somewhere
by a vineyard on the, on the river Rhine or something. What. Beautiful. Yeah, absolutely. And how about you? You kind of touched on it earlier, but is there anything particularly special about the outdoors for you, Dave? Well, I [00:38:00] did Scouts as well, actually. Uh, no, I love the outdoors. At least days. I am working from home on the couch, in the exact same position.
If. I can get out and explore the communities. I think it's interesting. The last year I saw more of it than I did in the previous six years because of this YouTube channel, but that's not really the outdoor experience I'm hoping for.
. And so I want my kids to, I have three and they're little right now. They're always playing inside phones.
And that's okay. [00:38:30] I played games growing up too, but, uh, they didn't, they don't have the go spend a lot of time outside without being watched mentality. You know, uh, these days you leave your kids outside without an adult to get reported and the kids go away. Oh, that's too bad here in Germany. It's not like that.
The kids, the teacher, um, and first grade I would walk my daughter to school. And then after the second week, she said, mom, you're holding your daughter back. You really need to let her [00:39:00] learn how to be independent. I love it. I see that. I see that in Switzerland too. And it still freaks me out a bit, but I see little kids walking to school on their own.
And it's obviously part of the culture to teach them, teach them independence. Yes, absolutely. I like it, honestly. And I think the outdoor experience, uh, I have to admit that when I said what I did when I was younger, that was all because I had friends that could afford all these toys. I, my family, we were pretty basic.
[00:39:30] We didn't have all the toys, but I did have friends that had them. So here we didn't have kayaks and snowmobiles and everything. But what we did have was an inner tube from an old car. And you would ride that too, down the river. So that's, this year's goal is to discover where I can explore where we can explore.
Yeah, Idaho, Idaho Southern. So blissful, I'm wondering why you guys ever left it in the first place? Well, before I met her, my wife was here and she [00:40:00] liked it here. So we're working on that next step up. Well, it will always be there for you. Yeah, you're right. No, I, it was a beautiful experience coming to Italy and, uh, I'd like to share more of my lifestyle.
Cause my, my summers were more like. Car trips into Montana, you know, and experiencing the, the gyms and the sapphires and crystals of Montana. So when I talk about Idaho and Montana kind of goes hand in hand, it's beautiful. [00:40:30] Yeah, Idaho, Idaho and Montana have a rugged wildness to them, but I will say, so I'll be in the doula media this summer.
I was there last summer with my daughter Sage, and we went on the ultra via one Trek from one hut to the next hut, you know, and it was, I mean, the views were absolutely insane. Like you can't go over one bend or over any corner without. A magnificent Rocky peak or one of those [00:41:00] Alpine cows with the little Tinkerbell on its neck.
And they feed you every night, a three course Italian dinner with wine on the top of a mountain. It's incredible. Crazy. I, I have to get, I have to get to the Dolomites in Italy in Italian it's Della meat, cheese is ladle, a meaty meaty I'll have to, I'll have to get there to visit you. Dave. I went to school with a guy called Dave waters.
Uh, coincidentally. Yeah, there's a few of them up there in the UK, Ireland, [00:41:30] Ireland. Yeah. Uh, a couple of years ago, a Rick Steves colleague of mine called Kathy Reno. She, she took a group up the. W on a little hike up the Dollarmites and she never came back down. You know, she, she dropped dead
, but, uh, , we, we paid for a bench for her and it's, it's there somewhere.
So I have an extra reason to get there because I want to sit on that bench, you know, and just think about her. She was she's American. She was American. But if you also had an Irish passport, so she's one of my Irish sisters, but her, her first [00:42:00] level is the Dolomites. Dave, if the listeners wanted to get ahold of you or learn more, where should they go? Well, I pretty much pushing everyone towards YouTube. Um, my channel D a U V O Davo is my gamer tag, actually my nickname as a kid. And so that channel Davo where we were just talking about Italian real estates and, uh, sh I share my personal investments, which are not a lot, but I share basically everything that I experienced.
And [00:42:30] then we talk about. The other one year old homes and all that kind of stuff. They're on YouTube. I also want to say that from this point forward, we all were, we're doing giveaways as well on there. So there's also going to be a link on the about page of that channel that you can click and enter your email for a chance to win basically every week.
Uh, it's not. It's just the opportunity to win a house here in Italy. So [00:43:00] very cool. Kind of like a raffle ticket. You're going to win a raffle ticket from my channel. So go ahead and do that if you're interested. Very cool. And how about you, Stephen? It was such a pleasure to meet you. And if one wanted to know more about the most beautiful place on earth, where should they go?
Well, they can, uh, they can visit our, our, uh, website, which is hotel, Overland points. C H. Which is the Swiss domain name. Um, every village in this region [00:43:30] has five or six hotels and they all have the same names. Every village has the same five names. So there's probably 10 or 15 hotel Overlands here, but that's, that's our hotel over on point C H, and I have a little Facebook page.
Steve MC, Philemy travels. Uh, my last name is quite rare, even for Ireland, but, uh, M C P H I L E M Y. I think there's only two Stephen McPhillemy in the world. One, one works for [00:44:00] Apple and the other is me. So I mean, .