Chris Lavergne: Transforming Homes into Functional, Renter-Friendly Oases

I'm really sort of opposed to hot markets. I recently relocated permanently to Florida and the first sort of instance would be, 'Hey, let's move to Miami.' And that was our first impulse. But you look at the Miami market and it's just, it's exploding and it's really hot. So … what's the upcoming market opposed to the hot market? And that led me to Tampa, which has a lot of the same things as Miami, but is not nearly as hot— but it's also not a bland market. It's definitely up and coming. There's sort of those sort of three distinctions you have to make between is this a hot market, an up and coming market or a pretty stagnant market? And, I really  like to look for the upcoming markets.

I really don't look for inspiration in the usual places. And, I don't even know if I look for inspiration at all. I think taking a photo you like from Pinterest of a dreamy house or a dreamy living room—  it's kind of counterproductive because it's all designed to look gorgeous and make you feel this amazing way about it. But is it really livable? Is it really functional? Is it really achievable? So I try to stay away from falling into this dreamscape of what could be and really just [talk] to professionals and people who have owned homes for a long time—What works? What went wrong? And really talking about the practical and functional elements of the home more than getting lost in a pin board, which I used to do a lot.

I have two tips and they contradict each other. First, you gotta just spend money. Like if you wanna do it right, do not try and find the middle ground. Buy the right thing. Spend [on] the right thing. And if you can't, wait. Be patient. So my money saving tips are either spend a lot of money or spend no money. I have furniture in my house that I literally picked up off of the street in New York City and just put in there, and I have stuff that I spent a great deal of money on. The main thing is to either go all out and buy exactly what you want, or find a way to use sort of recycled materials in the meantime until you can afford what you want.

There's two types of renter homes. The first are ones that are built on beaches and lakes in important cities, and those pretty much sell themselves. Clearing Farm is …really trying to carve out the home as the destination itself. The hooks aren't necessarily what you think they're gonna be going in. I thought for our homes that the hook was they're gonna be beautifully designed historical homes. Turns out there's really not that big of a market for it. So the house became a pet friendly house for dogs. I don't have a pet. But it sort of just followed the data of what people seem to want. And we installed a fence that covers a whole acre so the dogs can run around, and it's our most popular rental.