How to Invest in Hotels Without Money or Experience

Real Estate Rookie

BiggerPockets

How To, Education, Business, Investing, Entrepreneurship

4.8 • 1.7K Ratings

🗓️ 25 June 2025

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Tired of rentals that give you little or no cash flow? Burned out from managing multiple properties across different markets? For the entrepreneur who wants to make bigger strides toward financial freedom, today’s guest will share an investing strategy with higher upside—a scalable real estate business that gives you many income streams under one roof: hotel investments! Welcome back to the Real Estate Rookie podcast! Like many investors, Sujay Mehta started out buying single-family homes. But when he discovered the enormous cash flow potential of hotel investing, he found a few partners and scrounged up the money to buy his first hotel. The myth that you need millions to buy a Marriott or Hilton? Sujay shatters it in today’s episode and provides a step-by-step blueprint that makes finding, funding, and operating hotels much easier than you thought possible! Stay tuned as Sujay discusses the different types of hotels you can buy and points you toward the perfect first investment for any rookie who’s looking to break into the space. Along the way, you’ll learn three ways to analyze a hotel deal, some common pitfalls to avoid, and the keys to a profitable hotel business! In This Episode We Cover Why you DON’T need millions of dollars to start investing in hotels Creative financing options for new hotel investors (even with low money!) Boutique versus branded hotels (and which one rookies should invest in) Fast-tracking financial freedom with a business-plus-real estate investment Three easy ways to analyze a hotel deal (as a complete beginner) Costly operational mistakes to avoid when building your hotel business And So Much More! Check out more resources from this show on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠BiggerPockets.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.biggerpockets.com/blog/rookie-579 Interested in learning more about today’s sponsors or becoming a BiggerPockets partner yourself? Email ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠[email protected]⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Do you think that you need millions to own a hotel?
0:04.0	Today's guest used an SBA loan and a few friends to buy a 75-room property and now manages
0:11.7	a portfolio of brands like Hilton and Marriott.
0:15.7	If you've ever thought hotels were out of reach for rookie investors, this episode is your
0:20.6	blueprint.
0:21.4	That's right.
0:21.8	Today's guest is a hotel investor and operator who's breaking down exactly how a
0:26.2	Ricky can go from a single family home or duplex to a full-blown hotel entrepreneur.
0:36.8	This is the Real Estate Rookie podcast. I'm Ashley Care.
0:40.3	And I'm Tony J. Robinson. And let's give a big warm welcome to Sujay. Meta Suja. Thank you for
0:45.0	joining us today, brother.
0:45.9	Hey, thank you both so much. It's an honor and a pleasure to be here. Obviously, you know,
0:51.6	Bigger Pockets has touched so many lives. So the pleasure is online.
0:55.6	Well, I want to start off with what are some of the biggest misconceptions that a rookie listening might have about hotel investing?
1:03.0	Yeah.
1:03.3	I mean, first of all, most people traveling, right?
1:06.3	Like how many of us have seen a hotel while driving down the road, driving down a highway?
1:12.2	Most of them may have been like the Marriots or the Hilton's of the world. Most people think Paris Hilton just owns half
1:17.0	these hotels, right? And that's a huge misconception. It's not these billion dollar companies or,
1:23.6	you know, Wall Street companies that own these hotels, but actually a lot of them are franchise.
1:29.9	And so we actually, as franchisees, own a lot of these, you know, holiday ins or Hampton
1:36.0	Inns, Fairfield Inns, and these are owned by small business owners just like us.
	...

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