It doesn't seem to take long for things to develop.  The people that were supposed to stay 2 nights? No shows and no contact. I have received no email, text or phone calls from them. They're out 1 night's stay.  I won't charge them the 2cd night - I think. I'm going to review the industry standard once again but I think it's make them pay one night non-refundable and then the second/subsequent nights aren't charged until they arrive.  I will close their account and call it good.

The other people coming for one night at lot 11 haven't shown up yet, but it's only 2:15. They are likely just traveling through and planned their trip so they could stop wherever they wanted to. In this case, my park which is the cheapest around in this entire region for a decent park. There are sh**holes that most people want nothing to do with. 

I have 3 trash cans out there now. 1 is the garbage company's trash can - they are supposed to bring another one and the other 2 are much smaller personal cans.  The big one is full, the second biggest one is full but the 3rd one is empty. So I'm hoping it will last through tomorrow and I can drag it all out there Sunday afternoon for Monday morning pickup. 

I measured the hip camp lots.  I knew I had some space, but now I know how much space.  Well there's 2 ways I could do it. One is parallel parking on either side and at the end.  This will give me maximum space and realistically, small vehicles, I could probably get 7 of them in there without crowding.  I plan on doing 5 to start with.  Remember, I already had the bobcat rented for the shed project, it cost me nothing more but some fuel to finish out that lot after having had started it with the mini-ex - which I also primarily rented for the shed project.  

Therefore, the only real money involved here will be to run electric for 20 amp service for the 5 lots.  The wiring will probably cost a bit, the outlets are cheap and a couple of circuit breakers.  I'll put up "Lot 1" signage and mark the lots, but I'm pretty much sold on the parallel parking.  On the east side that means I can have 2 50 foot long lots and on the west side, 2 48 foot long lots.  On the south side, it's about 41 feet. It's actually much longer but there is 41 feet of fairly level space, the rest is a pretty steep grade.  

I'm getting my plan together in my mind, just want to resolve any lingering questions on how I'm going to do this before I start working on it.  

After I get the shed done it won't take long to set up those lots. But I do need to remind myself to get a couple of 50 pound bags of grass seed tomorrow and spread it behind lot 14 and all over the Hipcamp area.  

Right now, for the month of March,  I have $725 worth of overnight/short term bookings enqueue. I need that to go up at by at least $475 to make it worth having those lots available.  Much more would be nice, at 80% occupancy I could leave trucking.  But I'm not counting chickens I don't even have the eggs for, much less to hatch.  Same with HipCamp. Who knows if this will pay off? But you never know until you try.

And as far as the shed goers? I'm pretty much tired of having to trek into the woods to find a place to go to the bathroom. If the toilet never got used by anyone else, it would definitely get it's use from me and the boys.  I don't know what it is about those kids, but every - and I do mean every - time we go over there, one of them has to take a dump.  Why didn't you do that at the house?  We just left there!  Well I didn't know I had to go!! I will highly likely put a small desk in that shed as well.  There will be some space left to put one in and if enough space, I may put a couple of comfy chairs in there as well.

Nothing fancy, of course, an used, definitely - cheap. 

The contractor. That texting went well beyond what I posted in the last post.  He quoted me $6,800 on the smallest septic system he can provide. Gag. That's a lot of money for sewage.  I mean, yes, I spent far more on the Park sewer system as it stands, but this was just to get 4 or 5 more RV lots.  Well, it is what it is.  We also discussed his park he built.  They haven't sold it yet. They were offered $700,000 for it and they turned it down. They have it listed for 1.2 million.  38 lots on 40 acres with a pond and a party barn.  I dunno folks, I don't make up the prices to buy RV lots. Another one I saw today is a 14 space facility listed at $699.000.  See if I could get that much money for my 14 space park? I would be seriously tempted to sell it, take the money and go build another park somewhere else.  Get another 20-40 acres and do it all over again.  

One of his partners in that endeavor is also a banker. He told me to call him for an appraisal or he could probably just give me a ballpark over the phone.  Ok! He then said I could probably get financed for expanding the park through him as well. OK!! He's on my list of things to do Monday, he gave me his phone number and I hope he gives me some sort of good word to the man.  I paid all my bills to this contractor immediately after they completed each phase.  I mean, drive up there and pay them in person type of stuff.  I made sure I stayed in his good graces because I knew I would probably need his services again.  So, there is a beacon of hope there, at least, for a sizeable loan - somewhere in the 250-300k range. If I can't get at least 200k I probably won't do it.  I need enough for at least 14 more spaces, a mid-sized swimming pool and I would like some sort of clubhouse structure.  Nothing fancy, again, just something where people can hang out, an office, rentable party space for locals.  

Don't want to get too involved with thinking about that right now, I need a "yes" or "we will look into it but it sounds good" or something like that before I start seriously planning a phase 2. I have phase 2 in my mind already as it stands. 

My Verizon business credit card came in today as well. As with the AMEX card, I will be using it in a limited fashion and paying it off monthly.  The idea, of course, is to build up business credit score. 

I did force myself to go back over. Someone had dumped a bag of trash on top of an already full trash can instead of putting it into a completely empty trash can next to it. ??? I just don't understand people but I am not saying anything about it to anyone, it's not worth it. I'll just deal with it and bite my tongue.  

But while I was over there, it dawned on me to go ahead and measure out the area for Hipcamp, I'm glad I did. It gives me some perspective.  There is ample room for pickups and even medium sized trailers in there. Just no sewer connection or water.  And no 50 or 30 amp electrical service. I'm not trying to drag that crowd in there unless they are just looking for a spot to stay overnight on the cheap. I've been trying to decide what to charge. I was thinking $12 per night, but that is too cheap. I'm going with at least $15. That gives them a 20 amp electrical connection, access to fresh water if they want to fill up their tank on the way in with a "community spigot" and access to the shed with all that will have in it. I think that's more than  a fair deal and should hopefully bring some people in.  I'm going to heavily advertise it, that's for sure.  

Well that's enough.  I am going to log into quickbooks and start scanning more receipts. Fun, fun.