Send us a text

Grant Collard, Founder and CEO of Redstone Residential, shares his unconventional journey into entrepreneurship and real estate. Raised in a non-entrepreneurial environment, Grant initially pursued pre-med before realizing his true interests lay in building, finance, and independence. He entered real estate just before the 2008 financial crisis, experienced job loss, and started Redstone in 2009 while broke, living in his in-laws’ basement, and welcoming his first child.

Redstone grew from a tiny student-housing management company into one of the largest student housing owners/operators west of the Rockies. Grant emphasizes focus, resilience, and “staying the course” through cycles like the Great Financial Crisis, COVID, and today’s high-interest-rate environment. He discusses disciplined capital structures, long-term ownership, avoiding over-leverage, and slowing acquisitions when markets overheated.

Beyond strategy, Grant reflects deeply on leadership, culture, and personal growth. Influenced by stoicism, biographies of resilient leaders, and experiences at Harvard Business School’s OPM and in Bhutan, he now seeks to balance high performance with high humanity—building a business that delivers strong returns while fostering community, happiness, and purpose for employees and residents alike.

Here are the Top 10 Takeaways from the conversation:

1. Entrepreneurship often finds you by accident—clarity comes from action, not perfect planning.
2. Crisis can be the best time to start—when the downside is already here, you can commit fully.
3. Focus wins: Redstone grew by becoming “category king” in Western U.S. student housing.
4. Vertical integration builds control and resilience in a messy, operationally intense asset class.
5. “Stay the course” is a real competitive advantage—show up, keep your head, don’t panic-cycle.
6. Capital discipline matters: avoid risky structures (especially floating-rate debt) and buy with margin of safety.
7. Skin in the game builds investor trust—he’s typically a meaningful LP (≈10%+ of equity).
8. Strategy: write value fast, hold long—renovate early, refinance opportunistically, then own great assets indefinitely.
9. Product isn’t just housing—it’s peace of mind + community: Redstone absorbs chaos for investors and designs spaces to activate connection.
10. Bhutan reframed the goal: after OPM’s “optimize and scale” mindset, Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness lens pushed him to balance high performance with contentment, culture, and human connection.

Books: 

• The Obstacle Is the Way
• Elon Musk
• The Last Lion