Today we’d like to introduce you to Fred Ballard.
Hi Fred, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
I grew up on our family farm near a very small, rural Texas community learning animal care, basic carpentry, and how to be happy from my mother and father. I saw first-hand that helping other people is important to success- if success includes living a meaningful life. My father, my brother and I enjoyed building things together on our and neighboring farms.
After graduating from A&M, my early desire was to get off the farm and see the world. I saw at least half of it. I got a job working in international sales for 9 years. I figured out that even though we don’t look it – humans are all basically the same….. in a really good way. And I noticed that a housing community is not a place, even though people in a community usually share a place in common. Memories of home and building things stayed on my mind.
I don’t remember the month or day, but I woke up one morning in Hong Kong after a dream in 1990. I read an article the evening before about all the active-adult communities planned overseas and state-side. In my dream I was being lectured by a kind, unseen, male voice about creating homes and neighborhoods where young and old can participate in the community….as if this no longer existed. It was very specific and quite enlightening. The elders helped the young families with their children and in return, they were looked after by the young. Mothers got dependable babysitters inside the community so they could run errands or take a class. Meals were catered to the elderly. It was just one of those vivid dreams that stick with you. It stuck with me because that was how I grew up in that tiny Texas town.
The most important noun for me to think about successful community is not “place” or “age” or “master”… but participation. I ask myself and my team members “how does one innovate the creation of space and structure to encourage participation in the community?”. Sometimes I ask questions that I already know the answers to because it’s a good team-building exercise.
I am still learning but I feel confident that the group of people I work with are going to continue to create some great structure and space that will make families and their neighbors feel at home. We don’t cure disease or keep the public safe at night but we try to provide the ladies and gentlemen that are curing disease and keeping us safe at night with a comfortable and healthy place to live. That is meaningful work for us.
I wish I could have built up my influence and done more sooner. My father told me he had heard a guy say that the very best time to plant a shade tree was 30 years ago. Then he said the second-best time is “today”. My team and I are working hard and fast to acquire land and design nice, small communities in Central Texas. Our current project is Mystic Canyon on a beautiful piece of property in San Marcos, surrounded by the tranquility that only nature can offer. We are designing new house plans to satisfy the new order of the way the young and elder live today.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
The dot-com bust, 911 and the great recession come to mind as at least three periods when I didn’t sleep and didn’t pay myself so we could make payroll and pay vendors. The real estate market ebbs and flows by its very nature. I think it is important to remember during those times that the underlying causes of market disruption resulted in a lot of suffering for most working people and the citizenry in general.
Of course, there were periods of steady work and good market conditions. Real estate is a lot like farming in the sense that there are good times and bad times…. but the stressful times can be the area in between when one is not sure if a boom or bust is coming up next. Then it’s hard to know whether to spend money for new equipment or save every dime.
This may sound counter-intuitive but I would say that the struggles are in the normal, in-between times. I will say that our market in Central Texas has been steady enough. We have never lost money.
We humans seem to be at our best when we are either making money and feeling charitable to our community OR when under duress and coming together to help each other through disaster.
We’ve been impressed with Blue Horse Building + Design, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
We are a boutique home builder at our core. Our recognition has developed mainly from customer service during high-quality, energy-efficient buildings with a big emphasis on healthy homes and indoor air quality. The accolades I am most proud of are Best of Houzz in Service five years in a row.
We have experienced project managers and interior designers on staff that guide our clients through the daunting process of making all the decisions to create their personalized custom homes.
On the community building side, we have our staff and our extended family of real estate, marketing, engineering and design professionals that team up to acquire great tracts of land, design beautiful layouts and install the infrastructure for dynamic neighborhoods.
We strive to be informative and helpful to clients and buyers at every experience level and to make the processes enjoyable as well as successful. We can share any dream.
We’d be interested to hear your thoughts on luck and what role, if any, you feel it’s played for you?
I suppose some would say I have always been lucky. If I am prepared, stay focused on the right things, show up on time and treat everyone with respect, it all seems to work out most of the time.
If that is luck I will take it.
Pricing:
- The home prices in our current community in San Marcos will start in the lower $600’s
Contact Info:
- Website: bluehorse.build
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/mysticcanyon?igshid=YzAyZWRlMzg=
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a28vxUCVkdk
Image Credits
Jeff Jones James Leasure – the bath with the lady with red dress Est. Architecture – for the red home with the goats
