Taking The Bus To Work

Early last spring, we’d been working with Tesla to become an approved partner as part of their Employee Benefits Program — becoming the first housing provider to do so. We created a special offering and discount for Tesla employees who wanted to live in any one of our communities — but what started us down the path at all was our Wonderyard project in Lockhart. The proximity and ease of getting from Lockhart to the Gigafactory was a factor in our Investment Thesis, so getting to create a special program for their employees was awesome. It turns out they hold an Employee Benefits Fair a couple of times a year out at the factory — where all their partner companies set up a booth and get to meet with employees to bring awareness to their product.

Just getting to go inside the factory alone was a very cool experience. The sheer amount of security, background checks, and instructions about where to park and what to do gave a good glimpse into why it’s such a forward-thinking, well-run company. There’s a reason Elon is now a Trillionaire. That’s a bit of a sidebar.

The real learning from that afternoon — talking with dozens of Tesla employees — was understanding how far away the employees traveled from to work at the factory. We talked with people who lived in San Antonio, all the way up to Georgetown and out into Killeen. Some of those are over an hour away. That seemed like a daunting task when you factor in that the factory line opens at 6:00am every day. Then we started to hear about the Tesla Employee Shuttle — a van that Tesla provided to transport employees from some of these faraway locales to and from the factory every day.

We walked away from that day having introduced our Wonderyard build-to-rent community to a lot of employees — and we wound up getting several residents out of the event. But the bigger win was learning about that employee shuttle — and we left determined to see if we could get Tesla to start a shuttle servicing Lockhart. Here we are a little over a year later, and we’re very excited to say there’s a new Tesla employee shuttle running between the factory and Lockhart five days a week. It follows the factory’s production schedule — arriving at the plant by 5:35am, with afternoon departures at 4:45pm and 6:15pm — and picks up and drops off just one block from Wonderyard.

Now, we certainly can’t take credit for that. We absolutely believe having that shuttle would be a big benefit to our residents, and would make our property more appealing to Tesla employees — but we don’t have the power to just snap our fingers and create a shuttle. After some initial conversations with the folks at Tesla, we understood the requirements they had to establish a shuttle route, and we were able to talk with the right people at the City of Lockhart about the idea. Ultimately, we just stepped aside once the right people were together — and we were thrilled when the announcement came that the shuttle would start service.

It may seem like an inconsequential thing to celebrate, but we’re extremely excited to see it turn into reality. It’s a great example of how we like to operate and find creative solutions that add value — finding spots where we can leverage local relationships to implement ideas, and in this case getting the right people in a small Texas town connected to the right people at one of the world’s best companies. Over the next couple of months, we’ll be eager to see how many more Tesla employees show up wanting to live at Wonderyard and take advantage of the shuttle — and we’ll smile with pride every time we drive past the parking lot where the shuttle picks up, seeing that small lot full of Tesla employees’ (and our residents’) cars parked there.