Entrepreneur Brittany Bay gives back to community

When Brittany Bay returned home to Navasota to fulfill her dream of providing affordable housing, she didn’t expect to bump heads with City Hall nor to become a spokesperson encouraging a clean, safe community.

Passion for helping

Raised in Navasota, Bay received her Business Accounting degree from Baylor University and gradually worked her way back “home” where currently employed at Ellwood Texas Forge.

Fun for this goal-oriented young woman is “breaking away from thinking about work or goals,” and spending time with her Baylor sorority sisters or cultivating family relationships, particularly with her son and her niece.

As for what motivates and excites her, Bay said, “It’s anything where I can help people.”

Acting on that desire, Bay began flipping houses.

She said, “I want to buy and flip houses that I can sell for under $100,000. My goal is to push home ownership for people who may not be able to go to a bank or mortgage company or get a home loan.”

Bay continued, “Most people these days are paying rent for apartments upward of $750 -$800 per month. If they can afford that, they may be in the range to be a homeowner if that’s what they desire. A lot of people don’t want to be homeowners.”

The “flip” side

According to Bay, her first experience was rough. She said, “I think I jumped into it not knowing exactly what it would be like, but I did sell my first home to a young couple with a new baby. This is their starter home. I was able to make my money back and a little bit of profit and still sell it for under $100,000.”

Bay describes flipping houses as a pretty daunting task but calls it “super fun.” She gets satisfaction from the design aspects of picking out paint colors, cabinets and counter tops and “seeing something come together, having a vision and seeing it through.”

She cautioned, “HGTV sells you a dream. They flip a house in 30 minutes. It’s nothing like that, it’s harder. And then there’s the unexpected and the unknown. You don’t know what’s on the other side of that wall, like termites and you have to scrap it.”

Bay is self-funded, paying as she goes, so sometimes projects sit idle until she has funds to resume work. She acknowledges she has learned a lot from contractor friends who “eyeball” the property for her.

She said, “It’s still a risk and you go into it knowing it’s a risk. I’ve learned a lot from having people explain things to me. You definitely ask questions about where your money is going, and why!”

From negative to positive

In 2018 while Bay’s Leon Street house-to-duplex conversion project was in an idle period, she was notified by the City of Navasota to cease work because a complaint had been filed. While there may have been some misconception about how the property would be used, the bottom line was that the proposed work violated the zoning ordinance prohibiting duplexes in neighborhoods zoned for single family dwellings. Bay’s appeal did not go as hoped.

She said, “I have to take full responsibility. I’m in accounting and in my field, you are responsible for doing your due diligence on anything you do. It was my lack of responsibility there.”

She continued, “It was disheartening more than anything. I went off to college and came back home mainly to be around my family but because this is what I want to do and what better place to do it than my hometown?”

Not allowing disappointment to get the better of her or her projects, Bay developed a positive working relationship with Kris Gruver, Community Relations Specialist and Lupe Diosdado, Community Development Director.

She said, “My first interaction was pretty negative but working through it with them was pretty seamless. They’ve told me things I needed to get done and they were very helpful.”

According to Gruver, it was at this time that Bay expressed an interest in getting involved in community beautification and Keep Navasota Beautiful seemed to be the ideal spot.

He said, “She’s done a good job and under her leadership KNB is thriving,” noting that she has recruited several new members.

Bay admits that she came back home “full of ideas” about providing affordable housing but offers this bit of advice – “Yes, you may have great ideas but seek first to understand the current status before you go in trying to change things.”

Show up where you live

This year the KNB membership elected Bay as chairman and drawing from her experiences in fundraising at Baylor, and as a mother, she floated a few new ideas at the 18th Annual Keep Navasota Beautiful Trash-Off. Despite a date change due to bad weather that affected turnout, Bay’s kid-friendly activities were well received and the mission of cleaning up Navasota’s streets was accomplished.

Trying to regain momentum after the 2015 economic downturn which affected KNB projects, Bay sees a need to renew name recognition.

She said, “I feel like we have a lot of work to do about getting our name out there and showing people we are doing something positive. People always like to be on the positive bandwagon.”

Addressing the lack of young volunteers, Bay attributes it to different interest levels from that of seniors who perform the bulk of volunteer service.

She said, “The older generation does it because it needs to be done, because this is our community. With the younger generation, I don’t think that’s their mindset yet. Theoretically, it should be. It’s sad to say you have to have a fun element to get someone to do what they need to do but that’s kind of the age we live in these days.”

Bay continued, “It’s got to be fun to get younger people interested. Once you get them out there, then you can have the conversation about why we need to do this.”

Bay said she approaches everything from a business perspective. “You have to be willing to show up and give something if you want something. This is where we live. You want your community to thrive and progress and that benefits you as well. Let your voice be heard if you have good ideas, or even if you don’t, but you can’t expect your voice to be heard if you don’t show up.”