Bring Back the Bustle

How to Avoid Taxes on Investment Income Good day and welcome to Season 2 of Bring Back the Bustle, a podcast about investing in rural America. I’m Shavon Jones, your host.  The Wall Street Journal recently ran a story about how investors lose a third of their earnings to taxes. Not because they have to, but because they don’t check. I’m talking about investments in your retirement account; private...

Pitfalls to Avoid When Investing in Rural America Investments in rural America are sparse. Few investors are quick to jump in. Those that do aren’t bringing services to residents. Instead, they are treating rural America like an ugly stepdaughter there to serve the rest of the family and deserving nothing for herself.  There are valid reasons for investor hesitancy. With few exceptions, rural inve...

Ways to Combat Rural Blight In rural America, one of the consequences of globalization is blight. Many buildings sit idle or in disrepair. There is no code enforcement to speak of. As long as the property owners pay taxes, sometimes as little as a couple hundred dollars per year, they are permitted to hold their property. And to, unfortunately, bring down the value of everyone else’s. Welcome to B...

An Analysis of Rehab vs. New Build in Rural Development To rehabilitate an existing building or to build from the ground up, that is the question. It’s a dilemma that plays out with rural investments in particular because rural towns usually have many vacant lots and dilapidated buildings from which to choose. Hi, welcome to Bring Back the Bustle, a podcast about revitalizing rural America. I’m Sh...

How to Make Money Investing in Energy Aside from the data centers themselves, the biggest money maker in real estate today is in power plants built to serve AI data centers. Hi. Welcome to Bring Back the Bustle, a podcast about revitalizing rural America. I’m Shavon Jones, your host.  A bit of housekeeping before we delve into this episode: First, Happy New Year. We’ve been off since Thanksgiving...

Get off my grid. One of the knocks against data centers is the increase in utility bills and pollution caused by data center energy consumption. The issue of who should pay utility rate increases caused by data center consumption is so clear that it wouldn’t warrant discussion—if everyday Americans weren’t being saddled with the bill. Welcome to Bring Back the Bustle, a podcast about revitalizing...

Rural Development Loan Primer for Investors When people are starting a business or a construction project, one of the biggest problems they face is how hard it is to get financing. USDA Rural Development loans make it easier to get financing for projects in areas with a population of less than 50,000 people. In that regard, rural development loans are another economic development incentive in the...

Why Historic Preservation Matters Historic preservation tells the story of American life through architecture. Historic preservation is so important that, as we discussed back in episode 3, the federal government provides historic tax credits (or dollar for dollar tax reductions) that effectively shift the cost of rehabbing our historic buildings from the developer to the taxpayers. So, somewhere...

What If Data Centers Leave? Hi, welcome back to Bring Back the Bustle, the podcast about revitalizing rural America. I’m Shavon Jones, your host. The Rural Revitalization Fund is a rural opportunity zone fund that invests in rural communities where AI data centers are locating. (Our website is ruralqrof.com)  The Fund uses money from many sources including tax and economic development incentives,...

Hi, welcome to Bring Back the Bustle, a podcast about revitalizing rural America. I’m Shavon Jones, your host. Today’s topic is right sizing your rural business to achieve profitability in rural markets. We’ve entitled the episode: “Don’t Super Size It” so maybe some listeners are looking for a Big Mac. I don’t have any, but invite you to stick around. You may discover something about investing in...

Good help is hard to find, especially in rural America. Hi, welcome to another episode of Bring Back the Bustle, a podcast about revitalizing rural America. I’m Shavon Jones, your host. This episode is about staffing issues in rural America. We’re going to delve into the root causes of skilled labor shortages in small towns then suggest ways to mitigate those problems so we can launch businesses w...

The technocrats are coming to your rural town to operate the AI data center that is under construction. We, at The Rural Fund, aim to make that a good thing.  Hi, welcome to Bring Back the Bustle, a podcast about revitalizing rural America. I’m Shavon Jones, your host. Today, the topic is class, socio-economic class. How to appeal to and mesh economically mixed groups within a single, small commun...

How to Use Historic Tax Credits as a Financing Tool in Rural Downtown Communities Greetings and welcome to another episode of Bring Back the Bustle, a podcast about revitalizing rural America. I’m Shavon Jones, your host. Today we’re discussing historic tax credits as a financing tool in rural downtown communities. When you visit rural communities, often, downtown has become a ghost town. Many bui...

Hello and welcome to the second episode of Bring Back the Bustle, a podcast about revitalizing rural America. I’m Shavon Jones, your host. This episode is about a special tax incentive known as opportunity zones. OZs are all about tax-free appreciation.  So, throughout this episode, listen for those words: “tax-free appreciation” because with tax-free appreciation, you don’t work and you don’t pay...

Welcome to the debut episode of Bring Back the Bustle, a podcast about Rural Revitalization.  More specifically, it’s a podcast about how to make money revitalizing and serving rural communities. On this podcast, we will explore small town revival from the vantage points of all stakeholders including private investors, rural residents, AI companies, commercial property owners, and state, local and...