Nashville’s First Hospitality-Driven Ownership Residences
Inside Modernest: how Modernest is turning the gap between hotel and home into Nashville’s most compelling ownership product.
Interview
Key Takeaways
Nashville’s hotel-residential binary has a gap, and Modernest is building into it
For most of this decade buyers who wanted to own, live part-time, and rent flexibly had nowhere to go. Hotels don’t offer ownership upside. Most condos don’t allow flexible rentals. Modernest, 129 residences in Wedgewood-Houston and 131 in Gulch View, is purpose-built to serve that underserved buyer at boutique hotel operating standards.
The tax structure is the real product
Buyers get Opportunity Zone benefits, bonus depreciation through cost segregation, and 1031 exchange eligibility in a single ownership wrapper. Modernest’s thesis is that the developer who builds for optionality captures a buyer pool the traditional binary simply misses, and the after-tax return profile is materially different from a conventional condo purchase.
Airbnb licensing gives units a regulatory moat as Nashville tightens STR rules
Owners can rent for any duration through an exclusive Airbnb licensing agreement managed by Victory Living Group at 12% of STR revenue. As Nashville’s STR permitting environment tightens, units structured this way carry a distinct regulatory advantage over standard condo conversions.
Nashville’s event calendar is a demand engine
The metro added 136,000 residents since 2020, generated $11.2 billion in visitor spending in 2024, and is on track for Olympic soccer at Geodis Park in 2028 and a Super Bowl in 2030. Tourism and residential demand are compressing into the same zip codes, and deliveries begin in early 2027.
The Modernest Team
Heather Gustafson leads sales for Modernest. With more than two decades placing buyers into Nashville’s most competitive residential product, she brings deep market knowledge to one of the city’s most novel ownership concepts. She is currently converting early interest into signed contracts across two active properties in Wedgewood-Houston and Gulch View.