Encore: Building a Custom Home Empire with Stephanie Dailey

Episode #49: Welcome to the She Builds Show, I’m your host, Stefanie Olson and I am excited to share with you an encore of one of our most popular episodes with special guest, Stephanie Dailey.

Stephanie is a licensed custom home builder with Steve Dailey Construction, and the work and product she produces is straight mind-blowing. She became a licensed real estate agent in 2015 and a licensed contractor in 2019. She spent 6 years in architectural design both with Landforms and Walker Home Design and now works side by side with her father Steve Dailey building custom homes across Northern Utah.


Ready? Let’s go…

 

SHOWNOTES:

 

•   So after transitioning through multiple architecture firms, I ended up getting a job for a local home builder here and felt like they do kind of track homes, but they’re on the higher end, so they’re million dollars and they don’t do thousands of homes a year. They do a few hundred, but they’re all really, really custom and really beautiful, so I started working with them and then realized, well, there’s other departments in this particular home builder that I wanted to try out. So I got a real estate license, started selling real estate for their model homes, I ran all of their marketing, and then I got to dabble a little bit on-site and just going out on site, checking on jobs, and kind of realize, Wow, that’s a lot more exciting for me than it is sitting in the office. (2:27)

•  Yeah, the house that She Built was a really cool project here in Saratoga Springs, so we started a Utah professional women in building Group, which is a chapter of a national group, a few years about here in Salt Lake City. And we’ve been lucky enough to have women from all over the state that have joined and that it is now a to state professional women in building Council. Cool, it’s really cool. And we have more than 60 women that have joined and are paying members and are doing really incredible things for our entire community. But the house that She Built, we needed a project that we could do that it was going to be fun and exciting and attention casting. And throughout discussion back and forth, this project of building an all-female built home came up, everyone thought, Wow, this seems really cool, really exciting. (7:45)

•  Yeah, and I think for me, I have a little different kind of crew, like all of my trade partners, they’ve known me since I was a kid, my dad, a very loyal contractor, he doesn’t price shop, he picks the people that are good to him and he’s good to them, and that’s why they have these long-term relationships. So a lot of these people have known me forever and they really… They know that I know what I’m talking about, and they don’t question me or give me a hard time on site, but the occasional time we do have new guys or new man that own companies that are coming out and joining our trade team. I do have to prove myself, and at some point I would like it would be great to not have that have to happen again, but I think for the next little while, we just have to continue to get the word out that women should be in this industry, it’s a great place for you to be.   (13:36)

•  I absolutely think construction is not for the soft heart, you have to have thick skin, even in a situation where I’m in, where most of the people I work with have known me since I was a kid, we still get into it all the time, I mean, we’re in a crunch where the last minute I’m yelling at the plumber about something, he’s yelling back to me about something, you have to have the skin… And you have to also be able to say, I’m wrong. And you have to also be able to… This is probably the difference between men and women, and I see this a lot on job sites as men are, my dad and the plumber or the electrician can get into it and then be best friends tomorrow.  (30:36)


ABOUT STEPHANIE DAILEY:

Stephanie is the current 2021 President of the Utah Professional Women in Building committee, and the 2022 Utah Valley HBA’s 2nd Vice President. She is in line to serve as the first ever female president of the Utah Valley HBA. Stephanie began her career in construction at a very young age. At 16 she got her first job at an architectural design firm. After high school she continued her education in computer aided drafting. She became a licensed real estate agent in 2015 and a licensed contractor in 2019. She spent 6 years in architectural design both with Landforms and Walker Home Design. 

In 2012, she began work with Symphony Homes out of Davis County. She started in their architectural design department. After a few years she transitioned into real estate sales and marketing while continuing to help the drafting department. In 2017 she began working side by side with her father Steve Dailey. In 2019 she became a licensed general contractor and today they work together building custom homes across Northern Utah.

Stephanie likes to spend her free time outdoors. You can usually find her out on the trails on a mountain bike or in her side by side. Most weekends she is camping or traveling and enjoying as much time exploring as possible.

 

CONNECT WITH STEPHANIE:

•  Website:https://stevendailey.com
•  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stephaniebuildsit
•  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@stephaniebuildsit


WAYS TO CONNECT WITH STEFANIE…

• Website: https://shebuildshomes.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shebuildsbetter
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shebuilds.homes
• YouTube:  https://www.youtube.com/shebuildsshow