On a Friday evening a little over two years ago, Edmund Griffin and Lizet Alvarez stuffed their car with camping gear, rounded up their two pups, Sandy and Cisco, and set out. It was Alvarez’s birthday weekend, and they planned to spend it in the high desert of Joshua Tree National Park, about two hours east of their home in Venice, California.

Although this was only Alvarez’s second visit, Griffin had long been smitten with the area, returning again and again over the years. “We had a spectacular campsite next to these ginormous boulders,” recalls Alvarez, who says she immediately fell in love with the place. The couple passed their time hiking, relaxing, and marveling at the vistas. Before they headed home on Sunday afternoon, there was one small bit of business: meeting with a local real estate agent to learn about the area housing market. Griffin, a custom furniture designer and fabricator who runs his own design company, Griffin Design, had been toying with the idea of investing in a property.

“It was supposed to be a quick little thing,” says Alvarez, 34, the Los Angeles director for Teen Vogue, with a laugh. The first house on the list had just been put on the market and was described by the agent as a “must see.” As they made their way up the winding dirt road toward the house, they were immediately impressed with the panoramic views: all sky and jagged mountaintops. But decades-old linoleum-tile floors, purple walls, and junk everywhere didn’t exactly endear Alvarez to the house. “It was really run-down, and it looked like a lot of work,” she says. Griffin was curiously quiet as the couple toured the 1,100-square-foot, two-bedroom home. They saw two more properties before going back to the first house. Even though it was in less-than-stellar shape, its perfectly perched 2.5-acre lot seemed too good to be true.

Over a bite to eat, the couple talked through renovation costs and ideas. “I really wanted a place that I could transform into something beautiful and renovate using all the skills I’ve acquired,” says Griffin, 38. “And I wanted to create an escape for us, but also something that could be a rental property.” The fact that a good friend had success doing something similar in Joshua Tree the year before gave the couple comfort. So Griffin marched back to the real estate office and made an offer.

“It was unbelievable,” says Alvarez. “This is a guy who spends months researching purchases involving far less money. I had no idea that we’d be bidding on a house that day.” One month later, it was theirs.

In June 2008, they loaded Griffin’s pickup with tools and set out for their first of many renovation weekends. Griffin hadn’t been able to take his mind off the house since day one and had been busily devising plans and schedules for everything he wanted to accomplish.

The 1950s home was originally a 500-square-foot homesteader’s cabin that had undergone several additions over the years. Luckily, the structure was sound. Outside was another matter: A profusion of cement patios and walkways needed to go. One of Griffin’s primary goals was to simplify the home’s footprint, so the duo donned work gloves, hoisted sledgehammers, and pounded away. One wheel-barrow at a time, they rid themselves of 5 tons of concrete, which went to a nearby recycling center.

Inside, they had high hopes of removing layers of linoleum and exposing the original concrete floor, but the decades-old adhesives and glues proved uncooperative. They went with Plan B and sanded the floor as smooth as possible before staining it. After testing patches of six different shades of gray with less than satisfactory results, they concocted a winning tone by mixing off-the-shelf pigments until they had a color roughly that of gray felt.

While most of the old linoleum tiles were destined for the trash bin, they saved several after noticing the combed pattern of adhesive on the underside. Nine tiles now hang in a 3×3 grid in the main bedroom, creating a tribute to the formerly scorned housing material. This spirit of reuse and repurposing was a high priority when it came to the work at hand: reclaimed Douglas fir boards were applied tongue-and-groove style to the living room ceiling, and old kitchen cabinets were cleaned, sanded, and refreshed with Griffin’s custom-made drawer and cabinet fronts.

With a budget of about $10,000, the couple did the vast majority of demolition and renovation themselves. But part of the budget went to hiring skilled locals for three important jobs: applying a skim coat of plaster to the interior walls, the exterior stucco job, and the building of a 1-foot-high cinder-block and stucco garden perimeter, in which they planted cacti.

Griffin and Alvarez were anxious to say good-bye to interior walls splashed with canary yellow, sunset orange, and the aforementioned purple. The cool white of the newly smooth plaster walls was so agreeable, they used a matching off-white paint to create a soft and serene vibe throughout the home.

When it came to filling the home, “We wanted furnishings that appealed to our sensibility and design aesthetic, but I also wanted to create things that were sturdy and durable,” Griffin says. His furniture has a minimalist, rustic feel that showcases simple joinery techniques and hand-rubbed finishes. In the end, he constructed well over a dozen pieces—large and small—mostly working after normal business hours back in his Los Angeles studio.

Initially, the couple forecast a three-month renovation. Nine months later, however, they were ready for it to be done. They later realized that doing the job weekend-warrior style, in two-day increments, was probably not the best idea.

“In hindsight, we should have taken some time off from work and spent a week at a time up there; we would get into a groove and then have to stop,” Alvarez explains.

In February 2009, they booked their first renters. It was around this time that the story took a romantic turn: In March, with the renovation work behind them, the couple spent a relaxing weekend at the house. During a late afternoon hike in the nearby national park, amid the boulders and the Joshua trees, Griffin proposed. “I had no idea he was going to do that,” Alvarez says. Happily, she said yes, and they were hitched that August.

Today the couple is relieved to report that the rental business is great. “We are really proud of how the house turned out, and people who have stayed there have been so appreciative of the space,” Griffin says. “Because we did it ourselves, we are very attached and are always thinking about who might stay there.” The home seems to attract creative types: writers, filmmakers, musicians, and artists—many of whom the couple have kept in touch with. “It’s turned out to be more than just a business transaction, which has been a pleasant bonus,” Alvarez says. Pleasant is right, especially when you consider that they’ve rebuilt a vacation house that nearly funds itself.

How to...Run Your Own Rental Property

“We were thinking of renters from the very beginning,” says Edmund Griffin, a furniture de-signer who runs his own firm in Los Angeles. The couple opted for a clean, minimalist feel that’s devoid of knickknacks but full of furnishings that are aesthetically appealing and also durable. “We didn’t want guests to feel like they were staying in someone else’s home,” says Griffin. Here, some tips from Griffin and his wife, Lizet Alvarez.

1. Streamline Colors
If something breaks or needs replacing, you want to be able to do it easily. “White works well for dishes and bowls,” Alvarez says.  “It doesn’t matter if the replacement is part of a set, if it’s the same color, it goes together just fine.” The same applies to linens.

2. Get the Word Out
Setting up a vacation home as a rental depends a lot on your own expectations. Anyone can post their digs on Craigslist.org or Airbnb.com, but making a distinctive website can help send a message that yours is a legitimate business. Griffin knew he wanted to call his rental pad Highdesert Homestead early on, and he enlisted a friend to design the site to feel a lot like the house—clean, serene, and inviting. Carefully staged, well-lit photos give renters a sense of the home.

3. Ask for feedback!
Allow renters to tell you what they liked and didn’t like. “We upgraded the knives and added more dish towels after a chef stayed for a weekend,” Griffin says.

To check out how to make your own bath caddy (like the one found at Highdesert Homestead), click here.