Rehab Warriors | Dallas News Live

Well, they are called Rehab Warriors, the non-profit training those who've served for a career after the military. Founded by HGTV's Flip or Flop Fort Worth co-host Andy Williams, a U.S. Marine veteran himself with success in real estate, now teaching vets the real estate market. And Andy Williams, we're glad to have you with us today. Big news for you today, this morning, but before we talk about that. Tell us how this idea of Rehab Warriors came about. I mean, you have vets from all over the country coming here, right? Yeah, it's a very simple concept. America has 250,000 veterans transition each year. We had a housing crisis back in 2017. I had this crazy idea. Why don't we upskill them and train them in construction project management? So I took the time to build rehab warriors, navigated the regulatory environment, got the VA approvals, worked with Department of Labor. And Hurst is a place where it's not new to me. I've done a bunch of developments in Hurst. But what we did today is we broke ground. To repurpose a fire station to be able to hit our next stage of growth, which is to build capacity so veterans can train. Yes, this is a fire station. Fire station number two is what it was called in the city of Hearst. They've now decommissioned that and made this donation to your organization so you can have a new national headquarters. Tell us what will happen at the headquarters. What will happen at the headquarters is a continuation of what we're doing now. Currently, we're in Fort Worth where we're training. Good evening. Rehab Warriors has an eight-week program approved by Texas Workforce Commission that trains them in credentials with PMICP. We do OSHA 30, and we also put them in a builder-developer Mindset while learning that credential what we're really trying to do is operate at the intersection of construction project management and housing incremental development and they'll learn at the headquarters that programming but off site what we've done and what we will continue to do is revitalize. In and around those communities, like in Fort Worth, where we have delivered over 75 homes in the 76104 area code and done some adaptive reuse to some buildings there prior to. So we're not new. We're matured and we built the infrastructure. We like to say Rehab Warriors is now an institute that allows for veterans to get the proper training with the proper credentials. And the goal is for them to build pathways and experience something I'm very passionate about, which is community revitalization. Because as we are on the... Approaching Veterans Day, we have to think about what do we do with the veterans that have served a 20-year war. And what I want to do is give them opportunity to continue to build new careers and fill some of those unfilled jobs. Yes, we can be skilled tradesmen, but we are also better set as your project managers in adapting to these communities to revitalize these communities where we can also find pathways to live, work, and play. And Hearst is a community that has invited us in. And so as a Marine veteran yourself, sir, the unique skills of serving in the military, how can that transfer over to what you're teaching them in terms of construction management and the real estate side of life? It's very simple. Every veteran is a project manager, whether it's a working party or it's a mission. But what we're doing is we're giving them, and what we've learned over the program is we're giving them time to figure out how those skills translate. America has so many unfilled jobs, a slew of unfilled project management jobs in Texas, but the credentials alone don't open the door. It's them understanding that they can do that job, that role. And when we Align them with the purpose of rebuilding the community, that concept of learning and integrating community revitalization is what gets them to, it's a light bulb goes off. And what they're really doing is they're learning the same way the Marine Corps trains you. You don't pick up a rifle, you learn everything about the rifle, and then you learn how to shoot from a Marine that has been. down tried and true. And that is the same concept. So we build community. We invite industry in to support us. It's not us saying, hey, this is what we want to train. We have a very intrinsic relationship with the industry. PMI Global Global Head was here at the reveal because we have a strong partnership with them because this is adaptable and palatable across the nation. Yes. And we are training veterans in 14 different states. And we have I've trained 250, and as the founder, I've restricted the growth because I wanted to make sure that the veteran understands that we understand how they need to learn. And so this is really the announcement of building a facility that allows them to come and find comfort in the learning environment, because we're now adult learners trying to learn a new skill, but really applying what we've already learned in a different way to a community that probably needs it, and we don't know where to solution. All right. Andy Williams, Rehab Warriors, thank you for the work you're doing at your new home in Hurst. Thank you.