Meet Jeremy Allen, who is currently serving as President of our Park Township Neighbors Board. Jeremy, his wife Rachael, and their (now four!) daughters moved from Seattle to Holland four years ago. Rachael grew-up in Park Township where her parents still live among the blueberry fields on Quincy.
Why did you choose Park Township for your vacation rental?
Shortly after we were married and started our family in Seattle, Rachael and I decided to purchase a second home near Holland State Park. Our dream was to have a place in West Michigan where we could bring our daughters to make family memories together with grandpa, grandma, aunts, and uncles. Being young in career and not at a place financially to buy a second home and let it sit when we weren’t using it, we specifically looked for and chose a home in the historic Ottawa Beach area, since it had a long history of being a family-friendly vacation rental cottage community.
What do you like about the Holland area?
Having stayed in our vacation rental dozens of times over four years, we fell in love with the tight-knit community, the beauty of the outdoors, and the sincere and effective public/private partnership that makes West Michigan such a special community. We were also excited about being closer to manage our vacation rental with our young girls. As an entrepreneur, the tangible experience and hard work involved in building sweat equity and serving others with kind, attentive hospitality is a valuable lesson we want to pass on to our kids.
Tell us a bit more about yourself!
Since moving to West Michigan, a lot of life has happened. Two years ago, I was fortunate to have an opportunity to sell a cloud accounting/bookkeeping business (systemsix.com) I started in 2008. With the freedom to consider what the next season of life could look like, I began getting more involved in the local community. Some of my favorite organizations are the Outdoor Discovery Center, Habitat for Humanity, Boys and Girls Club, and Velo Kids. I joke that when I wanted to get more involved in the community, helping to start and lead an advocacy organization to help find a win/win way for vacation rentals to continue to exist in an area with a hundred year history of welcoming visitors was not exactly what I had in mind!
In my free time, I love to efoil around the lake, road bike with friends, and play on the boat/beach with my family as often as possible.
What is your hope for Park Township Neighbors?
I believe Park Township and our larger West Michigan community is a wonderful place to live. I hope that a common sense, a reasonable set of regulations along with being good neighbors will help keep vacation rentals available for other families to come make their own memories and who knows, possibly even attract some of them to move to our community and raise their families here!