Success in Central Oregon real estate is typically associated with land deals, building projects and high-dollar transactions, but Nase Co. LLC follows a different strategy.

The family-owned company buys property at bargain prices, attracts income-generating tenants and holds on for the long-haul. A second generation of management is doubling down on the buy-and-hold strategy, even as real estate prices in Bend climb toward a new peak.

Nase Co. late last year bought the former Diocese of Baker office building on Armour Road for $1 million and soon filled one of the buildings with artist studios, while another tenant, DIY Cave, expanded its business.

In 2015, Nase Co. acquired the former High Desert manufactured home park, which is off Boyd Acres Road in Northeast Bend, for just under $1.2 million. Nase Co. paid about half of what a previous owner paid in 2006, just before the real estate bust canceled a plan to build 66 single-family homes on the property. Nase Co. instead created a new recreational vehicle park for monthly rental, Scandia Village RV.

“It’s always cyclical,” said Steve Nase, one of three siblings now running the company started by their father, George Nase. “That’s why we look at it as long-term.”

Steve Nase, 56, moved to Bend in the late 1980s, when his father and uncles built Scandia Square, a strip mall near the intersection of U.S. Highway 97 and Reed Market Road. At the time, the property was outside city limits, but George Nase had heard Fred Meyer was planning to build a store on south Third Street, and that would generate traffic in the Reed Market area.

Over the decades the company increased its holdings, which include Scandia RV Park, along Third Street, to about 20 acres. “We’re always looking for more,” Nase said.

The Nase Co.’s total holdings in Deschutes County have a current market value of $20.7 million, according to Deschutes County’s property information database.

Dressed in a fleece pullover and white T-shirt with a frayed collar, Steve Nase likes to keep a low profile. “Most people think I’m the head maintenance guy,” he said. He declined to be photographed by The Bulletin.

Nase handles most of the leasing and does hands-on work with the company’s commercial buildings, while younger sister Belinda Bowden does the books. A younger brother, Brad Nase, manages the family’s properties in the Willamette Valley.

With an expanded urban-growth boundary and new zoning regulations, Bend landowners have the opportunity to build at higher densities with more dwellings per acre and a mix of uses. The Scandia Village RV site, for example, is zoned for medium-density residential use, so it could hold as many as 200 apartments, Bend city planner Aaron Henson said.

Instead of flipping the property or building new homes or apartments, Nase decided to create Scandia Village RV. All the wiring, plumbing and sewer lines from the days of High Desert manufactured homes were still in the ground and working, he said.

“I think he may be brilliant in some ways,” Henson said. “It put it into an income-producing state with minimal work.”

Indeed, Nase said Scandia Village was half-full before he’d even finished the landscaping and other preparations that were required. It was completely full by last spring. Now, even as a shower and laundry house remain unfinished, there’s a waiting list for the 66 lots, which rent for $500 a month.

The RV park has been a good fit for Mandi Schwendt, who lives in a fifth-wheel camper with her partner and three dogs. The couple moved to Bend from Reno, Nevada, to work in construction trades.

“We have to travel a lot for work,” she said. “Renting with dogs is impossible, so we went with the fifth-wheel idea.”

Schwendt said she’s grateful that the park allows pets, and there’s a grassy area for the dogs to stretch. Many of their neighbors, a mix of families, empty nesters and fellow tradespeople, also have dogs, she said.

Steve Nase is aware that mobile-home and RV parks have a reputation for attracting crime or becoming eyesores, and he said he’s tried to prevent that. Each lot at Scandia Village has a storage shed, so residents don’t have to keep things outside, he said, and the RVs have to be model 2005 or newer.

Nase Co. also owns Bend Trailer Park off Third Street. Nase said that when he took over managing the parks in the 1990s, “There was a lot of drug activity and booze.”

He encouraged the site managers to evict problem tenants. Nase instituted criminal background checks and raised the deposit requirements, and he said police calls subsided.

“They’re not high-income people, but they’re all working people,” he said.

Long-term residents eventually figure out that he’s the owner, Nase said, and a few of them have thanked him for the opportunity to overcome bad credit or instability. “Nowadays it’s hard to do that because you don’t want to take the chance,” he said.

Nase Co. properties have also provided entrepreneurs with a place to start their businesses. Nase said he prefers to keep the rent in commercial buildings below the average market rate because it means less turnover. And he keeps in touch with the business tenants. “It’s to our advantage that someone succeeds,” he said.

When the Great Recession hit, Nase Co. commercial properties Scandia Square and Scandia Plaza were 40 percent vacant, Nase said. The company was lowering rents temporarily to help tenants stay in business, he said. “It was scary,” he said.

Fortunately, the company didn’t have as much debt as other real estate firms, Nase said, and Scandia RV Park fared well.

—Reporter: 541-617-7860, kmclaughlin@bendbulletin.com