WATERTOWN, SD (KELO) — A long-time motel in Watertown was completely re-developed last year into short-term workforce housing. This unique housing option is in demand and has had an impact in the community.

“Any type of large project that goes on in the area where they need to bring in a whole bunch of guys, that’s the type of corporation that will rent from us,” Mailbox Money owner and developer Dusten Hendrickson said.

Finding housing for a large workforce on a temporary project can be challenging and costly.

“It’s much cheaper than a standard hotel at you know, $50 to $100 a night,” Hendrickson said. “Our budgets are a lot lower than that.”

Hendrickson helped to open ‘The Cottage’ in Watertown last year, offering corporations monthly rentals of this recently renovated motel.

“We pretty much had to gut the entire thing. So what we kept was the shell, the masonry. We painted that all white just to make it, just to get it all cleaned up nice…almost like a new construction, just using the original structure,” Hendrickson said.

The new workforce housing concept was an instant success.

“They filled up almost immediately. One company came in and was having troubles finding like 20 beds for their guys or 20 rooms,” Hendrickson said. “So as soon as it was finished, they took half the rooms.”

The remodel and the new clientele is making a huge impact on the neighborhood.

“It had been known as a crime-ridden area where people do drugs and cause mischief, and that immediately we remove that just by coming in,” Hendrickson said.

“It was well needed for sure. It seemed to have helped the business with different non-local people coming, you know, for work,” The Juice Bar owner Brooke Green said.

Green owns The Juice Bar right across from the former Budget One Motel; she says the remodel and change to workforce housing has been a big improvement.

“A lot has to do with the curb appeal to you know it just makes a huge difference all around so yeah definitely much more clean,” Green said.

“We haven’t heard one negative complaint on that building, and that usually happens when we take a building that’s rundown and we improve it and reduce the crime in that area,” Hendrickson said.

Rental rates at the Cottage range from $800 to $1,200 a month. While it is open to individuals to rent, Hendrickson says nearly all of their rooms are filled by businesses in need of temporary housing for their workers.