Lawrence Spain opened Spain Sober Living in August 2018, the year after he lost his cousin to addiction. Eight years later he runs two men's houses in Austin, works in business development at Arise Recovery Centers, and sits on the board of the Austin chapter of the Texas Association of Addiction Professionals. If you operate a recovery residence anywhere near Austin, you already know the name.
We asked him what actually works:Prefer to read? The full conversation is below as a Q&A, lightly edited for length and clarity. Every answer links to that moment in the video if you want to hear it in his words.
You didn't come to recovery housing through your own recovery, but there's a lot of personal motivation behind what you do. Walk me through the decision to turn it into a career. 1:35
I had a cousin who had been suffering from addiction for quite some time. I was the baby of the cousins. It got really bad as time went on, and we lost him in May of 2017 to meth. I remember the impact it had on my family, and on me. His sisters, his brother, especially his mom, the whole family. At that time I had a house in Austin, and I decided to make it my mission to turn that into a sober living and help men out. I talked with my family and they supported me through that journey.
Tell me about that first year. 2:51
That first year I was nervous. By the time July of 2018 hit, sitting in that house preparing to open in August, I knew I was all in. There was no pulling out. The doors opened on the 18th of August and I got my first client at the beginning of September. Then it became real. That year was an experience, a lot of learning and a lot of education for me. I was in it to win it and I wanted to know everybody's journey. It proved something I've always believed, which is that everybody has a story to tell. But actually meeting people carrying trauma, addiction, abandonment, from childhood into adulthood, you see how big a role that plays.
You take residents from 18 and up. How do you handle that age range? 3:43
Eighteen and nineteen year olds will burn it down. As you learn sober living you learn you have to have a mix of ages in the house, so the 18 and 19 year olds can learn from somebody who's 30 or 35. A big brother. Going to college in today's world brings on a lot of mental health pressure too. Parents may be doctors or lawyers and they expect their son or daughter to be the same, and that brings pressure. So you never put that judgment on people. You stay open, vulnerable, and understanding.
Who taught you the business? 5:06
I spent that first year learning everything I could from a few owners who are pioneers in this town. Harmony Haus was one of them. They took me under their wing. I had my own home to run, but I was invested all the way, determined to learn everything about sober living. Then around 2020, after a lot of people told me I needed to go look at other houses because other houses were not like mine, I started visiting. Clean. Updated furniture, not raggedy or broken down. The way a house smells. All the things people should be looking for when they walk in.
Somebody opens their first house tomorrow. What should they be doing first? 6:23
Learn the space. Start networking in the community first and learn the landscape before you open a house. What people fail to understand is that they think they'll get the house, furnish the house, and the clients will be at the door.
Which events should they be at in Austin? 7:06
Austin TAAP. That's the one I started going to myself and it's the first one I refer people to. You'll get anywhere between 85 and 100 people. One thing I noticed before I joined the board is that they move the event all around Austin, and sometimes it was out in Georgetown and I'd think, I'm not driving to Georgetown. But every event brings a different crowd. You'll see a lot of the same faces, but you always run into at least 10 or 15 new people depending on whether it's south, north, east, or central. Now I go to every one.
Why does educating a resident's family matter so much? 8:26
Educating families is huge, because there are a lot of options to choose from. Sometimes it's somebody's first time in treatment. Sometimes they've been in sober living a few times and had bad experiences at other houses. A lot of houses do good, ethical work. And then there are houses that let somebody stay after they've already relapsed because that person is paying.
How do you get a parent to trust that your program is high quality? 9:38
Transparency is huge for me, and I come at it from the family side. At Spain House I contact sponsors once a month to make sure the sponsor actually exists. We don't get into logistics with the sponsor, we just want to know they're checking in. Anybody can tell me they have a sponsor and they talked to them last night. And I have my manager reach out to families once a month to give them an update on how their son is doing. It wasn't like that when Spain first opened. Sober living is a continual learning curve. Every month you come across something, and there's always a way to raise the bar.
What are families asking you, and what should they be asking? 22:46
What they ask is what's going to be different about this house, and that is what they should be asking. But by then they're tired. They've been doing this for so long, and they just keep helping and helping. There comes a point where they shouldn't be helping anymore. Cover the first month, sure. Not three or four months. The resident has to have a little skin in the game. Some families understand that. Some say, that's my son, that's my daughter. Same thing with a car. If his car is at home, it can stay there for the next 30 days. Why? Because we don't know how things are going to look when you get here. Sometimes you have to earn back the things your addiction took away. Now if the car was with him at treatment, obviously it's coming to the house.
Is recovery coaching the owner's job, or should it be outsourced? 11:19
Outsource it. Recovery coaching is a unique service. You're taking those guys a couple of times a week, sometimes by phone, and you have to have that individual time to build a connection. They can be honest with the coach because the coach isn't the person controlling where they live. The coach can help when they're struggling with the house. A coach can also teach them things they were never into before. Some people don't know they like working out until a coach shows them. That's a new skill. Learning how to be sober and still do fun things. I don't require coaching at Spain House, but I offer it as an option, same as IOP.
Why do you push aftercare so hard in the first month? 13:07
When they come out of a 30 or 45 day treatment center, the freedom is back and it's overwhelming for anybody. A recovery coach, an IOP, some kind of aftercare bridges that gap. The first 30 days are brutal. They're vulnerable. They've been used to being told what to do and where to be. Now they're discharged and they've got to go get a job and be out at a certain time. That's the program, not laying around the house all day.
What do operators get wrong about insurance? 14:08
I brought Amber out to Austin a few years ago to speak at the owners meeting I host here, specifically to go over insurance. We may be educated in how to run a sober living and not educated at all when it comes to insurance. Narcan, overdose, suicide, you have to be protected 100 percent. Some people cut coverage because of cost and some people just aren't aware of it. When you're on the phone with a general insurance person, they may not explain it to you thoroughly. Amber goes over it and over it until you understand it.
Two specifics she gave me that operators should know: single rooms carry higher overdose risk than doubles, and your policy needs to be explicit about who you accept and who you don't.
What does your lead funnel look like? How much is digital? 16:18
Ask anybody in Austin or the neighboring cities and they'll tell you I'm always out. There's probably nowhere I'm not at. So about 80 percent comes from being out, boots on the ground. People who know me but aren't in a position to refer me still know somebody who needs sober living, and they put my name out there. The other 20 percent is social media, and that's something I need to improve on. I do a lot of events with the guys, so that's a lot of what I post.
There's a lot of new sober living content on social media right now. What's going on? 17:28
I have this conversation with owners weekly. Realtors, people making sober living courses, this whole idea going around that sober living is a cash cow. That's far from the truth. They look at the revenue. What they don't factor in is the relapses, the house repairs, the events we put on for the guys. That money comes from somewhere. It's been more common the last two years or so. You've got realtors with houses that have been sitting, they hear about sober living, and now they want to open one because they think it's guaranteed. And people making videos about how to run one. What worked for you may not work for the next person. There is no blueprint.
You tell new owners not to open a second house too fast. Why? 19:18
For me it takes six months to a year to really know what you're doing. Owners come to me four or five months after opening saying, man, we're full, we're about to open another one. I wouldn't do that. Because there's such a thing as slow season. That's when people aren't seeking treatment. It's hot, people aren't trying to do that. When it gets cold, everybody wants to go to treatment. Although there's no timetable on it either. You just have to be done. Done with what you're doing, done with that life. Everybody can say all the right things. It's whether the actions match the words.
When you interview an applicant, are you trying to judge whether they're actually ready? 20:25
I interview clients myself, then my manager does a follow-up call. On my call, if it's all "yeah, sure, okay, no problem," there's no fire, no excitement. I want to hear, I'm ready for this, I own my faults, this is where I know I messed up. If it's their first time in sober living and they're not enthused, tell me that. I ask how close their relationship with their family is. Addiction destroys families, so are you willing to repair that? What are you going to do to repair it? What are you willing to commit to? What are you willing to surrender? Then I call the family myself and say, your son is looking at this house, and here's what he just told me. Sometimes you find out a completely different story. You find out how long they've really been dealing with this. You find out the family is done, that they'll cover one month and that's it. It's important to bridge that gap, because even when families are done, that doesn't mean they stopped caring.
Where do you land on certification and standards in Texas? 24:23
I've known TROHN for a while. They had a conference in Houston back around 2021 or 2022 when that went into effect, and I invited one of their representatives to my owners meeting here in Austin. It's mixed feelings. I think more owners in Austin would support it if there were more oversight on what it actually delivers, not just paying the amount they want for the certification. What's the return on that investment? If it's pay X and we'll see you in two years, where are the expectations in between while you're still doing business? So I'm torn. Should there be more oversight on sober living? There should be. But as owners we also want to run our own program in our own house without being told how to do it. It's going to be a checks and balances thing. Meanwhile Airbnbs have to be licensed, and sober livings keep operating unlicensed.
How many of Austin's houses do you think are certified? 26:30
Of the houses running with a house manager, maybe five to seven. Probably under 10.
Editor's note: Those are Lawrence's estimates from years of working this market, not verified counts. Nobody has verified counts, and that is arguably the point. Texas has no registry of recovery residences, so there is no authoritative number for how many homes operate in Austin or how many carry certification. Any figure you see, including any figure we publish, is an estimate. That gap is exactly what makes the oversight conversation hard to have.
Last thing. What do you tell a family that's shopping for a house? 28:11
Check on the sober livings. Talk to the owner. Do your own investigation. Google shows you one thing. Talking to the person, and hopefully seeing the house, learning the program, learning what they actually offer, that's different. And ask about check-ins, because a lot of families are out of state and can't come to the house. You have to give them some kind of support so they know their child is here and he's safe. When a family calls me, I ask what they're looking for and I give them two or three options. I started the sober living owners meeting here, and when treatment centers come into Austin from out of town, it's never a second thought for me to say come on in, I'll set you up with four or five houses to go look at. I tell other owners, I'm not here to be your competition. I'm here to help. My story is a little different from theirs. I lost a cousin to this, so I know how it affects a family.
Find Lawrence: spainsoberliving.com · LinkedIn · Austin TAAP
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This interview has been edited for length and clarity.