‘Extreme Buyers Club’ Lands a Boeing 727 and Creates the Ultimate Rental

Noel Collier’s real estate superpower involves diving headfirst into her clients’ unique lifestyles to understand why they love what they love and do what they do. She then puts that insight to work in finding the property of their dreams — and Extreme Buyers Club matches her step for step on each one-of-a-kind search.

She flew to El Paso, Texas, to join married educators Ismael and Ruth Lara on a technically terrestrial adventure that was actually all about taking to the sky. Ismael caught wind of the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to buy an abandoned Boeing 727, so he plunked down $10,000 to do just that. He and Ruth needed Noel’s help finding a parcel of land to park their unique acquisition; she then coached them through converting it into a field-trip destination for local schoolchildren that would fund itself via stints as a short-term vacation rental. This project had a lot of moving (and no-longer-moving) parts, but Noel knew just what Ismael and Ruth had in mind — and in their hearts. Ready for a closer look at their flight of imagination?

“I see the value in everything,” Ismael explained to Noel. “Like this airplane. It was going to go to a scrapyard! It was one of those things that’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.” This retired Boeing 727 had been abandoned for about 21 years before appearing on Ismael’s radar. Both he and Ruth work with children, and they each recognized the plane as a unique way to promote STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education by bringing kids and parents out to interact with a massive, historic plane.

“A lot of kids in our community, they don’t even have that opportunity in their lifetime,” he explained. “So, it would be wonderful. Even if it’s not going to fly, I’d like for them at least to be able to see the engineering behind flight.”

That brought Noel to tears. “I actually did not get on my very first airplane until I was 22 years old,” she said. "So, I understand what you mean. Like, we did not have that access. So, I think that’s incredible.”

Ismael and Ruth’s plane is 130 feet long and has about 1,000 square feet of interior space; it also cost about $15,000 just to drain its fuel and break it into pieces that could be transported from the airport to a parcel of land that would be its permanent home. Their all-in budget for the transportation, land and conversion was about $500,000, and Noel provided pro assistance at every stage of the spend. She identified a one-acre property with a well and septic and electrical systems already in place; even better, it was accessible by a well-traveled road (and would attract curious onlookers galore as they drove by).

Noel then encouraged the couple to lean into the 727’s golden-era-of-air-travel charm by outfitting its interior with furnishings that evoked 1960s Hollywood glamour. “One of the best strategies that you can employ with a short-term rental is a theme,” she explained. “With this being a plane with a ’60s aviation theme, the same thing is going to happen; [Ismael] will keep this thing booked 365.” After four months of putting all of their big ideas in motion, the Laras couldn’t wait to show Noel how they landed the plane on this passion project.

While the 727 retains its classic old-school exterior looks (with the exception of its wings, which the Laras subbed out for a much more stable exterior deck that recalled their shape without presenting safety concerns), its now-drywalled interior is another world entirely. “Oh my gosh, the last time we were in here this was all exposed!” Noel gasped.

“There’s still a few items on the punch list: little things, little trims here and there, a little bit of paint, but in general, I mean, I think it looks fantastic,” Ismael said with pride. “Night and day compared to what it was!”

“I remember the first time that I walked through the plane and it was a mess,” Noel agreed.

Noel encouraged the Laras to outfit the plane’s interior with finishes and fittings that recalled its heyday. Launched in 1960, the Boeing 727 was a game-changing commercial aircraft that could carry 106 passengers 2,590 miles in a single trip. Rich jewel tones, wood paneling and ornate hardware recall the stylish and stylized vacation destinations jet setters might have booked tickets to visit all those years ago.

“This is so cute! I love the common area; I can see people hanging out here,” Noel said. As they planned out the plane's new interior, she had advised Ruth and Ismael to create a private, primary bedroom in the space at the end of the plane that was once the first-class compartment, then anchor shared spaces with entertaining and serving areas along with versatile pieces like the daybed, which can double as a sleeping space for little ones.

Natural light pours into the plane’s shared spaces, thanks to dozens of passenger windows on each side. Ismael has big plans for those in the future: “On my [bucket list] would be getting some custom-made screens,” he said. “Maybe just put them in this room and then giving the kids a virtual field trip — take them to, you know any type of country that they want to [see]. I think that’d be fantastic.”

The beauty of a retro theme, of course, is that it can expand and grow more layered with every new trip to estate sales and flea markets. The Laras created cost-and-theme-conscious occasional tables throughout the plane by stacking pieces of vintage luggage, then tied their furniture’s rich hues together with intricate area rugs. What are the odds that the old-school globe in the corner opens to reveal a cocktail set?

Noel was delighted with the suite the Laras created, and she knew their prospective guests would fall just as hard for it. “I feel like it keeps getting better! This is like a perfect space and primary bedroom for a short-term rental — I love it,” she said. “To see what Ismael and Ruth have done, what they’ve put together, I am blown away. This is 1960 through and through, the radio, the lampshade: old Hollywood, old aviation!”

Though Ruth and Ismael will have no trouble keeping this place full of vacationers, “I would really like to have those field trips for the kiddos and it would be fantastic for them to just kind of experience the plane,” Ismael told Noel. “For example, we do have this tiny little exit. We like it because it’s really like the emergency exit on a plane!”

Viewed from afar, the wing-like deck accessible from that emergency exit looks fairly slim. Once you’re through the door, however, the outdoor space just keeps going. That dovetails well both with recreation for guests and with Ismael’s plans for bringing aviators and El Paso students together. “We’re really excited to bring some professionals in, some of the [local] pilots and the ANPs [that is, Aeromedical Nurse Practitioners] so when we do have a field trip and the kids are here, they get to learn from them as well at a way higher level.”

You may have been wondering why just getting the plane to this location was so expensive in the first place. Have we mentioned that it weighs about 78,000 pounds? “Moving the plane we had to cut the wings in different sections, and then we had to cut the fuselage, and then we had to transport that in two different trips,” Ismael recalled. “Everybody seeing it go down the road, you know, they got their phones out — that in itself was amazing.”

The chairs around this fire pit will be first-class seats when the sun goes down. The Laras were intent on landing at (and Noel made sure to find them) a spot outside more densely-populated parts of El Paso, where light pollution wouldn’t interrupt guests’ views of the wide-open Texas sky and stars.

At the beginning of their property search, Ismael envisioned potential guests passing his plane on a route just like this one. “You’re driving down the road, and it’s a main road, and you’re just kind of like, ‘I spy with my little eye, it’s a 727!’ So you gotta turn.”