Matthew Reibenstein started out as a civil engineer, not a builder. He studied at Texas A&M and spent his early career in land development, sitting in trailers with general contractors more often than he sat behind a desk with the engineers and draftsmen he technically worked alongside. He noticed pretty quickly that the job sites felt more like his world than the office ever did.
“Those aren’t my people. I do better in the job sites. I do better in the trailers. I do better with the foremen. I do better there.”
That realization carried him into homebuilding full time. For the next fifteen years he ran Royal Design Build out of Montgomery, Texas, putting up custom homes that ranged anywhere from sixteen hundred square feet to sixteen thousand, each one shaped around the family who would actually live there.
Michael opens the episode with a story about a lobster, the way pressure inside a shell eventually forces the animal to shed it and grow into a bigger one, and that idea threads through the whole conversation. Matthew talks about hiring his first employees with no real plan for what they’d do, and how that grew into a team built around customer experience rather than volume. He walks through his design process, including a habit of asking new clients to describe an ordinary day before anyone talks about cabinets or countertops, because knowing who wakes up first or whether the kitchen faces the backyard tells him more about how to build the home than any style board could.
“Let’s face it, I can build a really, really cool house, and you can move in and go, ‘Hell, the kitchen’s way over there and my bedroom’s over here, and I hate it.’ The next person walks in and goes, ‘Well, when I wake up in the morning, she’s got the lights on. It’s blaring in my face, and I can’t stand it.’ It can be a gorgeous home, but it may not work for you. So what I’d rather do is make the home work for you, then we’ll make it pretty.”
He also talks about preferring the word home to the word unit, and he doesn’t hold back on why.
“You’ll hear developers say, ‘I’m delivering 5,000 units this year,’ or maybe production builders do it, 3,200 units is their goal. It is not a unit, it’s a home. It’s where somebody raises their family, it’s where somebody retires, it’s where somebody lives life, and I refuse to call it a unit, and I don’t know whoever came up with that, but they need to stop calling it that.”
The conversation turns to the years everything changed. Production builders started moving into Montgomery, a market Matthew had built in for over a decade with almost no competition, and a local school board planning committee handed him numbers projecting the district’s student population could double within ten years. That pressure eventually led to a merger with Story Built Homes, run by a builder named Chastity who he’d known for years and half jokingly accused of stealing his clients. Matthew is candid about what that transition cost him personally, moving from being the only decision maker to being one voice among several.
“We live in a world where a lot of times the word follower has a very negative connotation, and I don’t know why that is. There’s leaders and there’s followers. And I’ve always said, in order to have good leaders, you have to have good followers.”
He’s equally candid about 2021 and 2022, when lumber prices climbed more than four hundred percent and price quotes sometimes only held until the email closed.
“Yep, 2021 to 2022. 100%, I can tell you where it was. Every day of my life I hated it, and everybody goes, ‘Well, that’s when building was the best.’ You’re right. I could’ve walked outside and said, ‘I’m a builder,’ and you didn’t even check my credentials, and you signed a contract with me. The post-COVID world was a world that I hope we never go back to.”
Faith comes up as a steady presence throughout the conversation.
“I’m an early riser, so I start my morning with a quiet time with the Lord. I’m lucky enough to have two big groups that I’m a part of, one’s called Men of the Barn, some Bible studies with local guys that are here, but also most of us are business owners.”
He also shares a story from early in his career, when another builder told him to trade his cowboy hat and boots for something more polished if he wanted luxury clients. He followed that advice for two years before a homeowner told him she chose him specifically because she remembered the hat.
“From that day on it hit me, I just need to be myself. And so my point to this whole story is, whoever’s listening to this, be yourself. If you ride a wakeboard boat and you wanna show up in sandals and shorts because that’s who you are, find the buyer that will appreciate that. The one that won’t will never appreciate it. It’s okay, you’re gonna have to lose that one. But find the ones that will, that will appreciate you.”
Matthew also shares his work with the Texas Association of Builders, where he serves as a Life Director, and the Greater Houston Builders Association, where he’s the Immediate Past President.
There’s no doubt in my mind, more than anything, the camaraderie. This is not an easy business. When you think about warrantying a home for six to 10 years, that’s what everybody’s kind of on right now, you think about what you’re getting paid and what it’s worth six to ten years from now, because that’s how long you’re maintaining that liability side. So certainly there are better ways to go. However, nothing in my mind fulfills you quite like this at times.
He closes things out with a rapid fire round covering team roping, runs that help him reset, and a stretch of three Ironman triathlons most people never guess about him. Asked what he still hasn’t gotten around to, his answer lands soft.
“I probably haven’t just loved on those that have loved on me for so long enough. It’s so hard when you get pulled so many directions sometimes just to stop and smell the roses. My personality is go, go, go, and sometimes I just need to learn to stop and smell the roses.”
Matthew Reibenstein is the Chief Strategy Officer at Story Built Homes, bringing more than a decade of experience in custom homebuilding, land development, and industry leadership across Montgomery County and Greater Houston. He joined Story Built Homes following the merger with Royal Design Build Co., the award-winning firm he founded and led with a focus on craftsmanship, transparency, and client trust for 15 years.
A graduate of Texas A&M University, Matthew is the Immediate Past President of the Greater Houston Builders Association and has held several leadership roles spanning over a decade, including Executive Board Member and Division Chair for the Northern Counties Builders & Developers Division. His work has been recognized with the inaugural “Excellence Under 45 Award” from the Texas Association of Builders in 2014 and the GHBA Custom Builder of the Year award in 2017.
Most recently, Matthew received the 2024 Presidential Distinguished Service Award and 2024 BEAM Award by the National Association of Home Builders. He also serves as a Life Director of the Texas Association of Builders and as a Trustee and scholarship committee member on the Texas Builders Foundation board. At Story Built Homes, Matthew oversees long-term strategy and business development, guiding the company’s expansion and helping shape its commitment to purposeful building and a client-first experience across all communities and custom homes.
Outside of work, Matthew is a devoted Christian, Husband and Father to 3 children. His servant leadership heart does not stop at the office as Matthew stays very involved in many community outreaches and local service ministries. When not working or volunteering, you will often find him hauling animals and kids to their shows, rodeos and dance competitions. In his little spare time, Matthew is an avid team roper and enjoys everything the western lifestyle offers. He is rarely seen without a cowboy hat on and best known for his Texan spirit.
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