Built from a Love of Travel

Hendel and Reiko

Our story began in 2015, on Hendel's first trip abroad before starting graduate school. We were raised in completely different cultures, in opposite hemispheres. Reiko is from Nagoya, Japan. She is the backbone of our family, and her own routine is the reason for the small comforts you find in our homes, down to the bath products, rather than an amenities catalog. Hendel has Latin roots, born and raised in Miami. Our son was born in Orlando in 2021, our daughter in Honolulu in 2025.

Since then we have kept moving, splitting our time between Japan and the United States, usually with seven or eight suitcases holding everything a family of four needs. That life has put us in a lot of other people's accommodations. We have stayed in enough properties to know within 60 seconds whether a host cares. We have also felt what it costs a family when a host does not. A door that would not open in the cold after a 14-hour flight. Hair left on the shower wall. A host who went silent at midnight.

We named the brand Rakuen Sol because it tells our story in two words. Rakuen means paradise in Japanese, a nod to Reiko's heritage and the hospitality standard Japan holds as self-evident. Sol means sun in Spanish, a nod to Hendel's. Together, the name is the story of our family.

We built Rakuen Sol because we never want a guest to feel like a tool for revenue. Every guest who stays with us worked hard to get here. We know that, and we prepare for your arrival the way we would want to arrive ourselves.