Hi everyone. I am considering purchasing about an acre of land around Hunter NY, about 2.5 hrs from NYC, for around $10k in cash and using some sort of financing to purchase a 4 season container cabin for the Airbnb short term rental market. The area is beautiful and has alot to offer in terms of many outdoor activities year round but also the proximity to towns like Phonecia and Woodstock which are minutes away is also a plus. Does anyone have any experience with these type of vacation rentals in the Catkills NY area? If so what are things that I should be looking out for? Any pitfalls? Any advice is appreciated. 

What an awesome project.  My wife has been researching container structures for some time now and we have plans in review with the building dept in Cleveland, Ohio for a container addition (40' high cube) on the back of our house in Cleveland.  I know the Catskill area very well as we have been going up there for almost 30 years to that area.  If you want to talk offline feel free to reach out.

Exciting idea. I would love to hear how this turns out.

I live in the village of Catskill. I’m about 20 minutes or so from Hunter. I think an AirBnB would do great up there. I’m not familiar with container cabins, but you’re right about the area. Lots to do all year, proximity to other towns/villages, etc. Winter (ski season) is huge up there. If I can be of any more help, feel free to reach out!

Just make sure you know your costs for developing the land - is there access to water/sewer/electricity or will you have to put in a well, septic, and/or run power?  Talk with a couple of contractors before you put in the $ to make sure you have a full understanding of the costs/work involved.  

Also, make sure you're familiar with any zoning restrictions and that a container house will be approved, as some jurisdictions have restrictions about them.  Good luck!

@Christopher Polanco

Have you checked the short term rental laws in the area? Some requires owner to be on the premises when renting as vacation rentals. Maybe confirm this with the town first before buying the land.

@Christopher Polanco

I live an hour away and have spend plenty time in the Hunter Area. We usually just day trip because it is so close. But have gone for the weekend for a close to home getaway. We usually do Airbnb but there aren’t many. And tons of people from the city go their to ski or I. Fall to check out the colors. So I think it is a good idea. Between all the activities there. It should rent fine. Not familiar with container cabins though.

@Christopher Polanco

Container cabins. I get it now. Those smaller tiny cabins should do well. People in this area love that stuff. And they are basically just sleeping there

Originally posted by @Jesse Phillips :

@Christopher Polanco

Container cabins. I get it now. Those smaller tiny cabins should do well. People in this area love that stuff. And they are basically just sleeping there

Thank you for all of this awesome feedback guys! This is much appreciated. I wasn't thinking about the short term renting laws of the county so that is probably my next step... 

As far as zoning goes I know for sure that there are no restrictions for this plot of land as I have already checked this out ,so basically anything goes, even a tiny house container cabin. 

These cabins are actually built from the ground up to be totally off the grid and ready to settle in once completed, the ones I am looking at are built here in Brooklyn by a company called Contanium. So there will be no additional costs as far as electric or a septic tank.

@Christopher Polanco Here is another product that you might look at for comparison. https://www.honomobo.com/

@Andrew Ziebro I don't know if you have connected with Aaron Westerburg at our meetup yet, but he is a BP guy and is working to build a large multi-use MF building out of shipping containers in Ohio City. He is moving through the various approvals, but everyone thus far has been excited about it. 

Hey Ryan, great seeing you at the meetup last night.  Yes, we are working on scheduling a meeting to talk about the container project.  My wife is excited to help out with her knowledge.  Looking forwart to connecting with you again.

How did this project go? Any learning you can share? :)

Hey there. Sorry I didn’t go through with it, I instead purchased a cabin which was in need of a full rehab. I got a good deal on it about a year ago when I bought and did a $70k renovation on it...it’s on Airbnb and we are doing extremely well with it.....very happy. If you need any advice on purchasing in the Catskills Mountain area of NY I’d be happy to share. Best wishes. 

Hi @Christopher Polanco are there any zoning restrictions for STR's, can you recommend a real estate agent out in the Catskills? Thanks!

Also interested in hearing more on restrictions, where exactly you ended up buying and how managing the reno from afar!

Zoning restrictions on short term rentals are pretty relaxed in and around the Catskill Mountain area, there aren't any in Delaware County where I bought my cabin and I'm pretty sure its the same for the surrounding counties. To be exact I bought in the New Kingston/Margaretville area.  The Airbnb's provide a huge boom to the local economy with people coming up from the city and spending their money, and I am sure that the people in charge of these zoning laws recognize that. 

Far as a realtor I used Sherri Manning of Catskills Heritage Realty, you can google her, I highly recommend her. A good find would be kinda hard to come by right now because the pandemic has created in my humble opinion a real estate bubble out there, with properties selling over asking price, people buying sight unseen and bidding wars galore with properties selling very quickly. 

As far as the renovations, I used a local contractor, also lucked out in that regard, the guy was excellent and it was godsent having him handle many of the logistics i.e. receiving packages that I had bought to ship up to the house for the reno, among other things. As I'm only 2.5 hours away, I would go up every other week to take a look at the progress and make sure everything I wanted done was getting done.

Here is a link to the Airbnb https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/4...

I'd be happy to share knowledge on anything else about the entire process if anyone is interested...

Christopher thanks very much! Very helpful

Not a problem. Happy to help. 

Hi Christopher, 

I am exploring the idea of purchasing a cabin / home for Airbnb rental use and came across your story. I was also considering buying land and building a tiny home or similar but understand there are complications regarding water, septic issues, and electric. I am curious to know why you strayed from your original idea and decided to renovate a home instead. Do you think those opportunities are still out there with the recent covid- related boom? What were some of the key factors you look for when purchasing a home? I really love your Airbnb rental and would think that is ideal for what I'm looking for. 

Sorry to bombard you with all these questions and appreciate your time!

Hi Emanuel,

I love talking real estate so it’s really my pleasure. The main reason why I strayed away from my original idea was because of the amount of capital needed to get a project like that off the ground. You need cash to buy the land, and in most cases you also need cash to buy the tiny house and add the septic and electric and to add a well and everything else you might need. There isn’t really a way to get a mortgage on raw land and as far as I know you can’t finance the tiny house....I was looking into this company called Contanium out of Brooklyn NY and they make these gorgeous tiny homes out of containers but they offer no financing. On top of all of this the land you buy needs to be zoned properly both for the tiny home and for short term rental purposes... So I decided to go a different route and look for a deal on a cabin, a fixer upper where I could put 10% down get financing and renovate it. 

So in the Summer of 2019 I started to look for a cabin and I found one that summer. I wanted something that was around $100k-$125k...there wasn’t much in that price range to be honest and my realtor told me that from the beginning, however I was determined to find something and after one month of looking I did find my deal in a dilapidated cabin that was listed at $129k and we settled on $94,500 and went into contract. Although the house needed a lot of work, it sat on the most beautiful plot of land and the views were amazing, so I was sold. I got a good deal on this house because it had foundation issues and needed two walls of the foundation to be torn down and rebuilt...sounds scary huh? This issue must have kept the owners from selling it because the house was on and off the market for over 4 years! And my realtor said I was the 1st person to request a showing in months....so point is don’t let anything scare you, you can use this to your advantage, get a home inspection and do your due diligence and find out what it would take to get the issue resolved, I found someone that would do the job for $18k and I rolled that into the mortgage  so I wouldn’t have to come out of pocket for that, as it was a 30 yr fixed rate conventional rehab loan. A regular 30 yr fixed loan would not finance a house needing foundation repairs....just FYI. It’s good to educate yourself on the variety of mortgages available.... But anyway once we finally closed, he got to work on the foundation while simultaneously working on renovations to the interior of the house...I was lucky to have a very competent contractor who worked meticulously and quickly and this was all done in 3 months time! 

In looking for a vacation rental property there are several things that one should consider, some of this is very unique to a vacation property ....First is obviously the price and this of course isn’t unique to this type of property but you should have an idea of what your budget is and what you can afford to pay for out of pocket costs....For this particular home, it had to be a fixer upper, because I wanted a deal and I was working with a limited amount of money....Proximity into town was also on my list, this was very important as I wanted ppl to be able to go into town and enjoy a beer or good food or whatever, my place happens to be within 10-15 minutes of several small and very quaint towns. Also I needed to be close to the ski centers so that it could have ppl coming up year round vs just in the warmer months. I also wanted privacy, something with at least 2 or 3 acres, this place has 5.5 and offers great privacy. I also wanted 2-3 bedrooms to be able to accommodate family when I use it for personal use and also so we can rent to more guests or families with children. Lastly and of utmost importance to me was either water or Mountain View’s....this is a vacation rental after all and I wanted a little bit of a wow factor and the Mountain View’s definitely provide that......I know it was quite a list but this place checked off all the boxes so I was very confident in my decision and I knew the place had huge potential and that once renovated it would do very well and ppl would enjoy coming up to spend quality time in nature and enjoy the views. 

Right now due to the pandemic I don’t believe any opportunities like this exist at the moment. The market is super hot and property is getting snatched up with buyers sight unseen.

I’m sorry for this novel of an answer to your questions but I didn’t know how to reply otherwise. Feel free to reply to the post and or privately message me and I’d be happy to discuss further. I love sharing my knowledge on this subject and I have learned tons about this topic over the last year or so. Take care! 

Thank you so much for that detailed response! This is all rather new to me and although I've always enjoyed the cabin lifestyle, this is the first time exploring a business venture of the sort, so all that information is extremely helpful. 

I suspected that the market is pretty hot and it would be hard to find a deal based on the bit of research that I did on Zillow and other sites. I'm actually pretty intrigued by the tiny home or container idea on a plot of land but I'm definitely wary of the challenges you mentioned. Plus, it would be dependent on the type of loan my bank would provide (which I'm sure you explored as well) since you can't mortgage them. 

I'll keep looking for opportunities for now and see if anything pops up. I'm honestly enjoying the process so far, so I'm not too discouraged just yet. You were definitely fortunate and smart to pull the trigger on that property when you did so congrats on that! It really looks great. Anyways, Thanks again and I'll pm you if I have any additional questions. Really appreciate it!