Anyone Struggle to Find House Hacking Roommates?

Question

I'm strongly considering buying a bigger-than-I-need house in Boise's overheated market for house hacking. My biggest fear is that I won't be able to find tenants to actually fill the house. Has anyone out there struggled to get enough tenants and if so, what did you do about it? I'm willing to try short, medium, or long term tenants. I would be living there.

Miller McSwain · Answer

I'm currently house hacking (rent-by-room), and we have had no issues filling our units. We've had 2 turnovers so far, with 0 vacancy (new tenant moved in the day the previous moved out). We do list our units on a lot of sites though to ensure we get lots of interest.

Like I said, we only have experience with rent-by-room, but I'll list some sites for other strategies too 😊

Traditional Long Term Rental:
- Zillow
- Realtor.com
- Hotpads
- FB Marketplace
- FB Groups
- Apartments.com
- Craigslist

Rent-by-room Rental:
- FB Marketplace
- FB Groups
- Zillow
- Roomies.com
- Roomiapp.com
- Roomster.com

Short-Term-Rental:
- Airbnb
- VRBO
- Flip Key
- Booking.com

Medium-Term Rental:
- Furnished Finders
- Kopa.co
- Airbnb (with 30 day minimum stay)

Jose Fernandez · Answer

The first home I ever purchased was a house hack. It was a 3/2. I was working at a University and rented 2 rooms out to employees of the university. One was an assistant coach for one of the sports and the other room was rented to an employee from the Sports Information Department. That room had high turnover because the position did not pay very well.

So, my advice would be to list the available rooms to faculty and staff at a nearby university/college or high school as well as the place where you are employed.

Olivia Radziszewski · Answer

@Carey Aydelotte- have you done due diligence? If you go on Furnished Finders you can see the type of rental properties that are in demand and the amount of times people have looked for rentals in your area! You can also go on Zillow and look at the rentals. The time that they are on the market for, the type of rentals you are seeing and the prices. Good luck!

Ryan Thomson · Answer

@Carey Aydelotte this is a very common fear. In Boise, I personally wouldn't be too worried about it. If you want to feel better about it, make a listing for a room for rent. Put pictures of your current house or an old house. Make the price what you want to get in your current home. See how many responses you get. I imagine this will make you feel a lot better.

Jeannine Harris · Answer

Check FB marketplace. I posted mine there and got way more responses that any other site. It was a mix of people but I found renters that were high quality. Plus you can check out their profiles to get a little more info on if they are the kind of renters you are looking for.

Anyone Struggle to Find House Hacking Roommates?

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