All Forum Posts by: Aubrey Maldonado

@Christopher Davis aside from what seems like a lack of contract knowledge, I'd ask for client references--people who she's managed properties for. If she's not able to provide any, that gives you a clear answer and if she can provide some, you'll likely be able to get insight on how she's doing placing tenants and managing the properties.

 Yes, that would be great! Although, I think it would drive up the cleaning fees and, in turn, the airbnb rates to have cleaning/PM companies that establish and maintain a higher standard of work. From my experience, it seems that's why it's hard to find dependable cleaning & property management for STRs because it's a higher volume of turnover of guests, and property owners can only pay so much for management/cleaning.

It depends on the area for the STR/MTR. In Colorado, there are increasing regulations on STRs that make it more complicated, but it's still possible and can be profitable. On the other hand, in the coastal markets of NC (at least where I have experience), there are little regulations but increasing saturation in the market.

I'd say no matter where you're located, some common barriers to success are: 

1. Finding and retaining dependable cleaners who do a good job

2. High quality property management if you don't want/can't to do it yourself

3. Over-saturation of the market

@Aaron T. that completely makes sense. I expect that will be many STR hosts' response and it's one of the reasons the regulations are going to come back to bite CO and other states pushing for tighter restrictions on STRs.

@Baron Wheeler glad you're a part of BP! Mid-term rentals are a good strategy here. There are multiple industries driving the demand for mid-term stays. In the past year, there were 364,553 map searches and housing requests for the CO Springs area and ~40% of "whole place" rentals are priced greater than $2500/month (Furnished Finder). 

One thing I'd keep in mind with mid-term rentals is I expect the mid-term rental market to get highly saturated at some point just like the STR market has. There are people switching from short-term to mid-term as the market for STRs gets more competitive and some people are tired of managing the high turnover with STRs. Not to mention, more HOA and possible gov't regulations on short-term rentals.

With that in mind, as long as you pick an area that caters well to long- and mid-term (and possible short-term) rentals you'll have multiple exit strategies to employ.

 Agree. I don't think the fight is over. I expect there will be new bills in the future with new angles trying to flavor them differently.

@James Carlson That's good to know about Furnished Finder. I haven't had much experience with it. I have done MTR through Airbnb myself and had success with it but I know others who have mostly advertised month-to-month on Fb Marketplace or the MLS for a 4-6 month lease, depending their strategy in the off-season. That's when I think it can hurt your results in the algorithm and I was assuming STR hosts would have to go that route if they need to limit their STR days rented.

If it's still rented through Airbnb for MTR, wouldn't that flag the days rented for gov-proposed limits? 

I agree. Property owners will adjust whatever they need to make it work. If it works to go 54% occupancy with STR and ~46% occupancy with MTR, why not? Some investors use this model as well with beach properties in Coastal NC because of the seasonality. One of the downsides is it can hurt your rankings with Airbnb if you're blocking off bookings for almost half of the year. Although, at this point, getting a little hurt in the rankings is likely better than the higher tax rates. And many people will be in the same boat, so it may level out the competition for search on BNB sights.

@Chase Cannon, I'm in the Topsail Island area of NC and we are seeing good numbers for STRs. Prices have gone up quite a bit in the past couple of years, but are still pretty affordable compared to other beach locations. It's a desirable vacation spot, especially for people coming from Charlotte and the triangle. There's definitely some seasonality but some investors are able to rent out their beach homes from Oct-April on a mid-term lease to cover the down time and keep it open as a short-term rental during the busy summer months. If you're doing strictly STR, occupancy is probably going to be around 60-70% for most properties on the island that are managed well. With the combo of renting out mid- and short-term, it's possible to get a cap rate around 5-6% or more and ROI in the double digits.

@Mike Ferguson HomeFront Realty Services and Cedar Ridge Management are my go-to property managers for the area.