All Forum Posts by: Culin Tate

If you are looking to invest in your first STR and want it to be a little closer to home, then ask yourself where do people from Akron or Cleveland like to go for a weekend getaway? Ohio is a diverse state with plenty of lakes and National parks. You can find good value by looking for areas that families have purchased a weekend getaway homes, but have not yet been saturated with full time rental properties.

The purchase price is only one side of the equation, the other side is what do you want to do with the property to earn income?

Yes, right now purchase prices are elevated, but so are short term rental rates.  Their is serious money to be made, even in a sellers market by increasing your gross revenues 3-4x the average long term rental income by deploying the right assets in the short term rental market. 

Make sure that would are getting a commercial / business policy.  

Getting started by renting the smaller space would be a great way to begin to learn the craft.  I would suggest spending some time on getting the decor really appealing then invest in professional photography.

Just ask yourself, where do people in this part of Michigan like to drive to for weekend getaways? Then check out the data on AirDNA for those markets. Pricelabs also has a nice tool called Market Dashboard that you will find helpful.

You should start by talking with your tittle company and an attorney in your area with experience in real estate investing.

If you decide to go with one large space you can always add extra guest fees for reservations over a certain number of guests. For example your base rate could apply to up to 4 guests, and you can set up your listing to charge an extra $20 per night per guest over 4.

I have found that building permit offices are more friendly than you might assume.  If your county requires a permit to offer the property as a short term rental, I would recommend getting the specific requirements for that permit in hand as quickly as possible.  You may find requirements that will take some time to achieve, so arming yourself with all the necessary information is better done sooner than later. 

We usually source most of what we need near our home, then load up a uhaul to drive to and spend about a week decorating a new property. It is very beneficial to live in your STR for a few days before listing it for guests.

Seth  I work with a number of NC agents and would be happy to help you. You can provide a lot of value especially in the area of operations once you understand how airbnb works