Originally posted by @Lauren Krainski:
@Jonathan Stevens thanks for sharing your experience so far - super exciting! We are also out of state considering this area for our first STR investment, so your post triggered a couple questions:
1/ Would love to learn more about the staging company's services: does this also include fully furnishing and stocking things, if needed? Did you partner on design, furniture buying?
2/ Are contractor finding challenges due to current demand, or something different? How did you find them?
Separately, campground/glamping investments are (personally) very interesting to me only because my family camps and backpacks quite a bit. And how cool would that be?! But, I have done exactly zero research into the investing aspect so far - if you have, any resources or groups you'd recommend would be amazing, thank you!
Hey Lauren, I would be happy to answer your questions. I am still learning on this journey as it is my first investment property. I would definitely recommend using the community FB groups for cabin owners. It has been a life saver because I can get all info at my fingertips.
1) My interior decorator I found on said FB group and she has been my ROCK STAR! She will look for the best prices possible that will be the most durable. Once we have all items needed, she will set everything up and make sure the place looks perfect before you have professional pictures done(which i highly recommend). She and her husband went to a local furniture supply and facetimed me so that I could see everything with them and then she organized delivery of the furniture so that she could be there.
2) This was the hardest thing to find. I received a quote from a contractor when I first had my offer accepted on the house and to my surprise he never actually went to the property to asses the work for me. He had only used the inspection report(which was flawed). I could and should have received a higher concession from the seller but due to my inexperience I learned an expensive lesson. Now on future properties I will know better. I ended up never receiving an updated estimate from this contractor because he either didn't want to or couldn't take on the extra work. I was very fortunate to find my current contractor who will double as my cleaning company. From the beginning he saw my vision on what I wanted to do to enhance the property and he is not killing my pockets. We are working as a team to do things right the first time and we both know that we will profit from it moving forward since he will be cleaning it as well.
3) Glamping to me sounds like a great venture in this area due to the high demand for rentals. I also do not have much experience with it but am seeking to partner up with someone who is so that I may add this niche to my investment portfolio. Like you I grew up camping in the White Mountains of NH with my family every summer and I love it. Do what you love right?
