All Forum Posts by: Ryan Moyer

The biggest problem with AirDNA is that it's a lagging indicator and we're in a period of fast change.  In a normal market I think they've got the algorithm working pretty well.  The problem is that it's using lagging data and when the market is changing fast you're looking at old data.  So coming out of covid it was underestimating because 2021 was a huge boom year but it didn't have much 2021 data yet.  Now it's the opposite as things slow down and return to normal some.  I think it's overestimating because it's still using 2021 travel boom data even as travel slows down back towards more historical levels some.

 Water is pretty awesome.  You can swim in a pool with fuel rods fresh out of a nuclear power plant sitting at the bottom and so long as you stay a few feet away you're exposed to less radiation than someone walking down the street 1000 miles away.

And yes, in this case it sounds like the PM just doesn't want to deal with it and is using Covid as an excuse.  Classic big PM company that treats your (OPs) arrangement like they're doing you a favor by hosting your home for you, rather than you doing them a favor by letting them make money off of an asset YOU own.  Don't settle for that kind of arrangement, imo.

Beaches have tough margins right now, though they have much more appreciation potential.

A house doing $150k in the Panhandle will likely cost $1.5M and have heavy seasonality where any major issue during the high season could really wreck your year (if your June or July gets wiped out due to some major capex or something like that it will knock like 30% off of your annual revenue in one fell swoop).

A house outside Orlando doing $150k costs $850k + $75k in theming and rents out pretty consistently year round with only a little seasonality to worry about.

The flipside is that near-beach land in the heart of the panhandle is a scarce and limited resource, while the area outside Orlando has plenty of empty space for new developments, so if you're looking for long term appreciation over 30 years there's probably a lot more meat still left on the bone for the beach properties.  But you're paying 40% more for the same revenue right now.

The pricing seems insane.  At 4 listings for $30k/mo revenue I would be paying them $1500/mo.  Ownerrez, the most complete channel manager in existence, is $49/mo for those same 4 listings.

FWIW, "Marry the house, date the financing" to me seems more relevant when home prices are deflated because of high interest rates.  Right now that's not really the case.  Homes are just as expensive as they were when the interest rate was 3%.

If the deal still underwrites at 7% with realistic revenues (using 2021 revenue is not realistic, using 10-20% less than 2021 revenue is not conservative) then yes, it's all good.  Otherwise maybe wait just a little bit because I don't think the market has adjusted to 2021 being an outlier year quite yet.

I think other people have nailed it already.  Just treat yourself as a 3rd party manager making whatever agreed upon percentage that is taken out as an expense, and split the leftover 50/50.

Those "rules" were already there before right?  I've been using emojis the whole time and never had a problem ranking/getting booked.

If you have less than 5 or 10 units, it's not that hard.  We all have phones with us all the time.  When you get a message, answer it right away, even if you can't take action right away.  You'd be surprised how many people are completely satisfied that it's something you're acknowledging right away.

I have 4 listings, all with 90%+ occupancy.  One of them is 9 bedrooms.  So lots of guests coming through.  My star rating is 4.99.  As in I have hundreds of 5* reviews and one single lone 4* review.  I don't do anything that special other than respond to people quickly.  I can't always resolve it quickly, sometimes not at all.  But the guest just knowing that I'm on it and am going to do what I can to help in a timely manner is enough in, well, 99.99% of cases.

Most people here hate it.  @Nathan Gesner offered a more realistic take and some good advice.

It's a legitimate thing that legitimate people can make legitimate money on.  But BP is not a good resource for it.  This is a real estate investment forum.  We are all approaching our STRs with different goals and requirements than someone doing arbitrage would have, and few to none of us have any experience with it that we could use to help.

As Nathan and some others have said, just make sure you are setting realistic expectations and most importantly make sure that you're doing everything legally, with your landlord and city's consent.  With those things, and a little capital to get started, you can make money with it and save up to jump into the actual real estate investment side of STRs in time.

 But the market doesn't always figure it out.  That's why we have zoning laws.  Because you don't want Zeeco Metals to buy out the 5 houses next door, bulldoze them, and build their new steel plant right next to you.

But that's essentially what we're doing.  We're operating commercial businesses in residential neighborhoods with residential regulations and residential loan products because legislators have been slow to adjust to the fact that Airbnb isn't just people letting someone crash on their couch anymore.  All of that will change with time.  30 years from now we'll be operating our commercial businesses (which is 100% what most of us are operating) in commercially zoned areas with commercial regulation and commercial loan products.  The best thing we can do is enjoy the ride while it lasts, and make sure we don't put ourselves in a bad position in front of those changes.

We are essentially operating hotels.  It's a loophole that we can do that in a residential neighborhood next door to a family with a small child that had no intent of living next door to a hotel when they bought in a residentially zoned neighborhood.  That loophole won't last forever.