All Forum Posts by: Ken Boone

@Kyler - Don't know your full intentions with this either. If you are purchasing this for mainly YOUR privacy and your use and just want to rent it out as an STR the rest of the time then go for it if that is what you want. If on the other hand, your primary reason is for STR cash flow, then I would still steer away from this property. There are other properties out there that won't have the headaches that this will come with. And although I am sure that kind of privacy will attract a few guests - I would love it honestly - most guests don't require that level of privacy. Just giving you my experienced feedback with steep roads in that area and how guests react. I don't think you can fully appreciate the issues you will have come winter time until you go through it.

@Kyler J Sloan said as long as you disclose it will rent. Not sure why you are posting the question. I am assuming since you said you are not familiar with the TN mtns, it is because you are thinking of purchasing this place for an STR. The place looks great once you are up there but here are a few things to consider.

In your question, you said driveway - not road - so I am assuming that whole thing is a private driveway to get to that cabin. I don't think I saw any other cabins on that route you took up in your video but maybe I am wrong. So based on that assumption let me tell you what you are "potentially" in for. BTW.. just about all cabins that have a great mountain top view in the Smokys will have steep roads with switchbacks. I have a cabin with an incredible mountain top view in the area and yes it has switchbacks and is steep for about 4/10ths of a mile. But the HOA maintains the road at the top and it is paved and plenty wide. The county maintains the road below. So with the "driveway" you have, I am betting you are going to deal with summer rain washouts, you will have occasional trees down across the drive. In the winter, you will have guests that either can't make it up the road, or they will not be able to get down at checkout. You will most likely have power outages during an ice storm - in the winter if all you have is electric heat this means no heat for your guests and no way to get down.

I don't mean this to sound rude, but there are a number of folks who book my cabin in Jan-Feb and never bother to check the weather and if they do check the weather and see a major storm system coming in they don't think about storing up food to get them through a few days. This past year was a 20 year bad winter. We had several heavy snows with iced up road conditions and power outages that loomed for days. Fortunately I didn't lose power, but I know of many who did. However, the norm is to get snow on the ground a few times a year and it might ice up, however the ice is usually melted by mid day the next day and everything is good. The problem you have is those conditions on that driveway are going to be a pain. Winter ice storms will surely bring trees down. When the storm hits, its gonna be hard to get someone that #1 can access it and #2 to get it cleaned up timely. Just some things to consider. If this is truly a driveway to the cabin I would not consider the purchase of this cabin. Too many potential issues there with that long of a driveway. This would be a different story if this was a county maintained road, or an HOA maintained paved road etc with other cabins but it doesn't appear to be that way. Last year we saw many many guests complaining about the cabin owners once they were stranded in cabins with no heat and no food. On several facebook forums they openly blamed the cabin owners and felt the cabin owners needed to do something to fix their problem Look, weather happens, but not all guests are reasonable or know how to handle those conditions. For those reasons I would be out.

@Zachary McDonough So here is the deal.   Build one in the right market and they will come.  Then you will learn about prime daily rates.  The thing is when you and your family would want to use it would most likely be the prime time.  Which means you will be giving up lots of dough to go at that time.  Just something to think about.  Nothing wrong with that if that is what you want to do.  As far as different places, I think that would take some time.  So start with one learn the game and then move to the next.  All of mine are in the same location.  I would like an alternate location, but I know my location so well it would be a lot of extra work to have one someplace else.  You have to establish new contacts, a new team, new cleaners, new handymen, new etc...  So my theory is that if I want to visit someplace else, I'll just use the money from my STRs at the location I know and and go wherever I want when I want.

As far as financing, you have a lot of options, a 2nd home loan will work for you first, and if your next one is in a different location you can do another 2nd home loan.   I love doing STRs so have fun with it.

Yes it makes a huge difference!  The key is a good cleaner and good handyman with backups for both.  And also make sure STRs are allowed in the area you are looking in. 

Kirsten - We live 3.5 hours from our STRs and we never drive there weekly.  Just every now and then when we WANT to.  It is all about having a local team.  Cleaners you can count on, handymen you can count on.  You get those two things down and you only have to visit when you want to.  When YOU feel like doing a repair instead of having someone else do it.  In the beginning it will take a few trips to get setup but once it is setup and have a good cleaner and handyman you will be cooking with gas.

@K F. So "good"cash flow can only be determined by you and that is the reality. Investments require time/money/risk.  For any investment you make you have to determine is the cash flow that I am going to receive (no matter the rate) worth my time and money and risk factor.  What might be good for me might not be good for someone else in a different position in life.  Also, managing yourself is not as hard you might think.

So unfortunately you are stuck in a hole.  Your only real option is to send in an email support request and describe the problem in great detail.  They may just need to do a reset on your connection.  I think you are having a different problem, since in my case it only happened on the VRBO side and even when they said it fixed it - it did not.  But I said my delay for 10 mins and I haven't had the problem since.  Unfortunately they are in a different time zone as well so you need to work them first thing in the morning because come 11am you will not get a response until the next day.  Sorry you are having these issues.

Pigeon Forge, Gatlinburg, Sevierville.  Wears Valley is really popping now too.  Wears Valley borders the GSMNP as well.  I think you will have  hard time beating those 3 locations though with anywhere else in the Smokies.

@Collin Hays has his points about Gatlinburg, but there are plenty of people that feel just as strongly about Pigeon Forge.  

Really any of those 3 you can't go wrong.  It will all come down to the specific location in those given areas and amenities your cabin has to offer to drive the price higher but that whole area has been booming for a long long time with no end in sight.

Yea I was thinking the same thing @John Underwood said...

So if airbnb is doing all the automated messaging and you are NOT on other platforms (VRBO, Booking.com) then I don't know that YourPorter is a lot of benefit to you.  The real benefit as I see it comes from the ability to auto message and see all my calendar info with details on multiple platforms from a single location.  The benefit is not really in the cleaner interface although I do use that.  I have a dedicated cleaning crew which is probably what you need to look into.  Not sure but from your description is sounds like you use different cleaners based on who is available.  That sounds like a tough model to work with.  I have a dedicated cleaning crew that takes 100% of my cleaning tasks. It is just expected - they get reminders a day in advance from YourPorter but they also have access to the cleaning calendar for 30 days out as well.  I think if I were you I would look into finding a dedicated cleaner that will always handle your properties.  Hope that I am answering what you are asking.