House Hack or Look for a Deal?

[Brett Avelin]

Own a single family with detached garage.  Been looking for a multi family or bigger to do short term rentals or combo of short and long.  Just realized our garage could be a perfect 420 sq ft apartment that would rent for $800-1000 or we could get Air Bnb tenants all summer in there, either way would bring in about $10,000 per year.  I am handy but would hire out most of it to a carpenter who I know well, so am guessing the apartment addition would land in the $40,000 range which I would pay cash for.  Would have no mortgage compared to buying a property, just higher taxes of course, and my wife thinks it's a great idea as we had an apt in our last home and rented it for seven years mostly really enjoying the community of having a tenant.  

Can anyone see pro's/con's to either way of going, the house hack/garage apt or jumping in to the investing game with a multi family?

Brett

[Chris T.]

@Brett Avelin

check with your local ordinance and zoning laws to make sure it's legal. And your home owners insurance company as well.

Assuming everything is fine, you can definitely get a good ROI on your garage apt by renting it short term. Especially you don't need to take a loan.

Only issue I see is when you sell your SFH, do most of your comparable houses have garages? Do you have land to build a detached garage if you needed to?