Vacation Rentals The Good The Bad-The Possibilities?

[Juliette V.]

I live in San Diego-a destination city for many visitors.  I'm moving to Nashville in September, and my tenant who rented my spare room and bathroom for $800/month left--and had no income from that for July.  I was struggling and stressing out and wondering HOW can I make some money-fast-to help pay the bills so I'm not stressing about my move, etc.   It hit me--rent my space out.....I decided to start renting out my spare room to people passing through San Diego (airBnB) and also posting my condo entirely as a rental on VRBO.  The first day my post when live which was July 16th, I was bombarded with requests (65 requests in 3 days!).  In fact, my space is booked from July 16th-27th.  In that time, 3 people will have used my space. I'm making more money in those days then what I rented it out for an entire month!

I'm only doing this for 6 weeks, through August because I need $$.  I have no other way to bring money in besides using my Real Estate to help me produce income. 

I even posted my space on a site that welcomes students who are on an exchange 'just to see if I got any bites', and because I'm so close to 3 universities, I've had students interested 1 to 3 months to study or do an exchange that need temporary housing.  Except they can't afford much, so it doesn't make sense for me to rent to them when I can make that $800 I would earn in month renting to them in 1 week.  

But just those requests got me thinking about future RE purchases and ways to make money....Perhaps putting 2 twin beds in a room or a bunk bed, and renting it out for 3 months to foreign exchange students.  One room would produce $1400/month.  In Los Angeles, homeowners do this all the time because people are coming and going from that city, and many don't have a lot of money for rent, 1st & last, etc.  

Is this a possible idea?  Has anyone else done this?  Concerns? Rewards?

This new experience got me thinking about vacation rentals too---do you have any ideas on solid vacation markets-where RE is still affordable, but the demand is very high?

Anyone have any vacation rental stories to share?  Liabilities?