Own a hotel with owner financing?

[Kevin Van Witt]

Have an opportunity to buy a $500k hotel in an area that has some outdoor attractions and off a main road. See some honest potential in updating it, I have a good eye for good, clean, economic design. And the owner is willing to do owner financing. I have a good amount of money to put down towards improvements.

The catch? It’s not the most desirable town, lots of properties on the market. It also has terrible reviews on Yelp— all the worst “gross”, “never again” comments. I wonder if I can change the business/hotel name and rebrand it to rid the bad reviews.

I own one duplex and will be house hacking it. We did a good renovation and I am very confident in my branding skills. However, I don’t know the first thing about owning/running a hotel business. Maybe I could make it cool and Airbnb it too? What about turning then into small apartments? It’s got about 10 rooms. What if I turned them into 5 apartments?

Looking for some advice, ideas and questions to ask!