STR vs LTR I’m undecided

[Alecia Loveless]

For 24 years I owned B&Bs. I’m burnt out of that model of renting rooms. I currently own 7 properties with 25 units. I just had a lovely 2 bedroom apartment with wide pine floors, open concept, and large rooms with big windows come available.

My contractor/mentor/friend really suggests I furnish it after the renovation and turn it into a STR as we are a 4 season resort community and many of his other clients are making good money doing this. He thinks I could easily 2.5X my income or more per month doing this. Probably a total of 3.5X for the year after expenses.

I don’t have any desire to deal with bookings, guests, managing this, or dealing with reviews and the like. The average lifespan of a B&B owner is 7 years and I did 24 and I feel done. Despite being a resort community there just aren’t management companies that I could easily turn this over to.

I could easily decorate and furnish a STR. The extra income would also be nice. I've got at least the month of July to think about this as we do the renovation.

Should I spend some real time searching for a qualified manager to take this on and handle it completely for a little bigger piece of the pie? And if I can’t find anyone then just go back to the LTR?

Or should I just stick to what I’m good at and continue on with the LTR that there’s a huge call for. I’m currently planning to increase the rent if it stays a LTR by $400/month which is already a $4800 increase for the year.

Thoughts please.