Is student rentals still a good idea?

[Arif Bor]

Hello everyone. First post here, amazing resource.

I've recently closed on a single family home and have taken my first serious step into real estate investing. I'm very new to all this so i'm still really trying to figure out what is my "thing". So many different ways to approach this thing we call real estate investing.

I have a couple real estate agents whom I talk with and i've thought about student housing because i've seen the immense cash flow you can get out of an 8 bedroom unit near a university. It's those kinds of properties that lets you retire financially with only 2 units if you can get it done right.

But both my real estate agent friends are nervous about that prospect. Both state that parents nowadays are actually more interested in renting or even flat out buying condo units to keep their kids safe from reckless teenagers or limit their exposure so that when they come home their chances of accidentally sniping off grandpa are lowered.

This makes me wonder if these types of properties are still worth chasing. The AirBNB market completely blew up with COVID to the point that very successful people who held 15-25 properties essentially went bankrupt within weeks. True, the fear was very fresh and new, so maybe the heat has died down?

I'd like to hear from others who are currently with student housing. Does this still work for you? All the ads for student housing I see now include "Highly Meticulous cleaning services". Some claiming even daily. That's a pretty serious load of overhead. It makes me think that perhaps at this point they're happy to break even or seriously reduce cashflow to keep the property from defaulting.

Thank you for your input and time.