NC - Beech Mountain v Sugar v Banner Elk - STR - Buy v Build

[Jeff Pullman]

Hello, 

I am considering a short term rental - Single family home, mountain views, 3-5br, 1500-3000 sqft in the Banner Elk/Beech/Sugar area and have several questions that I am hoping the excellent resources on this forum can assist with. 

1) Thoughts on the relative strength of each area for STR potential

2) What demographic is the most common source of rentals in the area - i.e. single families, group vacationing, etc? 

3) We are familiar with beach (not beech) property in NC and have learned that there are certain sectors of the market that are easier to make money on (i.e. in Nags Head, it's really hard to make money on a $600k house...which is the low end of the market...but easier on a 2M house for a number of reasons. Is there a sector that is easiest or most difficult in this area - for example, if most vacationers are single families, I can see it being harder  to make money with a 6br home. 

4) Lots seem to be very affordable...is building a huge challenge? Obviously there are structural challenges with mountains, but I assume the builders here have it figured out. 

5) Does anyone have an idea what one could expect to spend to build per sqft, inclusive of all site prep?  If a 2000 sqft existing home was next to an empty lot, would one expect the final bill to come in more than or less than the existing home price? I wonder if the barrier to building is just not wanting to take on the headache/timeline.

6) Recommendations welcome for the following: Property managers, Builders, cleaners, handymen

7) For those of you renting in the area full time or close to it, what is a reasonable ratio of gross rents to purchase price that could be targeted in this market? Again, to compare to beach property, 10% is kind of the magic number...at 10% gross rents to purchase price, you can make money. Many of the deals out there now are more like 6-7% but you can find 10s and 11s. 

Sorry, this is pretty all over the place, but thanks for any and all help you can offer.