STR in St. Augustine - We live in San Diego

[Jessica Muto]

Hello!

We were pretty excited to wake up at 5 am on Christmas Eve to an accepted offer on a cute little house in St. Augustine. We live in San Diego and have long term rentals in the mountains nearby and in Arizona, but haven't ever done the STR thing. As we proceed in escrow, I am doing my research on income and costs associated with a STR that is literally as far away from us as possible. We are purchasing here because we want to stay there as well and may move there at some point if CA becomes too terrible.

My question for you all out of state STR investors: How do you manage your rentals? If you use a company, what extra things do they charge you for? If you have properties in St. Augustine and have either a cleaning/guest handling team or a "soup to nuts" management company, who do you like? I have interviewed 5 so far with a few more calls to make tomorrow. Most seem to charge around 20% with various things added in like linen service, remote key service, AC maintenance, etc.

What are the absolute MUST questions I should be asking? 

Finally, is it possible to manage myself from California??? I already own and run a plumbing company here full time, am a personal trainer, and oversee our other properties (oversee the management companies.) 

Thanks in advance for all your help!

-Jessica

[Dan H.]

Similar to you we have a busy life. We self manage our local LTR units (mostly because managing them does not take much time), but pay a PM to manage our local STR units. It is my belief that it is significantly more effort to manage STRs than to managing LTRs. If for no other reason than the rate that service (cleaning, client support, maintenance, etc.) is needed. In addition, when an LTR tenant has issues it is not dire, but STR guests expect their issues to be addressed immediately. WIFI is down due to issue with cable company that LL has no control over, but STR guests expect the issue to be resolved immediately.

I would clearly choose to pay a manager to manage my STR if it was a cross the country as I pay to manage my STR units that are less than 30 minutes drive from me.

Note the STR management fees seem high, but 1) it is a fair amount of work 2) it is less than I can make by making well researched investments 3) it is not the most rewarding of tasks 4) In San Diego market, the appreciation dwarfs the STR management fees. The property has appreciated an average of almost $4.5K/month over our 21 year hold.

Why would I want to work for STR management level compensation? Use a professional PM and enjoy having a bit extra time to spend doing what you enjoy.

Good luck