SFH, Condo, Townhome, Resort Apt….Help me make sense of this.

[Steve Uekert]

Hi everyone! I hope you are all having a wonderful weekend so far!

As I'm learning as much as a I can about real estate in the context of STR, one question that has arisen the most in my head (especially living in a destination city like Orlando) is which type of "home" makes the most sense to invest in.

At first glance, it would seem SFH would be the best, and it just might be. But you have a much higher cost of entry of course. As well as the ongoing maintenance, upkeep, etc that makes owning a home a much larger investment than the purchase price.

But is there any data showing which of the above are the best for cash flow?

I mean, there are Condo's, but fee's and HOA's are a crap shoot. I've seen some great looking townhomes that are as close to SFH as they can be. Many with their own pool, no back or side neighbors (at least on one side), etc.

Then there are the resort communities. These are the ones with all the resort amenities like resort pools, on site restaurants and arcades, weight rooms, (and a huge list of other things). These of course look great on the surface, but seem to have some things that can make them not so desirable such as very high HOA's and requirements to use their PM's and Cleaners. Then you are also at the mercy of their front desk sometimes for guest reception which could be great, or horrible, depending on the resort.

Anyway, I would just love to be able to narrow down my search (as we try and get closer to our first property) and get rid of some of my nagging doubts or confusion about which direction would be best to go.

I would greatly appreciate any feedback and first hand experiences that anyone has with these types of circumstances!

Thank you so much for your time and help!

Steve