Buying a beach town apartment for STR in the off season

[Erin Mullaney]

I'm considering buying an apartment, 2BR-4BR with 10% down, second home mortgage, in the 450K-550K range. 

Some stats:

- We probably won't be able to find too many vacation renters in the off season. Season starts in June.

- We have about 70K in savings (closer to 80K once our tax refund comes for 2021, late filing)

- We've never been STR landlords before, total newbies.

- I really just want to be able to cover the mortgage with the rental, don't need positive cash flow, 0 is ok. We plan to visit it in the off season each year, just at the season's end when the area is still warm and nice but with way fewer vacationers. It will be awesome to have a place to go each year.

- Our realtor has access to airdna and is running numbers on how much we would likely make. I'm not getting an account yet because it's expensive and he doesn't mind doing that research for us!

Should I wait until late spring to make this purchase? The good thing about purchasing in the off season is it might be a quieter market. Suggestions on finding vacation renters for the off season?