Vacation Rental vs. Single Family Rental

[Stacy Preston]

Planning for 2020 and plan to make another investment.  Currently have two single family rentals in Indianapolis which are performing well.  Just returned from Gatlinburg and am curious about vacation rentals in that market.  I'm exploring buying more single family in Indianapolis OR branching out and buying a cabin in the Gatlinburg area.  I could probably buy 2-3 rentals in Indy for what it would take to buy one cabin.  Would love to hear from those who have branched out into the short term/vacation rental market.  Pros/cons vs single family rentals.  Advice?  What would you do?  Obviously I need to crunch the numbers, but would love to hear from others who have a mix of single family and short term rentals.  Thanks!

[Paul Sandhu]

I do STRs in my home town and self manage.  The furthest is about 8 minutes from home, the closest is 3 minutes.  23 front doors, 83 beds, 60 televisions, 26 washers, 27 dryers, 30 refrigerators, 18 grills, 1500 previous renters.

There is no tourism in this town; just drugs, prostitution, unemployment, crime and general misery.  It's known as Hades.  But there is a refinery here.  It generates $13,000.00/minute in revenue.  I try to get .0001 of that revenue by renting my STRs to refinery contractors.  Big burly guys that drive jacked up 4x4s and have neck tats.  They smell like diesel fuel and chew tobacco in their sleep.  If you saw one in an aisle of Wal Mart, you'd avoid the aisle.  I'd go up to him, punch him in the arm and say "What are you doing here?  The hand lotion is over there."