Lake Hopatcong, NJ vacation rental experience
Member since 2020 · 5 posts · 1 vote
Hi,
I'm looking at a property at Lake Hopatcong, NJ (Jefferson, NJ) directly at a Lake for short term vacation rental and the occasional own use. Does anybody have experience with vacation rentals in that area? The season is not very long, but I still think there is potential with lake front property at the largest lake in NJ.
Any feedback is appreciated.
Having just sold my lakefront property on lake Hopatcong I can tell you this... I rented the home several times over the last few years. Rents have been coming under pressure a lot and what you need to cover your costs for a year are fast becoming more than what you will see in income. You need to remember things like most homes in the area are well water, septic, have sump pumps. Therefore consider what you will need to do for winterization if you don’t have it rented. Electric will most likely need to stay on consistently.
it may sound like an opportunity to get some great $ on STR but in my experience anyway, I received more demands for lakefront STR at a ridiculous amount (I'm talking half of what is normally anticipated) than I did in getting anything that was near the rents we used to see five years ago.
Hi,
I'm looking at a property at Lake Hopatcong, NJ (Jefferson, NJ) directly at a Lake for short term vacation rental and the occasional own use. Does anybody have experience with vacation rentals in that area? The season is not very long, but I still think there is potential with lake front property at the largest lake in NJ.
Any feedback is appreciated.
I know Lake Hopatcong quite well! So, look, I'm gonna say this as nicely as possible and of course to each their own: you can only invest every dollar once, you should invest it where you can make the absolute highest return, and that is certainly not Lake Hopatcong. And that is also why I don't invest in or near my hometown either. Because the highest ROI is about 1000 miles away from me where I own a number of properties that make a ton of money
I tend to buy in the Southern half of the US for 3 reasons:
1) you get much higher year-round occupancy rates in the South & it’s simply tough to earn a good ROI in the North if your place sits vacant for a big chunk of the year
2) Culturally, the Southern half of the US seems to be a lot more accepting of STRs regulation-wise. A lot of these southern beach & mountain towns have been supporting STR for 75+ years, long before Airbnb was a thing, so they're very comfortable with it and it's a built-in part of the community.
3) The Southern half of the US is more forgiving if your property is out of service for a couple months (a flood, property damage, coronavirus) bc you earn year-round revenue. People in the north can get really screwed if, for example, their property is out of service during the peak summer season when they would typically earn all of their revenue
A lot of Northern places are FREAKING OUT over STRs & STR regulations & they don’t seem to be very supportive of it. So, in the North, best case you’re fighting an uphill battle with a lot of uncertainty. Worst case, it gets outlawed in a town AFTER you’ve bought a place there & now you have to sell at a HUGE loss bc there’s no buyer demand once STR use is banned! I’ve seen it happen...
Anyway, there’s some great resources on the internet that show the amazing numbers you can earn on STR down south. Once you see the STR data on these various southern towns, you’ll see that you simply can’t get annual revenue, annual occupancy rates, annual net income, & annual ROI like this in the north.
If you pick the right spot down south, a 3+ BR house can bring in anywhere from $100k-$250k per year. As I said, you can only invest every dollar once. I’ve checked out Lake Hopatcong investments & I know for sure that Lake Hopatcong will NOT pull in this kind of money during the very short summer rental season...
You may have heard a lot recently in the news about the Southern strategy, it’s a strategy for winning a presidential election. Well I have a southern strategy too, it’s a strategy for making a ton of money & it goes like this: buy a bunch of vacation rentals down south & then you’ll make a lot of money
Thanks @Mark Miles for your insights. I 100% agree with all the points you made. I'm also looking at Central Florida for pure investment properties for STR.
I currently live in NJ across the river from Manhattan which needless to say is a very expensive area which makes it more difficult to invest and have a decent ROI. The thought behind Lake Hopatcong was more to have a weekend getaway and cover the cost with STR rather than maximizing $$$.
Having just sold my lakefront property on lake Hopatcong I can tell you this... I rented the home several times over the last few years. Rents have been coming under pressure a lot and what you need to cover your costs for a year are fast becoming more than what you will see in income. You need to remember things like most homes in the area are well water, septic, have sump pumps. Therefore consider what you will need to do for winterization if you don’t have it rented. Electric will most likely need to stay on consistently.
it may sound like an opportunity to get some great $ on STR but in my experience anyway, I received more demands for lakefront STR at a ridiculous amount (I'm talking half of what is normally anticipated) than I did in getting anything that was near the rents we used to see five years ago.
Thanks @Angela Crewther, very helpful. I'll stay away from that area for now, unfortunately I don't have the luxury to not being able to cover the cost through STR.