Medium Term Rental Regulations

[Warren Bryant]

I currently have a ranch house with basement that is 2bd/1ba on the main floor and a 2bd/2ba in the basement. Both floors have a laundry and a kitchen. They are separated by a staircase with a locked door. Both have multiple points of egress. Utilities are not separated, but there is individual HVAC on each floor. There is ample parking on and off street parking. There is also an unattached garage that I don't plan on giving tenants access to because I use it for storage. 

What problems would I run into if I were to try to rent these units out separately as either long term or medium term rentals. I'm especially interested in what I would need to do as far as zoning, regulations, code, etc. I'm not interested in STR because of the added layer of regulations.

The easiest thing to do would be to rent it as a single long term unit but I would be lowering my cashflow. We also are considering renting it as a single medium term unit (3-6 months) but I'm not clear on how the regulations differ from STR or long term.

Were gonna cashflow no matter what we do, but we wanna maximize it. 

Any advice would be appreciated.

[Lisa M Thompson]

Hi Warren, 

I also have a rancher with a studio apartment with its own entrance. We live in the main level which is 4 bedroom, 3 bath. The apartment has its own kitchen, bath, washer and dryer. Like yours the electric is not separated so we set the rent accordingly. Originally my husband and I built out the apartment to be furnished and listed on ABnB, but before we could finish it we had people begging to rent short term. This being our very 1st rental experience we did the full background and credit check and signed a 4 month lease with our first applicant! It has been a great experience! We are cash flowing nicely. When their lease is up we are thinking of continuing the medium term leasing through nurse finder. I hope this helps! I know our situation isn’t exactly like yours because we live in ours. But we are thinking of moving eventually, and renting the upstairs also. So we would have the same duplex situation as what you have described. We are located in Loudon County and haven’t run into any regulation issues. We do carry an endorsement on our homeowners insurance for the rental, and it’s very inexpensive.

For guidance on applicants, leases and background/credit checks I highly recommend Rentprep. They are very easy to use. 
Hope this helps!

Lisa