Airbnb condo at Purple Parrot Resort

[Ken Gurta]

Investment Info:

Condo buy & hold investment.

Purchase price: $254,900
Cash invested: $87,000

I purchased a condo at a resort. It is a block from the beach.

What made you interested in investing in this type of deal?

My unit is in Purple Parrot Resort. It is a highly sought-after vacation destination. I am using it as an Airbnb short term rental

How did you find this deal and how did you negotiate it?

I booked an Airbnb to stay in Pensacola to look at property. My Airbnb host turned out to be a realtor. He showed me around. He found my condo on the FMLS.

How did you finance this deal?

I used an asset-based lender. I had funds in a 1031 exchange from a sale of another property that I used as the down payment.

How did you add value to the deal?

The condo came fully furnished. We changed out most of the paintings, added beach knick-knacks, a play station, a ring doorbell, and a few other things.

What was the outcome?

We went live on April 1, 2022. Our first guest booked with us 10 minutes after going live on Airbnb. We already have almost $18,000 in bookings for the year even though nothing is booked from August 1st on. We will make a profit in our first year.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

We have only had 2 challenges; 1. We had a squatter that somehow got into our unit before we went live. That is when we added a Ring doorbell and changed lock codes. We have a Kwikset lock that gives every guest their own personal code. 2. When it storms or the power goes out, it disconnected us from our lock and doorbell. So we bought a repeater that reconnects to the wifi quickly. My fiance had to drive to the condo with our 3 phones to sync them with the door lock. But everything is ok now.

Did you work with any real estate professionals (agents, lenders, etc.) that you'd recommend to others?

yes