First short term vacation rental

[Lori Pyne]

Investment Info:

Single-family residence buy & hold investment.

Purchase price: $620,000
Cash invested: $125,000

Life goal to retire in Yosemite. Purchased with plan to live in permanently but currently too small to be a full-time residence. Is a successful short-term vacation rental - Hibernation Hideaway in Wawona, inside of Yosemite National Park

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

Our life goal is to have a home inside of Yosemite.

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

We worked with a real estate broker - Judy Wensloff - who let us know when the property was listed. Right-priced properties inside Yosemite move quickly. We bought it sight unseen as we were out of the state when it was listed.

How did you finance this deal?

Conventional

How did you add value to the deal?

Over time we have improved it - replaced heating and air, upgraded furniture, painted.

What was the outcome?

It is a successful short-term vacation rental.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

Introduced us to being short-term vacation rental investors and introduced us to our property manager partners. Challenges - fires and snow causing the Park to close which means cancellation of reservations. We lost most of July this year due to the Washburn fire in Yosemite. Despite the challenges, it is worth it.

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

Judy Wensloff has been our real estate broker for all of our Wawona properties. She is such a smart and ethical Realtor that she inspired me to become a Realtor and I joined her Yosemite Real Estate Team.