All Forum Posts by: Abe DeHart

I own a 7 bedroom and an 8 bedroom (and smaller) and can answer any specifics you've got on them.

My COC return has been crazy good on them -- way more than my 1 BRs. Since you can afford to take down a big cabin, you'll get great results (assuming you didn't get in for too much money).

Wear-wise, I'd say that generally speaking it's about the same.  Granted, big groups are rougher on the cabins but as long as your decor/furniture/floors are quality you'll be fine.

I have a few suggestions learned the hard way:

-  Minimum night stay is good to help avoid the kind of parties you don't want.  I do 3 day mins with 4 during peaks.
- DON'T PRICE TOO LOW.  I've had a couple of party groups come in and work the cabins over.  When 20 people get together and pitch in $200 each for a long weekend, they will probably party hard.
- Require the booking party be 25 years old.
- Request a copy of their ID.
- Be prepared to handle damage claims within hours on same day turns.  I had one group that spilled alcohol and OJ all over the entire first floor, literally break the door off the oven, and have wars with trash in the front yard.  I submitted an 80 page claim with airbnb within three hours and the host guarantee paid out $1700 within a couple of weeks.

I started managing the cabin myself after one of the large local shops wasn't maximizing my money.  (After all, if they have 300 cabins, why do they care if you're at 40% utilization instead of 80-90%?)

Totally happy to help guide you through this.  It's a wild ride!

I've got 23 STRs in my town.  Refinery contractors are my tenants.  Half of my places are 2BR and they get rented out quite often.  Most of the other places are 3BR or 4BR, and they get rented out less often, but the weekly rate is greater.  I have a 3 story house with 8 beds and 4 baths.  It doesn't get rented out that often, but it brings in the most money each week when it does get rented out.

At the end of the year, all the places gross about the same amount of money regardless of their size.

The 3 story house is my man cave.  The bedrooms are decorated like Hugh Hefner's mansion, the rest is decorated like a frat house.  I put a kegorator in there.  There is a vacant lot next door that I spread pigeon and starling bait on.  I keep a scoped .22 cal pellet rifle in there and snipe the pigeons and starlings.  It's also haunted.

@Abe DeHart It's definitely a niche but your returns can be excellent - as has already been stated, cabins this size are not nearly so common, and demand for large groups staying will allow you to charge a premium, so long as the cabin is nice and offers amenities in line with its competition.

I've found that there's more large cabins like that on VRBO than AirBNB, so make sure you list there also.  

Congratulations, Abe!

My friends own a large retreat in Cody called Bull Moose Retreat.

Their rates are low right now and they're not even booked for half the summer, but these are unusual times. They are normally booked solid throughout the summer.

I also have friends that manage vacation rentals and I keep an eye on the market. Majority of vacation rentals are one or two bedroom guest homes. At least 75% of all vacation rentals in our area have three or fewer bedrooms and try to cram as many guests in as possible. The property that is in most demand are larger homes with 5 + bedrooms that can handle two or more families and larger groups. 

A decent hotel room in Cody will cost $250 a night. A family of five (or two couples) would pay $500 for two rooms. No views, no outdoor space, no kitchen, no table to sit and play games or share a bottle if wine, etc. For the same price, that family can have a beautiful cabin with stunning views, a fully-equipped kitchen just like home, private bedrooms, and much more. 

The larger homes perform better due to economy of scale. If priced correctly, six couples could rent your large home for much less than it would cost to rent individual hotel rooms and they'll save more by cooking their own meals. 

This year may be an anomaly but I think you'll do just fine. I have no experience in the Smokies but out here usually takes a couple years to build up a reputation, workout kinks, and start getting repeat business.

A nice 8 bedroom cabin in the Smokies will do well.  It is obviously going to be appealing to family reunions, wedding parties, and two/three families meeting up for vacation.  As Luke said, it won't stay as booked - this will typically be a long weekends and holidays cabin - but your nightly rent will be substantial, simply because there is a limited supply of these cabins.

One word of caution on large cabins:  We have managed these types of properties in the past, and they are repair/maintenance intensive.  Large groups of people together for several days can be quite hard on a house.  We were constantly repairing furniture, broken chairs, touching up walls, unplugging potties, etc.  What we found is that folks at these types of cabins often spend quite a lot of time actually at the cabin.  So the math works against you in terms of repairs/maintenance.  Contrast this with a smaller cabin, where the guests quite literally are often just sleeping there, and rarely even cook.

On a large cabin such as the one you are looking at, I am going to budget $10,000-12,000 a year for repairs and maintenance to be safe.  Some years you might get by with $5,000; others it might be $25K because you are having to replace a bunch of furniture, etc.  

As a side note, we have had a much better ROI on furniture getting the good stuff. Ashley-grade furniture needs replacing often. As an experiment, we went with high end leather in our newest cabin - several Ralph Lauren pieces and a couple of Drexel, and they are extremely durable. Twice the price, but I think it pays off. My $.02.