All Forum Posts by: Brian Kantor

Hi, Kyle. A few points.

By way of background, we have a two-family home in Weston, which is about 15 mins from Okemo, 15 from Bromley, 10 from Magic and 25 from Stratton. Most of our renters are for Okemo, but we see a mix.

Our house is 4 BR, 3 baths and we allow dogs. We've grossed about $45k annually give or take, less expenses, over the past 2 years. We're booked solid for thanksgiving, Christmas, new years and ski season, but I was surprised at how empty we are the rest of the year (something that we are currently working to solve for).

If I was to buy another property in the area, I would not go larger than a 4/3 and may even be more open to 3/2s as smaller properties are also more likely to cater to families vs single partiers.

As it stands, as a mountain, with Stratton you can't go wrong. It's the "bougiest" of the mountains and attracts a high-end crowd—More wealthy families willing to pay for quality homes and less partiers. Also with Stratton, there are more caretakers and cleaners that service that area than where we are.

Red flags to look out for:

Every town in the general area has their own STR ordinances or lack-thereof. Be sure to research your exact town before buying. There is one town near Mt Snow, for example, that has an outright ban on STRs. Know what you're getting into beforehand and know that things could change over time to become less favorable to STRs.

At the state level, there are currently no restrictions on STRs, but that could change. Almost every year it seems that there's a new bill up for vote putting various restrictions on STRs, the current one being that it's illegal to rent out your home if you live there less than 120 days per year. 

Big picture, it's foolish for a state that's so dependent on tourism to place onerous restrictions on the ability to house tourists, but many locals make the case that they are getting priced out of the housing market. They are not wrong, but restricting STRs isn't going to change that; building more affordable housing, on the other hand, just may. 

It remains to be seen whether or not this law passes or another like it, but whereas we were at one point heavily-considering a second rental property here, we're holding off until we get a clearer sense as to how this will pan out.

 Hey, @Jon Martin. The trackball is for arcade games like Golden Tee, bowling games, baseball games, etc. Here is a full list:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_trackball_arcade_games

Also, after much deliberation, we went with Quality Arcades full-wrap cabinet with 4-controllers, track-ball and two light guns. So far, we couldn't be happier. Cinch to setup and plays well. Will report back if any issues arise.

 We anchored the top of the machine to the wall to prevent it from tipping over. We send out explicit instructions by email to our guests before check-in and have a hard copy waiting for them upon arrival.

 Been using OwnerRez for a little over a year to manage one property and sync it between my Airbnb, VRBO and direct-booking site. I could not be happier.

The site does look a little old-school as others have referenced, but there is not a single piece of functionality missing that I wished it had. It includes everything you have asked for.

I could also connect it to other booking engines like Booking.com and TripAdvisor, but have not set them up.

Customer service is wonderful, and they are always super-responsive with any requests I have.

The only gripe I have with it would be their website templates, should you want to build your direct-booking site directly through them. The templates are bland and don't feel modern. That said, it was easy for me to have my own custom site built through a 3rd party developer on UpWork, and then connect it to OwnerRez with their Wordpress plugins and short codes.

I feel the cost is relatively small and worth it.

I also pay separately for PriceLabs dynamic pricing engine, which I plug into OwnerRez, which for the extra $20/month, I find easily pays for itself.

@Christina Swaby BP has a good book on this "The Book on Estimating Rehab Costs" by J Scott. The pricing is a bit dated following the post-covid inflation spike, but adding 20% to these costs should be a strong directional start.

To dig a little deeper, I created a Google Sheet and line item'ed out all of the major repair items I might encounter in a property. I split it between materials and labor. For materials, I went onto HomeDepot.com and priced out the exact materials I'd suggest using and hyper-linked back to the product pages on their site. For labor, I did a mix of Google Searches for what I might expect to pay and asking a contractor that I worked with earlier on a small project.

Everything is done with formulas, so I can just enter in the number of units to calculate a total price. Now, as I evaluate properties, I pop in the units and get a solid estimate.

 Tons of advantages with your suggestion, Frank. Fully agree. I am opting for a true standup arcade machine for the novelty as much as gameplay. Tons of people have the mini-consoles at home, but few have an actual arcade machine.

After months of deliberation, we went with a 4-player machine from Quality Arcades with the track-ball and two light guns (ie, their top tier machine). All in, it ran me about $2000 (including shipping) and has 18k games. Customer service so far has been great, and repairs seem easy. They told me that they've rarely had a screen crap out, but if it does, they told me that I could buy a new one from them if I wanted, but could likely get a better deal from Costco and easily pop it in. I appreciated that they volunteered that I would not be required to go to them for repairs, but that they were there if I wanted.

They are delivering it on Monday, December 11th, so I will report back with the verdict once it's up and running.

I'm going to have to go with @Bill B. and his POV here, unfortunately.

Tenant's will never treat a property as if it's their own, because it isn't. Even if it truly is their fault, for one this is tough to prove and two, it's unfortunately on you to ensure your rental is resistant to excessive wear and tear. Water spillage is common in a property and it should be up to you to reinforce the bathroom to ensure that isn't an issue.

I think you need to "eat this", and when you have it fixed, use a quality vendor who can repair it in a way to keep this from happening again.

Hi, @Robert Flores. We bought 2 of our 3 properties out-of-state never having looked at them. One I've owned for 3 years and have never actually been inside (though I did once walk the perimeter).

@Ali Nichols is correct. Definitely "walk" the neighborhood via Google Streetview to make sure the area feels comfortable to you.

As for the property itself, I had my realtor do a Facetime walkthrough with me so we could view it together. I was able to ask him questions and he was able to explain what he saw. The big thing here is to make sure you're using an experienced agent who knows what to look for with regards to an investment property vs primary residence.

Look for "problems" and try to assign a cost to fix those problems as he/she walks through providing commentary. Good luck!

If you have $100k+ in stock investments, you can move them into a professionally managed account and take a loan against your portfolio. Depending on your advisor, you can typically borrow between 50% and 70% of the value of your portfolio. The rates are pretty similar to a HELOC, though, and in the current environment, you're still looking at around 8%. That said, like a HELOC, it's a revolving line of credit so you only have to make the minimum payment each month instead of a fixed schedule.

We've been doing this for a while, but it was a much better deal when interest rates were low. When we started this in 2021, the rate was 3.5%.

That said, if your hold period is short, the total interest payment wouldnt be a lot.

DM me if you want me to connect you with my advisor who set this up for me. Great guy. His fee is 1% annually of assets under management, so worth factoring in that as well. I find his advice helpful on top of the ability to take out these types of loans.