All Forum Posts by: David Cherkowsky

Hi Nana, I have an Airbnb in DC and would be open to co-hosting. It’s a 3-bedroom, 2-bath home with 16 five-star reviews. Happy to chat more over DMs if you’re interested.

In general, the difference between co-hosting and full-time property management comes down to how involved you’d like to be as the owner.

Co-hosting is a good fit if you want to stay engaged but offload certain tasks like guest messaging or calendar management.

Property management is better if you’d prefer to be completely hands-off, with the manager handling everything including guest communications, maintenance, cleaning, turnovers, etc.

However, there are two big benefits, in my opinion, to co-hosting over property management. The first is tax benefits. With a property manager, you often lose access to the short-term rental tax loophole, which is one of the major perks of STRs. The second is control. Co-hosting allows you to retain more say over how your rental is run, while property management shifts most decisions to the PM. That’s a plus for some owners, but a drawback for others.

For a 3 bedroom 2 bath AirBnB in DC, I spent around $15k. I shopped around between Costco, Wayfair, Ikea, and Amazon.

One pro tip I discovered was calling Wayfair and gaining access to Wayfair professional as I was making purchases for a business. I don't think it added a significant discount, but even 1-2% on $15k adds up.

Another thing I did was apply for two new credit cards that had 5k spend requirements to receive the signup bonuses. While this didn't necessarily reduce the cost of the furniture, it did result in roughly $2k worth of points.

Hey Franklin, send me a dm. I have a STR in DC and I'd be open to discussing.

I'm doing the same thing in DC. Bought a 4 bedroom house with an English basement for just under 800k with 5% down on a conventional loan. The top house AirBnB's for ~$6k a month, which covers the entire mortgage. Would certainly do it again if the short term rental permits weren't restrictive in DC.

I was asking myself the same question about a year ago while renting in nova. Ended up house hacking and have been very happy with that decision. Feel free to DM me. I'd be happy to provide details.

Hi Bridgette, I actually just purchased a home recently and am implementing a similar strategy, living in the english basement and AirBnBing the upstairs. Some lessons learned from my experience:

- If there is a kitchen in the second unit, you can likely use the potential income generated from this unit to qualify for a mortgage. That obviously won't help the affordability, but will help qualify by raising your income in the DTI calculation. I recommend discussing this with your lender.

- Account for furniture costs - we furnished a whole ~2000 sqft house, but the costs were not insignificant. It ended up being ~$10k.

- Work with an agent that has experience with both house hacking and STRs. With AirDna pro, you can find comparable STR units and get a pretty strong idea of ADR and occupancy rates. This is invaluable when analyzing deals and something my agent helped with.

Are you calculating cash flow, ROI, etc. when opportunities pop up? I'd highly recommend doing that to ensure that you are making a smart financial decision.

Hi Billy, house hacking in the area is a great way to get started. I'm maybe a few years ahead of you in my investment journey and would be happy to describe what's worked for me. Feel free to send me a DM.

How will you be financing it when you initially purchase it?

@Jamal Kamara I think there's better folks in BP that can be speak to different areas of DC better than I could. I'm closing on a duplex at the end of this month and will be househacking in the Bloomingdale neighborhood of DC. I could provide better insight in a few months after getting some experience, but happy to answer any questions.

I think rent by the room is a good strategy in Alexandria because it allows you to house hack.  The main benefit there is house hacking allows you to put down a lower down payment than an investment property. You'll have to live in the property for a year before turning it into a full time rental, but you can rent it portions of the house the first year as long as you live there. Lots of good info on househacking on BP.

A traditional rental in this area probably won't cash flow at today's interest rates, and will require 20% down. I have one that I bought last year, and knowing what I know now, I may not have bought it.

Another strategy to consider close to Old Town is short term rentals. I think that's a way to get potentially positive cash flow in an appreciation market like northern Virginia. Only thing to be cognizant of is that laws vary by city. Alexandria city is the least restrictive area in the DMV for it, but if you're looking for something more active, a house hack with STR seems like the best option in the area to me. That's what I'll be doing in DC.

Hi Jamal, from what I've seen, duplexes are pretty hard to find in northern Virginia, but DC has a lot. Have you considered expanding your search to across the river?

The best strategy for househacking in Alexandria seems to be a rent by the room strategy. Not that I have too much experience, but happy to chat more.