All Forum Posts by: Keith Courtney

Frank -
Reunion Resort is a beautiful community with the variations of the architecture of the homes and the 3 golf courses. However, from a short term rentals standpoint, it is very difficult to profit in there because of the costs. I wanted to make sure you realized that for you or your guests to be able to use the golf courses, water park and the tennis center, you have to be a member of the Reunion Club. The initiation fee I think is either $7500 and $15,000 and the monthly dues are at least $4-500/month. On top of that you are only given around 20 guest passes for an entire year. And, make sure you take into account the condo's HOA fee each month.
Having said the above, I will again state that the resort is beautiful, and there are some incredible vacation rentals in it.  I have just never been able to make the numbers work for investors except for the very large 9+ bedroom homes that cost $1.5M+.
Keith

Jaclyn -
I have been involved with a good number of purchases of townhouses in Windsor Hills.  I think your idea is a good one, but I wouldn't buy one yet. More have come on the market recently and the prices have weakened some, and I think they may weaken further because rentals are down this summer due to Covid-19 and more townhouses may come on the market in August and September.
I have a pro forma statement showing the profit you can expect from a Windsor Hills townhouse during normal times.  It's based on actual numbers of other W H townhouses. Let me know if you would like me to send it to you.
Keith

I primarily assist investors purchasing vacation homes here in the Orlando area, but I also handle the short term rental listings for a select number of vacation homes on HomeAway/VRBO and Airbnb primarily.  I don't want to suspend the listings hoping we may receive reservations for further out dates.  I blocked off the empty dates for the next 2 weeks.  I cannot imagine that the government would come after us for still having active listings since we blocked off the dates.
On another related note . . . For people traveling to Orlando to go to the parks this summer, I have to think that a lot of them would rather stay in a vacation home than a hotel to minimize contact with others. If the virus has subsided by the end of April or sometime in May, bookings for the summer could still be good. We have a lot of bookings still on the books for the summer months.  Only a very few have canceled.

To expound a little more on what @Jonathan Conaghan stated, yesterday afternoon Governor DeSantis stated that he was going to issue an order stopping all new Airbnb reservations for the next 14 days for vacation homes in Florida. He also stated it will not apply to hotels and motels.  Makes no sense.  There is a greater chance of the spread of the virus in hotels and motels between groups than groups staying in separate vacation homes.  It is also unclear if his order is going to apply to existing reservations that have check-ins within the next 14 days.  If it does apply to the existing reservations checking in within the next 14 days, it would have been nice to have a little warning that the decree was coming down.  He declared this yesterday afternoon late.  What happens with the reservations of people checking in today?

Jay -

I applaud you that, before you purchase a vacation home here in the Orlando area, you are going to analyze the numbers of owning one. You are somewhat of an exception. There are literally thousands of tourists who come here on vacation, have a great time and, acting more on emotion instead of any kind of financial analysis, buy a vacation home. They love the idea of staying in their own short term rental, and then simply turn it over to a property manager to totally manage for them when not using it. What has been even more astounding to me is most of them don't really care if they make a profit.  If their vacation home will pay all of their expenses, they are happy.  Their property manager ends up being the only one who makes money on the home.

I often am asked the question by people interested in investing in a short term rental vacation home - How can I expect to make a profit when there is so much competition - there are thousands of vacation rentals in the Disney World area?  My answer to that question is - Yes, there are thousands of vacation rentals here, but, relatively speaking, there is very little competition for the vacation homes that are set up to maximize rentals.  The great majority of the owners are like what I described above or they buy a vacation home hoping to make a profit but they don't set up their home to make a profit due to lack of knowledge or funds or both.

Regarding your mention of a condo - As a general statement, it's harder to make a profit with a condo here than a SFH. It's harder and more expensive to finance them. The rental incomes generally are not great enough to cover all of your expenses including the HOA fees and mortgage payments especially if you are not doing your own short term rental marketing. When a property manager or a third party is charging you from 10-25% of your rental income to market your property, that takes away all of your profit usually.

Good luck to you. You are going about it the right way.

Keith 

@Matthew Stallings

There are good opportunities for short term rentals south of Orlando in Kissimmee and Davenport.  Purchasing the best vacation rental you can in the best location is of course important.  Of equal importance is to make sure that you have enough cash to pay for renovations to make it appear new and modern and including adding a game room and/or movie theater and themed kids bedrooms.  The goal is to make your home as much fun as possible and to make it stand out against the competition.  If you do this, you are set up to have a very profitable vacation home investment.

Good luck,
Keith

Robert -

I agree with what has been posted above regarding Orange County.  There are only a few areas in the county where short term rentals are allowed, and in many of those areas the HOAs preclude one from short term renting a property.

The great majority of the short term rentals here are in either Osceola County (where Disney World is located) or in Polk County, which is south of Osceola.  Both of those counties are very accommodating to short term rentals.  These are the areas where I would look if I were you.  Because of Disney, SeaWorld and Universal Studios primarily, the demand for vacation home rentals is year-round.  And, what a lot of people don't realize is Cocoa Beach on the east coast is less than an hour away and St. Pete and Clearwater beaches (west of Tampa and on the Gulf) are 1.5 hours away.

Hope this helps.

Keith

@Joey Morea

I agree 100% with @John Underwood and @Mike McCarthy.  Renters are far less likely to damage a home if they know all or part of their damage deposit can be taken. Our damage deposits are a minimum of $500 for all of the short term rentals.

Keith

 

@David R.

Other than Margaritaville all of the new construction on short term vacation rentals is further out from Disney. With the every increasing traffic, it is going to be more and more of an advantage to be in close proximity to Disney. There are good opportunities still close to Disney.  The investment just has to be planned and structured properly. 

David -

You have obviously done a lot of digging into short term rental vacation homes here, and I agree with your assessments of each community mentioned. Finding the right vacation home for you will take a little longer than a year ago because so many of the good ones have been snapped up.  I have pro forma statements on homes in what I think are the better communities. Private message me, and I will be happy to send some to you.  I also have excellent contacts with lenders, insurance companies, a property manager and someone to do renovations if needed. 

We just had a big announcement yesterday from Universal Studios here that Orlando is buzzing about.  They announced Epic Universe, which will be their 4th theme park here.  This is another indication that the tourist industry here is going to continue to grow and demand for vacation homes has to increase.

Keith