All Forum Posts by: Zachary Cain Humphrey

Sotherland Designs is a good company. Brianna Michelle Interiors is another good company. I have consulted with both of them in the past on our cabin. For me to get them to offer interior design pallet with all items to buy in every room of my 1800 sq foot cabin along with color pallete, everything down to light fixtures was going to cost me around 5K for their services. I would then buy all those interior design pieces and install. Though I have not went through with either yet, I do see value in it and all the professional hosts speak very highly to its benefit in standing out... which is everything in STR.

Robuilt has some youtube videos where he covers these tax considerations. I highly recommend them. 

Vacasa and evolve are both terrible. You would do much better yourself to personally manage or find a local management company. Learning SEO is important in any business. Consider reading "profitable properties" by Daniel Rusteen to help with understanding HOW to "maximize" a listing. Your home can be great, but if the listing you make sucks then it dont matter. Everybody is judging your home by the first 2-3 pictures you use and the first few lines of the description and the title of your listing. So try to communicate as much as you can through those 3 parts of your listing to optimize your performance on the airbnb search engine. 

 I would agree on a personal note I think a good arbitrage unit should be 100% return first year. I wouldnt settle for the risk of not recouping furniture first year unless the lease is multiple years. Overall I just dont like arbitrage. I had 3 units and sold them all . they were okay but a waste as I should have used all that money to do a down payment on a property instead. 

 Have you ever purchased your first home? If not you may be able to get a low percentage down loan on your first investment. 

Maybe consider becoming a realtor if real estate is something that interests you. Becoming a realtor would also let you get into the knowledge, daily tasks and study of real estate. Such a career would mesh well with your goals and you can get licensed in 6 months. By the end of this year you could be selling homes and have a much better income coming in to fuel your investment goals. 

I would analyze an arbitrage the same as an owned investment. Replace the mortgage payment instead with a monthly rent payment, add up all other expenses, then subtract from your reasonably numbered monthly gross income based on market trends for nightly rates for your size property with similar design and occupancy rates of the area.

Once you get this number add up the yearly net income and divide it by total cash invested and you will get your ROI number to tell you if you think it will be a good investment or not.

Usually rental arbitrage units you want your ROI to be several notches higher than if you owned. For STR think 15% minimum and up on ROI for owned investments. Think 30% and way up for arbitrage investments.

Tyler Coon - Savvy Realty Group

Cleaner has always done this for us. 

2023 data is nearing where it should be. There are markets that have been forever changed since covid such as Logan Ohio that was essentially noting pre covid to what it is today. Some markets boomed and then died once covid travel died down making those markets especially competitive now that demand was down but supply was high. At the end of the day each and every market is different, competition different, etc. Ultimately a good plan moving forward in my opinion is looking for secondary and tertiary markets that are fed by the larger saturate markets near them and really hunting for those undiscovered areas. Many gems still exist. 

I use Hospitable for my PMS. I like it. Easy to understand, budget friendly. Connects well with all listing platforms to sync calendar and schlage encode.