HUGE tourism base too.

Part of my retirement strategy involves travelling a lot, especially in SouthEast Asia (Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia) as the cost of living is much cheaper than the US and I enjoy the food & culture.

;-)We have the Childrens Museum of Southeastern CT; the SE CT Council of Governments (SECCOG); a tourism group, SECTER (SE CT Enterprise Region); and a bundle of other organizations w/'southeastern CT" in their names that I won't mention lest I start to sound like Forrest Gump's friend. hahaRegardless of what you call it, there's a lot of opportunity here.

None of these are promising signs.Combine that with strict regulation and the leasehold ownership and you have structural disadvantages which make it very hard to profit as an individual investor.I know other expats and locals who are investing in Vietnam, Thailand, Taiwan and Malaysia.

Born and raised in Tampa, ofcourse I am biased to Tampa but I think there is a case to be made that Tampa enjoys a variety of STR travelers, more than the average city.For example, here in Tampa not only do we have theme park and beach tourism (#5 ranked beaches by TripAdvisor in the world in 2021), we have educational tourism (one of the largest universities - USF and then UT), and also medical tourism (we have some of the best hospitals in the country especially for outpatient services).

Daytona Beach has a wide tourism reach from bike week, NASCAR and a newer spring break crowd.

There is the demand from refinery contractors and from tourism.  

We have a ton of tourism, which fuels hospitality.

However, you can take advantage of this if you wanted...Take care and buy something well-positioned, low priced, and have plenty of reserves behind it so when tourism recovers in those markets you can take full advantage.In the meantime, people will always need a roof over their head!

Given Texarkana's lack of tourism and large institutions, I think you are looking at the friends and family market.