You basically need to assign a value to all of the personal property (furniture, appliances, TVs, kitchen supplies, etc) inside the STR and they'll send you a tax bill based on the total. 

These would esquire you to spend 5-10x more time on the rentals,  and what if they produce the same or less income after you go out and buy all the furniture and start paying all the utilities.

Gone are the days of half updated houses with used furniture and cell phone pics.

I would say go the owner occupant loan route to get into something for 3.5-5% down instead of 20-25% that you'd need with an investor loan, but those require you to live in the property for a year before you could rent it out.Airbnb could be appealing also since you'd already be furnishing the place for yourself, could just leave the furniture there after you'd move out.

@Jason O.I've rented to over 700 students (under and grad) and I understand the market well.To do it successfully: time it with the academic calendarSept to May: flat price including utilities and furniture for max revenue, can include a cleaning service to keep an eye on the rental.May to Aug: depends on your city density and the amount of summer classes, increase the price to accommodate the demand or decrease it accordingly.

Cleaning, restocking, rebuying broken furniture, hanging up new art, meeting with a general contractor, etc. your kids will be expecting the beach, and yet you will be hanging up wall art. 

To figure the expense of furnishing, you could use this rule of thumb: $10-15k for the unit itself (things like appliances, living room furniture) and $2-3k/bedroom.

Furniture.

As compared to today, the former process was more like crafting a fine piece of handmade furniture, instead of buying something at Ikea. 

You should try renting the home out with furniture if you have the budget to do it.