They are mainly a hedge against inflation as they typically will not cash flow well, they should be less management intensive and therefore take less time, but if you are investing for cash flow, or even strong appreciation there are much better paths.

The worst thing to do would be picking a couple markets as it is intensive to find the right teams and systems in those areas especially with only 50k. 50k focused in one cash-flow affordable market is the best way to do it, so I say chose a market you have some connection or competitive advantage in.

Originally posted by Joseph Irons:J Scott as an investor you know as well as I do that more is at stake then losing $10k...I completely disagree...and I have my own story to back me up...I started with absolutely no real estate knowledge, and without taking any courses, seminars, or expensive trainings, I did my first rehab after about 6 months of intensive study and learning my market.

That means speaking at the level of your audience, even if your audience is elementary students on one end and college students on the other.To be honest, it's very time intensive and it's ideal to have the relationships built prior to ever appearing in front of the council.

If it's just a shot in the dark type question, I'd say the average laundry pulls in more than the average rental at the dollar invested, COC, but it is labor intensive and you earn more than you make, it's a hands on operation unless you have a good maintenance/manager person.

The nice thing is that even if the STR market proves to be too labor intensive for my wife and I it isn't hard to find a property that cash flows at market rents and that will be a key factor as we move forward in narrowing down the properties.What has been your biggest challenge in the STR market so far? 

Some real estate niches are very marketing intensive and require you to be a real "people person".

When you plan to operate remote, choosing a management intense scenario amplifies your biggest weakness - not beeing local.

You could consider yourself lucky that this is your only time-intensive tenant.

The longest stayed for three years (as I updated the other units), and I would be more proactive next time as that relationship was strained snd management intensive the entire time.