This shocked me, as normally if I list something for sale on the internet (like say an old piece of furniture for sale) it seems like the ratio of scammers and weirdos to legitimate buyers is about 10 to 1, that did not appear to be the case for the rental which was a nice surprise ... 

Both sides are vacant with evictions happening this month.There's a lot of junk still laying around, plus furniture, etc.With the "as is," clause, we're on the hook for moving the old tenants stuff out?

We added color through furniture and accents.

I didn’t have furniture in my house for about a year, that got old for my girlfriend.

I provide a full list that has free furniture, food banks, etc. 

Puppies usually go after personal property, shoes or furniture not doors or light fixtures. 

Of course we took him up on his generous offer, especially after about two months of prior discussions with him about staging that never went anywhere.Unfortunately, whatever deal Jekyll may have made with his stager at his own alleged expense turned out to almost cost us: Two months into renting the furniture, Jekyll forwarded to us an invoice from the stager.

Anyways, Thanks Erin for the conversation starter and I hope those who are interested in just starting out with a house-hack AND STRs will still give it a shot because the upside is so awesome and the downside is you sell the furniture and convert to a LTR.

and how did you factor the cost of furniture into your calculation?

I need to figure out what the best locations may be and how to estimate costs such as management, maintenance, cleaning as well as furniture, towels and kitchen items initially.