And if it is close, consider that this new tenant may only stay a year, and then you have another lost month's rent and costs to turn it over again.And a new tenant is an unknown. 

Unknown to us it said 9 birds were accepted by the management company and it did not stipulate what kind of birds they were although we were told verbally they were just two love birds which are about 5 to 6 inches long and birds that are in the apartment flying around are cockatoos about 14 to 18 inches.

New builds take a lot of the risk out of buying the unknown, they are desirable to renters too.  

The guy set off to explore a world completely unknown where it was thought you’d sail off the edge of the earth or be eaten by 500 foot long double headed sea creatures .

I know it will cost money to bring the property up to par with market value, the big unknown is how much?

Upon move out I find that that there is blue paint (about 2"x12" long) on the carpet of the master bedroom and 2 large stains (about 3"x6" each) of unknown origin on the carpet of another bedroom.

There are too many unknowns and costs associated with PMs.  

I think there's an opportunity here to keep a good tenant by not necessarily rocking the boat(tenants who are reliable and can help you to cut out some of the stress of the unknowns).

As both a short and long term rental owner I’ll just add a few words of caution here...AirBnB and other vacation rental sites like HomeAway are great for the purpose they originated: short term rentals, but they offer minimal protection for the concerns of many owners needing to secure their properties for longer lease terms.As a traditional property manager I’m far more interested in ensuring I pull a full criminal background check, speak with a potential tenant’s present and prior landlord, confirm consistent employment/income sources for > 6 months, and ensure a potential tenant has a track record of paying other bills they have agreed to in writing like credit cards, car loans, and others.On the contrary, at best AirBnB/HomeAway/others give me the following info on guest/tenant: a blurry selfie (that could be their dog)confirmation of a non-specific government IDconfirmation of an email address I can’t seecurrent city/state of residencelist of reviews by individuals running a different AirBnB (that I have no way of confirming is not the guest’s best friend)Property insurance secured by (and in the interest of) someone who is not meWhile I’m OK with taking a gamble on unknown guests using my property for short term stays, stays of longer than 1 month generally involve: Someone looking to move significant belongings in with them (that I cannot legally remove in most states)Moving in for a period of time they’re generally unable to pay for entirely upfrontTenants receiving access only after a legally-executed lease, criminal, background, credit, and income check that’s par for the course in a professional, term stay arrangementEven beyond the blatant lack of risk mitigation tactics common in long term lease agreements, the fact remains that many STR platforms are also skimming 10-20% of gross revenue off the top of owners’ profits for little beyond the initial SEO and payment processing.

They don't have experience, they likely want to move before having an established income record, and there are a lot of unknowns.