Stay away from HOA'S and condos(my personal rule)Pick tourist destinations.

Indeed, I'm not sure why you'd want to own a short-term rental home in Cancun to start with.People who land in Cancun (mostly tourists) generally either stay in a hotel / all-inclusive resort there or in the neighbouring Riviera Maya or they stay in a short-term rental in the Riviera Maya.

Although we are in Temecula, we are located on the wine trail which is outside of the city limits.

In fact, the views are a LOT better and there are hardly any tourists -- just walk along the Jersey City or Hoboken waterfront or take the bus to the cliffs of Weehawken.Feel free to check out my post about my journey from Brooklyn to Bayonne...My Long Journey to House-Hacking (biggerpockets.com)

@Tom Dean not every STR needs to be somewhere tourist centric, people have all kinds of reasons for wanting to rent a STR in an average joe kind of town.

Outside of real estate, I enjoy going to wine dinners, charity functions, date nights, piano bars, and nice dinners with my amazing wife.Excited to learn and connect with you all!

thank you for an amazing threadI had a couple college rentals which I collected  the years rent upfront with double security deposit and signers on the lease were parents and had to have excellent credit and plenty of income I made almost as much money in damage fees as I did on rent Or unusual to receive 5 figure checks from parents for wine stained carpet.  

Like  Bark Beatles that have devistated western pine forest as the way up into BC.. and of course the Ice wine bizz )  That must have been 2014.

In the latter two areas you can even do some STR, not with tourists but visiting nurses, etc.

However, Muskoka is a huge tourist area that attracts a large vacation population each summer.