Single Family Vs. Short Term Rentals

Variety in your investment portfolio is a must! But how do you decide what that variety should be?

There is such a difference in income with traditional rentals compared to vacation rentals. I’ll use one of our current Vacation Rentals, Cabin on the Flats, as an example. If I was to rent this out as a traditional rental, I could probably get around a thousand dollars a month for it. It’s not very big; it’s about 1200 square feet, three-bedroom, two-bath.

So using round numbers, we’ll stick with a thousand bucks a month. So that’s twelve thousand dollars a year gross rent, that’s before any taxes, any insurance, any mortgage or anything. Or any maintenance or God forbid something breaks in it throughout the year.

$12,000 a year whittled down after all of that potentially might not leave us with very much. If this is your first time investing, traditional rentals might be your route, just like it was my route, and you get your foot in the door, and you can eventually upsize, modify and change your portfolio, and that’s great.

But for us, this very same property, same 1200 square feet, same utility costs potentially and same maintenance and all the same expenses, taxes, insurance and mortgage as a vacation rental, we could make five thousand dollars a month, which is sixty thousand dollars a year, which leaves a lot more additional income left over at the end of the year.

So for us, this is an eye-opening opportunity of traditional rentals compared to vacation rentals. Every market and every area is going to be different, and depending on how seasonal it is or how expensive it is to get into that vacation rental property market, that all changes and varies, but it can be life-changing money. Then you have great success. There’s always the possibility to add another one or two, or who knows. Or you can upsize them and have a nicer one, somewhere where you want to vacation to.

It’s okay to start small, you could be that same person like I was when I was 22 and buy the cheap house that needs some work, and then gradually you can upsize it, or you can sell it even. The safe thing about real estate is generally as long as you don’t get in over your head from the get-go, you do build equity and God willing, it’ll appreciate and, depending on the market, maybe more than you expect.

With vacation rentals, literally, it could be something as small as an extra bedroom that you have, that could be you starting small to build revenue and equity, and then take that additional income and maybe then buy a property that you can convert into either a traditional rental or a vacation rental.

Ultimately, there is no wrong answer. It all depends on your tolerance for risk and the specifics on whatever property you are looking at. But if you want to Live Limitless, Real Estate Investing in both of these directions is your key to abundance and wealth.

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Author: Christina VanDergrift

CHPC | Author | RE Broker | Serial Entrepreneur

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