Buying a Branson Short Term Rental: What Works (and What Doesn’t)

Avery :
Everybody, welcome to the Short Term show special episode series on Branson, Missouri where we are doing a 10 episode deep dive on how to buy a short term rental in Branson. So we’ve got a few supplemental materials for y’ all in addition to the content on this podcast over on our website. So any questions you have about purchase prices and searching properties, you can do that on our website. We also have the Air DNA data thanks to our friends over at Air DNA income data on properties in Branson. So you can find these things at the short term shop.com so www.the shorttermshop.com Purchase prices and income data. If you want to buy a short term rental property with a Short term Shop agent in Branson, you can email us at agents the ShortTermshop.com or if you just like us, you just want to hang out with us more, there’s a few ways you can do that. Can join our Facebook group. It’s the same title as my book.

Avery :
It’s called short term Rental Long Term. We, we are over there talking about short term rental investing all day, every day. Or if you prefer to talk to us in person or virtual person, you can join our zoom call that we have every Thursday. You can sign up for that@strquestions.com. we’ll catch you guys over there. Hey guys, welcome back to another episode on Branson of the Short Term Shop special episode series. So today we’re going to talk about what to buy. So areas, types of properties, things like that.

Avery :
And we got a cool panel here today. You are going to recognize Bill from last time. But Bill, go ahead and introduce yourself.

Bill Beck :
Hey, it’s Bill Beck. I’m a Branson real estate agent here with the Short Term Shop. I’ve got a background in vacation rental buying, consulting and. Yeah, all right, there you go. Like I said, try to keep it different each time. Right?

Avery :
Okay. All right, next we have Jonathan Roberts. John, you want to introduce yourself?

John Roberts :
Hi, I’m John Roberts. I’m a new investor in the Branson area. I worked with Bill last year to get my first short term rental property. Been operating it since November. At this point it’s going really well. Having a lot of fun. Excited to be here.

Avery :
Thank you so much for coming. So we will start with areas. So what is there a geographical area like a triangle or a square that we want to stay in when we’re buying short term rentals in Branson or is it kind of all over the place? Let’s, let’s go through that.

Bill Beck :
The triangle how did you know it was a triangle? You said it right off. I said that to you before?

Avery :
No. Well, so honestly, it. Since I’ve been selling in the Smokies longer than anywhere, I use a triangle there. So I just ripped that off. I didn’t realize it was actually a triangle. In Branson also, so much for being different.

Bill Beck :
Every episode, one more similarity. Right?

Avery :
Okay, tell me about the triangle.

Bill Beck :
Great question. So in Branson, first and foremost, everyone’s driving everywhere. So this is one of these areas that doesn’t have the same degree of sensitivity of where is your location, just to like, maybe like a beach market where it’s like, as you progressively get farther away from the beach, probably going to be less occupancy, less. Less eyes on it. The triangle shape kind of encompasses starting the northwest Branson west. That’s where Indian Point is. That’s where John’s property is. It’s not like that’s the edge.

Bill Beck :
It’s more like that’s a hub. And then that. That goes all the way down across the lake. Because Table Rock Lake, if you look at it on the map, Branson’s on the east side of the lake. So the majority of where the people are, the stuff is the strip, the shows, the entertainment, the restaurants, all on the east side. So you take that all the way down to the border of Arkansas, and there’s vacation rental properties all along this area. There’s things to do. And again, drive time from, you know, from Indian Point, where Solar City is down to Arkansas is probably 25 minutes.

Bill Beck :
And then you can kind of say it goes up to the other point of the triangles, like where Branson City center is maybe a little bit east of that. But if you start to get 15, 20 minutes north of Branson, you’re kind of in no man’s land. There’s nothing really out there. If you go east of Branson 30 minutes, you really are starting to get, like, far away from everything, Tom. There are things west towards the lake, you know, some. Some things. But it gets. It gets.

Bill Beck :
It gets to be pretty far out in the middle of nowhere really quick. You’re out in the sticks before you know it, so.

Avery :
Gotcha. Gotcha. And I hear a lot of talk about secondary and tertiary markets amongst all the influencers lately, about how the. The main. The major markets don’t work anymore, and you need to buy in a secondary market, like right outside of it, or a tertiary market even a little further outside of it. And I found that to be decent. Okay, advice in some markets and in some markets to be just like, wildly horrible advice. What do you think? Are there any little areas like that in Branson where, I mean, I guess Branson hasn’t gotten so crazy expensive like some of these markets have.

Avery :
But are there any, like, secondary tertiary markets that we need to be aware of or you really just want to stick in the triangle?

Bill Beck :
Well, it’s all down to the zoning, right? So Taney County, Stone County. Zoning is the conversation that really, if people are sleeping, not listening, like, this is it. Like, this is where the funnel begins. So if you don’t have a property that’s in one of these areas that’s approved for vacation rental, you can’t be jumping on Zillow realtor.com looking at things and saying, oh, that’s a cool house in the middle of nowhere. That’d be great to have as a vacation rental. Or if you. In this residential neighborhood, it’s just, you’re not going to get it approved. And we had that, I think, discussion a little bit with, with our earlier episode Tyan, but that’s the main thing that people need to be paying paying attention to.

Bill Beck :
So as far as tertiary up and coming, Barry county is on the west side of the lake. There are no regulations there, but you are about an hour away from Branson. So that is something where I’ve seen people look at those properties as an option. It’s just what brings people out there. I’ve showed property out there and people are like, okay, Bill, what. Why are. What is bringing people out here? Because there’s nothing but Dollar General and couple churches and farmland. I’m like, I don’t really know.

Bill Beck :
I mean, there’s probably someone out there that wants to book these to get a. Get away from it all. But that’s, that’s, that’s a maybe, you know, down in Arkansas, right. Right past the border, that’s a hotspot because it’s like, technically still part of Branson and there are no zoning restrictions, but I don’t have my Arkansas license. That’s one of those where it’s like, I can’t speak too much into that. Going north of Branson, we kind of already mentioned that. So it’s, it’s really hard. We don’t have a ton of tertiary markets in, in our area.

Avery :
And that’s totally fine because some markets have them. Some markets really don’t. Like the Emerald coast, for example, where I live. There’s, you know, if you could go across the bay to, like, Freeport. But that doesn’t make Sense, because the, the beach is over here on this side of the bay. So there’s no point in doing that and nobody would ever rent there. So. Okay, cool.

Avery :
So not really a lot of tertiary secondary stuff. So that’s fine. Some markets have them, some markets don’t. So let’s talk about the type of property. So this is where a lot of people will say, oh, I’ve bought in this mountain market and that mountain market and I’ve bought in the Poconos and the Smokies and the wherever else mountain market. And I’m coming to buying Branson. I’m coming from a Branson cabin now. So Bill, what are you going to say to people when they say, here I come to get my Branson cabin.

Bill Beck :
You’re going to go get yourself a cabin? Well, we don’t have cabins here, Branson. Well, just something that we uniquely have because of that zoning is we have condos, lots of condos. So are you excited to buy a condo? Because even single family homes are going to be condos and these are the things that are zoned for it really. We go back in a little bit of history. This is an area that very early wanted to set up. How do we allow these vacation rental properties in our market and figure out a way so that we’re not disrupting residential neighborhoods? So let’s push them all into certain communities where all your neighbors are doing the same thing. So if you want to get a cabin in Branson, there they exist. I don’t want to make it sound like this is a non existent product.

Bill Beck :
It’s just from an inventory available to buy standpoint, very hard to find. And when they get listed, they usually have a feeding frenzy for them. So there, there are, there are a handful scattered across our area, but they are going to be again in these communities that are technically deemed detached condos like we had in our first conversation. So that’s something that people just need to be aware of. So from an inventory breakdown, lots of 1, 2, 3, 4 bedroom condos and then we’ve got larger lodge properties, cabin type properties in the five plus bedroom range that go all the way up to one listed this weekend for like there was a 12 bedroom for 3 million sleeps, like 60 people might make, I don’t know, four or five hundred thousand dollars a year. So wow.

Avery :
Okay. So if you’re looking for one of those lower occupancy ones, it’s possible to find properties that for all intents and purposes other than lending, look like a cabin, but they’re Technically a condo, so you can still have your quote, Branson Cabin, just for lending purposes. It’s technically a detached condo, right?

Bill Beck :
Yes, yes, that’s exactly right.

Avery :
Okay, cool. And John, what type of property do you own?

John Roberts :
I know it’s going to come as a shock, but I, I bought a condo with Bill talking about trying to make it exciting. Bill, you excited me. The first call that we had when I told you I was interested in this market, I, I kind of did that thing that you were talking about. Went on Zillow and was looking at, you know, houses in like Kimberlin City area and things like that, that really wouldn’t work. But once you kind of broke it down and started explaining this is, you know, this is kind of how the market works and I started running the numbers on those condos, it, it really did excite me, especially since the, the one that I’m in. I mean, you can see Silver Dollar City from my deck, which has really been a driving factor in the bookings that we’ve got. So I’m in a two bed, two bath, about 900 square foot condo. Really great little community in village of Indian Point.

John Roberts :
And yeah, I think, I think it took what, like a couple of days to get it under contract back, back in that point. And I mean, it might be a little bit different now. I don’t really know how the market’s going now, but Bill kind of showed me it and I was like, yeah, I don’t know what that, that one’s doing. It’s been sitting on the market for so long, I was able to, to snatch it up.

Bill Beck :
So the nice thing about these concentrated communities is you start to get a feel for like what the relative values are and you can just see it as soon as it comes out. You see qualitatively, you’re like, okay, that thing is probably a little too high or that thing’s a potentially an awesome deal. So I saw it and John was, you know, he could, I could tell from the way we were communicating he was serious. So I’m like, hey, you might want to like really look at this one again, because on any given day there’s probably like half a dozen like really awesome buying opportunities where it’s like, okay, I’m not going to say this is the number one deal, but like in this cohort of good deals, one of these five or six ones is probably going to get it done. And I think that’s what, you know, maybe even yours was like a number one or two picks. So I’m Glad you took action when it presented itself as an opportunity.

Avery :
Awesome. And how many bedrooms is yours?

John Roberts :
It’s two bed, two baths.

Avery :
Okay, awesome. All right, so type of property. We’ve gone over that. So what is Indian Point? As someone who is not familiar at all, what’s Indian Point and West Branson and all that that you mentioned? So, like, where is the strip in relation to all that?

Bill Beck :
Okay, first we start with the lake. Do you know where Table Rock Lake is? Does that have a mental, like, shape? Okay, yes. So then Branson is east of that, like almost directly east of that. And then between Branson and the lake is the strip. So that’s where all of the activities, the theaters, the food, the restaurants are. And then when you take that towards basically up along the edge of the lake, that gets towards Silver Dollar City. The Silver Dollar City is like the entrance to Indian Point. So it’s right there on the edge.

Bill Beck :
And that’s something that Indian Point is. Is a bit of a, like, almost like a resort area where there’s a lot of people that own resorts, there’s a lot of vacation rental areas, there’s timeshares, there’s just, you know, all sorts of things that are having to do with tourism. But mainly the Silver Doll. Silver Dollar City. Right there.

Avery :
Are there a lot of RV resorts over there? Okay, that’s probably where I had my near death Branson experience. Was.

Bill Beck :
Yeah.

Avery :
And. Yeah. Okay, gotcha now. Now I’ve got my bearings. All right. Because we stayed at the. It was called the like Silver Dollar City Campground or something, but it actually was nowhere near Silver Dollar City. You have to go out and around.

Bill Beck :
That’s exactly. That’s right. That’s not an Indian point, but yeah, that’s like heading towards it. So you’re kind of like on the fringes of it, but. Yes.

Avery :
Okay. Okay, gotcha. And we just downsized our motorhome so to like a camper van. And we’re gonna. This is totally not anything to do with this, but instead of staying at campgrounds all the time, we’re going to just stay at Airbnbs and hotels. We can sleep in it if we want to for like a. A night, but it would be tight. But now we don’t have to worry about these near death experiences of getting the motorhome into situations that we can’t get it out of, which is what happened.

Bill Beck :
So we get. I know this is totally off topic, but it sounds really riveting. Can you give us the 32nd what happened?

Avery :
Yes. Okay, so we had a 44 foot motorhome towing my jeep. And we passed the entrance to the Silver Dollar City RV Park. And so I’m. We’re looking at our map and we said, okay, if we turn right right here, we can go down here and loop around. Looked great on a map without elevation lines. So we took a right and it was straight down. Nowhere to turn around because you have to have.

Avery :
You can’t just like, do a three point turn in a rig like that. So we’re like going down and then there’s a switchback and another switchback, and we’re thinking we’re going to fall off the cliff. And when we finally get down to the bottom, we’re like, okay, here’s the turnaround. The road ended. It just ended. There was no more road and it was just mud going out across. And we’re like, man, we. We made it through all of this downhill and the switchbacks.

Avery :
And then not being able to get like the switchback turn radius was too sharp for the motorhome to be able to get around. We somehow did without killing ourselves and our children. And. And then the road ended and there were two big, like, huge potholes full of water that they could have been three inches deep. They could have been 3,000ft deep. You could not tell. And we finally. Luke was like, okay, I’m just.

Avery :
I’m just doing it because there was no way. There was no way a tow truck was going to get us. There was nothing. And he just like, gunned it through the mud and we made it. And it almost broke, like, everything in the motorhome because it, like, shook it so bad. And I was like, laying on top of the kids because things were flying out of the cabinets onto us. And that’s the 32nd version. But it was really, really, really scary because it was a drop off on one side and.

Avery :
And Luke, I thought was gonna explode. And then we were trying not to have an explosion in front of the kids, let them know how scared we were. And I’d never, ever want to be in that position again. It was horrible. So now we got the camper van and we don’t.

Bill Beck :
You got PTSD about Branson. Avery, you’ve got a little bit here. Like, that’s.

Avery :
We’re coming back through at the absolute worst time of year, 4th of July this year.

Bill Beck :
So your blood pressure is going to come up because you’re just going to, like, start to see triggers and be like, oh, no, there it is again.

Avery :
Yeah. And Luke has an irrational fear of heights to Begin with. So it was just, it was really, really scary.

Bill Beck :
You’re just gonna start to see those billboards and be like certain little pieces coming down.

Avery :
So there’s a few areas of the country where we’ve had those issues. Okay. But anyway, so we’ve gone over types. So you’re pretty much always going to be a condo. Which guys. We keep saying that because it matters in terms of what type of loan you get. So you can’t just. And we’re going to talk about this in depth on the financing episode, but we keep beating condos into your brains because you have to finance these, like, condos, like non warrantable condos.

Avery :
So not your regular financing routes are not always going to work. So just. That’s why we keep saying that. So you cannot forget.

Bill Beck :
And, and because that’s what is available to buy and what people are staying at. So it’s, it’s not like this is like another market where if you get a condo, it’s not as good because there’s houses available. Plenty, plenty of houses or cabins as an alternative. It’s like, no, that’s like, that is what people are staying at. That is what is out there. And there are areas you want to be in close to. I think one of the best. I don’t know if you’ve ever recommended this, Avery, but sometimes just telling people, if you’re going to go look at a market.

Bill Beck :
If I were to go to Pigeon Forge or Gatlinburg or Sevierville or Dollywood, it’s like you put those terms into Airbnb and VRBO and look at the mapping algorithms. Where does that lay that over? It’s going to be a little bit different each time. But Branson is interesting because people don’t go like, hey, I want to go to like Branson west, or maybe they’ll see some of our city. Maybe, maybe Indian Point. But majority of research is showing people are saying Branson and where is that map, like putting you? So if you’re looking at location again, don’t put any dates in, don’t put any occupant number in vrbo, Airbnb, and then just plug that Branson in and it’ll show you. Okay, here’s the starting grid. And from there, if you’re like in that square, you’re in a good spot because you’re already like, people are going to be scrolling around and at least you’ll be there. If you’re way outside of that, that’s, that’s not a good, not a good Place to be.

Avery :
Got it. All right, so now let’s talk about sizes. Is there a specific size that doesn’t work? Or do all sizes work or what are we looking at size wise?

Bill Beck :
So we start with the one bedroom condo. I mean there’s ones that are like studio style. I don’t like those. They’re almost like hotel rooms. They’ve got like a kitchenette. It’s like, how are you, you know, differentiating yourself from a hotel room? You know, there are one bedrooms though that have, you know, full bathroom, full kitchen. If they’re like in a nice community with good amenities, it’s like those could actually rent out pretty well. In fact, they can in some cases have higher occupancies than some of the two bedrooms.

Bill Beck :
The two bedroom is like the majority of our inventory in Branson. I think there’s like, I want to say like 1700 two bedrooms out of our like total of about 5000, maybe more if you expand the area. But the two bedroom condo, that is the mainstay of what, what people are getting their hands on, it’s great for, you know, you can get six, eight, maybe even 10 people. Ten is probably a stretch. But comfortably get six to eight people in there, which if you think about it, that could be family with grandparents or it could be two couples. Or it’s just, it gives that enough option for you can have families or different demographics. You could get the older generation that books those. And if you want more space, there’s three bedrooms.

Bill Beck :
So three bedrooms, there’s less inventory of. They have a little bit more pricing power as far as your ability, but harder to get your hands on a three bedroom. But that is one of those that everybody is. Because there’s less of them. Some people want to go for those and then not as many four bedrooms, that starts to be like kind of rare territory. So if you get a four bedroom condo that’s like, and you’re starting to get into. There are cabins and, and single, single family type properties that are the two four bedrooms sizes. But there’s, there’s less and less of those.

Bill Beck :
And then we start to shift into the, the lodges, which are like from five all the way up to 10 bedrooms, actually even 12 bedrooms like we mentioned earlier. So those are all in purpose built communities. And you know, those are for the big groups of people coming in for our baseball tournaments, dance tournaments, church retreats. So those are the groups that are spending, you know, upwards of a thousand dollars a night to stay at this place because it sleeps, you know, 30 plus people. So.

Avery :
Okay. And I mean, that’s. I would imagine, and correct me if I’m wrong, that the lower. Lower occupancy properties have a higher occupancy rate. So the one bedrooms and two bedrooms probably stay booked a lot more often than the bigger ones, but the bigger ones command such a higher price per night that they. The return on investment can be higher. Is that fair to say?

Bill Beck :
Yeah. Occupancy for smaller properties, like, you can see like one bedrooms getting like, you know, 65, 70% occupancy, which is pretty good for our area. We don’t have like 12 months of the year where everyone comes here because January and February are pretty dead. So average, average in our area is like 55 or 56 or 54 somewhere right in that mid-50s. And then. So that’s. The two bedrooms are kind of right in that. In that lane.

Bill Beck :
I mean, John, have you seen a full year yet? I forgot when you bought yours.

John Roberts :
We haven’t done a full year. So we haven’t. We haven’t got to go through the busier season yet. But honestly, we got our condo up and running in November of last year. I think the first week in November was when we hit the go live button on Airbnb and we had it booked every weekend and into the week from November to December. And that’s a two bed, two bath. And that’s kind of taking advantage of the fact that Branson kind of has those two busy seasons. They’ve got the traditional summer season when people are coming for family vacations, they’re going to the lake.

John Roberts :
And then you’ve got the holiday season, which is huge in Branson. You’ve got all the shows do their holiday shows. Silver Dollar City completely changes and does the light shows and decorates for Christmas. We actually decorated our condo for Christmas this year because we had guests asking us to do that. So, yeah, we, we had. We didn’t have any issue keeping, you know, occupancy through that time of year with a two bed, two bath. And honestly, I know people in our condo complex that own multiple units, and they specifically are trying to buy the unit right next to them. So if they do have a larger group come in, they can say, yeah, it’s a.

John Roberts :
It’s a two bed, two bath. We’re limited to seven people per unit. But we have this unit right next door that’s also open, so. So we can accommodate a larger group with you. And in some of the units, they’ve actually been able to, like, open the deck. Up so that you can have the shared space on the deck. So even though, as Bill mentioned, you know, that two bed, two bath is kind of the sweet spot, there’s a lot of opportunity to, you know, mix and match in there so that you can, you can accommodate different group sizes, even if they’re looking for a little bit larger place.

Bill Beck :
Also the sweet spot too, it’s like, yeah, there could be ones that are overpriced or ones that are lacking amenities or are old and not updated. And it’s like those are ones that you don’t necessarily want to look at. It’s the same opportunity as the ones that are maybe a really awesome deal or, you know, ones that have, you know, walk in is a pretty important thing here. People like walk ins because we do have demographic of, of veterans and retirees that have, you know, from amputations to like, you know, walking issues and hip problems, knee problems, you name it. So a lot of people are looking for walk in properties. I do think penthouse units are good too though, just because they’ve got the spacious, lofted open area. So it feels bigger, you know, your voice carries. It feels more spacious, better lit, I generally think.

Bill Beck :
So you don’t have people walking on.

John Roberts :
Top of you in the middle of the night.

Bill Beck :
Right, Right. So those are just like little things that throw out as nuggets because yeah, not every two bedrooms, a two bedrooms, a two bedroom, we’ve seen massive ranges from like, hey, I made like $6,000 in a year. You’re like what, six? That’s it. Like, that’s not good. All the way up to like, oh, I’ve got a two bedroom that did 51,000. You’re like, that’s really good. What? So obviously outliers, what’s a purchase price.

Avery :
On a two bedroom?

Bill Beck :
Just average 200 to 250.

Avery :
Okay. So you can hit 20% of purchase.

Bill Beck :
Price, not probably 18, 19% right now. I just looked at it actually over the weekend and I was running some analytics and it’s. Then we could, I guess you could. If you started to offer lower than asking, you probably could get pretty close.

Avery :
So that’s, that’s hard to do nowadays.

Bill Beck :
Especially for less than $250,000. It’s like, what other, what other market? Avery, can someone go do that?

Avery :
Maybe Myrtle beach, but that’s it.

Bill Beck :
Because my background, I’m like, there’s there. This is like a unique market where it’s like, okay, if you are going to work in Branson, it’s going to be a condo, but if you only have, you know, quarter million dollars, play with like, this is. This is it. This is where you should go. And then if you go to other places across the country, yeah, sure, you could probably find a really sweet lake house with a slip on a nice awesome lake. But what lake is that? And it’s like, what’s the, what’s the number of occupants that are going to come through the course of the year and is there going to be, you know, your operational infrastructure from a team to take care of that? So that’s where Branson, like, yes, you kind of have quite a bit of homogenous inventory, but hey, you’re going to be taking care of on all these different fronts. So.

Avery :
Awesome.

Bill Beck :
Yeah.

Avery :
I mean, you. There are very few markets out there that are as affordable as Branson that still return and that they’re a mature enough vacation market that there’s actually the infrastructure for cleaners and handymen and people like that where you’re not having to go find somebody who cleans primary homes and try to train them to turn a vacation rental. So that’s pretty cool. And let’s talk about. I know we talked about it on the previous episode, but let’s hit on it again about lakefront and lake view properties just because people are going to. I feel like people are going to skip around episodes and miss that. So can you get a lakefront property with a boat slip and. And all those things?

Bill Beck :
Lakefront’s hard because the Corps of Engineer, Corps of Engineers owns, you know, the lake frontage. For the entirety of Table Rock Lake, you can own towards Lake Taneycomo, which is actually the river that runs off of the dam from Table Rock Lake. So the river runs east and kind of up along the Branson city center where the landing is. So there are certain complexes that you can have right off. I mean, you can walk down to the water, but again that’s. That’s more of a river and not the lake but Table Rock lake front with the slip. Very, very almost almost near. Nearly impossible to get lake frontage.

Bill Beck :
But Lake View is very doable. John’s community, there are lake views and you know, there’s marinas so you can get yourself if you want boat access. There’s proximity to those marinas is available.

Avery :
So yeah, typically do Lake View properties perform better than not Lakeview or are they priced higher for. To purchase. Sorry. To cost more to buy one.

Bill Beck :
Yeah, people. People have a weird thing with the lake. They love to see that water and.

Avery :
I think it’s that weird it’s not weird.

Bill Beck :
It’s. I. I just say that jokingly because it’s like, it’s like. It’s interesting how, you know, if you got a property that doesn’t see water, it just doesn’t have the same exact attraction that, that. I mean, I’ve got a listing that just sold actually yesterday, so. And it’s right by Table Rock, but you can’t see any water from it, so it’s like right next to it, but because there’s trees literally covering the water, I mean, you could see through it and see water, but it’s like, it’s right there, so.

Avery :
Gotcha.

John Roberts :
The. Having the, the lakefront view for us was actually a major selling point for my wife. She really wanted a. A property that we could get to Table Rock as easy as possible. And, and yeah, there are places around there. Village of Indian Point’s got a lot of. Of condos that have that kind of lake view. And it’s not necessarily lake frontage, but, you know, our.

John Roberts :
Our condo has a lakeside trail that I can get to from my unit, just walk down the stairs and I can walk along the trail, be right, right next to the lake. So it was a major selling point for us. But I can understand that, you know, some. Some people might not be that interested in it. Some people come to Branson just for Branson. Other people come to Branson for Table Rock. Other people come kind of a mixture.

Bill Beck :
So.

Avery :
Okay, got it. Let’s talk about amenities. Are there any amenities that you absolutely have to have? Because everyone has them. So if you don’t offer it, you’re at a disadvantage.

Bill Beck :
Resort amenities, I mean, that’s kind of the big thing is like, even for my vacation rental property, I have. It’s like my third picture is the pool. And that’s like, you know, if you want families to stay at your place, you gotta kind of swimming pool. So.

Avery :
Yeah, it’s the best way to wear out toddlers and little kids.

Bill Beck :
Exactly. Yes. Yes. So getting a nice attractive photo of the blue sky, blue water, comfortable seating, it just, you know, gives you that association of I’m on vacation. So communities that have pools got to have one, I think, at the very minimum. And then ones that have indoor pools, that allows you to stretch your. Your booking window or excuse your. Your bookings into some of the off season.

Bill Beck :
So maybe when people who have regular pools, they shut down for the season because we’re. We are in the Midwest. We’re not in like, you know, the south, so we do get chilly. So Pools are seasonal, so if you have an indoor pool that can help you get some occupants into the. Some of the off season where others may, may not book out as well. So that’s, that’s probably the number one profit driving a community amenity. We do have communities that have, you know, everything from like sand volleyball to shuffleboard to even like, like little like mini golf that people can go and do and just pick up. Um, but you know, ultimately that, that pool is like the number one thing that people are going to want.

Avery :
All right, what about inside the unit itself? Are hot tubs a big thing? You have to have a hot tub?

Bill Beck :
Not really. No. No. So the large lodge type properties even, they have like resort like pool and hot tub areas. So there are some of them, like I’ve sold one that had one that was in a, in a room that they had hot tub area so that they, they are out there for larger properties, but for condo properties, like. No, that you don’t, you don’t have those private ones, generally speaking.

Avery :
Okay. Do. I mean, can you even get a hot tub in some of those condo properties? I would imagine maybe the HOA has something to say about that. Or can you get one on your personal deck? If you want it to offer it.

Bill Beck :
Probably need to be HOA dependent. So I haven’t seen too many that people have done that though, just because I think part of it becomes like a structural engineering question too. Like, can this deck, like hold this thing up and.

Avery :
Right.

Bill Beck :
Secondly, how are you going to get it there? Because if it’s like a third story, it’s like, how is this actually gonna like get put there? So the community having pool and hot tub as, as like for starts kind of takes care of that.

Avery :
Gotcha.

Bill Beck :
Yeah.

Avery :
All right. Anything in particular that people are looking for in the unit? Like, in some markets you need to have at least an arcade game. If you don’t have an arcade room or a pool table or anything like that.

Bill Beck :
Yeah, large properties are very similar to the Smoky Mountain type properties as far as, like game rooms, you know, movie theater areas. All those things that, you know, like we have this here in particular is we’ll have like two separate kitchens. Because if there’s multiple families, maybe people don’t want to commingle there. Food and drink or if they’ve got, you know, baby food and whatnot. So it’s like, it’s good to have multiple kitchens.

Avery :
Okay.

Bill Beck :
Or smaller properties, it can range all over. I mean, just literally the fit and finish, usually starting with the kitchen, you know, that’s generally where you can tell if the properties, you know, been take, you know, been updated or not. Because you can do flooring, you can do paint, but to do the cabinets and to do counters, that’s pretty significant investments that really can dictate qualitatively where a condo’s at when you’re, when you’re judging it. So looking at the kitchen first, seeing, you know, what kind of counters they have, have they done the cabinets, appliances, are they stainless, you know, newer, or are they original, like the bottom of the barrel ones that are kind of rare to find here. But we do have people that will still rent green carpet, like straight up, like, like emerald green carpet from 1993 that the color is like sort of greenish now because of all the bleaching and dust and people walking on it with these like really a lot of brass, a lot of.

Avery :
Oh yeah. Do you get that great mauve colored carpet occasionally? That’s from the same era. Is the mauve carpet.

Bill Beck :
Yes, yes. It’s just you, you just see like, you can almost see that through the pictures, the smell that comes with it. So some people are like, ooh, I smell money because I do the rehab and I’m, I’m ready to burn this thing into str. And it’s like, okay. Most people are like, that scares me. Why would anyone ever stare that stay there. And you’re like, I don’t know, I haven’t. Great question.

Avery :
It sounds like. Or maybe I’m wrong about this. Correct me if I’m wrong. There might be a lot of opportunity for people who do want to do like a full in condo rehab because that’s not really that expensive compared to like a single family house. You’re only having to do the inside. Typically condo kitchens are a little smaller, so you’re not paying for as much like square footage of granite. So it seems like there might be a lot of opportunity for that, for some of those more grandma units for an easy rehab salute.

Bill Beck :
I mean even John, that’s, that was kind of your situation. Right? I mean, I’ll let you go ahead and I mean this is, this is a huge opportunity. So let, I’ll let him speak and I’ll finish off.

John Roberts :
Yeah, so there are actually a lot of, there’s a lot of variety in our complex on, on how many units have been fully updated and how many haven’t been touched since the 90s when those buildings were built and ours was kind of in between where it’s. They’ve done a little bit of work but you can tell that they haven’t done anything to the bathrooms since those things were built. The kitchen kind of has newer appliances and the cabinets have been replaced from the original, but there’s still some painting fixtures that could be going on. So that was another reason that we bought our unit was we saw what these other units in the complex were selling for that had been fully renovated. And, and looking at that and saying, you know, it’s not necessarily a project that I want to get into right now, but I know there’s the opportunity to do it. So that’s something that, that we’re looking at. I don’t, honestly, I don’t know if I really want to get into a full Renault on it. Mainly because if it’s running out just fine as it is and it’s making the numbers that I projected and wanted to make, that might be something that, you know, is, is a longer term project.

John Roberts :
But I know there are, I know there are three or four in, in our unit or in our complex that was on the market the same time of ours that you look at them and you’re like, this hasn’t been touched in 20, 30 years. And I know the guy who lives or not lives, who owns a few in, in the building next to us, that’s specifically what he does is he goes in, he buys those, those ones that haven’t been touched, does a full renovation on them and then gets them up on the market. So there’s a lot of opportunity there to do that.

Bill Beck :
Yeah. And like, like, I just think it’s a math thing. Right. So if it’s the community, they’re selling for 260, 270 and one’s for sale for 205 and it’s going to take 30, 35 max to get it to be a grade. It’s like, think about all that extra equity in there, just in the valuation of it. So definitely an option for the right people. I think people who are like, no, I want that. I just want to buy it turnkey 100% and not do anything to it and get huge cash flow with it.

Bill Beck :
It’s like, well, that’s going to be hard because the seller put a lot of work into it. So their psychology is that, no, I’m not going to give this away. I’m going to charge a premium for it. And then that kind of eats into the, the potential return on a property. We are in a market right now though, where there is a little bit of a shift and there’s a little less of the buyer demand than we saw last year. So there are some opportunities maybe get some of those renovated ones where maybe they will drop their prices a little bit. So you can still get a good opportunity. So just.

Bill Beck :
It’s just being mindful of what is the. What is the relative value for what they’re asking and what you should or shouldn’t go for.

Avery :
That makes sense. I do like that. That idea, though, because there’s really only so many things, so many expensive items in condo, so that could be a really good opportunity for people.

Bill Beck :
Yeah. And it’s low risk because you’re not gonna have to mess with, like, a roof. You’re not gonna have to do, like, a refinish a basement, you know, like, there are no basements. Like, yeah, like, you’re right. Kitchen floors, paint, furnishings, electronics. Maybe H Vac. H Vac and water heater. Those are the, like, ones behind the closet.

Bill Beck :
But that’s the biggest ticket item. Right. And then from there, it’s like, what. What else is there to worry about here? It’s like, nothing with siding, no foundations.

Avery :
It’s like, anyway, you’ve got me interested in the. In Branson now.

Bill Beck :
Let’s do it, Avery.

Avery :
Okay, so I think we’ve kind of gone over everything. Is there anything in particular that sticks out in your mind that doesn’t work, that people should avoid? Aside from things that aren’t zoned Right.

Bill Beck :
Timeshares.

Avery :
Yes, we should avoid those at all costs.

Bill Beck :
But it’s also not a joke because we have. What’s really interesting in Branson, if you think of the first part is, okay if it’s zoned use for vacation rental. Cool. Well, then there are communities that are like, yeah, you can use this as a vacation rental, but you have to use our management. Like, what? It’s like, you have to use the management as part of the covenants and restrictions that you are forced to use the management that goes along with it. I don’t know if that’s in other markets. Like, do you have that every.

Avery :
In some markets more than others, but, yeah, I think that’s a terrible idea, too.

Bill Beck :
It’s. It’s brutal because they usually are like, we’ll charge 45% off the top. And it’s like, well, how is that ever going to pencil out? And the answer is, it’s never going to. So I never have sold one to a client. I will never try to. Unless someone really wants to, like, go ahead and lose some money. Those are the ones to completely watch out for. It’s like, do not do not go, don’t, don’t even think about it.

Bill Beck :
So that’s like, that’s like the big red flag. And then generally speaking too is like the, the very, very entry level because you know how Air DNA will like do different tiers. Like there’s luxury tier and there’s like the high tier, then there’s like the mid and then like budget and like the ultra like the very entry level economy. I don’t know if economy is lowest but that, that is something I caution too because it’s like from a competitive advantage and future proofing of your investment. What are you going to have moving into the future if it’s something that doesn’t have amenities that is really, really basic. I mean you really, your only value is the low price and that’s a race to the bottom if you’re just trying to cut your rates. So.

Avery :
Gotcha. Yeah. And you just like can’t if they start doing a bad job, if you’re like deed bound to have to use them, then you can’t even threaten to hire somebody else to replace them.

Bill Beck :
Yeah. It’s like where’s the incentive here? Because if you can’t fire them then how hard are they going to work for you? And if they’re taking such a huge amount like shrug worthy. Right.

Avery :
So yeah, yeah. So yeah, that’s a good thing to avoid. Anything else we need to avoid.

Bill Beck :
There are also ones that are like you can self manage but if you do then you don’t get to like access the amenities which is again one of those like huh. Or there’s another one that if you self manage you have to pay a per booking fee to the association because they, they manage the key cards. Again it’s one of those that’s like you kind of have to find it out by investigating for clients like okay, what’s the situation here? So just those little nuances. I generally just, I get that right in front of people so there’s no surprises. Yeah, I just like to get that like right out in the open. So yeah. And then just flat out people that are really, they weren’t listening and are really like wait, what about this house though? It’s, it’s, it’s like it’s kind of cool looking. Right Bill? And I’m like yes, it’s really cool.

Bill Beck :
Do you want to move here? Like be my, be my, be my guest. Come on out, let’s go. You can’t use it for vacation.

John Roberts :
And Bill, what was the. There’s also, I remember when we were Looking, there was that one property that had like two HOA fees. There was the property owners HOA fee and then there was another fee on top of that. And I think total monthly fee was like 450 bucks.

Bill Beck :
So that’s Point Royale. Yeah, there’s a couple that have like a split one where it’s like a community association and then it’s split with the actual building condo association. So those fees can add up. But Point Royale is good in terms of it has like the indoor pool clubhouse, really nice taking care of golf course. So I used to say like, don’t go there. It’s like no go zone. It’s too expensive. But then I’ve seen occupancy for like clients that were like, no, we want to buy there anyways.

Bill Beck :
And they’re like, yeah, we got like this occupancy percentage. I’m like, that’s phenomenal. Like, that’s really, really well. So I just think it’s a factor that factors in, not something that’s like a deal breaker.

John Roberts :
Yeah. I didn’t know if there were other ones other than Point Royale that are kind of like that, but it was something weird that I was looking at that you just have to like factor in your numbers. But.

Bill Beck :
Yeah, but there’s not really like, I mean, luckily a lot of our anything that you’re kind of free to self manage, it’s like the world’s your oyster. Like if you get something that’s zoned like, hey, you got opportunity here. There’s not like, there’s not like a lot of landmines out there. It’s just like, just all the basics that we, you know, talk about with how to self manage or use good management to take care of it. Because then that’s really what’s going to dictate performance.

Avery :
Yeah, absolutely. All right, well, I think we’ve pretty much covered everything about what to buy or potentially what not to buy. So guys, if you want to buy a condo with Bill in Branson, you can email us@agentshorttermshop.com and we will get you connected. And also if you just have further questions and want to learn more about this, there are several ways you can do that. The first one is you can join our Facebook group. It’s called Short Term Rental Long Term Wealth. So same as my book. And you can also join us every Thursday for a live zoom call where you can.

Avery :
We’ll just answer any of your questions on short term rentals and you can sign up to join those@str questions.com thanks everyone.

Bill Beck :
Thanks John. Thanks Avery.

John Roberts :
Thank you.

Avery :
SA.