We Bought Our First Airbnb...And Are Moving!
We loved hearing your guesses on Instagram as to what our big news would be! For those of you who guessed that we bought an Airbnb, you were right! For those of you who guessed we are moving, you were also right! (for the 5th time in under 4 years! I know, I know, you are laughing!) We've been keeping this quiet for a while, and my insides have been screaming to tell y'all. WE ARE SO EXCITED FOR THIS RENOVATION!! More excited than ever before! Okay, where to start with this story.... We bought this property right before Christmas. It was extremely impulsive, 0% premeditated.
Ty and I were in Holland at 205 Coffee working on the blog. I was checking the new real estate listings and turned the laptop toward Ty to show him a house. I thought it was an incredible value considering the location. Really, I just showed him because I thought it was interesting. We share unique properties with one another, both for fun, and for self-education, constantly learning the market. Ty said something like, "Wow, that is a special property, I wish I could think of someone in the market for something like that! Maybe we should drive by it." We drove by and walked around the neighborhood. The location was far better than we had imagined. This home is STEPS from Lake Macatawa, with water views and lake access! We decided to walk through it...just for fun (famous last words).
Ty got ahold of the listing realtor and asked if we could walk through the house. She approved a showing for several hours later. We ran some errands to check on our townhomes in Holland, and a flip in Grand Haven, talking about the property the entire time. Before we even saw the inside of the house, we were emotionally attached.
We walked through the house with my parents that afternoon. The house was in need of an ENTIRE renovation. The flooring, walls, ceilings needed to be refinished/replaced. The kitchen and bathroom were falling apart. The garage door was broken; the exterior was very dated. Needless to say, we fell in love immediately. Nothing screams "buy me" more than old cabinets and crumbling baseboard (yes, we know we are not normal).
We walked through the house in 15 minutes in order to get home in time for the Vikings game. 15 minutes was all we needed to know it was meant for us. We began to discuss what we could do with the property. Should we flip it, turn it into a long term rental, Airbnb?
We decided to buy the property as as an Airbnb!
We called the realtor that night and made an offer. After negotiating for a few days, we came to an agreement and closed on the property 10 days later.
I told you it was impulsive! We woke up that morning having literally NO idea that we were going to buy a house that day, much less this year. We hadn't looked at a single property (for ourselves) since buying the condo; it was not on our radar whatsoever. And what makes this even more random? We certainly had not thought about buying a home in HOLLAND, or anywhere on the lakeshore! However, If we have learned anything in this business, it is that some properties only come up once in a lifetime. We strongly feel that this house is not replaceable. It could be many years before another similar property is on the market, especially at a reasonable price. We had to jump.
We also decided to move in (temporarily)...
Shortly after we bought this property, we decided to move in, temporarily. Yes, we are selling the condo. We are a little sad that we are leaving the condo so soon, but ultimately decided that it would make the most sense to sell the condo and move into the Airbnb temporarily. The long term plan (which seems to change every 2.5 days) is to begin looking for land in Grand Rapids. We would like to build our next home, living in the #HTlakehouse during the construction. We will be living in the condo for a couple more months until the lakehouse is livable.
Why not just keep the condo and add it to your rentals, you might ask? We wish we could; unfortunately our condo's HOA prohibits rentals in the neighborhood, so we are not allowed to rent our condo, short or long term. Whereas, we are able to rent the lakehouse, making it more of an asset to us. We plan to Airbnb the lakehouse when we travel. Our short term goal is for the lakehouse to cover our current travel expenses! Our long term goal, after we move out, is to use #HTlakehouse as an AirBNB several months out of the year, enough for it to pay for itself entirely. Essentially, we plan for it to be our full time residence now, with plans to keep it long term as a cottage/Airbnb.
Why wait so long to share the news? Frankly, we weren't entirely sure what our plans where for the new property, or what it meant for the condo. We wanted to take some time to navigate this purchase along with other life changes. Stay tuned for a tour of the property, as well as our plans for the renovation! We began this project about two months ago and have so much content to share. We are so excited to share this journey with y'all!
HJJ