[00:00:02] Speaker A: Welcome to short term shopping, where we explore homes for sale in the best vacation markets in America.
Some homes we do like, some homes we don't like.
Brought to you by the short term shop.
It's short term shopping.
Short term shopping. Episode number 47. I'm just kidding. I made that number up. But we are here with Natalie in the smoke.
And life is good. Life is good. How's things out there? Business seems to be picking up a little bit, but sellers not selling. I don't know. What's your take on it? Just briefly on the market.
[00:00:44] Speaker B: So first thing I'll say is that if anyone tells anyone that tourism is down in the Smokies, they are wrong because it is packed. Everywhere is packed. Little obscure places are packed. It's packed every day, like, it is packed. So tourism is not down. Someone tells you that they.
They might be down, their. Their rental might be down for 100%, it's them.
It's them.
And I say that lovingly. Right. Like, if you are. Are our client and struggling a little bit, come to short term shop plus. If you are not our client and you are struggling a little bit, come to short term shop plus.
[00:01:25] Speaker A: We're happy to help. We're very happy to help. And we've been there before, too. I've been there. I've been guilty of it. It happened.
[00:01:32] Speaker B: Yeah. I call it letting go of the wheel. I had an entire year with my rentals that I didn't know I was doing it. But I let go of the wheel and got to the end of the year, and my income was lower than it definitely should have been. And I sat down with my husband, and I was like, what just happened? And we fixed it so it was. It was pricing, by the way. It was pricing.
[00:01:51] Speaker A: It's always pricing. But. But also a year goes by like this.
[00:01:55] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:01:56] Speaker A: And it's. You know, it just.
[00:01:58] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:01:59] Speaker A: Gives you some perspective being in this business. Like, man, it's. Wow. I didn't realize how fast my life was flashing before my eyes.
[00:02:06] Speaker B: You know, it's crazy.
[00:02:08] Speaker A: But I agree. Tourism is up. As a matter of fact, it took
[00:02:11] Speaker B: me
[00:02:13] Speaker A: almost twice as long to get my son from tennis to baseball yesterday.
Two and one, two and one day on a Tuesday or whatever it was.
And as usual, because we had to go down the main highway and they are. They are here. They are here.
[00:02:33] Speaker B: Same here.
[00:02:33] Speaker A: And they are spending money.
[00:02:35] Speaker B: Same here. My oldest is.
He is moving at the beginning of May, and so we're trying to knock out, you know, his favorite things before we leave. He wanted to go to the peddler last night to eat. So we had to go through. Yeah, so we had to go through downtown, to the other side of downtown Gatlinburg, to the parkside of downtown Gatlinburg. And parking lots were full. And it was packed on a. On a Tuesday.
Yeah, absolutely packed.
[00:03:07] Speaker A: Yep. And I read a study one time. It was for a particular county not far from me here in Florida, and they said it was $5,000 per car. So if you see a car out there in that traffic they have brought, in addition to lodging and travel.
[00:03:23] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:03:24] Speaker A: Just spending money. They will drop $5,000 per car in our town, and we need them to do that.
[00:03:30] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. That's the thing is, you know, locals, which. I am one. I am local. But locals complain about the traffic, and I understand it is very frustrating, but when I'm sitting there, I try to remind myself that that feels like money. You know, I've said that on the podcast before. You know, if you're. If you come to visit your property and you're frustrated because of traffic in your area, you bought in the right area.
[00:03:56] Speaker A: Yes. And without them, our restaurants will close in the wintertime and things like that because, you know, there's not enough people in these areas to sustain all of the business.
So we're grateful for them, even though they.
[00:04:10] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:04:10] Speaker A: They can get annoying. But it's that time of year. All right, let's do some shopping. We're gonna go to Pigeon Forge. I'm just gonna type in pigeonforge on Realtor do and see where this goes. We do have a few houses kind of on the back burner just in case, or we might click around on them. Who knows how this is going to go? We're just going to have some fun. Actually, let me do a cooler screen share. Actually. I don't know if I can share with.
I can only share my face. So we won't do that. We'll just do a regular old screen share.
Okay. So, I mean, we can do whatever you want here. The sky's the limit. Space is the place. Is there a particular dollar figure we should move zone in on? Or a number of bedrooms?
Start with something small, start with something cheap, and then go. Go more expensive. Or what do you think?
[00:04:55] Speaker B: Uh, well, so here, every price range can be sexy for whatever your budget is. So let's just maybe start small and let's work our way up. Let's.
[00:05:04] Speaker A: Yeah, let's try that. Let's do. Let's do. And it's just Again, I'm on realtor.com today, which is usually my favorite. And keep an eye. Keep in mind here, this is again, we're teaching folks how to shop for houses. If you click.
If you click one of these, I've already screwed it up. But if you click one of these on this is again just realtor.com it will highlight anything bigger.
Huh. So this is something. Keep an eye on here. I. I'm not looking for that right now. I'm looking for. I'm gonna X that out again. I'm looking for studio and one bedroom only.
And we'll go ahead. Any bathrooms? It's not going to have more than. I mean, to have even two bathrooms and a house that size, a little weird, but we'll see.
[00:05:42] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:05:43] Speaker A: And then I don't know what's. What's the going rate here? What should I. If I'm looking for, you know, a decent deal and we're gonna. We're gonna find stuff that's not a deal and stuff that is a deal. But is there a price range that I should eliminate or should we just look at every one of these things?
[00:05:59] Speaker B: You know, if you drop below 350, you really kind of get into either you get into things that aren't going to probably be a good rental, so things that are very residential looking, or I will tell you, like, even below 350, there's not really world where you're going to find something for a deal and fix it up. So I, I usually don't do a search below 350.
One thing I'll tell people, since the objective is obviously to teach people how to shop.
When you set bedroom parameters specifically in the Smokies, it can make it tougher for you because sometimes it will be listed on the MLS as a one bed, but actually a two bed or things like that because a septic permit. So what I usually tell my clients for the Smokies is set. The only parameter I want you to set for right now is just your price because if your budget allows for 450 and you can get a two bed for that, I'd like to see those. I don't want to, you know, so.
So anyway, that's just a little trick. That's just a little. I don't usually do bedroom count because I. In this Smokies, it can kind of skew things a little bit. So whatever your budget is, that's an excellent point.
[00:07:09] Speaker A: Excellent point. I think I am going to keep it just for right now and then we'll delete it here in a second and I want to prove your point.
See if any of these are worth a damn it. And also another. Yeah, go ahead real quick.
[00:07:23] Speaker B: Another thing I'll throw out there is in our market, sometimes something will be a one bed, truly meaning that septic permit and the actual doors that close.
But it may rent as a two bed because it has a loft that no one is calling a two bed, but on rental you can call it a two bed. And it's true, truly a second bedroom as long as you show your potential tourist that it is an open wall loft with a king bed or, you know, whatever, so they can sleep very different as well. So again with back to the budget thing.
[00:07:55] Speaker A: Well, see now here, this one's under contract. That one I actually don't want to look at this, see if it's.
[00:08:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:08:01] Speaker A: Where is it? First of all, that's, that's where it comes in handy to have a rockstar agent and like have, you know, a lot of this stuff memorized.
That's Walt Price Road. So you're what going into hidden Moun mountain areas west.
[00:08:14] Speaker B: Yeah, that's good location.
[00:08:18] Speaker A: That's at the beginning of the hoa, I think. Yeah, it might, it may not even be in.
[00:08:24] Speaker B: May not. Yeah, yeah. Which is. Okay. Hidden Mountain west, even if you're inside the HOA is super cool. It's hidden mountain east that you want to avoid.
[00:08:33] Speaker A: Yeah, this, this is a real log cabin with the chinking. This actually looks like it might have been a pretty damn good option here.
[00:08:41] Speaker B: Yeah, they've done some. Whoever owns it now has done some, some stuff. Some good stuff.
[00:08:48] Speaker A: Yeah, this is actually. Seems like the price was right on this.
[00:08:52] Speaker B: Yeah. Newer hot tub.
[00:08:55] Speaker A: Unless there was something about the location that we can't see right here. Yeah, maybe. Who knows?
[00:09:01] Speaker B: I didn't show, I didn't show this one, so I'm not sure. But could be. Sometimes up here you have to be careful.
[00:09:07] Speaker A: Yeah, that might be one of those ones that's down there on the left hand side down kind of in that ditch. You know what I mean?
[00:09:12] Speaker B: I do. And I think that's where it is.
[00:09:13] Speaker A: Yeah, it might be because that, that would explain the price. But it still is cute as hell.
[00:09:18] Speaker B: It is. Yeah.
[00:09:19] Speaker A: So that one actually again, we're. We're just having some fun here. But that one is actually worth noting because the reason I even clicked on that it just was happened to be the first 350 I saw there was because I figured based on what Natalie said where 350 is kind of your danger zone.
If I were to be able to find something in that neighborhood, a dollar figure neighborhood, it would probably have to be something that just went for sale. In other words, if it's in that 350 or lower range and it's not brand new listing, it's probably. That's another indication that it's most likely garbage. Yeah, right.
[00:09:59] Speaker B: Yeah.
And real quick, just something to throw out there just for education purposes. When you are shopping at this price range. Another thing that you want to be in really good communication with both your realtor and your lender and a lender that really understands short term rental lending rules is there are certain loan products that we use that cannot be below a certain square footage. So some of these get very small.
And then there are certain loan products that will not lend on a true log cabin. So those are two things. The log cabin aspect, you have to be careful at any price range but the square footage. When you're looking, when you're shopping, lower budget, you want to be careful of square footage.
[00:10:44] Speaker A: Absolutely. I actually recognize a few of these.
This one here has been for sale for a very long time.
[00:10:50] Speaker B: Not a bad house at all.
[00:10:52] Speaker A: Definitely has some maintenance issues. But I think the road was maybe not super desirable, but pretty good price.
[00:11:00] Speaker B: Yeah. And I will say so that specific road is a very, very washed out road that is not maintained by anyone. There's no HOA for road maintenance and it's not maintained by the county.
So that's tough because it's. It's very washed out, very rutted, but it's at the beginning of the road. So like this specific house, the road is less offensive than if you were buying a little bit further up and having, you know. But it does have some maintenance things that need to be.
But for 350.
[00:11:33] Speaker A: Yes. But I do have some insider information there from a gentleman who owns one up higher up the hill and they have gotten together and come up with the money to fix the road.
[00:11:42] Speaker B: I love that. Gosh, that's so good to hear.
[00:11:45] Speaker A: Yeah, that's good to hear.
So that person got lucky because they may or may not. They probably don't know that.
[00:11:52] Speaker B: I love that. Yeah.
[00:11:53] Speaker A: So I agree. I think we're seeing, you know, this is not even a real. I would assume that's not even a real house. It looks like some sort of shed situation.
[00:12:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:12:01] Speaker A: I mean it's cute as hell, but it probably doesn't have a foundation mobile home. Yeah, yeah.
Same. Same thing here. I would guess that that is not a found solid foundation. Regular, I would agree. Stick built house. Now this is cool. What's this?
[00:12:17] Speaker B: Let's see.
Yeah, no thanks.
[00:12:21] Speaker A: It's a bit of a deal breaker when you flip through the pictures there.
[00:12:24] Speaker B: Yeah. Very residential.
[00:12:26] Speaker A: Yep, yep.
[00:12:27] Speaker B: Very, very.
[00:12:28] Speaker A: Yep. See, you know, some of this stuff you can deal with, like this, all this sheetrock. Sometimes for the right deal, you might deal with it maybe. But when I get downstairs and I see the drop ceiling and all the sheetrock, I'm like, no, I'm out. Out. I'm out.
[00:12:42] Speaker B: Yeah, you could make her look like a cabin, but it would take a lot of money.
[00:12:46] Speaker A: Yeah. At that point, why not just go shop for something that makes more sense? This is cute.
[00:12:52] Speaker B: So I've been in this one. It photographs really well. In person. It needs a lot of maintenance. But again, I mean, it's a small house, so like a lot of maintenance. I mean, could it be worth it? Yeah, it could be worth it. It is down. So it's in Sky Harbor. It is. That mossy trail, I think is the name of the road. It is a.
It's a tiny little road in sky. Inside of Sky Harbor. I think it only has like a couple of houses down in what you would maybe call a Coca Cola sack or something. So anyway, could be a cool option. Need some love.
The deck on the front is kind of. You can see it there. It's kind of falling.
[00:13:34] Speaker A: Janet Giphy got that one there.
And I mean, honestly, it doesn't look like a horrible option. But you said when you walk inside, it kind of lets you down.
[00:13:44] Speaker B: Basically, it just needs a little bit of love.
[00:13:47] Speaker A: Yeah, but this is. Let's talk about that because we're already down 20 grand here or whatever that means. I mean, that could be their third fifth price drop. So let's look at some price history.
Let's see. Let's go. We'll go back as far as we can. And again, guys, realtor.com zillow all this stuff. A lot of times the price history is not accurate. You know, your agent can pull this stuff and get accurate info. We don't have what they paid for it here. At least on realtor.com we only go back one year.
So they.
The most information we have is that they listed this one year ago for 400 and they have not been able to sell it. And you never know, maybe they're ready to ditch it. So, all right, let's go ahead and up our budget here.
[00:14:35] Speaker B: Maybe let's do a 350 to a 400 or something like that.
[00:14:40] Speaker A: Just inch it up a little. And I'm going to get rid of the bedrooms again. Like you said.
450 maybe.
[00:14:49] Speaker B: Yeah. I go in hundred thousand increments whenever I'm doing this for clients. I'll go like a 350 to a 450.
[00:14:57] Speaker A: All right. And for whatever reason, I'm going to zoom back in on this side again. And I'll be honest with you, a lot of times I'm looking for that new button. If I'm super hyper focused. I've probably already seen every single thing that's not new.
[00:15:09] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:15:10] Speaker A: What's this? Three sets a lot. So I'm actually going to go ahead and get rid of that. Yeah, let's get. Let's just go house.
[00:15:16] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:15:17] Speaker A: It's not going to eliminate a lot, but it will get rid of the pieces of dirt.
[00:15:20] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:15:22] Speaker A: All right. This is kind of cute.
That tells me there may or may not be wi fi at this home, which is not a absolute deal breaker, but it's not great.
We've dropped it ten grand, which really they. They should have started it at. With the. I like to put the nines in there.
[00:15:42] Speaker B: Yeah. So. So when I. When I. So now I'm up around 400 and I'm still only at 633 square feet. So. Which is not a bad. It's not. That's not bad. Right. So one of the biggest things in the Smokies to understand is when you're talking about income for a one bed studio is included in that.
So, you know, if. If one bed income is 60 to 70,000 for well managed average gross, a studio is gonna. That's gonna apply to a well done studio as well.
So anyway, it's not a big deal that it's such small square footage, but just keeping that in mind.
[00:16:20] Speaker A: Yeah. And some of these are examples of what you don't want. Like this one here is gonna be in town, most likely, or close to town. And it looks like, oh my God, it's on stilts.
[00:16:29] Speaker B: Yeah. So some of these are really cool because.
And I have people who like, think that they might want to be interested because this is right in the heart of Pigeon Forge. Like literally you can almost hear the parkway from here, but it has the river, creek river. I think it's the little pigeon in the backyard of a lot of them. So they seem attractive.
They can be rentals. So I have seen some people go in there and make them look more mountain cabin on the inside, but that's One where like you gotta be a. You gotta be a next level kind of investor looking at like, I would never want to sell one of these to a newbie. Like ever.
[00:17:12] Speaker A: As wild as Greek back there.
[00:17:15] Speaker B: It says that, but it's like, oh, slippery rock. Okay. I'm thinking that we are. Okay, so there's a neighborhood like this in downtown Pigeon Forge.
I. This is not a bad.
[00:17:26] Speaker A: Yeah, no, this is over there by that little mobile home RV park.
[00:17:30] Speaker B: So not a bad area here.
[00:17:32] Speaker A: Right?
Yeah.
[00:17:35] Speaker B: But the one in Pigeon Forge that I thought that this was is only attractive to some people. Really because of its like prime location. So out there, I'm probably not going to touch that.
[00:17:46] Speaker A: Yeah, I agree. And I don't. I own one right here, which is. I like the location, but I'm not going to buy that house. Yeah, let's see what I do here.
[00:17:54] Speaker B: Let's talk about that one just for one second. Where. Because people, when they're new, the. The one that was just up on your screen and this one as well, they'll see three bed, two bath house for only like four something.
And they get excited because they.
[00:18:07] Speaker A: Oh, here.
[00:18:08] Speaker B: Yeah. Because they think three bed.
And this is just driving home in the Smokies. You cannot, you're not going to reinvent the wheel. Just because a three bed is cheap does not mean you're going to get three bed income.
That is not something that people are looking to rent. Come here.
[00:18:25] Speaker A: Yeah, this is a long term rental at best.
Or maybe, maybe somebody want to live in it. But again, this looks like a mobile home.
[00:18:33] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. This one specifically. Any of these though that are going to be in the price range we're in right now, if you see three beds or more, it's probably not going to be a good rental.
[00:18:43] Speaker A: Yes, absolutely. Excellent point, Excellent point. Let's maybe cruise over here.
These are mobile homes, I would assume.
[00:18:55] Speaker B: Yeah, those are, those are kind of interesting. They're also very, very old. They're in the entrance to Sky Harbor. They're not even quite in Sky Harbor. They're like on the road on the way in.
[00:19:04] Speaker A: Oh yeah, That one looks to be sagging.
[00:19:14] Speaker B: Yeah, a little.
That's a good one.
[00:19:18] Speaker A: Which one?
[00:19:19] Speaker B: The one that right there.
[00:19:24] Speaker A: This one. Error.
[00:19:25] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And I say good. It is baloney. Yep, yep. It is a bigger one bed. So this is, this is one I was kind of hoping to stumble. Not, not this one, but something like this. So this is a one bed, one and a half bath, but it's over a thousand square feet, so. This is going to be a house that, yes, it may only have one bedroom, but it's going to have more room. It's probably going to sleep at least six people, if I had to guess.
See, but. So that's a huge, huge room up there. So huge that we have a pool table in it.
[00:20:02] Speaker A: And nicely done. It's got newer floors
[00:20:08] Speaker B: and it's, you know, prime location, you know. So I'm not sitting here saying that I'm like jumping up and down to sell somebody this house, but if I was going to sell something that was around 4:30, this is certainly one that I'd want to have a conversation with somebody about because it is a bigger one bed. It is not a studio. It's not 600 square feet like the one we were looking at a second ago.
[00:20:32] Speaker A: I want to point out this, this on the wall here, this is a stain from a piece of art they used to have hanging there that was bigger than the one they have hanging there now. It's very common. It happens because the sun comes in here and fades everything.
[00:20:45] Speaker B: It's actually so. So that's actually called ambering. And your law, your wood is going to amber over time, which means it's actually going to darken over time. When you have something covering it, both the sun and the oxidation are going to prevent the wood that's behind that thing from oxidizing at the same rate, basically. So it's actually not causing it to. The room's not fading. It's the opposite. The, the, the area behind it is holding its original color while the room is ambering or darkening. Okay.
Can you do anything about it? Not really.
It's not usually that offensive in person. It's usually more offensive in pictures.
So your only option really is you got an extreme and you've got an easy. Your easy is just buy a similar or bigger piece of art to put on top of it. Just remember that if it's bigger, then you're, you're going to, over time create a bigger problem because the room is new to amber over time and then. And it actually happens very fast.
The other thing is it can be and then restrained.
So like, if you were to buy a very. I bought a very old cabin once that, you know, back in the early 2000s, they put shit on all the walls like it was everywhere. So when you take all that down, it looks like a checkerboard.
So in that house, I actually did consider sanding and restaining, but anyway, that's really all you can do.
[00:22:10] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:22:10] Speaker B: Cover It. Or sand it.
[00:22:11] Speaker A: Yeah. And over time, that will. It will start to darken amber.
[00:22:15] Speaker B: It will. It will also amber over time if you don't cover it back up. That's exactly right.
[00:22:19] Speaker A: Although I'm getting rid of these junky Christmas lights that they just hung there with a staple gun, it looks like. Yeah, that's not.
[00:22:25] Speaker B: Well, I'm gonna also get rid of that piece of art that was that. I'm getting rid of that like that.
[00:22:31] Speaker A: They moved that from some other room. They didn't, like, go find that, you know, at a store and put it on there. Brand new. That's old.
[00:22:38] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:22:39] Speaker A: But.
Yeah. Okay. All right. Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Mini split.
[00:22:44] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:22:46] Speaker A: Which is not good or bad. It's just, you know, something to keep an eye on. That means there's no ducts in this room.
[00:22:50] Speaker B: Yeah. Or I will tell you, sometimes there are ducts, but when the ceilings are really high like that.
[00:22:55] Speaker A: Right.
[00:22:55] Speaker B: They will install those to give you a little bit more zone control because it can get very hot.
Cabin lofted rooms and cabins, even when you have normal H vac, have a tendency to get very hot.
[00:23:08] Speaker A: Absolutely. All right, let's raise it up a little bit here. Let's see.
We're gonna go. We're gonna go forward 550. How about that?
[00:23:15] Speaker B: Yeah.
So let me say this. While you're doing that, this kind of gets you into, so the. The prime shopping zone, both for buyers because of their budget constraints, and also for sellers, because it's like the bulk of properties here live within the size that will fall between, like, a 500 to a 700. 500 to 700 is the most robust opportunity. And it also is where the most investors, new investors, live as far as their budget and what they can buy.
So you kind of get into this world where it can feel very, very full but very, very empty all at the same time. And it can also get very confusing because you're, like.
You'll look at. You could pull a span of two beds that are around the same square footage, around the same rentability, everything, and they'll range from 500 to 600, but they're all very much the same house, if you will.
So shoppers need to be very discerning of, like, there isn't a world where you can, like, reinvent the wheel. But if you're shopping in the world of, you know, like a. Like a 500 to 700, you gotta know, like, if they're asking you to spend above hundred versus, like, 525. What am I doing? What am I getting? Why am I spending that much more?
So you just kind of gotta, you, you gotta really have a realtor who is talking you through. Why are we spending 600 on a two bed when I can get a two bed for 500? Why would I do that?
[00:24:58] Speaker A: I'm passing on that one too much. She rock and no furniture and went a little crazy with the blue.
[00:25:06] Speaker B: People do stuff like that. Because what I'm about to say is true, but someone tells them that they need to have something that makes that like stands out in listing pictures for your rental. Which is true, but I don't know that blue cabinets is the answer for that.
[00:25:22] Speaker A: That is a massive retaining wall. However, it does look to be very well done. Yeah, horrible pictures here.
[00:25:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:25:33] Speaker A: All right. I like, I like horrible pictures. Let's look at the price history.
Okay.
Sold no. 7 for 215 back in the old, the, the olden days. That's, that's, that's before the 08 crash, which really in the grand scheme of things pre 08, like this period of time was considered to be pretty high back then because post 08, this would have dropped down, but they held onto it and then they decided to sell it one year ago for 559 and they got nowhere. So this is something to keep an eye on here with these price history. What does this price history say to you?
[00:26:15] Speaker B: Yep. So scroll back up, let's see. Let's look at square footage and bedroom count and all that.
So we are.
Okay, so we're a two bed for the sake of being a two bed, but we're still under a thousand square feet. So like, that's okay though. But, but I will tell you that under a thousand square feet for a two bed, there's for sure no game room. You're. You're just going to be getting a two bed. That is a two bed.
So 500 for that though is, you know, and I don't know, I don't know how often we talk about this, but if you are coming into this thinking that you're going to use price per square foot as a metric for this, that does not work in rentals at all.
[00:26:58] Speaker A: No, Nope.
[00:27:00] Speaker B: That does not work residential. That's a kind of an easy metric if you're buying in a neighborhood where everything's kind of the same or, you know, whatever. But for us, rentability, features cause you to be worth more money. It just is what it is.
So in this house, if it had a game room or a killer View or whatever.
And it was a two. Two. It's obviously going to be worth more than 500. But at 900 square feet, just under 900 square feet, this is just a two bed. It's a good price.
But then I also need to know some answers to some questions like what condition is the house in? I can't always tell that from pictures. You know, how much work?
What do I need? Does that help?
[00:27:44] Speaker A: I think they're a little proud of this thing.
I think they got a little Covid hangover here with their price and they're proud of it because they put a new bathroom in it. But they, man, they've got some bad pictures. That is an HOA though. 250 bucks. A little outdoor, little swimming pool, which is cool. I like this neighborhood.
But. All right, we're going to move on. Let's see.
All right, this is what we call this, a cabin camp. What neighborhood is this?
[00:28:11] Speaker B: That is Gatlinburg Falls. It is a very, very, very well taken care of resort.
It is, you know, it is going to have very similar looking from the outside, you know, houses or cabins. But it's got a community pool, great location. It is a very well respected little neighborhood.
I will say that when you drive through this neighborhood, as compared to other neighborhoods up here, it's got a little bit of a Disney effect. Meaning that they just take care of their grounds. You're not, you know, you're not.
Some of the neighborhoods up here, I cannot say the same.
[00:28:47] Speaker A: Right.
[00:28:47] Speaker B: So. So this one is cool because let me tell you why in Gatlinburg Falls there are two different one. Well, there may be more than two, but there are two well known one bed floor plans. One of them is this floor plan which is right around 1500 square feet, which is huge for a one bed, let's be clear, huge.
And then there's another one that's just under a thousand square feet. So the two of those, they're both one beds on paper and they're both one beds in reality. But they achieve very different rental history. So in this one, this specific house, I have clients who own this exact floor plan.
And they manage it very well and they do two bed numbers with it. Because this house, it's very easy for this house to sleep eight people because this game room is the entire bottom floor of the house. And it has an area that can fold a queen over queen.
This one's only twin over twin, but it could absolutely hold queen over queen box.
And that little area is about the size of if they had put up walls, it would be a two bed house. So it's got a big game room that is big enough to have all these games and an additional living room and a queen over queen bunk. But it's got two bathrooms so it really definitely can support eight people.
[00:30:08] Speaker A: Heart shaped tub.
[00:30:11] Speaker B: Ding, ding.
[00:30:13] Speaker A: I like the heart shaped tub. What do you think of the hard shaped tub?
[00:30:16] Speaker B: I mean, I'm just not a fan of jets in general. If something has jets, it's gotta go because I've gotten more phone calls about black stuff coming out of the jets when someone turns them on than I care to answer. So I'm just not a fan of the jets on indoor tubs.
I don't, I'm not offended that it's heart shaped and if it did not have jets, I wouldn't be offended at all.
[00:30:41] Speaker A: You're totally right. They're a pain in the ass. Especially with this beige tile around it and all this nonsense. But I do, I like the nostalgia.
[00:30:48] Speaker B: Yeah, I get it. I totally get it.
Huge game room though. I mean this house, I have clients who do 75, 78 a year with this floor plan. So for 499, for the potential that it has, like it's almost 50,000 square feet. It's worth a look. Yeah.
[00:31:07] Speaker A: Okay, I got you. All right.
[00:31:09] Speaker B: And it's got a little bit of a view from the front porch.
Not that you're going to really hang out on the front porch, but you could have two rockers. You could have rockers or it's got a swing or whatever.
And it's got a mountain view from out there. Doesn't show it, but I've been there.
[00:31:23] Speaker A: All right, here's another view. This is bigger. How we're stepping it up here.
[00:31:26] Speaker B: Man, oh man. So. So this one is a house that is tracked in time. It just needs to be updated.
If you're worried about rental history, this is not the one to look at. It's been with property management. It's not, it has not been managed by Luke Carl. Like it is not, not going to have great rental history. But let me tell you what it does have. It has the best view of the national park that you can get.
It has three different floors where the bedrooms are up top. The living kitchen, dining is on the main floor. And then the fun, the theater room and game room are on the bottom.
Again, not great pictures. So it's not. I've been there in person multiple times, so I know that, I know the vibe of the house.
[00:32:15] Speaker A: It's like, they got one. They got one fancy. Almost like a.
Yeah. Digital AI type of AI here, and then the rest of them are just horrible.
[00:32:24] Speaker B: Yeah. That view is amazing in person.
But here's what it definitely needs. We were.
[00:32:30] Speaker A: We're looking for bad pictures. To me, this is somebody.
This is. This is an ideal seller for me. I usually gravitate towards the folks that don't have great listings, to be honest, because they're probably not, you know, all that savvy.
[00:32:44] Speaker B: Yeah.
So upstairs has some carpet that needs to be ripped out, some LVP thrown down, and the theater has some carpet that needs to be ripped out.
But the fact that it is almost 3,000 square feet. The fact that it has a theater room and a game room.
A killer view.
[00:33:03] Speaker A: You like it?
[00:33:04] Speaker B: I like it. I like it. At 750. There's other houses. There's other houses that are a very similar floor plan with a great view that are above 850, above 900.
[00:33:17] Speaker A: They paid 400 2010, folks. That's what you're looking for.
That's what you're looking for. And they've had it listed since. Only since December.
[00:33:27] Speaker B: So I will tell you. So I will throw some experience on the whole. You're looking for people who paid very little.
I have. In the Smokies. I have found that.
And rightfully so. Good for them. The people who paid very little and probably don't have a mortgage.
Number one, they do not care whether their house is making $20 a year or $2 million a year. They don't care what their income is because they probably don't have a mortgage on it.
But they are the least negotiable.
They are here right now because they have nothing to lose.
They have. It doesn't mean don't try, but these people are the ones who are the most planted with their feet a lot of times. So you just have to be persistent and try. Just definitely try. But don't get your feelings hurt whenever you're like, but wait a minute. They only paid 400 and they're only willing to negotiate seven nickels.
[00:34:29] Speaker A: Like, shoot your shot. You got to shoot your shot. Always been like that. That's never. That's never changed, man. You never know which seller's gonna sell. And yeah, sometimes you just got to put quantity out there and get the one you're looking for. All right. What do you got here? Oh, look at this monster.
[00:34:46] Speaker B: Yeah.
So this is a four bed, septic, five true ensuite king bedrooms, all with a view of the mountains
[00:34:58] Speaker A: location. Where are we?
[00:35:00] Speaker B: You are right in the heart of Where's Valley. Right in the hardware valley, Just up Happy Hollow.
[00:35:09] Speaker A: I gotcha. Okay, so it's. We got a little breathing room there probably.
[00:35:14] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:35:14] Speaker A: Not a lot of. It's not like super crowded right there, I would guess.
[00:35:18] Speaker B: Right? It's not. And they have a really big lot. Almost two acres.
[00:35:23] Speaker A: This thing's pretty impressive.
[00:35:25] Speaker B: You know, it needs a little bit of cosmetic updating, but what doesn't, you know, but for the price, for almost. What is it, like 3,600 square feet? And I. And I'm telling you. So it is five en suite, king suite bedrooms. Only one of them doesn't have a view from the bed.
[00:35:47] Speaker A: Look at that. If you can't rent that.
[00:35:49] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:35:51] Speaker A: So something to be cons, you know, something to keep an eye on here. This was cut into the side of a hill. Right. So there's a retaining wall here which looks to be a.
In front of the home.
[00:36:01] Speaker B: It's.
Yes. Well, yes. On. In the front. Yeah. Where the parking is. Because the back where the decks are would be facing the view.
[00:36:09] Speaker A: Yeah, It's a very nice retaining wall, but, you know, it's something you need to understand what you're getting yourself into. Oh, it's gated. Look at this.
[00:36:16] Speaker B: Just the house that's not for the neighborhood. Yeah.
[00:36:18] Speaker A: You're kidding me. No, that's cool.
[00:36:21] Speaker B: This was primarily a vacation home.
[00:36:24] Speaker A: A second home.
[00:36:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:36:29] Speaker A: In other words, no rental.
[00:36:31] Speaker B: Not with the current owner, which has been for a while. Before that, I don't know.
[00:36:37] Speaker A: But this thing is cool, man. I could get into this.
[00:36:43] Speaker B: Real cool.
I will say for the size, because you're getting five bedrooms and it has this open lofted, natural light coming in situation. It does only have two smallish gaming areas.
So it's got that right there, which is upstairs. Just enough for a little poker table. But that's like the perfect use of that space.
And then downstairs it's got an area big enough for like a pool table and maybe a few more games if you wanted to add them.
It. I will say the carpet definitely needs to go in all three floors.
[00:37:23] Speaker A: Lots of sucker tubs, but bam,
[00:37:27] Speaker B: there's.
[00:37:28] Speaker A: Look at that, dude.
That's a door window. Two door doors.
[00:37:34] Speaker B: Yeah. Double doors on either side. Big picture windows in between.
Every bathroom is set up like this with double vanities, Soaker tub, stand up shower, every bathroom.
It's an impressive house.
[00:37:50] Speaker A: It's cool. Yeah. This thing was really cool when it was built.
[00:37:53] Speaker B: Really cool.
[00:37:56] Speaker A: Got the kids in the room with you.
[00:37:58] Speaker B: Yeah. So keep in mind, even though this is.
It is a true five bed, you are going to be limited to the 12 sleep capacity because of the rental permit. But there's the lot. Yeah,
[00:38:19] Speaker A: I like it.
[00:38:21] Speaker B: Yeah, It's a good, good price for what it is.
[00:38:25] Speaker A: Let's look at the rental history.
[00:38:27] Speaker B: No, it's vacation home.
[00:38:29] Speaker A: Oh.
I mean the. Sorry, price history.
[00:38:32] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, yeah.
[00:38:35] Speaker A: They bought it for 705 in.07.
Okay. So they've had it for a while.
[00:38:42] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:38:44] Speaker A: Yeah. It seems like to me that price is not, you know, super offensive.
[00:38:48] Speaker B: Yeah, I agree.
[00:38:52] Speaker A: All right.
[00:38:53] Speaker B: If someone's looking for a five bed with a view and they don't want to fiddle with a pool, that's it. That's. This is. This is the one.
[00:39:03] Speaker A: Love it.
[00:39:04] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:05] Speaker A: All right, let's go. We'll come back here. Look at one more, two more. Let's raise this price up, go to 450 to.
Well, let's go more like.
Yeah, something like that.
[00:39:24] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:28] Speaker A: Don't buy that.
I'm just kidding. I don't even know what that is.
[00:39:33] Speaker B: I think that's pre construction.
[00:39:35] Speaker A: Yeah.
All right, let's see.
Just clicking. Random houses. Got a new roof.
[00:39:46] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:46] Speaker A: This is over there. Jada Lane, maybe Piney Overlook.
So you're coming off.
Oh, I see. It's up there. It's by the high school or the junior, whatever that is. The junior.
[00:39:58] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:40:02] Speaker A: I don't know that little. That little road.
[00:40:04] Speaker B: I don't know that little road either.
Interesting.
[00:40:12] Speaker A: It's got a lot of grass. You got to keep that in mind. You got to get that mowed.
It's kind of cute. Yeah, definitely 277 days.
They've lowered it lots of times, but not very much. 5. Oh, there's a 20,000. 10,000.
Don't know what they paid. Let's see.
390 and 17
[00:40:38] Speaker B: and back in 22. They tried to sell it. Interesting. Did they not sell it?
[00:40:42] Speaker A: They did not.
Had it ever since.
[00:40:46] Speaker B: Interesting.
[00:40:46] Speaker A: They tried to. This is just, you know, you got to look at this stuff. They tried to basically cash in here. What, $800,000 in five years. Yeah, it's like. It's like playing the price. It's like going on the price is right, you know, spin the wheel.
All right, well, we're just pulling up random houses here. Let's look at one or two more. Let's see what we got here.
New pioneer trail, newer listing. 13 days.
[00:41:18] Speaker B: This price range. Ren right now, is it Is like a no man's land. Like, this is where it's very, very hard to find listings between seven and nine. Well, 750 and nine. Yeah. Because it's. That's like three bedroom world. And three bedrooms are less common. And also, three beds can be like the one we looked at that was 750, but they could also be a million, so it's kind of tricky to figure out.
Oh, that's an interesting room with the beds.
[00:41:54] Speaker A: Got a mini split.
[00:41:56] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:41:59] Speaker A: Two junky Amazon beds, which I hate to say that because I do have one of those frames in one of my rentals.
Yeah.
Yeah. That's a little bit of a weird setup.
[00:42:10] Speaker B: That's a weird room. Yeah.
[00:42:11] Speaker A: Kind of some crappy pictures here, too.
Carpet's got window.
This is gonna be a lower level with the Sheetrock ceiling.
Looks like it's got a view that they're not even showcasing.
[00:42:25] Speaker B: Yeah, I haven't been in this one.
[00:42:27] Speaker A: All right, Something to look at. But let's see what else? Just pick a random house here.
New construction, worth anybody's time.
[00:42:37] Speaker B: It's a good location.
[00:42:39] Speaker A: Leslie Adams, give her a shout out.
[00:42:41] Speaker B: How many bedrooms is that? One? I think two beds.
Yeah. Two, two, three.
[00:42:46] Speaker A: So it's probably three. Three, right.
[00:42:48] Speaker B: Probably not. It's. See, it's only 1500 square feet, so it's probably two in a. Some kind of a little game room situation.
But, like, keeping in mind and just kind of trying to keep things in perspective that this has a view. So that's peak. That area, that peak loop area. They do have some great views.
Got a cool little outdoor kitchen.
But anyway, what I was saying, just from perspective, like, this house, for as far as square footage goes, is very similar square footage to the 499.
One bed that we talked about a minute ago. So, like, is this one gonna. What. What am I getting inside of this one that I'm not getting inside of the other? And is it worth that much more money?
Maybe, but I'm just saying, you gotta think through those things.
[00:43:41] Speaker A: Right.
Well, it's under. It's already under contract anyway, so.
[00:43:45] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right. Yeah.
[00:43:47] Speaker A: It's a big. This is like a pretty big house here. 3,000 square feet. We're on High Rock.
High Rock way.
Eagle Cloud.
[00:43:58] Speaker B: Yeah, that's up. Like the Black Bear.
[00:44:03] Speaker A: Black Bear Ridge.
[00:44:05] Speaker B: Let's see.
[00:44:08] Speaker A: Yeah, if it's that neighborhood I'm thinking it is, I'm probably out on it.
[00:44:15] Speaker B: Carpet.
[00:44:15] Speaker A: Yeah, lots of carpet. Lots of vinyl surround showers, which is fine. Old hot tub.
Does have a vernac view.
[00:44:23] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. So for this price for this is
[00:44:27] Speaker A: not really my thing.
What do you think up here?
[00:44:30] Speaker B: Here's the thing. They rent. Guests don't care. People coming here, they don't care. So you can't let it deter you. Here's what I tell my clients that are buying. If there is enough of an element of what you want that matters, consider. Then let that be a consideration. If it's not, if you're just looking for something that's a rental, no one that's coming here minds staying in a neighborhood like this. Matter of fact, this is probably going to a neighborhood that looks like this is going to offer them either or multiple of these things, a view, good proximity, and a community pool. So when you see that, that look, the cabin farm look, oftentimes it's. Those are the communities that are going to have the things that guests are looking for.
People really want a community pool. They really want good proximity. They really want. They don't care. So what I tell my clients is, keep in mind these people that are coming here. These are people who don't mind staying in hotels where your room is connected to someone else's room. They certainly don't care that someone's balcony is over there. And you can create privacy situations for people with balconies. So I'm not out on these. There's a lot of money being made by our clients in neighborhoods like these.
It's just, you know, personally, and that's fine. Yeah. And I tell my clients the same thing. If they say that, I'm like, that's great.
[00:45:50] Speaker A: Well, I've had tons of people that say, luke, I don't want to be out there in the woods where there's no neighbors. I want to be somewhere where I feel safe.
[00:45:57] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:46:04] Speaker A: Okay, well, listen, we're out of time anyway, so any words of wisdom on our way out the door? We need to do this more often. I can do this all day.
[00:46:13] Speaker B: Yeah. No words of wisdom. I would say if you. It is still a buyer's market. Understanding what that means in the market that you're shopping is important. So ask your agent. What does that look like right now here in the Smokies? It means that you should certainly be able to negotiate some closing costs. Definitely getting your broker fee for the shop covered and some amount off of the purchase price.
So if you're offering on things and they are not negotiable in those departments to some degree, unless you're married to the house for some reason, unless it's just the one.
Maybe. Maybe try. You know, we've. Avery and I've said this on several different things many, many times. But right now is also where you need to just like whenever we were multiple offers and we would lose out an offer on 10 things before we got something.
Unless you're married to a specific property, you should be offering on it, trying your hand and then offering on something else if it doesn't work out until you find a seller that is as negotiable as you want to be or if you're married to the house. Because there is. We are in a buying world right now where one of the big reasons that people are buying is for their own vacation home, like for their own interests. And that is fantastic. I love that for people. So if they are married to a view or a specific floor plan or whatever, then of course that's different. But if you're not and you're just looking for something that will potentially generate a certain amount of money, let's offer until we get some. Find somebody who is negotiable.
[00:47:52] Speaker A: Love it. To be honest with you, I'm still sitting here shopping for houses. I'm having so much fun. I love looking at these things.
[00:47:57] Speaker B: I know. Me too. How do we find you,
[email protected] is my email.
That is my email. I am not on socials.
[00:48:09] Speaker A: But you can find us on socials at the short term shop. Almost a hundred thousand strong on Instagram.
[00:48:14] Speaker B: Yeah. And you can. You can actually message. Well, that was my email. You could email me, but you can also email agents the shorttermshop.com and ask for anybody that you want. Our all of our agents, bios and everything are out there on the website. Shorttermshop.com you can find me there.
[00:48:32] Speaker A: All right, wonderful. Thank you so much. We'll see you soon. Okay, bye now.
[00:48:37] Speaker B: See you.
