Please take a second and vote in this poll! It will be interesting to see what you all think we should do. Britton and I have lots of discussions about this (like should this be a five year plan or two year), but we’d like you to weigh in on it as well. If there is another choice that you would recommend that isn’t found on this, you can either comment on the poll or in our blog comments! I have also created a new page about our place in Rincon, Puerto Rico if you need to remember what we are talking about. You can find it here (also on the side bar where it says “Our Place in Rincon Puerto Rico) . Thanks!
For this poll you can choose more than one answer since it is basically dealing with two different questions: 1) what should we do with the wooden house and 2) should we start a guesthouse business?
Since you are exploring ideas, here are some observations. With second homes, sometimes it is good to go slow. You have the concrete house for vacations for now, it is sturdy and seems to work. You really have no hurry. Get to know Rincon and get a little involved with people there before jumping into a big project. After all, for now it is a vacation home and you hard workers need a little vacation. Solutions will come in time, and out of nowhere, it sometimes seems. Perhaps you will become friends with locals and find out about contractors and construction. Maybe you’ll meet people that have rentals, a B & B, or cabanas they rent out. All the local knowledge will help you to make decisions when you are ready. You’ve got lots of time, and hey the beach looks pretty nice!
On 4 acres of land you can do a lot! You have plenty of options. I’d love to see your property. If you do cabanas, you don’t want to be with in hearing distance of guests. You’ll loose your privacy, but you’ll gain other things. You’ve got to weigh out your expense and anticipated income. Rentals are a fierce business in Rincon. How long will it take to recuperate any monies invested?
On 4 acres you can plant a ton of tropical fruit trees, a pool, tennis court. I wish I had that much space. Study the local market. Google words that would describe your rentals and see what pops up. Who would be your competition? How much are they charging? How long they have been in business? You can start getting a sense what you can do.
Maybe I missed something, but you are both employed on the mainland, right? Maybe Britton can telecommute, but what about you Cassie? Would you leave a job/income/benefits in 2 years? Unless there is a compelling reason to vacate CO in 2 years, then a 5 year plan may be better. Learn about the local area (as Annie states) before investing money in any project. And also learn about any laws, taxes, licences, insurance you might need to run guest houses.
Wil
The first thing I would suggest is to finish the concrete studio. Add a small stove, make the kitchen usable. Add AC and hot water. Make it nice enough to rent out. Maybe do something special with the roof.
I would ask myself how much return on my investment I could expect and how much risk that would involve. Then think about other type of investments. Listen to Luis and Wil. What will be the real cost and the real income? What is special about your cabanas that would bring guests in?
Maybe, A cabana down at the bottom of your property in the trees with a ZIP line down to it or a skybridge. But what about the river? The heat? The bugs? It might not be practical. A jungle retreat might be a selling point but can it be permitted and what would the cost be? You would need a septic system or a big pump. $$$
Then if you had a pool, tennis courts, or some other kind of attractions you could use the wood house as a gathering place. I would suggest to put more windows in and even remove the wall facing the deck. Put a canopy over the deck. Screen the area in.
Doing all this would make it much harder to sell. What if you have kids and want them to go to better schools.
The wood house is basically one warm room. You would have to make a lot of changes to cool it down. It’s also not very kid safe and needs a bathroom. It’s hard to get into.
On the other hand if you tear the wood house down and build a nice one family concrete house it will be much easier to sell and there will no compromises on how you want to live. You will have a nice, clean, safe place for you and your family. The property would also have a nice mother-in-law studio apartment that could be rented out long term.
Jeff, I think the first thing we will do is fix up the studio. It’s pretty nice as is but could use some paint, screens and a working kitchen.
We are still undecided on the wood house. We’ve seen some in the Rincon area that are really nice. It is just a matter of how much money we want to spend. I mean sure, a newly built house finished to our specifications would be nice but I don’t know if we need it. It basically means more years of our life spent working to pay for it.
I don’t think we are planning to sell…ever. So that isn’t really a factor on our minds. Although things can and do change so you never know! Decisions decisions.
I say…Enjoy the ride! Frank and I do not use our house enough but we plan to be there in about 5 years full time! And we will never sell…Frank want to be buried down on our hill….he wants an ocean view…ha ha!
Thanks Annie,
Yes, at first I think we’ll just ponder it for a while. We have plenty of time. The hard part is that we are go-getters AND planners. So that is both a blessing and a curse :-). We have been meeting more and more people each visit to Rincon! We are so happy to have chosen there…very friendly, helpful and welcoming.
Luis,
We’d love to show you the place sometime and meet you! I’d like to see your place too. Aren’t you trying to sell? We are very glad we have the 4 acres. It’s a great opportunity to do whatever we want to the property and also just to have a slice of privacy and of course to grow fun tropical things. As for ROI, we talked with one construction person (thanks Rosa for the recommendation) who told us he could build a small cabana for $25,000. If we could rent it for $200/week (which is cheap!), we’d be looking at probably $5,000/year income (50% vacancy? Is that high or low??). So we’d recoup the investment in appx 5 years and still have the asset…I’d say that’s a decent return.
Wil,
Leaving the jobs will probably be the hardest thing to do. That is partly why we’d like to have an income stream in the form of these cabanas for rent. We also will keep our rentals that we have in Greeley for income. I have been researching some into guesthouse businesses. I think we’d start with longer-term rentals, since those are a little more lenient. We’re also going to talk with our accountant about the Colorado/Puerto Rico income split. I think it’s a little confusing!! Really, though, those are the details, the small stuff that we can get to when we get there. I like the big picture things. All those other things can be worked out with enough money and time.
Jeff, as Britton said, I’m not too worried about re-sale, but for the price we bought it for, you can’t even find 4 acres of raw land in Rincon. If we were selling and someone absolutely hated all the improvements we had made (which would be odd) -it still is worth something for the land/electrical hook-ups and water!
Strangely, I don’t feel worried about our ability to rent out the cabanas either. I think because of the price we paid and the price to build, we could rent them out for a lot lower than the full-service hotels -which I think would appeal to young couples/surfers and others looking for a low cost/clean/close place to stay. That’s all we wanted on our honeymoon and had a hard time finding it! Plus we’re RIGHT off the 413!
Thanks Rosa! I agree. Your house is beautiful! I can’t wait till we live there in Rincon full-time too! Maybe we’ll be permanent locals at the same time! 🙂
Lots to decide, but it keeps our minds busy and keeps us dreaming and scheming. And that makes life so much more fun! 🙂 Thanks for all your votes! It does help to see what other people think instead of just us all the time.
I stumbled by accident in your blog and you gave me back my lost pride of being PuertoRican and living here.Reading about your goals,dreams and plans made me realize that not everything is lost in my island.
Reading so much about crime,drugs and the general decay of our society is in direct contrast with your joy and pride of becoming landowners in the paradise named Rincon.I wish you the best and may God grants you everything that your hearts desires, Thanks for restoring my faith and my pride of being a son of this land.I sincerely hope that someday we can get together and share a beer or two and perhaps even a dinner.My wife and I would gladly receive you guys in our humble home and if for any reason you guys are ever in needs of assistance that we could help,don’t hesitate to contact us. Welcome to Puerto Rico