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- October 4, 2016
Not long ago, Mitch Wasterlainasked and answered a question many physicians will ask. Is a second home a good real estate investment?
While there are many individual factors to consider, the math points to a second home as being less than ideal as a pure investment.
I’d like to share the story of our second home and why, for us, it was a fantastic investment.
I neverimagined I would want, let alone have a second home. Maintaining one home is challenging. Doubling the property doubles the work. And you need to have lots more stuff. We have too much stuff! A second home means duplicate sets of silverware, flatware, beds, sheets, sofas, etc…Why on earth would I want to complicate our lives like that?
I distinctly remember telling my parents (who commuted six and a half hours round trip to theirs hundreds of times before moving there eventually) how I didn’t see that ever happening for us. I was happy with one really nice home in a place where we wanted to be.
Nevertheless, for nearly a decade, we were the proud owners of a second home until we sold it in the summer of 2021. I’ll detail the expenses, returns, and intangibles that we experienced over the course of 10 years with our little lakeside cabin.
How did we end up with a cabin?
A few months after that conversation with my parents, I saw a sign. Not one of those profound revelations that result in a new vision of how to live our lives. This was a plastic sign. On a wooden stick. It said “Auction.”
I also saw an ad in the newspaper detailing the auction and advertising a preview weekend. We toured the grounds of the resort turned summer camp turned condo association.
Sometime near the peak of the housing market in the mid-to-late 2000s, a developer purchased the property and attempted to sell individual cabins for a premium price. Only a handful of units sold in a few years. The rest were to be auctioned off in a couple weeks to the highest bidders.
While we had expressed little interest in a second home, this place was within ten miles of our primary home, on a picturesque recreational lake, with a bike path running right to and through the property. We could boat, bike (I like to bike), jog, or drive to this place. The cabins were in pretty rough shape, but we had recently built our home, so we knew godependable tradesmanwho could do the work that would needto be done.
My attitude towards owning a second home shifted when it appeared I might be able to score a really good deal. This frugal physician loves a good deal.
I was serious enough about it to take out the required $5,000 cashier’s check as a deposit to obtain a bidding number. There were about as many people with the same idea as there were units for sale. This worked to our advantage and made the auctioneer rather surly.
The auction style was bewildering. It was so strange that I’m not sure I can describe it accurately, but I’ll do my best. There was a first round of bidding that set a reserve price of sorts, but we weren’t bidding on particular units. We were telling the auctioneer how much we would pay for first pick of the available units. Then there was a round for second pick, third pick, etc…
I had some idea of what was going on, having had the auction team explain the bidding process at the preview. I kept my number down throughout the initial bidding process. No need to drive up the reserve price. Other befuddled bidders thought they were bidding on the units, but all they were doing was unnecessarily increasing the reserve.
Once we had established a minimum price for the units in rank order, the actual selling began. The highest bidder in the initial round chose the unit they would prefer, and bidding began at the price they said they would pay. No one tried to top that opening bid price. Sold. Next was the second highest bidder from the first round’sturn, third highest, and so on.
There wasn’t much bidding going on until the prices dropped below $10,000. The auctioneer was literally scolding us for not bidding. It was awkward.
Winning at Auction
Those of us holding bid numbers realized that there wouldn’t be many of us going home empty-handed. I ended up with the winning bid on one of the last places up for grabs and was able to get one of the units we preferred.
At the time of our purchase, we were also in the market to buy a used minivan. We paid more for the van than we did for the cabin.
We were ecstatic!We would have a cabin just down the road, on a lake attached to our primary home by a navigable river. We could take family bike rides there, choose to spend the weekend or just a night there whenever we felt like it.
Our out of town guests could stay there. Our friends were more likely to visit. My winning bid was a sign. Not a plastic one on a wooden stick, but a sign of good things to come.
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Or so I thought.
Our hospital, the only one in the county, had been struggling financially. I thought my status as the chief and only anesthesiologist (the only one in the county) was a bulletproof vest. I didn’t realize just how dire the situation was, and a couple months after we closed on our second home, I lost my job.
The hospital shut down six months after that, and due to my non-voting volunteer position on the Hospital Board, I was later one of a number of volunteer Board members sued for millions.
There were no other jobs within commuting range. We landed on our feeteventually, but the second home dream lost some luster on that fateful day.
We decided to fix up our fixer-upper, and while I worked loc*ms and found a new job, the cabin was transformed from dilapidated to delightful. A few years later, we had some exterior work done, installing cedar shakes and fresh layers of paint.
Second Home Financial Analysis
While our initial cost in 2011 was about $16,000, we put about $34,000 into it in 2012, and another $10,000 in 2015. We had roughly $60,000 into the place.
We sold the condo by owner, one of four properties we’ve sold ourselves, for $203,000. That would suggest a profit of over $140,000.
It’s not that simple, of course. If I hadn’t bought the cabin and spent the money to fix it up, it’s safe to assume I would have invested that money.
Using an S&P 500 returns calculator, I can estimate how much we would have if our dollars were working for us in a low cost index fund.
If we had invested that money in 100% large cap US stocks instead of buying and fixing up the cabin, we would have had a profit of about $184,000. That’s a bit better than our suggested profit of $140,000 that we got by investing in this piece of real estate.
However, there are other financial considerations. We paid the electric bill. We paid property taxes and association dues. Those dues covered lawn mowing, snow plowing, dock in, boat lift in, dock out, and boat lift out, etc. It was a pretty sweet deal.
There was also a pole shed to store our boat in the off-season. The dues were money spent, but it was money spent on things that allowed us to enjoy our time when we were there.
If we didn’t have a second home, we would have spent more on vacations and short-term rentals. I don’t know if we would have spent as much as the home costs us to own, but to answer that question, we need to know how much those annual costs are.
The association dues were $150 per month, or $1,800 a year.
Property taxes were just under $1,000 a year.
The electric bill was under $10 in the winter months when we shut it down, but ran much higher if we ran heat in the winter or air conditioning in the summer. We’ll say it averaged $50 a month or $600 a year.
While there could have been other expenses related to maintenance or repairs, our experience was that those were minimal. We’ll call it $100 a year to replace light bulbs, batteries in the fire alarms, and that sort of thing.
In total, we spent about $2,500 a year to own this place. To me, that’s a bargain. We get a lot for our $2,500.It’s difficult to take one decent vacation per year for a family of four for that price, and we spent up to 12 weeks a year at this place.
In a previous iteration of this post, I also calculated the opportunity cost of having the money invested in the cabin rather than in the stock market.
However, we already calculated that the place appreciated at a clip not that far off from the red-hot stock market over this time frame. Much of that came from forced appreciation by getting the place for a song and making it much, much nicer with the renovations.
The Intangibles
While we didn’t live nearby for long, it was never more than a day’s drive away. When I was working, I would spend four to six weeks there every year, and my wife and boys spent most of their summers there, averaging around 10 weeks a year.
Our extended family used it, too. My wife has many relatives in the area, and they not only stay there on occasion, but they also help with tasks when we’re not around, like winterizing the cabin or putting the boat away.
We invited friends to stay there when weren’t around, and a few took us up on the offer. We actually had a family live there for eight months straight when they were in need of a place to stay.
Short-term rentals of the place were not allowed, but we got to be charitable with our property by letting our friends use our second home for free.
This second home actually became our primary home for a spell when I retired for good and we moved back to Michigan. Even when we bought another place in town, this place was a great spot for fun on the lake and a good base camp for winter downhill skiing trips in the area.
Second Home Lessons
We learned that we could live in a small space, at least temporarily. 700 square feet, 2 bedrooms, 1 bath, a small porch and deck, and we were perfectly content, getting by just fine without all the stuff that filled our primary home, which was roughly five times larger.
TV is optional. The largest screen at our cabin wass the 13 inches of pixelated space on my laptop computer. I could watch a game when I “needed to,” but there was no TV routinely on in the background, as is common in many homes.
Less is more. Without all the distractions of home, we had time to just be a family at our second home. Talking, reading, family walks and runs. No hustle. No bustle. Simplicity.
Low maintenance is key. If our second home was anything like our primary home, we’d have had a lawn to mow, snow to blow, and many little headaches that can add up to one big one. Our association dues pay for that work to be done, so there was very little for us to do but enjoy ourselves and our neighbors’ company while we’re there.
You can’t evaluate the value of a second home by looking at nothing but numbers. While this one looks pretty good when examined under the financial microscope, we received immeasurable value for our family in the boat rides, beach days, and sunsets that will never show up on the spreadsheets.
While we no longer have the place, it served us well for 10 years, and it turned out to be an excellent investment in multiple ways.
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Do you own a second home? Has it been a good investment, financially speaking? How about from other perspectives?
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68 thoughts on “Our Second Home Was One of Our Best Investments”
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I like how you said that if you didn’t have a second home, you’d be spending a lot more money on vacations and short-term rentals. My husband and I have been considering buying a second home on the beach. I didn’t realize how much we could save on vacations, so thanks for pointing that out!
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You mentioned commuting to the small airport…airline service, or private plane?
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Interesting story.
I spent summertime with my grandpa at some cabin in MN fishing for pike and muskie. It was somewhere around a 20ft statue of Paul Bunyan and Babe. Good memories. Life isn’t always about making a financial killing. It’s about creating a past worth remembering and about creating a future of security. I bought a condo in St Pete Beach back in my locum days. When I did loc*ms I made the hospital get me a condo on the beach and the one I bought was in the building next door. This was like 1992 and I remember I paid like $158K for that sucker. The condo generated about $1000 a month on rental and the management company did all the maintenance and prepping the place for rental. The next year the condo association decided to renovate which meant the place was essentially gutted and rebuilt, so no rent for nearly a year. Eventually it came back together and I sold it in 1998 (back during the dot com boom) for about 3 times what I paid. Today it’s worth about $529K 25 years later.
For me it was a mixed bag of headache and hooray. I overall made money on the deal but it took up too much space in my brain. It taught me enough about real estate investing to say Homey don’t play that. I love Gulf coast FL. If I want to go over there I just pony up the rental fee have a blast enjoying the beach and when the week or two is over I leave the headache behind.
One question is what do you plan on doing with your kids when they are in high school? Our kids were home schooled through an accredited academy so it was easy to school them from any place with an internet connection but as they developed their own interests and social life piano ballet tap gymnastics track boyfriends and so on they would have been grumpy at me hauling them all over hell’s half acre.
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Excellent opportunistic buy back in 2011. That was actually the most important part of your story. Back in 2011 the real estate market was at a nadir almost everywhere. We also bought real estate in 2011 and it has been a significant reason I was able to retire at age 58. (Could have retired earlier but had a rare pension deal that essentially maxed at age 58.) I’m pretty sure almost anyone who bought real estate in 2011 has come out way ahead by now.
If you had bought real estate in 2005 to 2008, not so sure everyone even made it through the financial crisis. (I personally know of MD who had five rental properties bought during that period all foreclosed during the financial hard times because could not get enough rent for them. Significant property negative cash flow is a financial arterial bleeder. )
If you are in your 30-40s, you can be pretty sure another recession will be coming to a neighborhood near you within your working career. Be ready for it. Have a secure job, affordable life style and home which permits big savings/investments to accumulate. When marked depressed real estate price come back, remember the posting of this cabin purchased in 2011 (or any other story of real estate purchased in 2011).
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Also figure in the opportunity of vacation time if you didn’t have the cabin, you would have spent much less time relaxing! Well worth the $$$ spent!
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This is great. One of the things I have always wanted to do is buy a lake cabin in our home state of Minnesota. Considering we are teachers we could spend summers there get our families to visit and it would make us feel more at “home” even though we live 1500 miles away. Something to definitely think about, particularly in WI or MN. It might be time to pull the trigger.
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Cool story and I know the Minnesota cabin well as I grew up at one. My grandparent’s paid 5k for our’s in 1955. It’s worth 500k now. A cabin can be a lot of work, but it’s amazing way to keep families together. I can’t wait for June first to get here so my new tenets can move into my rental (I’m updating it all of may) and then I can disappear to my cabin for a week and float on the lake near St cloud. Cheers!
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For about 15-20 years every summer our family rented a cabin up north at the same resort for a couple of weeks, Big Pines Resort. After some older family members passed away and the kids grew up we stopped going there every year. The resort was sold off a few years later, cabin by cabin – possibly in a similar fashion to what you describe if I remember correctly. Was always sad about that as we weren’t able to get up there anymore because of the amazing memories we created there, but it is an intriguing idea to wonder if we could find a deal like this at some point. I’ve actually looked at cabins on that same lake, but all of them are in the $200,000 range at this point – I’m sure we could have bought one of them 20 years ago for somewhere in the 30-40k range at most.. Time to start looking.
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Sadly, a lot of the mom & pop resorts are disappearing. The land is so valuable and the taxes so high that it’s more profitable to sell than to continue operating the resort in many instances.
When I was in residency, I used to look at entire resorts for sale. There are still some out there, but the pricetag tends to be steep.
I hear they’re not making any more lakeshore. If you want some, get some!
Best,
-PoFReply
Sounds like a true Minnesotan. I was always an outsider the 14 years I lived there because I did not have a family cabin up North.
I think this is a great example that life is about more than just a balance sheet and many of the “rules” can be bent on the edges and still allow for FIRE.
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I’m a real estate investor and dabble in index fund investing. I think you’re analysis with opportunity cost and other considerations was spot on.
I agree with most other comments that given both the finances and the priceless family memories you get, it’s a worthwhile investment. The main thing I don’t like is the inability to rent it out. Rental income is so fundamental to the value of real estate for me, that when I can’t rent it – it becomes much less attractive. You just lose the flexibility to know you can cover your costs for periods of time while you wait for a better day. Even though stocks give small dividends, at least you know the earnings they retain continue to be used and reinvested. Real estate without income, on the other hand, only has value when it’s resold. But given that your basis is about 50% of the value, you’ve compensated for that negative pretty well.
I enjoyed stumbling upon your website from friends at 1500days.com and eatthefinancialelephant.com. I look forward to following and recommending this to some of my physician/dentist family members.
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Glad you stumbled on over, Coach!
Our inability to rent it out is disappointing, but I can understand the rationale. The owners don’t want weekend or week-long rentals with partiers or people who don’t abide by the rules / bylaws. We can have tenants for a 90-day minimum, but summer is the only time we could demand a decent price, and that’s when we use it the most!
Thank you for sharing my site with your MD & DDS family.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
My dad’s family vacationed at this place, and we eventually went there. The owner was selling a few cabins and my parents decided to buy. Within a few years they added a bedroom, made the kitchen bigger, and moved the bath, but it’s still under 1100 square feet. My mom was a stay at home mom, so we would spend the first 5 weeks of summer up there. 4th of July weekfriends and relatives would rent other cabins and visit. Over time most of the cabins were sold. We would rent it and the money went to upkeep, utilities etc. A few years ago the owner wanted to sell the peoperty. The cabin owners banded together to create an llc/hoa to buy the land. Now the cabin is my mom’s summer retirement house. 🙂
When I was a kid, it was 2.5 hours away, but I moved, now it’s 4 hours each way. I generally go up for 3 days weekends and try to take a day or two, to make the drive feel more worth it.
My sister has declared lack of interest in the business / hoa, and my brother doesn’t say much, so I expect to take over the financial side of things someday. For now, mom is happy and I love going up there, so with running no numbers, totally worth it!Reply
We didn’t get anything like the deal you did, but we have a vacation house on the Oregon coast that we love. We were based in Seattle before our move to the Bay area, and have held onto it. It’s obviously a much bigger trek to get there now, but my family is close by, they use it a lot, and we use it as a landing pad when visiting. We are also on the fence about moving back. That said, best family memories, for all of the reasons you’ve described. SO many amazing family times at that house. . . love it!
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Am I just The Luckiest* or what? Ya Think!!?? Crushing it! Great deal at the auction, great story! We had a second home for 4 years, before selling our primary home and moving to our mountain cabin full time. The cabin has paid for itself (mortgage & all expenses) for the past 3 years. Now, it’s our downsize move for retirement. 2nd homes can work well, but have to be “The Luckiest” on the buy price, or have a plan to migrate as a downsize move..
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I should add: it “paid for itself” via rental income, as our cabin is in a popular “mountain retreat” town just 2 hours from a major city, and we’ve rented it extensively until we moved in full time.
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Great! No catastrophes with renters then, I take it?
I’ve actually had pretty good experiences overall with renters in other places I once lived, but have heard stories from others that would make Steven King cringe.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
This looks amazing! I wish we could find such a good bargain here in Canada. We were shopping for a cottage an hour away from the city but quickly lost hope seeing the sacks going for over $250,000.
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Look south of the border, xyz. From our cabin, we can be in Canada in about 90 minutes.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
Wow, great deal on that bit of property and nice job on the renovations! It’s a shame you can’t rent it out!
For the S&P 500 time period your comparing with, does that include dividends reinvested?
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Yes, return is with dividends reinvested. I use this S&P 500 Return Calculator.
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It’s interesting how things turn out, and it’s pretty awesome that you turned a nice profit with a low-cost purchase. It’s also good to hear that even though your department closed its doors, you found a way to survive. I’m currently in a similar situation, and I just sunk in a relatively large amount on a new house! It is a nerve-wracking feeling being uncertain about my working career future.
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Ouch! Sorry to hear, S$MD. I ignored the “RENT, DON’T BUY” mantra for your first “permanent” job as well. Cost me a lot of money.
Fortunately, our services are in relatively high demand in many places. Best of luck with the job search!
-PoFReply
I really like how your second home has worked out as a nice little test as to whether you guys could live in a smaller space. It must give you more confidence that you’ll all be fine in a much smaller space when you go travel the world.
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That is one of the key benefits, FP. And one that couldn’t have occurred to me back when we bought the place.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
Wow, I’m jealous! We purchased a vacation home so we could escape the cold, snowy winters in the Colorado mountains. Our requirement was that it be within a day’s drive of home so we ended up buying in Arizona. Even though we purchased deep in the real estate downturn, it hasn’t proven to be the financial windfall we expected. But, even in spite of that, it was the right decision for us. We feel a connection to the community and have made friendships that wouldn’t have been possible without purchasing.
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Cool! I mean Warm! We, too, have appreciated being in a little resort. We can mingle with neighbors on their porch or around a campfire in the evenings. Makes being social very easy.
Best,
-PoFReply
Did you remove the shower stall in that bathroom remodel, or tuck it in differently? If you removed it, do you miss it?
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Good question, S.G.
We moved the shower curtain and made it a smaller enclosure to make room for a 40 gallon hot water heater in the same space. Worked out well!
Best,
-PoFReply
Yes. That layout is much better. Well done.
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POF, you successfully demonstrated two key rules, and you hit the cover off the ball on both of them:
1) The best way to earn a good return on a real estate is to buy it right
2) Don’t buy a second home that you can’t get to for the weekend
Amazingly, you outperformed the stock market at a time when the market produced “once in a lifetime” returns (2011 to 2016). Your purchase opportunity was certainly related to the real estate market cycle, but you also created a lot of value with your renovation. Way to go!Reply
Thanks, Mitch!
We definitely bought low, and we planned to be within a ten minute drive. Fate had other ideas, but we are glad to have this place to use and call our own.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
Wow. I always wanted to go to a RE auction! Seems like you made out well. Wonder why he was auctioning them off and not selling separately.
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Worked out for us. It’s the only RE auction I’ve attended, and I wouldn’t want to go again. I have no interest in managing more than two properties (again).
The developer tried to sell them individually, but the market wouldn’t tolerate the asking prices. Only about 20% sold in several years.
Best,
-PoFReply
Convincing analysis POF. Of course, a second home is two homes too many is where I stand on this issue! I realize I am among the minority renters in the FIREd community but these are highly subjective decisions – congrats on finding your own cabin paradise! Maybe someday you’ll invite me over to see what I am missing! ?
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You and Jim Collins 🙂
I have shifted my thinking from RE being a good investment to RE is something you pay for. There are ways to come out ahead, but if you add up the true cost of home ownership, particularly in states with high property taxes, you have to be lucky or good to win in real estate. Just simply being a homeowner doesn’t make you better off.
Best,
-PoFReply
For you, looks like it has been and will continue to be a great day. You were even able to use it to help someone else get back on their feet, that is awesome. But everyone, has to make sure they do the math and that they can afford not only to buy the second place, but maintain it. We just got back from a weekend at a condo we found on Airbnb. It was really nice. More are even being built. Very close to a ski resort, but still we aren’t in that place where buying makes sense yet.
Great job on the remodel, too.
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Glad to hear, Chris! I love AirBNB and the whole concept of the “sharing economy.”
Before we had this place, I much preferred the idea of spending our vacations in different places. But our second home gives us great access to my wife’s extended family, and friends in the town where we lived for several years and started our family. It’s a great place to visit, and we still vacation in other places enough, given my schedule which has long workdays, but generous time off.
Best,
-PoFReply
Wow, great deal on the cabin! How lucky for you that they auctioned all the cabins in one shot, instead of splitting it up on separate days. Sounds like you did a great job reading the room, too, so you didn’t end up overpaying. 🙂
The remodel looks nice, too. That was very smart to move the toilet over so it’s not the first thing you see when you open the bathroom door.
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Thanks, Snow Monster!
Yes, we were very pleased with how the place turned out, including the toilet placement. The vanity is a dresser I found and refinished when I was between jobs. The mirror is straight from Ikea. $20.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
That is a heck of a deal. I have a lot of same concerns that you had about a second home. But I also have good memories at about my grandparents cabin. Maybe if we find a great deal, we will pull the trigger one of these days. Although, it would be cool if we could rent it out. =) Our area has a really strong tourist industry, so that is a possibility.
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We did get pretty lucky. There’s no way we’d have the place if it hadn’t been an incredible bargain. Rental income can be useful to offset a lot of costs in some rentals, but the wear, tear, and logistical issues (cleaning, repairs, replacing items gone missing) can offset the monetary reward if you’re not able to line up a good property manager and quality tenants. If you live close by, you could do much or all of it yourself.
Best,
-PoFReply
As you point out in your closing paragraph, you have to move on from financials and look at the more important intangibles. As much as a great deal it was to secure the purchase, the value of family time can not be quantified. Our second home purchase has a different flavor and that is because it is going to be our permanent home once we relocate in two years. We absorb the costs of running two homes for a short period. That strategy / philosophy does not sit well with everybody though.
The upgrades look grand and the sweat / dollar equity is clearly compensated in greater amounts by the awesome family experiences.
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That’s a great plan, PIEs. By using the second home now, you have the additional benefit of finding out what it’s really like to live there. Some people fantasize about life in the mountains / forest / secret underground lair, etc… The reality and the dream can be miles apart. It’s best to learn that before up and moving. The extra money you’re paying by owning both places is insurance against that happening to you.
I’d write more, but I’ve got to get back to digging.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
We should catch up on more of this stuff in Dallas next year over a beer or two.
You are going to FinCon, right?Reply
Indeed! We’ll see you there, Dr. PIE.
What a deal! I like the renovation work, and for a second home that’s far away it’s nice to have all the maintenance covered. Sounds like a perfect home base to have while traveling the world.
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No doubt, MCK! The possibility of making it our primary home for a period of time might be the best perk, and it’s one I hadn’t considered until quite recently.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
All sounds great to me, that is a great deal on a lake, would have a hard time buying a lot for that price.
I know you pay for it, but putting boat lifts and docks is a great chore to avoid
Reply
True story. I still pay my dues sometimes at my parents 2nd turned primary home. Fortunately, the tractor does all the heavy lifting.
Best,
-PoFReply
Looks like a solid deal and that’s great your family gets so much use out of it. Hard to go wrong when the initial purchase price is $15k! I like the idea of that being your landing base when you begin to travel the world too, it should work out well.
Also, I like the before and after pics! You folks made some fine improvements.
Reply
Yes, Green Swan. That “auction” sign was serendipitous. It allowed us to maintain closer ties to the area after we were forced to move away.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
Wow that was some deal. Several times we’ve looked at cabins somewhere on a lake, usually a long distance away. The maintenance and/or the risk of a condo association fee sudden in trade keep us out so far. How consistent have the association fees been to date? Is the dock something the homeowner’s collectively have to kick in to replace every so often? One final question, are you neighbors still 10k cabins or did the neighborhood also improve? Just curious as we may someday go this route.
Reply
Valid concerns and questions, FTF. The condo fees started at $175 / month, but have dropped to $150 / month. Any work on the dock comes out of the reserve built up with our dues. There have been a number of improvements around the property, many of them costing several thousand dollars, and there have been no “special assessments.”
The cabins aren’t taj mahals, but all are in decent shape. There were a couple in disrepair that were torn down completely and rebuilt from the ground up.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
Wow, you got an awesome deal on that place! I think financials aside, the family memories you are building with your kids is invaluable! And being just a days drive away is still very close by imo.
It just goes to show that rules of thumb like, “vacation properties are bad investments” are not always true and every situation is different. You always have to run the financials yourself.
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It’s a full day’s drive, but we’ve done it many, many times. There’s also a small airport nearby and I’ve used it a few times to commute when the rest of the family is there most of the summer, and I only have a few days free.
Cheers!
-PoFReply
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