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Blue Ridge with a Twist of Key West · Short Term Shopping

• 0:02
  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. All right, here we go. Short Term Shopping. We are in the mountains of North Georgia, Blue Ridge Mountains. And we've got John Swan, which is possibly one of the coolest names that I've ever heard of on an individual. So, John, how you doing, buddy?
• 0:39
  Speaker B: I am doing great. And it is beautiful up here in the mountains. And yes, it rhymes. So at least people remember my name.
• 0:46
  Speaker A: Yeah, I like it. I'm Luke. Carl. Two first names. That's, you know, whole nother thing. But anyway, we're going to talk about the mountains of Blue Ridge and vacation houses and Atlanta getaway houses, et cetera. John, if you want to give us a little backstory on yourself and then tell us a little bit about your market.
• 1:09
  Speaker B: Well, I have. I grew up in a tourist town in Maryland, so I'm intimately familiar with the tourist based economies. And then later in life I spent 10 years living in Key West, Florida. So that was just a bigger version of the tourist based economy. And now Blue Ridge, Georgia, which is a whole other tourist based economy. So I'm very versed in that type of thing and how a town can survive based on who comes to visit and making it pleasant for them to come visit there.
• 1:42
  Speaker A: What was the Keys like? How long were you there in the Keys?
• 1:45
  Speaker B: The first time I was there three years in the early 2000s, and then I was there for 10 years, my last stint. And I moved up here into Georgia over a year ago.
• 1:55
  Speaker A: And I mean, I have to assume that it's kind of a weird place to live, right? Like, what is the day to day life like there?
• 2:05
  Speaker B: It is definitely called Key Weird for a reason. It can be whatever you want it to be. We lived in a very calm, quiet, peaceful little neighborhood in what was called Midtown on Laird Street. And it was a wonderful neighborhood, great neighbors, very good sense of community. But it could always be Saturday night if you wanted to go downtown to Deval Street. Or it could be the most laid back place in the world. Just don't come to Key west looking for a beach and you're good to go.
• 2:37
  Speaker A: No beach. So what are we doing there? I mean, you're in the. You're damn near in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico, right? So like we're fishing and partying or what are we doing?
• 2:45
  Speaker B: That's pretty much it. It's A little drinking town with a fishing problem. Fishing is great. There's lots of historic things to do. The Hemingway home is there where Ernest Hemingway lived and wrote a lot of his famous stories. The aside, I used to build the cat houses for the Hemingway home. That was my part time gig.
• 3:06
  Speaker A: What do you mean? What is a cat house?
• 3:08
  Speaker B: They have little houses all over the property that the cats live in because they have these polydactyl cats that have the extra toes and they live all over the property and have free reign of the property downtown. And they have these little houses all over the place built. And I had to build them exactly the way Hemingway built them. So no modern way of building. That was the way he would have built them back in the 40s.
• 3:32
  Speaker A: And this house is now what, a museum or privately owned or.
• 3:37
  Speaker B: It's owned by a group, partially the family and then by some other investors and it's the Hemingway House Museum.
• 3:44
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 3:44
  Speaker B: And it's also open for folks to use as a wedding venue or event venue.
• 3:49
  Speaker A: Oh, that's wonderful. I've never been there. It's always, you know, we live in Florida, but we could not be further away. And it's always one of those things that's kind of on your list. But we've not made it there just yet. Well, then we moved to Blue Ridge and what do we do there? What's that? Tell me what that's like and where is it?
• 4:08
  Speaker B: Well, Blue Ridge. I actually live a little bit south of Blue Ridge, but Blue Ridge is in the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains, obviously from its name of North Georgia. And I work mostly in Blue Ridge and then the surrounding little teeny towns of Ellaj, Morganton, Mineral Bluff. There's a little area just south of Blue Ridge called Cherry Log Mountain, those type of places. And it is a wonderful laid back mountain experience with lots of nature things to do rather than amusement parks and intense. It's very laid back and you can enjoy the river and trout fishing and wineries and breweries and those type of things.
• 4:50
  Speaker A: Do you do. Are you a fisherman?
• 4:52
  Speaker B: I am a fisherman. I have not had time to do much fishing since I've been here because I've been working on getting myself established and we bought a house and been renovating it ourselves. So I can't wait to get to do some fishing.
• 5:05
  Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, we. I try every chance I get. We actually just went red fishing out in, in the swamps south of New Orleans last weekend and it wasn't the per, it was too hot. But we still caught a few and it Was a great time. Just a little flat bottom. Wasn't little. It was a fiberglass boat with a. I mean, it had a full size outboard on it, but nothing crazy. But we were out there for. I mean, we probably went out 45 minutes or so and. But just stayed like in the marshes. But it was. It was fun. First time I'd ever done anything like that.
• 5:40
  Speaker B: Very similar to flats fishing in the Keys. When you get up in the mangrove forests and things like that, you kind of get into the swamps of that area. And there's always really good fish in there too.
• 5:51
  Speaker A: And what are we fishing for there, around those roots?
• 5:54
  Speaker B: What's that?
• 5:54
  Speaker A: What are we fishing for down there?
• 5:58
  Speaker B: All sorts of stuff. Snapper. We see. If you get a little bit further out, there's tarpon. Those are fun to catch. They're big guys. And during certain parts of the year, sailfish. They have the world Sail fishing tournament there every year. So there's lots of different things to catch while you're out there.
• 6:18
  Speaker A: Okay, one last thing. On the Keys, because it is such a vacation town, even though that has nothing to do with what we're talking about today. What's the rental situation like down there? You hear that? There's a lot of regulations and things, but I don't really know much about it.
• 6:31
  Speaker B: There's a ton of regulations down there. You have to have a transient rental license, of which there are a limited number, so they're a hot commodity to sell. You can sell your license to someone else. So when you're tired of it, you can stop renting and sell your license without selling the property. You can also buy a property that has a transient license, and a lot of people do that to obtain one rather than trying to get a new license, because those are few and far between.
• 7:02
  Speaker A: I see, I see. And are there hotels or not really?
• 7:06
  Speaker B: Tons of hotels.
• 7:07
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 7:08
  Speaker B: Hotel, motel kind of places. Lots of classic hotels downtown. And on the water. Almost everything is on the water. I mean, you're never more than a couple blocks from either the ocean or the Gulf. And tons of places to stay. And then a little Essex, but ultra expensive. Most of them now just up the Keys. As you work your way up. There are less expensive places to stay outside of Key west, once you get up to places like Big Pine and Sugarloaf Key and even in Marathon and Islamorada. And the fishing is superb up there as well.
• 7:42
  Speaker A: Mm. But not necessarily an area where you would consider, you know, buying a rental house or Maybe, maybe, but not really.
• 7:52
  Speaker B: It's A totally different market. You're investing a lot of money in a rental house. A lot more people buy rental properties there for long term rentals or midterm rentals because we get a lot of like traveling nurses and those type of things working at the hospital. But a lot of long term rentals because people can't afford to buy a house there. So you buy one and rent it to somebody else and that pays your mortgage and hopefully you make a little bit on top of it. But that's becoming a real problem because property taxes there and insurance have shot through the roof. When I lived in the Keys, over half of my mortgage payment was taxes and insurance. It was insane.
• 8:33
  Speaker A: Yeah, I can imagine. Well, no more hurricanes in Georgia, right? Well, you know, hopefully. Hopefully.
• 8:39
  Speaker B: Hopefully once in a while one passes through, but I'm looking forward to not having hurricanes.
• 8:44
  Speaker A: Okay, well let's look at some houses. If you don't mine. What do you, what do we have there? What do you got for sale up there in the. In North Georgia?
• 8:51
  Speaker B: Well, we have an array of things here.
• 8:56
  Speaker A: Well, which. And while he's pulling that up, I should also mention that Mr. John is a licensed real estate agent and works for the greatest vacation rental real estate team on the planet. Second home, vacation home, etc. The short term shop. And we, we are going to just shop around today and see what's available in his market basically.
• 9:18
  Speaker B: So I put together an array of things here today from the starter places because we have folks coming into this market that want to buy something that's on the low end that they can generate some money with. So I've got the lowest price. One is $410,000 to as a starter place and then the high end place today is 5.3 million and it is absolutely spectacular.
• 9:48
  Speaker A: Okay, well hold on a second. This is already catching my eye here. This thing's 410 and it's got a view.
• 9:55
  Speaker B: This is 410. Now that view is blown up a little bit from photographers are really, really good. So the view is. That is expanded. What you actually see this part if you can see my cursor is in the distance. So this has been blown up to see it.
• 10:14
  Speaker A: I see.
• 10:15
  Speaker B: But it does have a little bit of a view and that was one reason I picked this one is It's a cute little two one. It's only 768 square feet but it is ideal as a honeymoon cappin or a couples retreat or even a small family getaway. It does not have all the crazy big Amenities of game rooms and things of that sort. But it's on a little over half acre lot. It's only 13 minutes outside Blue Ridge which we try to. The sweet spot we talk about in this market is you want to be between 15 and 20 minutes of downtown of Blue Ridge or Ella J. If you're. If you're buying in that area. Just so that if you're there with your family and you forgot something it's not an over an hour round trip to go get the milk or something that the kids want. It just makes more sense.
• 11:09
  Speaker A: I feel like. Can you, can you scroll through this one? I feel like I have seen this one before. Is this one of YOX listings?
• 11:15
  Speaker B: It is. This is one of yacht's listings. He and I were talking about it yesterday and I said you know what, I'm going to put that on there because this is such a cute little place and it has. It has a hot tub. It has a small hot tub but it's made for a small crowd. It's just a really cute little spot with a view and that. That's a million dollar thing here. For $410,000 it's pretty amazing.
• 11:40
  Speaker A: Location on this thing 1 to 10.
• 11:44
  Speaker B: I would say location on this one is probably an 8 because it is real close to town and it's a real easy drive. So no crazy mountain roads and no four wheel drive required. There are places that do that. So this one's pretty cool.
• 12:03
  Speaker A: The baseboard heat I noticed at least in one room. Is that. Is that common?
• 12:08
  Speaker B: It is not common. It's common in some of the really older places. This one was built in 2000 so it was right at the time when everybody was switching to heat pumps and central everything. So this one still has some baseboard heat. It does have central heating and air conditioning in most of the places. So that's like an extra or a leftover. But it does have central.
• 12:33
  Speaker A: Gotcha.
• 12:33
  Speaker B: Matter of fact there's the heat pump right there.
• 12:38
  Speaker A: All right, that's cool. All right. Yeah. That's a nice little starting point. Let's move on. I have more questions but we'll be here all day. So let's go ahead to Zane drive here.
• 12:49
  Speaker B: All righty. The next one, this one's at 464 9. It's a three bed, two bath. Because the other sweet spot in our market is the three bedroom. Two or three bedrooms seems to be a really good rental size here. Fours rent higher but usually have a little bit less occupancy because people aren't necessarily looking for something that big but they will rent for people who want something smaller when all the smaller ones are taken. This one on zane Drive, it's a 321300 square feet. It's a 1994 build but it's been completely remodeled and it's on over three quarter acre lot. It does have a water view of the lake and something else that's good for it has lake and mountain views. You know it does have a really nice view. I tried to pick some things that had a nice view because that is something renters are looking for. So it's cute. It also the downside of this one is it's close to its neighbors so there is privacy but your neighbor is right next door and some people would rather be further out than that. But as you see in these photos you do have that long range mountain vista out the windows of the cabin.
• 14:20
  Speaker A: This seems like a pretty good. I like this. I'm. I'm actually kind of surprised you're hitting me with a couple right away that I'm. I'm. Can you go back to listing. I'd like to see how when this was built. If you could go back top left there back to listing.
• 14:33
  Speaker B: Sure. This one was built in.
• 14:37
  Speaker A: Gotta click it one more time.
• 14:39
  Speaker B: 1994
• 14:42
  Speaker A: and the reason I ask is because it seems to be very well taken care of. Have you been inside of it?
• 14:47
  Speaker B: I have been inside of it once. The downside of this one because this has one negative. Well other than the close to the neighbors it's 24 minute drive to Elijah. Okay So it's just far enough out. It's a little remote so it doesn't. It's not going to be a place that rents at the top of the list. I see it does have a fenced in yard. So if you're a pet friendly place that is always a plus for pet owners to have a fenced in space. Fairly flat. Fenced in space for animals.
• 15:19
  Speaker A: Can you scroll down a little more? I'd like to see the. What they paid for it. I like this one.
• 15:25
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 15:26
  Speaker A: Keep going.
• 15:26
  Speaker B: Yep. Little further.
• 15:29
  Speaker A: There you go. There you go. Sold. 2020. Okay. They bought it in 23.
• 15:33
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 15:35
  Speaker A: For full asking price at 399. So they do have a little wiggle room even though they've only owned it for a couple of years.
• 15:42
  Speaker B: They do. It also looks like they probably put quite a bit of money into it after they bought it because a lot of things inside are pretty updated.
• 15:53
  Speaker A: Yeah. This is the one where I try. I Would personally try and track down if I was the buyer the old listing and see if it looked junkier and see how much they put into it. Because right. I would say right now just a few pictures you flip through. This thing's in great shape now. I'm not super psyched about the textured low ceilings but that's just kind of how they did things in the late 90s. Yeah.
• 16:15
  Speaker B: The popcorn ceiling. Not my favorite either. They do make a wonderful thing. That is a sander that hooks to a shop vac now that you can.
• 16:23
  Speaker A: Oh really?
• 16:24
  Speaker B: And vacuum it up at the same time.
• 16:26
  Speaker A: I haven't seen that.
• 16:27
  Speaker B: Did not make too much of a mess. I don't know how expensive it is but I have seen that now.
• 16:32
  Speaker A: Yes. Because I have definitely done it the old fashioned way with a scraper and it is a disaster. Me too.
• 16:39
  Speaker B: But this one I felt had a modern feel for a 94 build. Of course the downside of the 94 build is how old are the infrastructure things. You know, the AC and the. The water heater and the roof and the. You definitely would want to look into all of that before you decided you wanted to move forward on this one. You'd want a good inspection but looks
• 17:08
  Speaker A: to be in great shape. But anyway, sorry to have interrupted. If you want to flip through more pictures or move to the next one.
• 17:16
  Speaker B: This one. This one is just kind of okay. It's not at the top of my list.
• 17:23
  Speaker A: I think it's better than okay. John, again you're. You're more familiar with your market than I am. But I really like this as far
• 17:30
  Speaker B: as my only concern is the distance. The distance we're at that 25 minute. The view does make up for it some. But you have to be really spectacular to make people want to rent something that's that far out of town.
• 17:44
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 17:45
  Speaker B: Just. We worry about that.
• 17:46
  Speaker A: All right. I'm going to. I might write this one down. Zane Drive. I kind of like that one. This is going to be my benchmark so far. But let's go ahead.
• 17:54
  Speaker B: All right. The next one is one that's a full time residence right now but short term rentals are allowed and it looks great on paper and the upstairs shows really well. But this is one of those that I'm like. I'm not sure that we really want somebody to buy this one. This one on Silver Fox Trail. As you see the river is right here and you have a great view of the river from the cabin and it looks nice. It has a modern cabin feel. So it does have wood accents, wood floors, but everything. Most of it is drywall on the inside. It does have that. It has a great view of the river but you don't have river access. So if you like the sound and be able to sit out on your deck or with the screens open and enjoy the rushing sound of the river that's there. But you can't get to it because there is a. The folks next door own a 14 acre plot and that land is in a conservancy for agricultural use that just got renewed. So they can't sell it and they can't officially allow you to use it. The current folks are friendly with the dentist next door who is a part time resident and have permission to let go across his yard to. For them to use personally. But I'm not sure they would want renters doing that. So that probably be a negative.
• 19:26
  Speaker A: But I mean for me again that's. I don't want the renters down there anyway. You know, it's a liability. So I don't. I don't. I would. Is it like way down in the. In the. Down the hill or.
• 19:38
  Speaker B: It's not far and once you get down the hill on this property the access to the river is fairly flat. So it would be very tempting for somebody to be running down to the river all the time.
• 19:49
  Speaker A: I see. Let's flip through though.
• 19:51
  Speaker B: I think so far also the one thing to note here is it doesn't have a dishwasher and that would probably bother a lot of people. This island. There's a banquette right in the middle of this. I think there's another picture of it. There's the banquet. This island is where the sink is. And there's a cabinet next to the sink you could remove to put in a dishwasher. But these wings aren't big enough. So you would lose much needed cabinet space because it's a very small kitchen to put in a dishwasher. I'm not sure. That's probably why they didn't do it. And then the downstairs has a nice master bath or main bedroom. Excuse me. The downstairs there's a really nice game room here. Has laminate floors and I think flip through a couple here. This had. Yeah, this was a. This is another bedroom. They just have it set up with a day bed that has a trundle right now because they don't have a lot of guests. These folks are moving back to Florida to be closer to their children. This is a little office room that could be used as a bedroom or bunk. Room. So you can. You could add another bedroom to this, but it's. When you get downstairs is the issue. It's a very. The decks are really nice. When you come down the stairs, they have, like, an exercise area set up. They have a bathroom down there. And then they have this weird. This space. But it's all one giant room centered around the bathroom and mechanical room on the other side. No way to make the bathroom go through to the other side because of the mechanical room. And it does have this kind of kitchenette, wet bar area, no stove. So you could divide it into two and rent out upstairs and downstairs, or keep upstairs for yourself and only rent out downstairs. And add a stove. But it's just an odd configuration.
• 22:08
  Speaker A: We could also add a dishwasher down there on that.
• 22:11
  Speaker B: You could. You definitely could add a dishwasher here. There's space, but you would have to do something to add a cooking. Some sort of cooking appliance down there. It is pretty. This is where you look out off the deck towards the river. Hummingbird feeder. Don't know why it's blue. They like red. But you also. There's also a power line that runs through an easement. It's on the next property through that agricultural land, in your view? I really didn't notice it very much when I was there, but it's there. And some folks don't like to have a power line in the fate.
• 22:46
  Speaker A: This looks a little newer or it's been remodeled. At least that kitchen. When was this built?
• 22:53
  Speaker B: This was built. Let me go back to the listing on that, because this one might not be able to get back there.
• 23:01
  Speaker A: Just scroll down. There you go. Oh, we lost it.
• 23:03
  Speaker B: Yep. Lost it.
• 23:05
  Speaker A: That's all right.
• 23:08
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 23:08
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 23:09
  Speaker B: I lost it.
• 23:09
  Speaker A: No worries.
• 23:12
  Speaker B: This one. So this one was one that I said. It's also 25 minutes out of Blue Ridge. And you have.
• 23:22
  Speaker A: Hold on.
• 23:24
  Speaker B: Yeah, this one. The other negative about this One was it's 25 minutes from blue Ridge, so it's really far from town. You really feel. Do feel isolated once you get out there. And unless you have AT&T and their service is really spotty, you don't have cell service in this. It's in the ASKA adventure area. You don't have cell service, so your GPS doesn't work on your phone. So unless you know where you're going or have really good directions, you will get lost trying to get there or get back. So as far as a rental goes, that's usually not a good thing to not have that kind of access.
• 24:03
  Speaker A: See, I, I, I'll find my way around all that. I will. I like that house. I like the little bank. Yet. But I hear what you're saying. I do. I hear what you're saying. We got to make sure we get the exact right house. And you're talking again. We lost the screen there. So you're talking about the bank at one with the AT and T thing.
• 24:20
  Speaker B: Yes. Correct. Okay, I got one with the bankhead and this, the strange layout downstairs.
• 24:25
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 24:25
  Speaker B: One giant room.
• 24:28
  Speaker A: I like it. I think you're being a little hard on it there, John, but I hear what you're saying.
• 24:32
  Speaker B: I just think that there's better things out there.
• 24:35
  Speaker A: Okay, well, let's look at that.
• 24:36
  Speaker B: Trying to put the better things.
• 24:38
  Speaker A: So far you've, you're under promising big time. Which is, which is good. Which is good. That means I'm gonna lie, I'm gonna fall in love with one of these here. Which, this might be it. That's a great.
• 24:48
  Speaker B: Well, we're getting. There's some much better ones coming.
• 24:50
  Speaker A: The price is still staying fairly reasonable here.
• 24:53
  Speaker B: Yep. These. I tried to pick things that were, would be appealing to most people. This is what we're seeing in our market right now. Everybody's coming in and wanting things in the 4 to 5 to low 600 range. So I tried to pick mostly those. Then I picked some really good ones at the end.
• 25:11
  Speaker A: This one also, I'm already in love with this. This is cute as a button. And what a great photographer you had here. So this is.
• 25:18
  Speaker B: Yes. This one, the guy did a really good job. But this one unfortunately had three kind of negative ones in a row. And this one has a couple negatives too. This one is a 3, 3, 1500 square feet built in 2021. So it's fairly new because it's in a new development called High River. The problem is that the development isn't really built out. So no, you don't have a lot of neighbors, but there's always some sort of construction going on somewhere close by. This one also reads more like a house than a cabin. It sits real close to the road and it does not have a game room space. So when you're getting. We're at the 5, almost $500,000. It's at 497, which, it's funny, they say it's priced for an immediate sale, but it's been on the market for over 103 days and had a $52,000 price reduction. So not as immediate as they thought. But it's cute. It definitely has its merits.
• 26:26
  Speaker A: Have you been there?
• 26:27
  Speaker B: The sunrise? Yeah, sunrise and sunsets here are really great. But when you get inside, it's a house. So for folks looking for a cabin as a rental, this would not appeal. People are looking for at least some wood accents, some exposed beams, some wood walls. And this has the vinyl plank flooring, which was very trendy. But it's not necessarily what folks are looking for when they want to rent a cabin for a mountain experience.
• 27:08
  Speaker A: Yeah, because it is cute. I like it. I actually like that circle driveway too. Is that road well traveled or not really?
• 27:15
  Speaker B: No, it's not. It. It's not well traveled yet, but there are tons of lots to be built out all around this area. So over time it's going to get much busier.
• 27:28
  Speaker A: Maybe, maybe not. Because I see the building slowing down. I just don't see the builders being able to sustain with the way the market is right now. It seems like, you know, you know how builders are always like two years
• 27:40
  Speaker B: behind everything right now. This one, a good thing here is for up in the mountains and having this type of view. It's not all paved, paved road. There is a little bit of gravel, but there's no four wheel drive required. It's not a steep approach. You know, it's a real easy place to get to. And a third bath 16 minutes outside Elijah, it feels a little remote because once you get into High river, which is the development, there's just not a lot completed. So you feel like you're kind of out in the middle of nowhere. So for some people that's going to be great because right now it has a lot of privacy other than being right next to the road.
• 28:19
  Speaker A: And the third bathroom is appealing. And we haven't seen that yet.
• 28:22
  Speaker B: Correct. This one we kind of moved up a little a tier. Here we have three baths instead of the two or two and a half.
• 28:29
  Speaker A: All right, that's a plus. That is a plus. Am I to assume that the next one is a winner? You've kind of implied that a little bit.
• 28:36
  Speaker B: The next one is a real winner. That needs one tiny thing done, but it's not all that tiny. The next one is 260 down under road. And down under is a misnomer because down under road goes through a valley and then comes up. And this one is on the top of the mountain. It's the last house at the end of the road. So you have that privacy. You're not going to have people driving by. It has a huge area for parking they call it the future garage space. If you wanted to live there full time and build a garage, this one has a lot of things going for it. It has screened in porches, which we have not encountered much in the previous one so far because, you know, it's north Georgia mountains. We do have bugs, we do have mosquitoes. So a screened in area is always a plus. And this one has nice screened in spaces. The only downside of this, it's three bed, three bath, and all of those areas are finished. The only thing this lacks is a game room space and a hot tub. So you would have to figure after you purchase this, you would need to put in a hot tub. You would also need to finish the basement space into a game room. Because right now you go downstairs into. And I think if I go backwards, we can get there faster. It also has, for the hot tub area, it has a nice concrete lower terrace level. So you're not worried about having to reinforce a deck or something to put a hot tub on.
• 30:16
  Speaker A: All right. Notice that already. That's a good thing.
• 30:20
  Speaker B: So here it shows that this is at the top of the mountain. It has great views.
• 30:25
  Speaker A: End of the road.
• 30:26
  Speaker B: Yep. This is the unfinished space. You come down the stairs. Right here in the corner, there's a door out to that concrete terrace level. And it's a poured basement, which is great because they don't. You don't develop as many leaks. You don't get stuff seeping through the block. You don't get many cracks in the foundation. Although a contractor friend of mine always tells me, and I use this during home inspections, there's two types of concrete. Concrete that is cracked, and concrete is not cracked yet. So eventually you'll end up with a crack somewhere.
• 31:01
  Speaker A: Yes. You know, it's funny because the house we currently live in has a concrete stained concrete first floor. And Avery's always, we've got to get something. We're going to rent it probably when we move out. Pretty soon we're moving next door. Actually. It's a long story, but she's like, the first floor's got all the cracks. You're gonna have to put some laminate on top of it. I said, avery, it's concrete. Of course it's cracked. It's not gonna be. Not cracked.
• 31:26
  Speaker B: Nope. There's no way to stop it.
• 31:28
  Speaker A: Yeah. I think it builds character. Really. I have no problem with the cracked stained concrete. I think it looks cool and not that that's what this is. I just bringing it up. A side note here, it could be Stained concrete.
• 31:39
  Speaker B: Right.
• 31:39
  Speaker A: If you wanted to stain it, but
• 31:40
  Speaker B: I like it, I would stain this. Probably.
• 31:43
  Speaker A: I would do.
• 31:44
  Speaker B: And this over here, this is a finished bedroom and a finished bathroom. This is the third bedroom and bathroom. So those are ready to go. It needs some sheetrock in here. It needs to have a closet built around all the mechanical. But at least all the mechanical is in one spot. So you don't have to build around multiple things.
• 32:06
  Speaker A: It's interesting. They didn't just sheetrock this because it looks like that's all it needs.
• 32:10
  Speaker B: That's all it needs. It even. It's ready for sheetrock on the ceiling even. I just don't understand why they didn't finish it.
• 32:17
  Speaker A: Yeah, they did all the expensive stuff and not the easy part.
• 32:22
  Speaker B: Yep. And the sheetrock. And it isn't even going to be a major expense. It's just getting it done.
• 32:27
  Speaker A: Yeah. Just get the right guy over there, get it, get it painted and let it rip.
• 32:32
  Speaker B: Yep. But this is like. This is the upstairs kind of the upstairs suite private area. There's a bedroom bathroom on the third level. And it has this screened in little balcony with a great long range mountain view. So this one is definitely a big plus. And it's only five. It's listed at 529. And it's 2,500 square feet. Now that includes that basement. That needs to be fixed. But the price is right for the view and its proximity to town. This gives you this feeling of being very isolated. You go up a nice windy road, get to the top of the mountain. But it's not scary. And it's only eight minutes outside of Blue Ridge. So feel like you have this total privacy, end of the road, private retreat.
• 33:21
  Speaker A: Just to reiterate.
• 33:22
  Speaker B: 10 minutes from town, 10 minutes.
• 33:24
  Speaker A: They are. They are including the basement, quote, unquote, basement in that finished square footage there. The 2584.
• 33:30
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 33:31
  Speaker A: It's great that you know that. How. What, what real estate agent is just going to know that off the top of their head? Great job. Go back to listing. I'd like to see the price history. And you've been inside this?
• 33:45
  Speaker B: Yes, I was just there the other day. Oh, wonderful. And got a one acre lot.
• 33:50
  Speaker A: I like that it's at the end of the road. It's eight minutes to town. Ten minutes to town. It's got a lot going for it here. Sheetrock, that basement. You probably get a little equity going. They paid. They built it.
• 34:01
  Speaker B: They built it. Yes.
• 34:03
  Speaker A: But we don't know when. So it's never been Sold.
• 34:06
  Speaker B: Correct.
• 34:07
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 34:08
  Speaker B: So there's not a lot to go on there. You don't let it cost them to build it.
• 34:12
  Speaker A: Yeah, we don't know. This is hard to figure. Cause right now, it's probably the first time in history or the most relevant time I've seen that price history matters. Most of the time, I don't look at that, don't care, because the seller's gonna do what the seller's gonna do. But right now, because of what happened with COVID and everything else, the price history is something that, I mean, a lot of times I go straight for it to see what they paid for this thing.
• 34:37
  Speaker B: We look at it all the time. Because up here, man, people at the height of COVID were paying anything hand over fist to get into these places. And now that they're coming on the market, they're thinking that they're still worth that. And it's a kind of an abrupt uptake when they find out that it's not quite worth what they thought it was.
• 34:56
  Speaker A: Yeah. What would you say? Forget about the price history and the fact that they built it and everything. What's a good price to get this
• 35:03
  Speaker B: one for at this point? What most things in our market are selling for about 95% of asking. Truthfully, that's about where we are. So you're going to be probably around 500.
• 35:23
  Speaker A: Would you say it's a deal at 500?
• 35:26
  Speaker B: I would say it's not a deal deal. And you might be able to get it under the 500 a little bit. They did do a price cut on this last month, so they're starting. It's been on the market for a little bit. So they're starting to think maybe we need to move it.
• 35:45
  Speaker A: 460 would be a deal.
• 35:47
  Speaker B: 460. I think even 475 would be a pretty good deal.
• 35:51
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 35:52
  Speaker B: But you'd have to finish that room. But again, I think that's minimal expense.
• 35:57
  Speaker A: I do, too. I mean, I haven't seen it in real life, but it looks to me like they did all the heavy lifting and then just kind of went on vacation and forgot about it.
• 36:05
  Speaker B: Yeah, the AC vents, everything's there in the ceiling. I mean, all you have to do is sheetrock and you're ready to go. And there's. There's wire drop for putting in pot lights or whatever you want to do, or led, obviously, now, but for adding lights in the ceiling, all that's already there. All the hard work's done.
• 36:23
  Speaker A: Okay, cool. So, all right, what's next?
• 36:28
  Speaker B: That's a good one.
• 36:29
  Speaker A: John, we're talking too much, which is easy to do with a gentleman like yourself. I just feel so comfortable at Yakity Yak. But we better burn through these. Okay, where are we at here? We got 3, 1. No, 3, 3. 1800 square feet.
• 36:46
  Speaker B: This is another 3, 3. 1800 square feet. 18 minutes outside Blue Ridge. It has, it's really centered around its mountain view. It has great sunset views from every room because it faces west. And its advantages are it has screened in porch area and its hot tub is in a sunroom. I think you can open the windows. I have not been in this one, but this one, the hot tub is in its own room so you can use it year round. And it's not cold, so that's kind of a plus. And there's kind of. That's a good idea of the view.
• 37:30
  Speaker A: Okay, and wait, how far did you say was the town?
• 37:33
  Speaker B: This one's about 18 minutes outside of town.
• 37:35
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 37:37
  Speaker B: And Air DNA didn't even with good comps, Air DNA for some reason didn't like this one as much and said it was about a 49,000 potential income. So. But you know, it is what it is. It's not a bad property. It would not be my first choice.
• 37:56
  Speaker A: Okay. All right, keep going. Weaver Creek.
• 38:00
  Speaker B: This one is 564. Weaver Creek, 599. It's 13 minutes outside Blue Ridge. Something here is it's on a two and three quarter acre lot. So you have a lot of space around you and your neighbors aren't right on top of you. Obviously most of these are being sold fully furnished. Unless it's a new build or once in a while it's a residence and people are going to take quite a bit with them. But all the ones we've been looking at, most of them, they're leaving everything. This one, you have the gentle sound of your own private creek. You get valley views here instead of really long range mountain views. And this is just kind of minutes from the Aska adventure area, which is hiking and fishing and tubing on the Toccoa river, that type of thing. And you have immediate access to the river excursions and hiking in the Chattahoochee Oconee National Forest. All that stuff is right next to this one. So that makes it definitely a, a good contender. This would do well even though it. And it's only 13 minutes to blue Ridge, but it feels like you're. You're in a secluded spot.
• 39:15
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 39:15
  Speaker B: Yeah, this is a cabin on the inside.
• 39:20
  Speaker A: Do they do Better. I mean, is it like the Smokies, where this is kind of what you're looking to rent, or. It's.
• 39:26
  Speaker B: It's really strange. There are now two classes of renters. You've got people looking for the classic cabin like this, and we had two classes of buyers. They're looking for the classic cabin like this, or. My most common person right now is coming in wanting the more modern cabin that's got wood accents and a lot of drywall. I'm really, really surprised at how many people want the modern look, and I think it's because they're younger folks and they've just bought their homes, and they're not looking to buy grandma's cabin.
• 40:01
  Speaker A: I got you,
• 40:06
  Speaker B: then. So this one, you know, this isn't a bad place. It is a classic cabin. It was a little bit. A little bit tight. Inside. It's just under 2,000 square feet. So the great room is not as great as you would think it is, just because it's. It's squeezed a little bit. We'll move on to the next one. This is a new build. 120 Monticello Drive. It's a four, three. The square footage. It's odd. Was not listed, so I do not know exactly what the square footage is. It's a new, modern cabin. So for folks looking for a new build and my. The last two clients that I've been working with, real heavy. We're looking for new stuff, and these are the kind of things that they've gone for. This one has a nice parking area, which up here can be hard to come by because you'll get these little teeny parking spots and nowhere to go. But again, this is that modern cabin feel. It has open wood beams and wood floors, but it has mostly sheetrock on the walls. This one is cute. The only downside to these is on top of the purchase price, you then have to furnish it. And for some people, that's a plus. For some people, that's a minus. And then the only other negative thing about this is it's 23 minutes outside Elijah, so I'm not sure if the view from this one makes up for the distance. We're under 25 minutes. But at 23 minutes, you'd have to decorate it really, really well to make it stand out in the listings and make it pop. But we got a blank slate here, so you have that opportunity to do it.
• 41:58
  Speaker A: I got you. All right, cool. Keep going. Let's go. So far, I think I have my two favorites, but all Righty. We're going to run out of time before too long, so let's let it rip.
• 42:07
  Speaker B: This one is Windy Valley Lane. This is what we call a classic tree house and that means it is a cabin in the woods. It's a three bed, four bath. The great thing about this one, it's really well maintained. It has an excellent rental history. I know we usually don't concentrate on that, but this one rents well with the exception of the owner who is also a licensed real estate agent. She and her family use it one weekend every month all year round so that they get to enjoy it. Owning it. It's only 10 minutes outside Blue Ridge and it, it's just fantastic. Three full bedroom suites, so each has its own bathroom. One shares a bathroom on the main level so that the main level has a bathroom. And then outside, big draw. It has this outdoor, real nice outdoor fireplace on the porch and a big full terrace level with tables and chairs. The Jacuzzi and fire pit, which are just necessities here. It did get a new roof in 2023 and new gutters and it's being sold completely furnished.
• 43:18
  Speaker A: Keep going. I want to see some more pictures there. This one's really cool. I can see myself hanging out and
• 43:22
  Speaker B: it has a matching shed. She had that shed built to match it and it's done very minimal decoration. Inside it is a classic cabin, but it's a lighter finish, so it doesn't feel as old and dark A lot. Cabins up here, the older ones feel dark and this one was done so that it feels light inside, which is really great.
• 43:46
  Speaker A: I like this one. I feel like there's a lot of love in this, in this thing.
• 43:51
  Speaker B: There is. And the folks have taken really, really good care of it because they use it all the time as a personal getaway. She lives close by but south of the area, so they go up to the mountains one weekend every month and spend time in the cabin. So it's well loved and well maintained. Then we have this one is 239 Ernest Alta Circle. It is a guest favorite on Airbnb. The shop actually sold. This fellow that owns it, the cabin, he is selling it. He's a super host. He is selling it to trade up. He wants to get something larger. So this place is another kind of tree house. It doesn't have a spectacular view, however, it has great outdoor spaces and the cabin has been meticulously maintained and it feels very secluded. But it's only 13 minutes outside blue Ridge. This one, I think if I go backwards A hair. You can see that he has kind of developed an area out back. He used one of these shed things that he made. An enclosure around the hot tub. There's an outdoor seating area. The fire pit is right there. There's a yard space terrace.
• 45:11
  Speaker A: That is. It's kind of brilliant. It's. It's very. It's. I mean, at its core it's rather redneck, but it's actually really cool.
• 45:19
  Speaker B: It is. It's redneck chic.
• 45:21
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 45:23
  Speaker B: And they are extremely proud of it. It is pet friendly and it has a. The yard is dispensed in. So if you want to bring Rover or Fluffy, you certainly can.
• 45:36
  Speaker A: Yeah, they put the work in on this. I'm actually kind of surprised to see it for sale.
• 45:41
  Speaker B: Me too. But he wants to trade up. Folks that own it live in South Africa, so it's another proof that the short term shop can teach somebody to run it remotely.
• 45:50
  Speaker A: Yeah, need to get him on my podcast.
• 45:56
  Speaker B: So, yeah, this one is really, really nice. Classic cabin inside. But he definitely redid a lot of stuff and has a lot of more upscale finishes. So it's a real steal, kind of. At 649, I think you could get it for less, but that's what it's on the market for. And it does have just a great history of maintenance. And the new decks in the fenced yard outside.
• 46:22
  Speaker A: And the four bathrooms is nice.
• 46:24
  Speaker B: Four is very nice. You definitely are not going to be fighting over a bathroom all the time. All right, next one. This one.
• 46:33
  Speaker A: This is catching my eye already.
• 46:36
  Speaker B: Well, this one needs a little tlc.
• 46:39
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 46:39
  Speaker B: The pictures look really, really good. Jaak and I were talking about this yesterday. Somebody left their coffee cup in the picture.
• 46:46
  Speaker A: I think on purpose.
• 46:47
  Speaker B: Maybe on purpose, but I think it detracts from the picture.
• 46:50
  Speaker A: I agree.
• 46:51
  Speaker B: This one has great views. It's an over acre and a half lot, four bed, three bath, 10 minutes outside of Blue Ridge. But it shows better. And they did a really good job with the photos. But when you get inside, it's beat. So it's going to need some major cleanup and a little refinishing. So, like, these pictures make it look pristine. I think somebody did some major Photoshop or smoothing of edges and things of that sort. It's still not a bad property at all. But I think for what you get when you get there, that it's probably still a little overpriced. It was just under contract and it came back on the market. I don't have any information on why. This one also has Great year round mountain views and it has a pickleball court. I know you're not the pickleball fan,
• 47:56
  Speaker A: but I'm a tennis guy. That's okay.
• 48:01
  Speaker B: Another advantage here, it's accessible completely by paved roads. So you're not going out into the gravel or crazy mountain roads at all. So it has easy access to shopping and dining and hiking and outdoor activities. And it's close to like the apple orchards and wineries. So lots of entertainment stuff that you can do from here. And it has a classic cabin style on the inside that's been updated. But it does need some a little love because they made it look really good in these.
• 48:36
  Speaker A: All right, well, listen, we only got three more minutes. Let's show me some high dollar stuff here. All right, so we're going to move on up.
• 48:46
  Speaker B: This one has waterfalls in your backyard. It's 1.2 million. It is a gorgeous place. Has a big detached garage. It has its own creek that you're running on. And the backyard is basically these waterfalls that are illuminated at night. I'm trying to think if there's which end of this the pictures are on to not take too much time. Yeah, these waterfalls are just gorgeous right in your backyard. You can hear them from in the house. And that is the feature here. But it also, it's lakefront. It has six bedroom suites, heated jacuzzi pool and a double decker dock. So you have a sun porch on the top and it covers over your boat. And this completely turnkey with the furnishings. A 24 foot pontoon boat. And it has an RV hookup with electric, water and sewer. If you bring your RV or have
• 49:54
  Speaker A: someone bring one, keep going.
• 49:57
  Speaker B: So it's a really, really nice place on the high end.
• 50:06
  Speaker A: Seems like a lot of bang for the buck.
• 50:08
  Speaker B: It is a lot of bang for your buck.
• 50:10
  Speaker A: Okay, keep going. Let's do one more.
• 50:12
  Speaker B: All righty.
• 50:14
  Speaker A: We ran out of time. I want to see some. Give me a high dollar one.
• 50:18
  Speaker B: Yep. This one.
• 50:21
  Speaker A: Oh my.
• 50:22
  Speaker B: This one is 474 Stuart Camp Point Road. It's $5.3 million, six bed, eight bath. It was five bedrooms and a bunk room and five full baths. It also has some flex rooms that could be turned into more bedrooms. So you could make this into a seven bedroom house. This one has on its terrace level has a billiards room, a wine cellar, a home theater, a fitness room. And it's lakefront on Lake Blue Ridge. It has.
• 50:56
  Speaker A: Am I looking at two swimming pools?
• 50:59
  Speaker B: You are looking at a heated. Yes. Outdoor pool and hot tub. So this is a hot tub that flows into the swimming pool. And the swimming pool is heated so you can use the pool year round.
• 51:15
  Speaker A: 12,000 square feet.
• 51:18
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 51:19
  Speaker A: My. Hmm. Look at this. I like. Keep flipping. I want to see more.
• 51:23
  Speaker B: Sure. Custom boathouse right on Lake Blue Ridge, which is very highly sought after. Things on Lake Blue Ridge don't come on the pool.
• 51:30
  Speaker A: Wait a minute. Go back one more. We'll go back one. This is awesome. You see what's the trickle down into that? The pool? Trickles down into what? What's that bottom level?
• 51:40
  Speaker B: It's just a pool or lake water feature. I think this is mostly the pool areas here. This I don't think is necessarily for swimming.
• 51:52
  Speaker A: Just for looks.
• 51:53
  Speaker B: I think it's just for looks.
• 51:55
  Speaker A: Okay, cool. It looks cool. This, this is.
• 51:58
  Speaker B: Has a custom boathouse and a four car garage. And it has an elevator access to all levels of the house.
• 52:07
  Speaker A: This is. You get me excited. Keep going. I want to see more.
• 52:11
  Speaker B: So this is. Yeah, this one's 5.3 million and just absolutely gorgeous. Built ins, chef's kitchen, high end appliances, a lot of paint. I love this bar.
• 52:29
  Speaker A: Isn't that beautiful?
• 52:30
  Speaker B: That's just gorgeous. That's the pub downstairs. And a billiards room. Instead of a game room, it has a billiards room, high end, done to the nines. Absolutely everything.
• 52:49
  Speaker A: Yes. This looks like a movie star could live here.
• 52:52
  Speaker B: It is. Definitely. I don't know who currently owns it, but it would be interesting to find out who.
• 53:00
  Speaker A: I love it. All right. Look at that ceiling, bro. Look at that ceiling.
• 53:04
  Speaker B: It's so new. Just absolutely gorgeous.
• 53:08
  Speaker A: Unbelievable. I love it. All right, we got to go. We're overtime. Thank you, John. What's your email, John at theshortermshop.
• 53:16
  Speaker B: Com? Or is it John Swan at the shorttermshop. Com?
• 53:20
  Speaker A: Nice. All right, buddy. Well, thank you for your time. We'll see you again on short term shopping.