Short-Term Rental Intelligence
STR Scout
Scout, model, and compare short-term-rental deals end to end — the gates, the cash flow, the payback — before you ever call your CPA.
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Search any market — a city or ZIP — or start typing a property address. STR Scout ranks the live listings by value, freshness, and STR fit.
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Popular short-term-rental markets
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Search a market
A city or ZIP — beach, lake, mountains, desert, anywhere.
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We rank the listings
Live for-sale deals scored by value, freshness & STR fit, and mapped.
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Model any deal
One click pre-fills the numbers — confirm and see the full verdict.
Modeling
Tax saved
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Cash flow
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Payback
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Welcome
Step 1 of 8
The Property
What are you buying?
Every property is really two things: a building and the land under it. The IRS lets you slowly write off the building as it "wears out" — that write-off is called depreciation, and it's the engine of this whole strategy. Land never wears out, so it can't be depreciated. That's why we split them.
e.g., 750,000 — the Marco Island number you've been circling.
e.g., 20% — the slice that's land, not building. Your county assessor's split guides this.
The month it's ready to rent. Standard depreciation is prorated from this month (mid-month rule) — buy late, get less year-1 standard write-off. Bonus depreciation is not prorated.
Building you can depreciate
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The Deal · Acquisition Lens
Are you paying the right price?
Before any tax strategy matters, one question comes first: am I overpaying? You compare the price to what the place is really worth fixed up (its After-Repair Value), and see the most a disciplined investor would offer. Then we add the question most deal tools skip: is a short-term rental even allowed here? A great price means nothing if the town bans Airbnb.
e.g., 820,000 — what it's worth rental-ready. Pull this from your comps or an AVM estimate.
e.g., 10,000 — repairs to get it rentable (separate from furniture, which comes next).
The biggest STR landmine, and the one most deal tools won't flag. Verify with the town or HOA before you fall in love.
Getting In
What does it cost to get in?
Before any tax benefit, real money leaves your pocket: the down payment, closing costs, optional points (prepaid interest to lower your rate), and furnishing — a short-term rental has to be furnished, stocked, and photographed before a single guest books. A loan covers the rest; its rate and length set your monthly payment.
e.g., 20% — . Investment STRs often need 20–25% down.
e.g., 22,500 — title, escrow, lender fees. Roughly 2–4% of price.
e.g., 1% — prepaid interest to buy down the rate.
e.g., 20,000 — beds, kitchen, linens, photos. The most-forgotten line.
e.g., 7% — investment-property loans run above primary-home rates.
Fixed locks your largest expense. A floating/ARM rate that resets higher is the risk that wiped out 2021-era buyers.
e.g., 30 — drives your monthly payment and year-1 interest.
Changes liability & financing — not the size of your deduction.
e.g., 0 personal · ~150–800 for an LLC (state fee + registered agent). Deductible; added to your carry.
Cash to get in
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Loan
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Monthly P&I
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Gate 1 of 3
The 7-Day Rule
Normally, rental losses are trapped — the tax code calls them "passive," and they can't lower the tax on the money you earn from working. But there's a door. If your guests stay an average of 7 nights or fewer, the IRS stops treating the property as a regular rental. That's the entire loophole — and the reason this works on a short-term rental but not a normal lease.
e.g., 4 — typical for a vacation Airbnb. Must average ≤ 7 to clear this gate.
Gate 2 of 3
Your Sweat
The door only stays open if you run the place — not a full management company. The test: 100+ hours and more than anyone else, or 500+ hours on your own. Booking, guest messages, supply runs, repairs — it all counts, but you have to log it as you go.
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This is not the 750-hour "Real Estate Professional" rule — that one is for long-term rentals. It's a common mix-up; investors often carry it over from a long-term deal, but it doesn't apply to a short-term rental.
e.g., 120 — your own time running the rental.
e.g., 40 — a full management company here will sink this gate.
Gate 3 of 3
Cost Segregation
Picture the property as a fruit basket. The basket — walls, roof, foundation — lasts decades, so the IRS makes you write it off slowly (27.5 years). But the fruit inside — carpet, appliances, fixtures, landscaping — wears out fast. A cost-segregation study is an expert separating the fast-wearing fruit from the basket. Then bonus depreciation lets you write most of that fruit off in year one — a big paper loss (a deduction, not cash out of your pocket).
e.g., 30% — the share a study moves to fast write-off. Studies typically land 20–35%.
e.g., 100% — restored by the 2025 tax law for qualifying property. Confirm current-year %.
Your Year-1 math, live
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For a single home, a residential STR study runs ~$400–$1,500 — not the $3–8K of big commercial studies. And the furniture you buy to furnish it needs no study at all; it's already fast write-off. The fee pays for itself many times over if the gates pass.
The Cliff
Your Snowbird Weeks
Here's the catch that hits your plan directly. You want to stay there yourself in winter — but personal use has a ceiling: the greater of 14 days or 10% of the nights you rent it. Cross that line and the IRS calls the property your second home, which caps your deductions and erases the loss that shelters your income. Use it, but watch the line.
e.g., 14 — the winter weeks you'd stay yourself.
e.g., 200 — drives the 10%-of-rental-nights test.
0 days used
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Your Tax Picture
What's the loss worth to you?
A paper loss is only worth your tax rate. Shelter $75K at a 32% bracket and you save about $24K. The higher your bracket, the more the deduction is worth. And where the property sits matters — Florida has no state income tax, so a Marco Island place saves only federal; a New Jersey property would add state savings on top.
e.g., 200,000 — your consulting / business income the loss can offset.
Your top federal bracket (2025).
Use your residency rate, not the property's. You're taxed where you live: a NJ resident with a Florida rental still answers to NJ (~6–9%).
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State savings are the murkiest number here. Some states — New Jersey included — don't follow federal bonus depreciation and limit passive losses, so your state benefit may be smaller than this estimate. A CPA licensed in your state has the real answer.
Every $1 of loss saves you
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The Operation · Income
What can it actually earn?
Instead of guessing a revenue number, let's build it: your average nightly rate times how full you keep it (occupancy). Add the cleaning fee guests pay per stay. That's your real top line — and notice it ties back to your average guest stay: shorter stays mean more turnovers, which means more cleaning fees collected and more cleaning cost next.
e.g., 325 — blended across seasons (Marco Island runs ~$400–600 in winter high season, ~$300 off-season). Drag to stress-test the rate.
e.g., 60% — 219 nights/yr. Drag to see best/worst case; 50–60% is a safe planning band.
e.g., 150 — guests pay this; it offsets what you pay your cleaner (next step).
Nights booked
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Turnovers
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Gross revenue
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The Operation · Costs
What does it cost to run?
Now every cost, fully counted. First the cuts off the top — Airbnb's fee (that's the platform marketing your listing and handling payment) and a manager's fee if you don't run it yourself. Then the real running costs, line by line. One synergy worth seeing: self-managing keeps your manager's fee at 0 and helps you clear Gate 2 — the hours count.
Why people quote wildly different numbers: a host-only split is ~1–3%, but if the host absorbs the whole fee it's ~15%. Picking one sets the platform % below — adjust if you know yours.
The platform cut only — not a manager. Set by the model above, or override.
e.g., 0% self-managed · 13–22% if a co-host/manager runs it. The "13%" people quote is usually this, not the platform. A full manager can also sink Gate 2.
e.g., 120 — paid to your cleaner each turnover (× your turnovers from the last step).
e.g., 4,800 — you cover these on an STR, not the guest.
e.g., 2,800 — short-term-rental policies cost more than a homeowner's.
e.g., 7,000 — the county's annual bill.
e.g., 3,000 — and confirm the HOA even allows short-term rentals.
e.g., 4,000 — restocking, lawn/pool, wear-and-tear, the broken-thing fund.
Platform + mgmt
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Running costs
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Cash flow
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The Bottom Line
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Cash flow / yr
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Tax saved · yr 1
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Cash recouped
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The Funnel — Both Lenses
The Deal · acquisition lens
The Three Gates · tax lens
Miss one and it's a vacation home, not a deduction.
Gate 1
The 7-Day Gate
Gate 2
The Participation Gate
Gate 3
The Cost-Seg Gate
Year-1 paper loss
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Depreciation in year one (bonus + standard).
Year-1 tax saved
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Cash to get in
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Yr-1 return on cash
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Cash recouped by
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Annual cash flow
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Depreciation runway
| Year | Depreciation | Tax saved* |
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*If all three gates pass. Year 1 front-loads bonus depreciation; later years taper.
Cashflow by Season · the shape of the year
A flat annual number hides the truth: most markets make their money in a few months. Here's your monthly cash flow, shaped by the season — green months feed you, red months you carry. (Same annual total, spread across the year.)
Wealth & Payback · the long game
%/yr
%/yr
Year-one tax is only half the story. Two engines build wealth quietly: the home appreciates, and your guests pay down the loan. Here's your equity over time — and the year your original cash comes back.
Cash back by
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Your equity · yr 5
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Total position · yr 5
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IRR · 10-yr hold
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Your annualized return over a 10-yr hold — cash, tax & sale combined. The number pros compare deals on.
Equity multiple · 10-yr
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Total cash out ÷ cash in — 3× means you tripled your money over the hold.
Investment value over time
Payback — cash + tax vs. your cash in
| Year | Value | Loan bal. | Your equity | Cash + tax | Total position |
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Equity = value − loan balance. "Total position" = equity built + all cash flow and tax saved to date. Appreciation and rent growth are assumptions — keep them conservative; set rent growth to 0 to stay flat. IRR & equity multiple assume a 10-year hold and a sale at current equity (before selling costs & depreciation recapture). Nothing here is guaranteed.
Compare Properties
Save each candidate, then line them up side by side — the funnel's whole purpose. Best payback is highlighted.
Compare to another analysis
Paste — or drop a screenshot of — another STR analysis for this property (an Airbnb calculator, a broker's spreadsheet, anything). STR Scout lines it up against these numbers: where you agree, where you differ and why, and what the other analysis leaves out.
Educational comparison — not tax, legal, or investment advice.
Take this to your CPA
Estimated model — confirm every figure with a CPA experienced in short-term-rental cost segregation.
Questions to confirm
- Does my material participation clear the 100-hour-and-most or 500-hour test? (Not the 750-hour Real-Estate-Professional test — that's for long-term rentals.)
- What accelerated % will a cost-seg study realistically support for this property?
- Is bonus depreciation 100% for my placed-in-service year?
- Do my personal-use days stay under the §280A line (greater of 14 days or 10% of rental days)?
- How much excess loss, if any, carries forward — and against what?