College units in college towns should be a great market.
My experience with this was just last month trying to get housing for our college-aged son around our state university. Students were lined up 3 and 4 deep trying to rent houses.
We finally got incredibly lucky and rented a nice 3-bedroom 4 blocks from campus for $1500/month. 3 students will share.
Then we had to drive a U-Haul truck full of old furniture several hundred miles just to furnish that house from our storage. Then we had to search local thrift stores to get 3 desks, a couch, and other missing stuff. The thrift stores were full of parents and students snapping the stuff up.
It cost a lot to get that house adequately furnished just so they could live! The roommates were from Ecuador and Chicago, and didn’t have parents in-state to help. Nor did they have cars. It was a big job.
Would this parent have paid more to rent a house furnished with beds, desks, dressers, couch, table, chairs? YES. The students can get their own dishes, linens, TV’s, vacuums, rugs. But that big, heavy, sturdy student stuff could be a money-maker for a smart landlord.
We also had to sign a year’s lease instead of the 9 student months that we wanted. That was a smart landlord move.
I believe students would rather be in their own cute, quaint, funky abode than in a large apartment house. My son and his friends immediately went out and got dogs, which wouldn’t be allowed in most apartments. Being an adult=living in a house=having the right to have a dog.
Another thing I noticed, many houses had their garages converted to student bedrooms. More bedrooms equals higher rent.
Furnishedowner