Just Found Out You Can Rent Your Pool for $20k+ Per Month
Pools are $$$
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I’m only aware of this in Arizona, but I assume it would be similar in other hot places.
I quit my job recently, and decided to celebrate with a pool party. One problem. I don’t own a pool. I Googled private pool rentals in Phoenix, and came across two pool rental websites, Peerspace and Swimply.
This is the house/pool of the first person I reached out to:
“Modern Beautiful Luxe Home- 2900 sq ft w/ marble throughout”
How much do you think it costs to use this lady’s pool?
$300 per hour. The pool is nice, but $300 per hour!? Luckily for me, she offers an 8+ hour discount of 25% off. This would bring my total to $1620 with the $120 processing fee. Unfortunately, she was entirely booked for the summer.
Let’s say summer is 89 days on the short end. If every day was booked at 8 hours, that would be $144,180 in revenue. This pool is at her house, so I’m sure it wasn’t booked every day. Lets say it was booked every weekend at 8 hours. Google says May, June, July, & August have 35 total weekend days. Google is not considering Friday the weekend. Only Saturday and Sunday. If all Saturdays and Sundays were booked for 8 hours this summer, she would bring in $56,700. She’s probably bringing in more than $56k if she’s booked solid from May to December 1st.
After I took that L, I found a really sweet house in Scottsdale. This place comes with a putting green, volleyball/basketball court, arcade/game room, and private pool. A multi-million dollar McMansion.
This place comes in at $350 per hour. With the 8 hour discount, my total would have been $2603. However, he was also booked for the entire summer, and didn’t allow parties.
I messaged about 30 people. Most either didn’t allow parties, or were fully booked for the summer.
Finally, I got one in Glendale. The neighborhood wasn’t terrible, but wasn’t super nice. I assume this is why he could get away with having loud parties. I paid $1035 to rent the pool. $150 per hour x 6 hours. I talked to the guy in person. He said his pool was rented the vast majority of the summer. We had the pool booked until 7pm. We wanted to extend the time, but another group had it booked right after us. Guy must have pulled in close to $2k that night.
He bought this place for $223k in 2019. He could have put down as little as 3% to buy it. Let’s say he did 5% down LPMI to get rid of the mortgage insurance. With rates at ~4% in 2019, he could be paying around $1300 per month all in with taxes/insurance. Covering the entire mortgage payment in one night is insane. Of course, it isn’t 2019 anymore. Zillow’s estimate says the house is worth $394k. If you did 5% down LPMI on a 30 yr term at a 7% rate, you would be all in at around $2800 per month. It might take you 2 days to cover the mortgage payment now.
Add ons for extra revenue:
To have a legendary pool party, you need more than a pool. The Glendale guy offered premium amenities. Towel rental- $5 per hour. Space heater- $15 per hour. Bartending service- $30 per hour. Lifeguard service- $25 per hour. Chicken drumstick, burgers or hot dog, or carne asada package- $250. Hot tub access- $20. I paid $400 on top of the pool rental for a modified carne asada package.
Costs:
Cleaning costs/pool upkeep- I bet you could get someone to clean up after each party for $75-100 if you didn’t want to do it yourself. According to Google, pool maintenance can cost up to $150 per month for heavy pool usage.
Hosting platform- Peerspace and Swimply both take a 15% cut to use their service.
Pool- I reached out to a friend that just got a pool in my area. He said it cost him $60k all in. His pool is pretty nice, so I’m sure it could be done for less. My one Google search is telling me pools can range from $30k-65k+. Don’t want to drop $60k? Pools can be financed. I’ve had clients get pool loans at 6% on a 20 yr term. $60k at 6% on a 20 yr term would put monthly payments around $430. I’ve seen pool companies put a lien on a clients home, so that’s a good thing to watch out for. You could also do a cash out refinance or HELOC to pay for the pool.
Pools increase property value:
My house wasn’t built with a pool. I reached out to my realtor asking him how much a pool would increase my property value. He says my house could be worth $15k-45k more with a pool. In my experience with appraisals, pools don’t do much to increase the property value, but a $15k bump is pretty nice.
I’m highly considering getting a pool to rent out. Seems like a great way to make extra cash. Not crazy about having lots of random people in my backyard every weekend though.
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