Short term rental, long term marriage
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Short term rental, long term marriage
A 20-year look back at Nelson County's getaway scene.
Twenty years ago this week, Tommy and I tied the knot at The Meander Inn, which was a farm Bed & Breakfast in Nellysford. Wedding and aerial photography has come a long way since then.
Nelson County had become more than just a vacation destination for us. We had small budgets and big dreams. We not only vowed to be together, but we vowed to make Nelson the place to live and raise the family we were planning (and at the time, we didn’t know if we would make humans or if rescue hounds would be our progeny). TV news drop-outs who had spent the last three years selling canning supplies online, we somehow cobbled together down payment money to purchase our first home a year later, a four-on-four farm house on 7 acres in Afton.
Book a stay. Fall in love. Buy your dream.
Shouldn’t things be that simple? They never truly are but we 100% benefited from an environment that 1) made it easy for us to book a getaway, 2) enjoy lazy afternoons at a winery or creek, and 3) test the economic waters for a publishing business we would launch in 2005, and run for 16 years while raising kids.
Twenty years ago, a smattering of B&Bs and inns — together with home and condo rentals at Wintergreen — comprised what we now refer to as this area’s Short Term Rental market. The County has enjoyed gains from the tax revenue brought in by the agri-tourism economy since those days. It’s been a great marriage, pun intended.
But a strain on that relationship began emerging as the COVID-19 pandemic era spiked a demand for vacation properties, accelerating migration from cities to rural communities, causing home values to surge and affordability to wane, primarily for first time home buyers. The kind of folks with small budgets and big dreams, which is who Tommy and I were, circa 2004.
There’s been plenty of criticism thrown at the STR market and a trend in blaming property owners for soaking up low inventory and widening the housing affordability gap. But fighting over money is nothing new and if we are to apply this marriage metaphor to County governance, we don’t bust a good marriage over a marital spat over funds. We pull up a seat at the kitchen table and look at the books.
The proposed Transient Occupancy Tax increase — which would have raised the lodging tax rate from 5% to 7% — failed at yesterday’s Board of Supervisors meeting. It was to be voted on last month but was quickly delayed to yesterday’s meeting. With one Supervisor absent, the 2-2 stalemate kept the increase from passing.
I was hoping to see the vote play out in person but a series of appointments and life events kept me from heading down to the courthouse:
5:30am: Deer vs. truck
7:00 am: Tommy’s medical appointment
8:51 am: Breakfast at TipTop
1:08 pm: Broker open house in Afton with my daughter tagging along
2:15 pm: Said daughter’s braces get a tune-up in Crozet
3:30 pm: Back home to check on the patient, mainly to make sure he’s not operating heavy machinery, against doctor’s orders
Yesterday’ highlight — aside from the breakfast at TipTop — was seeing my daughter’s eyes beam when she walked into The Afton House, a property designed and built to be a vacation getaway.
This one’s built by Bramante Homes. The gables remind me of another recently-built getaway, The Indigo House, which was built by Roseland-based Tectonics II.
Then there are the dreamy glamping tents at The Retreat at Crabtree Falls, constructed by Ben Butler’s team at Capler Homes.
We are fortunate to live in a place surrounded by beautiful mountains and talented craftsmen. No wonder people flock to Nelson County to stay a while. For us, it’s been 20 years and counting.