Short-Term Rental Income Underwriter
Underwrites Airbnb-style income for DSCR loans, slow season and ban case included
Install it in one line — paste a single command into Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor and it writes the skill into your project.
Free, and about thirty seconds: a work email and a six-digit code.
Downloading shares your name, firm, role, and email with The Helvetica Group. That introduction is what keeps every skill here free.
What this skill does
Works out how much short-term rental income a lender can really rely on. Cleans up platform earnings reports, tests the nightly rate, occupancy and seasonality, models the real operating costs, and shows what the loan looks like if the city stops allowing short-term rentals.
What it does
- Strips out what isn't rental income — lodging taxes collected for the government, pass-through cleaning fees, refunds
- Compares actual booking history to the market projection you supply and flags the gap
- Calculates debt coverage the way your program does, then checks it against an itemized cost model
- Measures the slow-season shortfall and the reserve needed to carry the loan through it
- Lists what to verify about local short-term rental rules, permits and HOA restrictions
- Always shows the fallback coverage at long-term rent, if short-term use ends
When to use it
- A DSCR or bridge loan is secured by a vacation or short-term rental
- The borrower is relying on a market-data projection rather than their own history
- Buying a property with the seller's booking history
- The property is in a city or HOA with short-term rental restrictions
What to have ready
- Booking history and/or a market-data projection
- Loan amount, rate, taxes and insurance
- Long-term market rent for the property
- The property's city or county, and your program's short-term rental rules
How to use it
- Download it with the button above. You'll sign in with a work email — that's how the creator knows who is using their skill.
- Copy the install prompt from the "Run it in Claude" box, and paste it into Claude along with the file. Claude installs the skill, fills in your firm's details where the file has
[BRACKETED]placeholders, and runs a quick test with you. - Then just ask in plain English. Claude picks the skill up on its own when a request matches it. Anything it still needs, it asks you for — it won't invent a number.
"Borrower is buying a [BEDROOMS]-bed short-term rental in [CITY] — loan [AMOUNT] at [RATE]. Seller's 12-month earnings and a market report are attached. Does it cover, and what happens if the city bans it?"
What you get back
A meets, meets-with-conditions or does-not-meet result, the income build, coverage under the program method, an itemized check and the long-term rent fallback, a seasonal reserve figure, an ordinance and permit checklist, and conditions.
Good to know
- Output quality tracks input quality. A missing figure is flagged as missing — it is never estimated to fill a gap.
- Every draft is a starting point for your own review, not a finished decision.
- Runs anywhere Claude does: the Claude app, Claude Desktop, or Claude Code.
- All market figures come from reports you supply and are labelled with their source; local rules are listed as items to confirm, never stated as settled law.
Legal disclaimer
This skill drafts; it does not decide. Its output is not legal, tax, accounting, appraisal, or investment advice, and using it creates no attorney-client, fiduciary, or advisory relationship. Nothing it produces is a commitment to lend or an offer to sell a security. Verify every number, date, citation, and conclusion against the source documents, and have a qualified professional licensed in the relevant jurisdiction review the work before you rely on it or send it to a borrower, investor, counterparty, or regulator. Laws, rates, and market data change. The final work product is yours.
Inside this skill
The actual file you get. Members can read it in full before saving it.
Short-Term Rental Income Underwriter
Short-term rental income is the least stable number that routinely goes into a DSCR ratio. The nightly rate moves with the season, occupancy moves with every new listing on the block, the expense load is two to three times a long-term rental's, and a single city council vote can turn the property back into a long-term rental overnight. This skill builds the qualifying income carefully, then asks the questions a lender's investor or loan buyer will ask: what if the projection is wrong, what happens in the slow months, and what does the loan look like if STR use goes away.
Works for 1–4 unit STRs, condos and small portfolios on DSCR rental and bridge programs. It feeds the DSCR calculation; for the full DSCR worksheet on long-term rentals, use dscr-worksheet-builder. This one goes deep on where STR income comes from and how fragile it is.
Step 1 — Intake
| Input | Required? | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Income evidence | ✅ | Trailing 12 months of platform earnings or payout reports, a property-manager statement, and/or a third-party market-data projection. Say which you have |
| Loan amount, rate, amortization | ✅ | For the payment |
| Property taxes, insurance, HOA | ✅ | Insurance must be a policy that covers STR use — often more expensive than a landlord policy |
| Program STR rules | ✅ | Which income source counts, expense factor or haircut, DSCR floor, seasoning required. If none, use labelled defaults |
| Long-term market rent (1007 or equivalent) | ✅ | Needed for the ban-case fallback |
| Property address and jurisdiction | ✅ | City or county and any HOA, for the ordinance check |
| STR permit or license | Helpful | Number, status, expiration, whether it transfers on sale |
| Monthly revenue history | Helpful | For seasonality; a 12-month total hides the slow months |
| Operating plan | Helpful | Self-managed or professional manager, cleaning cost per turn, average stay length |
All market data is user-supplied. Nightly rates, occupancy and comparable-listing figures come from the user's reports; this skill never assumes them. Label each figure with its source and date.
Minimum viable: one income source, the loan terms, taxes and insurance, and the jurisdiction.
Step 2 — Clean the income
Reading the full skill counts as a download. The contributor receives your name, company, and email.
Ratings & reviews
No written reviews yet. If you run this on a live file, say how it went. The next lender reading this page is deciding whether to trust it.
Examination record
Run it in Claude
- Copy the install command above
- Paste it into Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor
- It writes the skill in, fills in your firm’s details, and test-runs it with you
Prefer the file? The prompt above is for a package you already downloaded.
Details
More from The Helvetica Group
They publish here under a verified work email. Their other skills, and how to reach them, are on their contributor page.