Selling a short-term rental in New Hampshire means selling a house plus a small business. The house transfers by deed; almost nothing else does. Airbnb listings and reviews, the state Meals and Rentals licence and most town registrations stay with you. Price depends on 24–36 months of documented income, the season you list in, and planning for depreciation recapture or a 1031 exchange.
The building gets an inspection and an appraisal like any other property. The business gets underwritten from records most owners have never assembled in one place, and that is where vacation rental sales here fall apart, usually in the last two weeks, over something the seller could have fixed months earlier. This guide is written for the Pemi corridor: Campton, Thornton, Lincoln, Woodstock, Waterville Valley, Plymouth and the Newfound and Squam towns.
What are you actually selling?
A short-term rental is four assets stacked on one another:
- The real estate. Land, structure, septic, well, roof. The only part that transfers by deed and the only part the appraiser values.
- Furniture, fixtures and equipment. Beds, dishes, linens, the hot tub, the snowblower. None of it conveys unless the purchase and sale agreement says so.
- The operating system. House manual, cleaner, plow contractor, hot-tub service, pricing rules, lock codes. It transfers only if you write it down.
- The demand. Reviews, search ranking, repeat guests, a direct-booking site, a calendar with money on it. This mostly does not transfer, and understanding why is the difference between realistic pricing and a season chasing a number nobody will pay.
Who buys a short-term rental in New Hampshire?
Every offer comes from one of three buyers, and they are not bidding on the same thing.
| Buyer | What they are buying | What they pay for | What they ignore |
|---|---|---|---|
| The investor | Net operating income | Verified statements, expense detail, the operations manual, existing bookings | Your taste, your renovation choices |
| The hybrid | A second home that pays part of its way | A house they want to use, plus credible evidence it rents | Aggressive pro formas, anything needing full-time hosting |
| The pure second-home buyer | A ski house | The house, the location, the finish | The income entirely, and often the furniture |
The investor builds a model from your statements and prices what the property will net once they take it over with no reviews and a new listing. If the numbers hold, they move fast. The hybrid is the largest pool in the White Mountains: a place for February vacation, with the other weekends defraying the carry. They pay a premium for a genuinely turnkey property (furnished, permitted, management in place). The pure second-home buyer is a big share of the market in Waterville Valley and at Owl's Nest Resort, and sellers who market only to investors lose this buyer on the first photograph.
The approach that serves all three: lead the listing with the house (rooms, condition, location, drive time from I-93), state the income as fact in a second paragraph, and keep a complete income packet ready for when an investor's agent asks. Our guide to choosing a listing agent in New Hampshire covers how to test whether an agent has done this before; general mechanics are in the New Hampshire home seller guide and our step-by-step guide on how to sell a house in NH.
How to document rental income for buyers
This section decides your price. Give yourself six months if you have them, three at minimum.
The record a buyer will accept
Build a 24- to 36-month record, month by month. Twelve months is not enough: one strong winter proves nothing in a ski market. For each month, show:
- Gross booking revenue before platform fees, separated from cleaning fees and taxes collected (cleaning fees are pass-through, not income)
- Nights booked and nights available, with owner-use and maintenance blocks disclosed
- Average daily rate, calculated the same way every time
- Length of stay and channel mix
Occupancy means nothing without the denominator: 62% with six weeks blocked for family reads very differently from 62% with the calendar fully open.
The source documents
Your spreadsheet is a claim; these are the evidence:
- Airbnb transaction history and annual earnings summaries, plus any 1099-K
- Vrbo owner statements and payout reports
- Your management company's monthly owner statements, the cleanest single source
- The Meals and Rentals returns you filed with the NH Department of Revenue Administration. The strongest corroboration you have: a buyer who can tie your spreadsheet to your filed M&R returns stops arguing about the top line
- Direct-booking records and the deposit ledger
- Schedule E from the last two or three federal returns, if you will share it
Separate operating costs from owner spending
Owner-prepared numbers are almost always wrong in the same direction: expenses understated, because the owner paid for things from the household budget. Sort two years into true operating cost, capital improvement and owner preference. A buyer credits only the first, but showing all three makes you credible.
| Line | Usually a true operating cost | Usually owner preference or capital |
|---|---|---|
| Cleaning | Turnover cleans, laundry, consumables | The deep clean before your own visit |
| Management | Management fee, listing fees, channel commissions | — |
| Utilities | Electricity, heat, internet, water and septic servicing | — |
| Maintenance | Plowing, sanding, lawn, hot-tub service, heating service | The new deck, the kitchen remodel, an added mini-split |
| Supplies | Paper goods, coffee, firewood, linens on a replacement cycle | Upgrading everything to a matched set |
| Insurance | The short-term rental policy | — |
| Taxes | Property tax, and M&R tax if you absorbed rather than collected it | — |
| Reserves | Furniture, mattress and linen replacement | — |
| Professional | Bookkeeping, tax prep, legal | — |
Two lines buyers always add back: a furniture and soft-goods reserve, and management at a market rate if you have been self-managing. Show both yourself. Our vacation rental property management guide explains how fees are structured here.
A normalized pro forma, not your best year
Take the trailing 24 to 36 months and state the adjustments plainly: open the owner-use weeks at your own realized rates (labelled as an adjustment, not folded into actuals), charge full management, add the reserve, insure it correctly, and flag one-offs such as a roof replacement or a winter with almost no natural snow. A buyer who finds an unexplained anomaly assumes the worst.
Then be honest, because the gap will be found. An accountant will reconcile platform statements against your M&R filings, and in a small Grafton County town the neighbors answer questions. If your marketing said $92,000 and the documents say $71,000, the deal usually doesn't reprice. It dies, because the buyer stops trusting everything else in the file.
What transfers to the buyer, and what doesn't
| Asset | Transfers at closing? |
|---|---|
| Real estate and attached fixtures | Yes, by deed |
| Furniture and equipment | Only if the P&S and a bill of sale say so |
| Airbnb listing, account and reviews | No |
| Vrbo listing | No; the buyer creates a new listing |
| Vrbo review history | Only if the new owner requests it, labelled as earned under previous ownership |
| Future reservations and guest deposits | By agreement; negotiate the mechanics explicitly |
| Operations manual, vendor list, guest data | Only if you hand it over |
| Management agreement | Only if assignable and everyone agrees |
| NH Meals and Rentals operator's licence | No; non-transferable by rule |
| Town STR registration or permit | Varies by town; often owner-specific |
| Domain name and direct-booking site | Yes, if assigned |
Airbnb: the listing and reviews stay with you
Section 28.3 of the Airbnb Terms of Service says you "may not assign, transfer or delegate this agreement or your rights and obligations hereunder without Airbnb's prior written consent." The account belongs to a person, the listing hangs off the account, and the reviews hang off the listing. Your buyer starts at zero reviews with no Superhost status. So: don't price the reviews into your ask; don't deactivate your listing the day you go under contract (wind it down on a schedule tied to closing); and consider a co-host period so the buyer learns the operation while your listing is live.
Vrbo: reviews can follow the property, on request
Vrbo's Property Sale and Transition Policy says listings "cannot be transferred to another party" and the new host creates a new listing without the old photos or descriptions. But "new owners may request that reviews be transferred. Where this happens, the new listing will note that those reviews were received under previous ownership or management." The transfer is at Vrbo's discretion and publicly flagged. Have the buyer open the request during the contract period rather than promising an outcome you don't control.
Source: Vrbo, Property Sale and Transition Policy (vrbo.com/tlp/trust-and-safety/property-sale-notice-policy), Internet Archive capture of 15 April 2026. Confirm the wording with Vrbo support before relying on it in a contract.
What you can hand over
Everything that is not a platform account is transferable if you build it into the deal, and this package is where the premium lives.
- The operations manual. Turnover checklist, linen inventory, shutoffs, which breaker runs the hot tub, the roof-rake routine, house rules and the quiet-hours language the town wants.
- The vendor bench. In this corridor the cleaner is the business: someone who will drive to Thornton at 11am on a February Sunday is harder to replace than the sofa. Introduce the buyer to the cleaner, plow contractor, hot-tub service, handyman, septic pumper and propane supplier.
- Guest-facing accounts. Smart locks, Wi-Fi, thermostat and noise monitors, cameras. These need logging out, resetting and re-registering to the buyer; put them on the closing checklist.
- The direct-booking asset. A domain, booking site, past-guest list and social account, the one part of the demand side that genuinely transfers. Handle the guest list in line with the privacy commitments you made when you collected it.
- A short transition agreement. Two to four weeks of phone availability after closing, in the contract. It costs little and often reassures a first-time buyer.
The management agreement
Read it before you list. Two clauses matter: assignment (can it pass to a buyer, and must the manager consent?) and termination (how much notice, and is there a fee or a tail on existing bookings?). Thirty to ninety days' written notice is common. Any of the three outcomes (buyer keeps the manager, brings their own, or self-manages) is fine if decided early. Tell your manager as soon as the sale is real. Our vacation rental management page describes how we run properties in these towns.
Furniture and the personal-property allocation
Almost every short-term rental here sells furnished. Attach a room-by-room inventory with exclusions named, allocate a value to the personal property, and document it with a bill of sale. It matters for three reasons: the RSA 78-B transfer tax is on the consideration for the real estate, and a genuine, documented personal-property allocation is not (both parties file a Declaration of Consideration with the DRA, so it must be defensible); lenders lend on real property, so the allocation affects financing and appraisal; and depreciated furniture has its own recapture treatment on your return.
Town, condo and state rules on a sale
Three layers of permission sit on a New Hampshire short-term rental, and each behaves differently when the property sells.
Town rules: does the permit follow the owner?
There is no statewide short-term rental permit in New Hampshire; rules are set town by town and change at town meeting. In most towns that register rentals, the registration is signed by the owner and names a local contact, which makes it owner-specific: the buyer files their own. Tell a buyer what the town requires and let them verify it before their contingency expires.
| Town | Current rule (source document) | On a sale |
|---|---|---|
| Lincoln | Registers every unit; three STR types by owner or operator occupancy; emergency contact who can respond within 45 minutes; asks for the NH Rooms and Meals licence. Fee per tax parcel: $100 a year on the 2020 regulations and current form, $50 on an archived application; confirm with the town | Owner-signed form: the buyer files their own. Condo-hotels with a single on-site manager are excluded |
| Thornton | Zoning amended March 2020: short-term rental is transient occupancy of 30 days or less, permitted in every district, subject to planning board regulations (ordinance as amended 2023) | Ask the planning office which regulations are in force |
| Campton | No short-term rental ordinance; the March 2024 zoning ordinance doesn't use the phrase, but defines a dwelling as for "nontransient or permanent residential purposes" | No town permit to transfer; confirm with the town office |
| Waterville Valley | Registration before the first guest ($20 per tax parcel) under regulations approved 13 October 2021; fines $100, $200, $500 after a warning | Units managed by a property management company or realty office are exempt, so a buyer who self-manages has a filing the seller never had |
| Woodstock | No zoning ordinance and no STR ordinance | No town permit; state septic, building, health and M&R rules still apply |
| Plymouth | No STR ordinance, but the March 2025 zoning ordinance defines a "tourist home" for transient guests as owner occupied and doesn't allow it in either residential zone | Whole-house transient rental in residential Plymouth is not a permitted use; get the land use office's reading in writing before marketing income |
The smaller Pemi and Newfound towns each handle this differently; call the land use office and get the answer in writing. Our guide to running a Campton NH Airbnb covers the operating side, Plymouth vs Campton vs Thornton compares the towns, and our look at Lincoln NH Airbnb investing is the buy-side counterpart, alongside our page on buying a short-term rental in New Hampshire for anyone shopping vacation rental properties for sale. For inventory, see Lincoln NH real estate and Thornton NH real estate, or browse White Mountains short-term rentals for sale across the region.
The condominium association
Much of this corridor's rental inventory is condominium, from Lincoln condos near Loon Mountain to Waterville Valley. Under the Condominium Act, RSA 356-B, the declaration, bylaws and rules govern rentals: some associations welcome them, some impose minimum stays, some cap how many units may rent and run a waiting list, and some prohibit it.
RSA 356-B:58 gives the prospective buyer the right to obtain a defined document set from the association, which must furnish it within ten days of a written request: the unpaid-assessment statement, anticipated capital expenditures for the current and next two years, reserves, last year's financials, pending suits, insurance, the declaration, bylaws and rules, and fees and special assessments for the last three years. No deadline binds the seller and nothing protects your schedule if the association is slow, so request it the week you go under contract. Under RSA 356-B:46, VIII the association's lien for unpaid assessments is extinguished if it fails to furnish that statement within ten business days of a written request.
Before you list, answer three questions: is short-term renting permitted today, in writing, and is there a cap? If there is a cap or waiting list, does the buyer inherit your slot or go to the bottom? That is the most damaging late discovery in a condo rental sale. And is there a mandatory on-site rental program?
The state Meals and Rentals licence
New Hampshire taxes room rentals of fewer than 185 consecutive days under the Meals and Rooms (Rentals) Tax, RSA 78-A, at 8.5%, the rate since October 1, 2021. Every operator needs a Meals and Rentals operator's licence from the DRA before renting, and RSA 78-A:4-a requires the licence number in every short-term rental advertisement. On a sale:
- The licence is not transferable. Administrative Rule Rev 705.01(h): "A meals and rentals tax operator's license shall not be transferable." The buyer registers in their own name, on Granite Tax Connect or Form CD-3.
- File Form CD-100 (Request to Update or Change License, Rev 710.07). Under Rev 705.02 your licence expires on a change of ownership once the CD-100 is properly filed.
- File your final return for the last period you collected rent, including any zero return for a period the house sat empty.
- Tell your buyer to register before their first booking, since they cannot advertise compliantly without a licence number.
When is the best time to sell a short-term rental?
List from mid-August through October. Buyers are thinking about winter (which mountain, how far, how long the season runs; see our guide to New Hampshire's ski resorts), the property photographs well in foliage, and a buyer who closes in October or November owns the asset for the season they are buying it for. A buyer who closes in March waits until July for revenue, and offers reflect that. Statewide seasonality is in our guide to the best time to sell a house in New Hampshire; this niche is narrower and earlier.
Selling with the calendar booked usually beats selling empty. Deposits on a winter calendar are future revenue and remove the buyer's biggest fear: a gap between closing and their first guest. The trade-off is that bookings constrain a hybrid buyer who wants the house for Christmas. The compromise is to keep the near calendar full and stop taking reservations beyond roughly 90 to 120 days out once you decide to sell.
Handling reservations after closing
- The buyer honors the reservation. The norm. The contract must say who holds the money, when it is credited, who talks to the guest and what happens on a cancellation. Vrbo requires that agreement before you sell any date past the expected closing, otherwise you must block the calendar; with it, you must notify each guest of the ownership change and offer a full refund regardless of your cancellation policy. On Airbnb, transferring a booking in practice means cancelling on your account and rebooking on the buyer's, which is a conversation with the guest.
- You credit the buyer at closing. Deposits collected for nights after closing are credited on the settlement statement. Give your closing attorney a clean schedule of bookings two weeks out.
- You cancel the bookings. Host cancellations carry platform penalties and a public note on the listing, and Vrbo says a property sale does not qualify for a cancellation waiver. If the sale then falls through, you operate with a damaged profile and an empty February.
Taxes when you sell a short-term rental
Ask your accountant before you sign a purchase and sale agreement, not after.
| Tax | What applies |
|---|---|
| NH transfer tax (RSA 78-B) | $0.75 per $100 of price from each side ($20 minimum per side); seller's share on a $600,000 sale: $4,500 |
| NH tax on the gain | None; the Interest and Dividends Tax was repealed for periods beginning on or after January 1, 2025 |
| Depreciation recapture | Unrecaptured §1250 gain taxed at up to 25%; depreciated furniture generally as ordinary income |
| Federal capital gains | 0%, 15% or 20% on the rest, plus 3.8% net investment income tax for higher earners |
| Section 121 exclusion | Rarely applies; requires use as your principal residence 2 of the last 5 years |
| 1031 exchange | Defers the gain if held for investment and set up before closing |
Depreciation recapture is frequently the largest single tax item, and the one sellers are most often blindsided by. Depreciation is treated as taken whether or not you claimed it ("allowed or allowable"), and the resulting unrecaptured section 1250 gain is taxed at up to 25%, separately from the capital gain. The federal arithmetic is in our guide to capital gains tax on selling a home in New Hampshire.
Section 121 excludes up to $250,000 of gain ($500,000 married filing jointly) only if you owned and used the home as your principal residence for 24 months of the five years before sale. A guest rental almost never qualifies, and even where a seller does, depreciation after May 6, 1997 can't be excluded and periods of "nonqualified use" after 2008 carve out a proportional share of the gain.
The 1031 exchange is the main deferral route. A short-term rental held for investment generally qualifies; property used primarily for personal use does not. You have 45 days from the sale to identify replacement property in writing and 180 days (or the return due date, if earlier) to close. You cannot touch the proceeds, so the qualified intermediary and exchange documents must be in place before closing. A seller who closes, banks the check and then calls an exchange company has already disqualified the transaction. Our guide to selling a rental property in New Hampshire covers long-term rentals and tenants.
Business Profits and Business Enterprise taxes. The BPT is 7.5% and the BET 0.55%. For taxable periods beginning on or after January 1, 2025, a BPT return is required above $109,000 of gross business income and a BET return above $298,000 of gross receipts or enterprise value tax base (DRA figures as of August 2026; the thresholds are adjusted every two years). A single vacation rental is usually well under both, but several units, or a rental held in an entity alongside other activity, can cross them, and the gain in the year of sale can push a return over for one year.
This is general information, not tax or legal advice; your attorney and your accountant have the current answers for a specific property.
Preparing a hard-working rental for inspection
Photograph it for a buyer, not a guest: accurate rooms, square walls, daylight, and the mechanical spaces. Keep the platform photos on the platforms and commission new ones for the MLS. Then walk it as an inspector would, because a hard-used rental fails in different places than a family home.
- Septic and bedroom count. The big one in Campton, Thornton and the unsewered parts of the corridor. NH septic systems are approved for a design flow based on bedrooms, and a listing that says "sleeps 14" on a system designed for three bedrooms is a disclosure, valuation and sometimes permit problem at once. Pull the approved design, make your marketing match it, and pump and inspect. Parts of Woodstock village are on town water and sewer; a similar chalet down Route 175 in Thornton is on a well and leach field and gets a longer list of questions.
- Water supply. Well pumps and pressure tanks cycle harder on a rental. Run a flow test and test for bacteria, arsenic, radon and uranium; arsenic and radon come out of this bedrock routinely.
- The hot tub. Usually the amenity that drives bookings and often the one that fails. Check the GFCI, cover, heater and sanitizing system, then replace it or disclose and price it. Half-fixing it is the worst option.
- Decks, railings and stairs. High turnover finds every loose fastener; railing height, ledger attachment and exterior stairs are routine call-outs.
- Stoves, detectors and egress. Clearances, hearth pads, liners and a current sweep; detectors on every level; honest treatment of basement bedrooms and egress windows.
- Winter systems and access. Ice-dam history, heat tape, and the driveway grade. A steep unpaved drive your plow contractor handles is a worry to a buyer who has never plowed anything, and a buyer looking at Waterville Valley is thinking about Route 49 in a storm.
On worn furniture, replace it or discount it, but don't stage around it. Investors would often rather have $12,000 off the price than your sofa.
The costs of selling, and when not to sell
The costs: commission and marketing (worth paying for properly when there is an income story to tell); the transfer tax; attorney, recording and payoff charges (see our breakdown of NH closing costs); recapture and capital gains, frequently the largest number; bookings lost to showings and inspections; pre-listing repairs; cancellation exposure; and your time assembling the record.
Reasons to wait:
- You are selling on one bad season. A thin snow year is weather, not a trend.
- You have never run it as a business. If you have never priced dynamically or fixed the photography, a season of professional management may raise both the income and the sale price.
- Your records are a mess. Take six months to build them.
- Recapture would hurt more than holding. Run it with your accountant; sometimes the answer is to hold, refinance or exchange.
- The permit or condo situation is unresolved. A pending rental cap or town warrant article changes your buyer pool.
- You mainly want your winters back. Block your own weeks and let a manager run the rest.
A decision checklist
- Do you own a business with strong records, or a house you sometimes rent? This decides whether you market to investors at all.
- What do 24 to 36 months of documented statements say, with full management and a reserve charged?
- What will recapture and gain cost, and does a 1031 change the answer?
- What do the town and the association allow, and does any of it transfer?
- Is your management agreement assignable, and what notice does termination take?
- Which season are you selling into, and is your calendar an asset or a constraint?
- What package will you hand the buyer at closing: manual, vendors, inventory, accounts, domain, transition?
For a read on value, start with what your home is worth; if you are weighing preparing the property first, our ready to sell program is built for that. Owners in the resort corridor can start at selling a home at Owl's Nest Resort or selling a home in Campton, and our guide to selling a house in Campton NH covers town-specific steps. For a lake house rather than a ski-market rental, see selling a lake house or second home in New Hampshire. If the sale includes surplus acreage, start with selling land in New Hampshire; if it is really a multi-unit lodging business, commercial property in New Hampshire is the right frame. Everything else we do on the listing side is on the sellers page.
Frequently asked questions
Do Airbnb reviews transfer when you sell?
No. Airbnb accounts and listings belong to a person, not a property, and Airbnb's Terms of Service bar assigning or transferring your rights without Airbnb's prior written consent. The buyer creates their own account and listing and starts with no reviews and no Superhost status. Vrbo is a partial exception: a new owner can request that reviews be transferred, and they appear labelled as earned under previous ownership.
Does the New Hampshire Meals and Rentals licence transfer to the buyer?
No. Rule Rev 705.01(h) says a meals and rentals operator's licence is not transferable. File your final Meals and Rentals return for the last period you collected rent, file Form CD-100 to close out the licence, and tell your buyer to register with the DRA for their own licence before their first booking, since RSA 78-A:4-a requires the licence number in every short-term rental advertisement.
How do you sell an Airbnb property in New Hampshire?
Treat it as two sales in one file. Prepare the house (septic, well, hot tub, decks, detectors, photography) as you would any listing. Separately prepare the business: 24 to 36 months of bookings, occupancy and rates, platform and management statements, filed Meals and Rentals returns, an expense schedule with management and a furniture reserve charged, a furnishings inventory, an operations manual and a vendor list. Market the house first; give the income packet to buyers who ask.
Does a town short-term rental permit follow the property or the owner?
Usually the owner, but it varies by town. Registrations are typically owner-signed and name a local contact, so the buyer files their own. Lincoln registers every unit; Waterville Valley requires registration but exempts professionally managed units; Thornton permits short-term rentals in every district subject to planning board regulations; Campton and Woodstock have no short-term rental ordinance. In residential Plymouth, whole-house transient rental is not a permitted use. Confirm with the town, not an old listing.
Should you sell a vacation rental with bookings on the calendar or empty?
Usually with bookings. A booked winter is the best proof of income you can offer and removes the fear of a revenue gap after closing. To keep hybrid buyers interested too, keep the near calendar full and stop accepting reservations beyond roughly 90 to 120 days out once you decide to sell. Then agree in the contract exactly how post-closing reservations and deposits are handled.
Can you do a 1031 exchange when selling a short-term rental?
Usually, if it was held for investment rather than mainly personal use. You must identify replacement property in writing within 45 days of the sale and close within 180 days, and a qualified intermediary must hold the proceeds, so the exchange has to be set up before closing. It defers both the capital gain and depreciation recapture. Talk to your accountant before signing a purchase and sale agreement.
When is the best time to list a short-term rental in the White Mountains?
Mid-August through October in most years. Buyers are shopping for the ski season, the property photographs well in foliage, and a buyer who closes in the fall owns the asset for the season they are buying it for instead of waiting months for revenue. Listing in April with an empty calendar is the hardest version of this sale.
What happens to the furniture when you sell a furnished rental?
It is personal property and transfers only if the purchase and sale agreement says so. Attach a room-by-room inventory with exclusions named, allocate a defensible value to the personal property, and document it with a bill of sale. The allocation affects the transfer tax base, the appraisal and financing, and your own tax reporting on depreciated furniture, so have your attorney and accountant review it before signing.
Owl's Nest Real Estate manages and sells short-term rentals across Campton, Thornton, Lincoln, Woodstock, Waterville Valley, Plymouth and the Newfound and Squam towns, which usually means we have seen the owner statements before we write the listing. If you are thinking about an exit in the next year and want to know what your booking history is worth to a buyer, talk to us.