On short-term rentals, the cost of endless growth, and the realization that not everything beautiful needs to make money.

I work in property management. I’ve spent years in the short-term rental industry, long enough to see the problems from nearly every angle. I’ve witnessed the challenges homeowners face, the struggles of the people who manage and maintain these properties, and the impact tourism has on the small communities surrounding them. And lately, I’ve found myself questioning whether any of this is truly sustainable.

Tourism is often celebrated for the economic opportunities it brings. Visitors support local restaurants, shops, artists, and businesses. In many small communities, tourism provides jobs and income that might otherwise be difficult to find. I understand that. I live in a beautiful part of the Pacific Northwest, surrounded by mountains, forests, rivers, and places people travel from all over to experience. I understand why they come here. What I struggle with is the cost of turning the places we call home into destinations designed to generate profit.

When does tourism stop supporting a community and start taking away from it?

Short-term rentals have changed the landscape of many small towns. Homes that once housed families have become investment properties, neighborhoods have become revolving doors of strangers, and finding affordable housing for the people who actually live and work in these communities has become increasingly difficult. In places where housing is already limited, converting homes into vacation rentals can reduce the supply of long-term housing and contribute to rising costs. The people cleaning the cabins, serving the tourists, maintaining the properties, and keeping local businesses running are often the same people struggling to afford a place to live.

Then there’s the quality of life for those who call these communities home. Imagine living next to a property that welcomes a different group of strangers every few days. Most visitors are respectful, but not all. Noise, parties, parking problems, property damage, and occasionally criminal behavior can disrupt the peace of an entire neighborhood. People who chose to live somewhere for its quiet surroundings can find themselves living beside what essentially operates as a small hotel. Yet unlike a hotel, these businesses are often situated directly among residential homes.

At what point do we begin prioritizing the people who live in these communities over the potential income they can generate?

And while homeowners may appear to be benefiting from this growing industry, I’ve seen how complicated that picture really is. Owning a vacation rental is not necessarily the easy money people imagine. Between mortgages, property taxes, insurance, utilities, maintenance, housekeeping, management, and platform fees, operating costs can be substantial. As companies like Airbnb and Vrbo change their policies and pricing structures, owners have to continually adjust how they operate. Some properties remain profitable, while others struggle to justify the investment.

What concerns me is how these rising costs affect everyone else involved. When owners are spending more to operate their properties, there is often less room in the budget to fairly compensate the people doing the work. Housekeepers are expected to maintain increasingly demanding standards within tight turnaround schedules. Property managers are responsible for coordinating cleaners, overseeing maintenance, inspecting properties, responding to problems, and managing expectations from every direction. The work doesn’t stop simply because there aren’t guests staying in the house.

I know this because I’ve lived it. I’ve spent years taking care of properties, solving problems, and making sure everything runs smoothly. I’ve also come to recognize how much I’ve undervalued my own labor. The responsibilities have grown, the demands have increased, and the compensation hasn’t always reflected the amount of time, energy, and physical work involved. I know I’m not the only person in this industry experiencing that.

There is something fundamentally wrong with a business model that depends on people working for less than their time and labor are worth. If a property can only remain profitable because the people maintaining it are underpaid, then who is really benefiting?

I believe there should be better ways for homeowners to operate independently of the major booking platforms. Direct booking systems and locally organized rental networks could help owners retain more of their income, potentially allowing them to pay the people managing and maintaining their properties a sustainable wage. There are already tools available to support independent bookings, but competing with the visibility and reach of major platforms remains a challenge. Homeowners shouldn’t have to depend entirely on a handful of large companies to operate their businesses.

But I also believe that creating better booking systems is only one part of the conversation. We need to look seriously at how many short-term rentals our communities can reasonably support. We need regulations that consider the availability of long-term housing, neighborhood quality of life, and the needs of the people who live in these places year-round. Not every community has the infrastructure, housing supply, or resources to support unlimited tourism growth.

And perhaps the bigger question is whether we need more growth at all.

We are constantly encouraged to expand, invest, build, and find new ways to generate income. More vacation rentals, more hotels, more developments, more opportunities to turn something beautiful into something profitable. We have created a culture in which nearly everything is viewed through the lens of its financial potential. A home becomes an investment. A quiet neighborhood becomes a destination. A beautiful landscape becomes an opportunity for development.

But what happens when we stop seeing places as communities and start seeing them as commodities?

I’m not against travel. I believe exploring new places, experiencing different cultures, and connecting with the world beyond our immediate surroundings can be incredibly meaningful. I also recognize that tourism supports many families and businesses. But I question whether our constant pursuit of more is creating the kind of world we actually want to live in.

Do we really need more vacation rentals? More hotels? More places designed to accommodate people who are only passing through? Or do we need to start protecting the places where people are trying to build their lives?

Maybe we need to get back to the basics. Maybe we need to stop making everything about wealth, expansion, and finding the next opportunity to make money. Maybe we need to start valuing community, creativity, connection, and the simple experience of living somewhere without feeling like every square foot needs to generate a profit.

And maybe we need to reconsider the way we experience the world.

When was the last time you explored somewhere new in your own community? When was the last time you wandered down a trail you’ve never walked, visited a little shop you’ve always driven past, or spent an afternoon exploring a neighboring town? When was the last time you approached the place you live with the same curiosity and excitement you bring to planning a vacation?

There’s an entire world in our own backyards that many of us have barely explored. We’re so busy looking for the next destination, the next adventure, or the next opportunity that we overlook the extraordinary places and people already surrounding us.

What if we spent more time supporting local artists, visiting neighborhood businesses, exploring nearby landscapes, and investing in the communities we already belong to? What if adventure didn’t always require traveling farther away? What if we learned to appreciate what we have instead of constantly searching for something more?

And as I sat writing these questions, something occurred to me. I wasn’t just questioning the industry I’ve spent years working in. I was questioning myself.

I’m an artist, a writer, and a creator. Over the past few years, I’ve poured myself into painting, poetry, books, and building a creative business. I’ve spent countless hours figuring out how to turn my work into something that could provide an income. Paintings become prints. Writing becomes books. Artwork becomes journals, stickers, and products. Every new idea seems to come with the question of how I can turn it into something profitable.

I’ve been so focused on creating a life where I can earn money doing what I love that I hadn’t stopped to consider whether I was beginning to put the same pressures on my creativity that I was criticizing in the world around me.

Somewhere along the way, I began treating my own imagination like an investment property. Every idea became an opportunity. Every creative endeavor became something I could build, market, or sell. Instead of simply enjoying the act of creating, I found myself wondering how to make it successful.

And I realized I was doing to my creativity what we’ve been doing to our communities.

I was asking something beautiful to justify its existence by becoming profitable.

That realization stopped me.

Because the truth is, I don’t want to stop creating products or selling my artwork. I love the idea of walking into a bookstore and seeing something I’ve written on the shelves. I dream of seeing my tarot deck in little shops, my artwork hanging in people’s homes, and hearing that something I created helped someone feel understood or less alone. I want my work to reach people beyond my little corner of the world.

But I also want to wake up in the morning and simply create. I want to paint without wondering whether someone will buy it. I want to write without deciding whether it should become a book. I want to explore an idea without immediately figuring out how to build a business around it.

I want to be seen, but I don’t want to spend my life chasing visibility. I want financial security, but I don’t want every beautiful thing I make to become another responsibility.

And perhaps that’s the same balance our communities are searching for.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with making money from something beautiful. There’s nothing wrong with sharing our homes, our landscapes, our talents, or our creations with others. The problem begins when the pursuit of profit becomes more important than the thing itself.

When a community becomes more valuable as a tourist destination than as a place for families to live. When a home becomes more valuable as an investment than as a place of belonging. When an artist begins measuring the worth of their creativity by how many products they can sell.

We start losing the very things that made those places, experiences, and creations meaningful in the first place.

Maybe sustainability isn’t just about economics or environmental responsibility. Maybe it’s also about protecting the things that make life worth living.

Our communities. Our creativity. Our peace. Our relationships. Our ability to experience beauty without needing to own it, sell it, or turn it into something more.

I’ve spent years helping maintain homes so visitors can experience the beauty of the place I call home. But lately, I’ve been thinking more about the people who remain after those visitors leave. The families raising children here, the workers trying to make a living, the neighbors who want to enjoy their homes, and the local artists and business owners who give these communities their character.

And now I’m thinking about the same thing in my own life. What remains when I stop working, producing, planning, and trying to turn every idea into something successful? What parts of myself have I been overlooking because I’ve been so busy trying to build a future?

Maybe we don’t need more tourism. Maybe we need more community. Maybe we don’t need more businesses, more products, or more ways to generate income. Maybe we need to learn when enough is enough.

Maybe the freedom I’ve been searching for isn’t found in building something bigger, but in giving myself permission to enjoy what I’ve already created.

I still have dreams. Big ones. I still want my art and writing to travel farther than I ever could. But I don’t want to lose the joy of creating in the process of trying to make those dreams come true.

I want to build a life that supports my creativity, not one where my creativity is constantly expected to support my life.

And perhaps that’s what we should want for our communities, too. Places that support the people who live there, rather than expecting those people to sacrifice their quality of life to support an industry.

Maybe it’s time we stop asking how much money something can make us and start asking what it brings to our lives.

Because a beautiful place shouldn’t have to be profitable to be worth protecting.

And neither should the beautiful things we create.

— The Wild Alchemist