Master of Vacation Rentals

10 Steps to Hosting Success for Airbnb + other platforms

Jeff Pierce

• Publisher: Address Realty Group, Inc.
• Year: 2018
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9780692191972
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Real Estate
• Index: Business

Master of Vacation Rentals is a comprehensive and easy to read, step-by-step guide to become a successful and profitable vacation-rental host on Airbnb or any platform. From finding and improving a property to using design, deals, pricing, and calendar tips, Jeff shows you through true stories and examples how to achieve great reviews for profit and growth. 

Whether you want to rent a room or make your whole house available, this book contains the insights you need to achieve financial rewards through satisfied guests. Jeff’s knowledge and experience has allowed him to perfect a technique to have his properties constantly booked and achieving 5.0 reviews. He guides you through the necessary tasks and thinking to follow (as well as what to avoid) for you to become the next vacation-rental success story!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Over the course of his very ambitious and successful career, Jeff Pierce has worked as a high-volume real estate broker managing his own profitable office while leading a business that identified under-valued properties to flip them with minimal investment. He holds a PMP (Project Management Professional) designation and is a regular lecturer on that topic. His background also includes serving as a sought after information technology consultant to top Silicon Valley companies, making him the perfect guide to lead you through the ten steps to master vacation rentals. Jeff earned his MBA from Ohio University at the age of twenty-one and purchased his first property that same year. He has held or currently holds real estate licenses in California, Massachusetts, Florida, and Georgia. As a Superhost with over 200 (and growing) very highly rated Airbnb transactions, his experience has given him a valuable body of knowledge that he shares with ease, perspective, and humor.

Location, location, location—this is the refrain you always hear in real estate, to the point of cliché. But there’s a reason this phrase crops up so often. Location is absolutely crucial to consider when selecting a property that you’re going to rent out. If you don’t already own property that you’re planning to list on Airbnb, there are a lot of factors to take into consideration when selecting your new place.

“Most people stop looking when they find the proverbial needle in the haystack. I would continue looking to see if there were other needles”

—Albert Einstein

Tourists looking for vacation rentals are taking their trip to visit your area—and explore. What attractions are drawing them to the area? You might consider using a service like Yelp to look up some of the most popular nightlife destinations such as restaurant areas or clusters of bars and clubs, large movie theaters, shopping malls, tourist attractions like museums or historical sites—the list goes on and on. If you situate your property somewhere central to a number of these spots, guests are more likely to look up the location and say, “That’s perfect!” Proximity to public attractions and amenities, ideally within walking distance, is also a worthwhile consideration—though the prevalence of services like Lyft and Uber has made it easier to lodge at destinations farther away from areas of interest.

Now, forget your guests’ convenience for a second—what about yours? Think about how close a property is to your permanent residence. If you’re going to be decorating, cleaning, doing maintenance, greeting guests, handing out keys, etc., you may not want to condemn yourself to a long drive for each tiny errand, no matter how good the location is. Keep in mind that as a property owner, you’ll be responsible for keeping the place stocked with items like toilet paper, dish soap, fresh towels, and other basics. Being forced to make long trips for little errands will start to become a drain very quickly.

Could you make the drive out to your place within a day? What about making it there and back within a day? If your satellite property is going to demand a multi-day drive, make sure you have a very accommodating friend to stay with overnight near your rental place. Racking up hotel bills is a good way to cut into your potential profits. Property managers can manage the local guests’ needs if and when you are not available.

Keep in mind there are considerations to take into account regarding neighbors, homeowners’ associations, property taxes, local statutes, and much, much more.

• Are short-term stays allowed? If so, how are they regulated?
• What’s the maximum number of guests that can be hosted at any time? What are the maximums based on? Some are based on number of bedrooms, for example.
• Are there noise restrictions that guests must abide by?
• Limits on how many cars can be parked on the driveway? On the street?

Think about your neighbors! How close is the next property over from yours? If you’re in a building, how thick are the walls? Are there other units on all sides? What kind of amenities might be shared (trash chutes, laundry rooms, elevators, mail rooms), and where are they located? Based on these kinds of setup considerations, how likely are your guests to encounter or bother your neighbors—and vice versa? Are there privacy barriers like fences or hedges? How might the neighbors feel about increased traffic around your spot?

Another very important factor: Be wise to make projections about any maintenance or upkeep costs you might encounter. Does the house have a pool? If so, be prepared to take into account costs for pool cleaning, chemicals, heating, and other forms of upkeep.

There are tons of features that might incur unexpected maintenance or utility costs; some include the following:

• Carpets
• Hardwood floors
• Decks
• Air conditioning/heating
• Garbage disposals
• Landscaping/gardens
• Barbecues, lighting, and other outdoor features
• Septic tanks
• Entertainment systems
• Extra food storage, like a second refrigerator or deep freeze
• Garage doors

Get a sense of the location’s average utility costs before you move forward on the decision to purchase. For example, in a hotter area, air conditioning can massively increase your monthly electric bill.

Other practical and financial minefields to navigate might include the following:

• Tax impacts
• HOA fees
• Local ordinances and regulations
• Airbnb’s 3% service fee
• Insurance
• General maintenance

Now it’s time to consider something a little more abstract than all these day-to-day details: the wow factor. It’s something that’s hard to put your finger on, but it takes a property from the realm of the functional and ordinary into the unforgettable and extraordinary. Astounding views, lively and creative décor, beautifully landscaped grounds—all of these types of details can prompt a “Wow!” from excited guests. That’s a really good sign—it means that not only will your place score high points in reviews for ambience and visual appeal, it’ll also likely be appearing on many a social media feed—snagging you some free advertising!

When aiming to cultivate the wow factor, the easiest way is to let nature do it for you. If you have a cabin with a deck-side view of a pristine mountain lake, an upper-floor apartment whose windows open onto an entire city skyline, or an adobe home that faces the desert sunset, the bulk of the wow factor is going to be generated automatically. All you have to do is accentuate it with proper amenities and fitting décor. Of course, everyone can sense this, and natural wow almost always comes with a high price tag. So let’s talk about cultivating a wow factor by taking a shopping trip and doing some renovating and decorating—a much more budget-conscious approach than ponying up the cash for a cinematic location.

Here are a bunch of ideas to make a space pop without paying for front-row seats to nature’s show:

• Get a piece of huge, colorful artwork and display it in the front entry or foyer. The placement is intended to create a stunning first impression. The piece doesn’t have to be a multimillion dollar Jackson Pollock—just find something that’s big, bold, and works with the style and color scheme of your décor. If you don’t have an eye for art, ask someone who does—an artist or interior decorator friend will definitely have some valuable opinions on what works with what.
• A subtler option: create a sense of “enchantment” that’s evident on first entering the space. Lay down a cute or humorous welcome mat, or give your place a name and put it on a handmade sign on the front door.
• Recall advice on captions that we cover in Step 3, Pretty Pictures: You may want to name the individual rooms your guests will be staying in. Go with something like, say, the “Moonlight” room if there’s a skylight with a great view of the stars, or “The Emerald City” if the interior color scheme is green. The name should relate to the theme of the home or the décor of the room. Be creative and fun! If you’re aiming for an artsier vibe, this is the perfect way to give your place a personality. Since Palm Springs has a celebrity history, one of the houses has “Liz Taylor,” “Sophia Loren,” “Audrey Hepburn,” and “Marilyn Monroe” bedrooms, along with the “James Dean” bar—all spaces pay homage to these icons with large, artful depictions of these emotion-evoking stars.
• If possible, set up some lawn art so you can get guests’ attention before they step through the door. Metal animal sculptures, vibrant wind chimes, seasonal decorations like flags or statues, outdoor hanging lights—there’s an infinite array of options, each suited to conveying a particular vibe. Eclectic and freeform, or sleek and professional—do some digging around the Internet to settle on the kind of look you want to give off. Sites like Pinterest.com are exceptional for finding ways to add small details that make a big difference.
• Wayfair and Houzz are good online sources for home decorating ideas, as is Airbnb itself—look at other folks’ listings for inspiration.
• Also check out local real estate magazines for high-end listings, along with Architectural Digest, Dwell, Coastal Living, and Veranda magazines. For mid-century modern inspiration, I’m a big fan of a magazine called Atomic Ranch. The options are endless.

Also important before investing in wow-ing up your place is considering what kind of vibe you want to project. If you’re going to be doing decorations and renovations yourself, it would make sense to tackle a style that you’re familiar with. I’m from the New England beachside, and I’ve lived all over the country, which has given me a chameleon-like ability to adapt to different styles and atmospheres. Try to think about what guests are expecting when they go to a certain location.

You also must, of course, consider your market. Are you looking to buy a place in an area known for its ritzy shopping district? What about a whimsical place known for bachelorette gatherings? Then consider the kind of people who might be attracted to that location.

***

Here’s a true story that will help illustrate the ins and outs of the process. It begins with my quest to relocate to Palm Springs. I love Palm Springs—always have. I bought my place a bit before Airbnb came around and changed the way we book places to stay during a vacation. When I bought, I was concerned about where I was going to live and how I was going to make this new home feel like mine. It was a little tough to pull the trigger on a property that didn’t have a pool—in Palm Springs, having a pool is practically a legal prerequisite for building—but I’d fallen in love with the place when I first walked in, and the price was a lot closer to that of a small condo than a house. There were flowing gardens, an open and breathy sense of space indoors, and a general style that was perfectly in line with my own taste.

As I settled in, I realized the potential inherent in Palm Springs as a tourist destination and the possibilities of owning a vacation rental. This led me to give the field a shot with a second house (with a pool) that would be a little more suited to guests. I soon found that, while a challenge at times, I loved setting up that property to delight guests and give them a memorable vacation. Soon, I found myself renting out the first primary-residence house as well! The lack of a pool wasn’t nearly as much of a barrier as I’d imagined.

With the right attitude and marketing, you can make spaces attractive that might at first seem to be less than ideal to many guests out there. It’s all in the presentation—spin it!

However, as these things go, my perfect setup didn’t last forever. Palm Springs put forth a voter initiative to ban vacation rentals. During the previous year, the city had rolled out tough new restrictions and regulations. It was time to expand my options and diversify my vacation-rental portfolio. One of the first areas to catch my eye was Paso Robles, a beautiful city in the wine country of California’s Central Coast. I’d previously lived there for about three years, so I had a good sense of its geography—and its tourist destination potential.

But there were obstacles to deal with. Could I actually make a profit on a wine country property that has a higher property cost than Palm Springs? Could I find good housekee...

Table of contents

• Master of Vacation Rentals
• Copyright
• Disclaimer
• Acknowledgments
• 10 STEPS FOR HOSTS
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• 1. Fantastic Finds – Locate it!
• 2. Innovative Improvements – Fix it!
• 3. Pretty Pictures – Snap it and list it!
• 4. Perfect Pricing – Set it!
• 5. Darling Deals – Sell it!
• 6. Clear Communication – Transact it!
• 7. Special Service – Work it!
• 8. Rave Reviews – Confirm it!
• 9. Complete Compliance – Satisfy it!
• 10. Roaring Revenue – Bank it!
• About the Author