How to generate extra income using Airbnb with your primary resident

Last year, my 1st reaction with Airbnb is “what the heck is that”. This year, I am hosting my rooms on Airbnb now and currently average about 300$ per month on cash flow for 2 months. I was like heck – 300$ is equal the cash flow on one of the house in my portfolio! I didn’t know that two empty - furnish ready room in my house can generate cash flow too!

The story on how the founder found Airbnb is pretty inspiring. I would suggest that you would google it up. I will share my experience with Airbnb over the last 2 months

How to get started: Very easy. You would just go to www.airbnb.com and sign up for an account. After that, make sure you verify your identity by offline ID, then linked all the social media into your account to increase credibility. After that, you will have to take very good pictures to upload, then analyze the market around your listing, pick a reasonable price and…list it!

Accepting your very 1st guest

Review play a big part when a guest is looking to book your listing. Since you don’t have any review yet. You would have to make the guest feel comfortable by putting up all the pictures and write a very detail description about your listing. If all failed, reducing the price just slightly below your competitors is also a good way to get your 1st booking.

Communication is also playing a big role as well. For me, I will try to respond to the guest within an hour of inquiry.

Hospitality

The easiest way to accomplished this is to treat people how you want to be treated. What would you need/want/expect to have from a host? I would want a clean bed/bath room. Friendly and welcoming host, free Wi-Fi, clean towel, phone charger if I happen to forget mine, etc… You should be able to get a good review from your guest once the booking is completed. Don’t forget to give your guest a nice review as well.

Continue the adventure while making yourself comfortable

It is your house after all! If you can’t sleep because there is a stranger sleeping next to you, then don’t do it. If your guest doesn’t have any review or have no verification, or doesn’t have great communication, simply denied the booking request.

I feel awkward on my 1st hosting but the feeling eventually went away and you can actually start enjoying it. Airbnb claimed on the website that their platform is actually “smart”. It not only take your input but analyze your social network to see what kind of network/association you belong to and try to match you with the right guest. Since I am working in the IT field for Oil and Gas industry. My guest is either related to IT or Oil and Gas so we always have something to talk about. The last booking even get crazier as my last guest is actually a member of bigger pocket! We even attended the same syndication seminar event! What a small world it is.

Not sure how this will turn out in the long run but I think if you are looking to start in real estate and looking for a side hustle to generate extra income. Airbnb might be the answer. Heck, treat it seriously and you could become a king or queen in vacation rentals. Who know!