Vacation Rental, Bed and Breakfast, Short term rentals ..

[Karen Margrave]

I must admit, I do NOT have any Vacation Rental properties. I am however; fascinated by this niche, and in fact was the one that pushed to get a forum devoted to it. 

My question is this, how many of you actually have Vacation Rental, Short Term Rental Airbnb or similar type room rental, Bed and Breakfast or other type properties, or are interested in the niche?

What is your rental or area of interest, and why? 

What are the pros and cons of each in your opinion? 

If you actually own one of these types of properties, what made you decide on which type of rental you offered? 

If you own such a property, describe it. 

[Lawrence Belland]

@J Kelley Sullivan how much are properties selling for there?

We have a single family home in Laguna Niguel CA that we had as a short term rental home until the HOA passed a rule prohibiting it in October.

It was lucrative mainly because it was our home that we used and it was furnished well above average.  It offered a gourmet kitchen with Viking professional appliances, leather furniture, the best beds, etc.  That resulted in off the chart reviews from those that stayed there. 

The biggest issue is vetting the guests you rent to. You need to ask questions to discover their purpose.  Going to a bachelor party, 30th birthday, etc. resulted in a "were booked".  Finding the right house keeper who can get there on the day between rentals is important. We were able to use our regular housekeeper so we got lucky.

Now, with our new HOA rule any rental has to be for at least 30 days and the HOA has the right to see the agreement. That makes it a little more difficult for us to plan our visits, and the income is less, but there's also less time management... so its a wash.

We were getting $300/night as a short term rental and now we get $4,500/month as a furnished corporate rental.  We have a guest there now until the 5th.  Another arrives on the 28th for 53 days which is the prime time to be away from Oregon. So the longer "short term" rental can suck a little if its also a home you like to visit.

My advice is to invest your money on furnishings and present the property online as best you can.  A 3D scan similar to this click here (that's not our home) gives the best representation available . Professional photography is a must.  

I find it surprising how much money someone pays for the property and then they won't spend $300 for the marketing that will generate the income. The marketing is evergreen.  Spend it once and reap the rewards over and over.

Show what you have, pair what you have with the appropriate price, then eliminate the uncertainty with transparency, and you'll increase your occupancy.  The fear of the unknown by the "guest" is what prevents 100% occupancy.

My feeling about Portland, and other communities having difficulty embracing the sharing economy, like my HOA, has to do with the horror stories that @ Marcia Maynard mentions. I've never known of anyone who actually experienced squatters in their vacation rental. I've experienced it many times with my "short sale" listings, but even then the odds are so small of that happening that it isn't worth planning for. I believe it's an urban legend.

Be that as it may for squatters; breakage should be part of your business plan. It'll happen so plan for it. 

We have thermostatically controlled faucets in our bathrooms.  One old guy couldn't figure out how to use them so he assumed my water heater was broken. I spent 20 minutes on the phone explaining it to him but now we have laminated pictures with instructions: no more calls (BTW those faucets are the simplest things in the world to use). The handle on our Fisher Paykel dish drawer was broken because a guest didn't know how to unlock it: more pictures. Same thing happened to our Duet washing machine.

Now everything in the house has a laminated pictorial instruction.  

The remotes were the biggest hassle so I eliminated them with a Harmony remote that handles everything by pressing on a... wait for it... a picture!  I also have a Nest thermostat, Rachio sprinkler system and MyQ Garage door opener so everything in Southern California can be monitored and controlled from our diggs in Portland.

Vacation rentals can be lucrative if you think it through.  Bernadette did just that.  She spent weeks researching everything from sources to by coffee, soaps, shampoos, towels, linens, evaluating dozens of agreements, how to present the property, how much to charge, how to work with the various portals (this is very interesting) she's thoroughly evaluated everything you can imagine to launch a short term rental.  It's astonishing how much there is to it.

She's putting it all together in a "How to" package... I'll post it up here when it's ready.

Cheers!