Management company for startup process - Evolve

[Peter Amendola]

Good morning!  My wife and I close on our first short term rental this Friday in the Poconos. We are contemplating hiring Evolve for only 3 months to help us with the initial startup phase (housekeeper and maintenance contacts, setting up the rental description, photos, initial rates, etc etc) until we get our feet wet. We honestly have no idea what to expect…

So what happens if Evolve acquires bookings 6 months from now? If I leave Evolve, do the future bookings stay with the property or do they remain rights of Evolve? How the heck do long distance owners remotely set up their houses for short term rentals?! I have been using my local realtor for contacts but it’s been hit or miss. I’ve also joined the community facebook page but was just wondering best practices that you’ve seen as most effective.

Looking forward to the journey… and im sure that there will be many lessons learned :)

[Joe Splitrock]

@Peter Amendola I know little about Evolve, but hiring them to setup your property and get you bookings, then firing them seems like a dishonest business practice (unless you buy that specific service). If you want to self manage, do the hard work yourself. If you want to outsource, then be loyal to your property manager. When you fire them, you most likely lose your cleaner, lose your listing and your bookings. You are starting from scratch with no reviews.

You can do this yourself, but it is a time commitment and learning process. All the best in the business cut their teeth on some learning lessons to the top. The platforms like AirBNB and VRBO will deliver the bookings, but if you don't manage it correctly, you will quickly get bad reviews, which means lower rates and worse guests.

No offense but why didn't you ask the question "how the heck do long distance owners remotely set up their houses for short term rentals" before you put a property under contract? The first thing I would do is buy this book from @Avery Carl so you can start learning the business. 

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