All Forum Posts by: Andrew Steffens

 You're welcome! Like I said (at least it used to be) very easy to get at minimal or no cost.  With that in mind it makes it easy to be better safe than sorry!

 Personally, it would be a toss up for me.  If you can afford to and prefer to rip it off like a bandaid and cancel them and get it done that is certainly one way to go.  If you prefer the income the 4.7 is pretty decent and then do the repairs following last check out and block out the calendar otherwise you will continue to get bookings and may never get to it until reviews do tumble.

Hi Ashley! We are in FL but many of our clients are in CA so it is very doable (we are a property management company).  What makes you want to invest in New Orleans specifically? I feel as thought if you are in CA and are willing to go that far you should go wherever the best return is?

Can you honor the existing bookings and then block future dates out? Does the property currently have great reviews?

Hey Monica!

I am a medium sized PM in Tampa Bay area, and actually most of our clients are out of state (quite a few from SF area too).  I would make sure you have a Realtor or PM who is well versed in the area, and make sure you have a plan for furnishing and any renovations that the property may need, and make sure your expectations are realistic for all things; everything from the purchase, renovations (if any), furnishing, listing, and all things the PM does or does not do.  I hope that helps! If you are interested in the Florida market let me know and I can give you more specific advice

Hi!

I recommend Samsung, any Samsung.  They usually have closeout deals like this:

https://www.samsung.com/us/hom...

Whatever you get do not go cheap! Cheap ones will break down on you from the constant use.

Hello from Tampa Bay area -

We had the same question based on that verbiage. We went with the DBPR Division of hotels and restaurants license to be safe, as we had originally intended to have our company become a licensed RE brokerage (I hold a broker license) but realized we did not have to. It was very cheap and very easy, and could keep you out of crosshairs as STR/MTR are constantly under scrutiny. I know this is not a concise answer but I hope it helps. If further in doubt I would call DBPR/Div of hotels and restaurants and seek guidance from them, although they will likely tell you that you should.

Hey Dave - We used to use Guesty from 2018-2021 and eventually left them for Streamline due to price and accounting issues. We tried the GCS during our tenure with them and we left it fairly quickly. We only tried it on 1 or 2 of 20 or so listings at that time and we were not impressed. The time it took for their responses and their VA's difficulty in grasping our business practices led us to look for other solutions. That said it has been 2 years since then so Im not sure if it has improved. If you have a lot of listings I would try it on a segment and evaluate for yourself.

 Hey Ryan - When we launched our new site last year I had saved every phone number and email from every booking I had previously made through other OTA's since 2016 (about 15,000 reservations).  We built a Constant Contact email campaign and a Twilio text campaign to urge direct bookings.  We made a repeat guest coupon as well to help.  Also, we use StayFI to collect peoples emails who want to use the wifi in our homes.  I hope that helps, good luck!

21% in West Coast FL, but likely will end up around 60% when it is all said an done.  We just received 3 more bookings this morning for Xmas or New Years that is not even counted in that 21%.  I think people are booking more last minute this year