All Forum Posts by: Brian Barch

Hospitable integrated with pricelabs and my smart lock.

I find hospitable to be very easy to use and reliable. it’s not as robust as some, but does the basic tasks really well

I believe there is value in these online, in the sense that I would use them as one tool and not ignore them.  However, When I punch in my rental some of them are somewhat close, and some wildly off.  Rabbu has my market at about 50% of what it should be for instance.

But I think between using all the tools, talking to STR friendly realtors, the enemy method, etc.....one can get fairly close

I agree that this sounds like a pet project for you, which again is totally fine if you are okay with spending your money in that way.

To me, the STR market (and from what I hear about the smokies) is on a downward trend. This year might not be the best year to go all in with an investment if the sole goal is cash flow or appreciation (not personal use).

In a mature market such as the smokies, I think you can reasonably arrive at a fairly narrow occupancy rate.  For arguments sake, suppose it's 65-75% given the market occupancy, the smaller size, and the newness.  So that's 21 days/mo.

I'm NOT an expert on the smokies market, but lets say this thing costs you $600K all in, you put 20% down, and with utilities and OTA fees you are all in at $4,500 - $5,000/mo.  That means you need to average a nightly rate without the cleaning fees of $240 on a small cabin.  Sounds high to me unless you are able to really make this unique.

I realize I made of lot of back of the napkin assumptions above, but it sounds like a no go to me.

It 100% depends on your goals.

not to be facetious, but if you are asking because to watched a YouTube video, the answer is I would not get into STRs

if the purpose is you have long term goals of investing in real estate, you enjoy hosting, and you want a place near your daughters college for when you visit, the answer might be that it’s great.

it’s a mature market now. So creating value is the name of the game, as is long term buy and hold, assuming you enjoy the asset class.

Our north Georgia cabin is doing very well this year. We are on the smaller side, and we started accepting 1 night stays which have really done well TBH. Given our size and price point, we have never had a long booking lead time, so it’s tough to say our early summer is shaping up.

when I punched in my address, it estimated 47% occupancy, which is WAAAAAY low.  But then, my actual cabin was listed as a comp with 79% occupancy, which is very accurate, albeit the nightly rate was about 15% too high.

Like most of these services, they don't do a good job distinguishing between owner stays and guest stays, my property included

 It won't make sense for eve
ry traveler, particularly for a single, business traveler only staying one night, I might argue that STR's wouldn't make sense.
But for a family of 5 that would have otherwise had to share 2 double beds and call in a cot from the front desk, it's a no brainer.
My family of 5 was able to book a condo on the beach for 4th of july for 4 nights, about $250/night all in!  Beats cramming into the Hampton Inn and paying the same amount for a crammed room and a highway view.

We make money on the cleaning fee (its a long story), and so there is some value in the number of turns we do.

A lot depends.  I think when one is starting out, you want to go lower than competition, but not so low that you attract the wrong crowd, so that you can build momentum and reviews.  

But then over time, work towards a nicer property than the competition, and higher rates, even at the expense of a little occupancy.  Both less wear and more options for when I want to stay there.  Also more options for pest/hot tub care.

Year 1 (2023) we had 79% occupancy, and frankly I think we were a little underpriced.  Trying to find the sweet spot this year, we raised our prices and we'll see what it does to occupancy.  It certainly leads to a shorter booking lead time, but haven't yet seen a drop (it's only been 6 weeks).
All that said, I loosely think of it as a weekend sweetspot, and a weekday sweetspot

To me, this is more about false expectations than it is any Airbnb failing.

I still scratch my head when I hear people talk about Airbnb failing them simply because they didn't instantly start clearing $1,000/mo.  

I mean, great if you are, but if that's your expectation than you are misunderstanding the STR asset class.

Speaking anecdotally only here:

when I spent some time in ABQ, I walked away loving the climate and desert mountain scenery, and feeling the a good majority of the city was sketchy. 

Does sketchy mean “unsafe? Not necessarily but I felt as though I didn’t need to spend more time there personally. I did see quite a few gas stations with bars and what not.

I have no doubt there are beautiful, wealthy, safe parts of the city, but I found them few and far between on my trip