All Forum Posts by: Carlos H DeOliveira

@Brian Gerlach Co-hosting would be handling all communication and coordinating with property management, what you described is something like a full service property management. You can find companies online that offer this service for 12% commission plus some other fees. Those companies will also guarantee a minimum occupancy based in your area

I live in the northeast where the returns aren't the greatest. I own 6 homes, have a full time job and also own a retail business, I simply wouldn't have the time to find a property in a different state and find contractors and etc...

So for me, turnkey investing makes a lot of sense. I deploy my capital, get about 15% cash on cash, plus some tax benefits and it takes very little of my time. Last provider I used gave me a 6 months warranty, and so far I haven't had any issues. There are steps that you can take to avoid paying a 30% premium, it's more like a 3% to 7% premium.

I dont think anyone can make a blanket statement saying one is good and the other, one is bad.

There is no guarantee that you will get a better return by doing everything yourself.

@Lisa Irimata I have a few STRs in Florida and occasionally I use mashvisor to check on my own property and the data is about 90% accurate.

You way want to use one of those services to have an idea on occupancy rates and ideal strategies.

@Collin H. I'm not fan either, but to be fair I was able to re-rent many of those nights at a discount, bringing my revenue to about 90% of what it would have been without the cancellations.

I wish Airbnb found more of a middle ground when deciding what they were going to do. They didn't think about the hosts at all.

I woke up this morning and noticed I had received an e-mail from Airbnb letting me know my COVID Payment was on the way. I noticed a couple of people were talking about the amounts they received, and others were wondering what this is going to look like.

As you can see in the picture below, there is a link for a CSV file so you can check the details

Below is a snapshot of what the CSV looks like, I blacked out my listing and reservation details.

@Alyssa Lukish, I have 3 STR in Polk County, they are vacation homes for families visiting Disney. They do extremely well.

Davenport is a pretty good area to be in.

Are you set on Orlando?

I don't understand how a guest drives somewhere and sees someone doing drugs should qualify for a refund. Should the guest just not drive by there? I can understand if it was on the same street corner as the property.

I get the restaurant analogy, but restaurants have very high margins, and also has regular customers that will come in 50x a year. 1 customer does not make a dent on their operating profit. I equate that to a guest breaking a plate or staining a towel, it's not like I'm going to try to charge their deposit for such a small expense.

What about if you placed an order at a restaurant that was the equivalent of 8% of their yearly sales which is what a 30-day stay is for a host. Would you get a refund? 

If you are a superhost, maybe you can afford a bad review. It's fairly easy to earn superhost status and once you have enough reviews, you will be fine.

@Blake Lawrence, the tools will adjust your price up/down according to demand, special events and etc... but ultimately your base rate is what sets the tool.

I used Wheelhouse & Beyond Pricing at the same time,  setting the same base rate( i have 2 houses on the same st that are the same size and rent for about the same ) , there was no notable difference on how their pricing adjustments worked, I did notice that Beyond Pricing was a little more aggressive raising and lower rates, but that can easily be replicated on wheelhouse if it is a strategy you want to follow.

Beyond Pricing has the advantage of being the preferred Homeaway partner.

Good luck

I agree with everything @Benjamin Vail said with the exception of Price labs being the clear winner. Price Labs charges a fixed cost of $19.99 for the first property and $14.99 each property from 2 to 5 and etc...

Wheelhouse and BeyondPrice charge commission rates on the reservation, so if you are paying 0.75% through wheelhouse and your bookings total $2000/month, it costs less for your first property and the same for property 2 to 5, but more for property 6-10.

So if you have a lot of listings, and generate more than $2500 per listing, then you can benefit from Price Labs. If you have 2 listings, and don't want to pay unless it generates revenue for you, then you may want to start with BeyondPricing/Wheel house

The one advantage with Wheelhouse / BeyondPricing is the commission structure, gives them skin in the game. Through this pandemic as my reservations were cancelled, Wheelhouse refunded the commissions they made on my reservations.

Beyond Pricing & Wheelhouse are great

I've used  HostTools, Beyond Pricing and Wheelhouse. I found all of them to be extremely useful, but you will always have to make adjustments to their logic, every property is different and offers different amenities.

Beyond Pricing connects with Airbnb and HomeAway/VRBO, Wheelhouse only connects with Airbnb, but if you use a channel manager you can push your Airbnb rates and minimum stays to Homeaway and save yourself the commission.

I currently use wheelhouse, simply due to cost. Beyond pricing was costing me about $180/month, Wheelhouse costs me about $90, lower commission fees, and no charge for HomeAway. If you don't use a channel manager that can push your Airbnb rates and minimum stays to HomeAway, then Beyond Pricing would be a better option.

These tools are great for managing your rates, but you need to tell the tool the correct base rate. Once you have found your ideal base rate, the tool will increase your rates according to demand, and do last-minute discounts etc...

The most valuable feature for me is the ability to dynamically adjust your minimum stays to close gaps or to get extra bookings when time is running out. Both Beyond Pricing & Wheelhouse do a great job of doing this.