All Forum Posts by: Gerald Pitts

Self managing.  90% of the time or more it's a breeze.  But you're technically on call a lot of the time.  

Check out Virtual Staff Finder.  They do the screening for you, and send you a few candidates with voice samples.  Even if this deal is too tight, they can  help with administrative tasks on future deals / help you scale your business.  

Hi Stacey, check out STR Insights. You can search by region, Beach, mountain, lake, Skiing, etc.

Quote from @John Underwood:

Quote from @Tiffany Cohen:

Hi - looking for suggestions on companies who provide property damage protection plans. Looking to implement a non-refundable $79 type fee for $3k coverage that all guests must pay when booking. Is this something hosts can purchase each time a guest books or is it a fee that is helping to cover the cost of the overall insurance the host has that covers the property as an STR? Thank you!

 Vrbo used to have that and I quit using it. I preferred to have a deposit. Maybe they did away with it if no one was using it?

If you have the extra rental car insurance then you really don't care if you car gets dinged up. 

 You can get it through a couple of the pms's. Like owner rez and guesty. I considered passing this cost on to the guest non refundable, but decided against it because of the rental car example that John gave. 

Quote from @Andrew Steffens:

Hey Jeremy, curious what you pay per unit/month at Pricelabs?

 Hi Andrew, I pay about 9 or 10 per listing for pricing, and additional 10 per listing for the market dashboard to look at comps. 

Love Price Labs, and would love to see the graphic to see if I'm missing anything. 

If the sellers don't have room, or if you're worried about it getting mixed in with their stuff, you could rent a storage pod or pods and have that dropped at the property. May or may not still need the white glove service.  

Quote from @Alison Pidgeon:

@Michael Baum @John Underwood Thank you for the reply. I have done research and it seems those are all popular places to have short term rentals. I was hoping to hear from someone local who has a short term rental in the area to fill me in on what I can't learn from doing internet research.  :  )

Vacation rental markets are good. Think mountain, lakes, beaches, skiing. Check out STR insights. It mentioned a few Pennsylvania markets for good ROI last time i looked. Join some local investor meetups as well.

Quote from @John Underwood:

Quote from @Patricia Andriolo-Bull:

Hi and Happy Thanksgiving.  I just saw a post re: the Airbnb algorithm.  Interestingly, I’ve always got most of my business from VRBO but recently I’ve had an increase in Airbnb and a drastic reduction in VRBO.  I appear in the 200 - 300 listing range and boosts don’t really help.  Is anyone else experiencing this?  I’m in Marco Island FL.  Any suggestions on changes to make?  Thanks in advance.

 Try updating your listing daily for a while.

Change some prices up and down. Lower some to get more bookings. More views and bookings will help move you up.

Make sure your 1st picture is your best foot forward to encourage people to click on your listing.

Agree with John. I try to go in and play with prices every day. I use price labs and go in and decrease the price by 5 dollars, and then bring back up to original price. If I have time, I rotate the first 6 photos as well. Then if I STILL have time, I change something in the title, and in the body of the listing. 

Surround yourself with others that do well at what you want to do.  BP, In Person Meetups, REIAs, Masterminds.