All Forum Posts by: Joel Case

@Pepper Bradford, nice work! I think these guys have given some great advice. Whatever you are doing with your mailers seems to be working, keep it up!

I too have found that being the bargain on the AirBnB market will get you parties, bad reviews, and horrendous guests. I periodically evaluate my pricing and make sure that between my two closest competitors that I am never the least expensive stay. I want them to have that headache and I don't mind sacrificing occupancy because of it. 

Sounds like you got a flip to do!

Utopia Bedding on Amazon gets rave reviews from STR owners. I went with Amazon Basics for towels and regretted it, they shed like crazy until about the fifth wash.

I recently booked a hotel room for the first time in a very long time. When I travel it's usually just my wife and I, and I usually go straight to AirBnB to book my stays. Most recently I was looking for a stay in Dallas for two nights on the weekend and I couldn't find anything that wasn't close to $500 near where I wanted to stay, so I went to Booking.com and was able to book a hotel room that was very highly rated for $202 total. 

That being said, I recently opened my Short Term Rental in October of 2022. My market had quite a few STRs that were operating, but I felt that most of them on the market were pretty mediocre, essentially just providing a house for people to use which generally lacked thoughtful touches. I identified a niche where I saw others doing well who were doing the bare minimum and thought that I could take a home with the same characteristics and do it better. So far my guests have agreed and my bookings have really started picking up. Speaking with my guests when I see them, they all rave about the thoughtful touches and extras that most people don't think about. I do expect more people to continue opening STRs and at the same or greater rate I expect that we will see the mediocre STRs disappear. I believe that amenities and management will separate the STR hosts of the future and look forward to setting myself at the top.

I just opened an STR in Ocean Springs in September. I read up on the regulations and it's not a huge obstacle EXCEPT for the fact that there aren't any permits when you factor in the ones issued and the ones in process. Knowing and living in the area I knew that there is a large patch of Ocean Springs just outside of the city limits that is not subject to those regulations. That's where I bought and setup my STR and so far have been successful despite opening in slow season. If you have any questions feel free to reach out.

 I must have missed that feature on Hospitable! I set them all up manually :(

What you are looking for is called an eviction. Start the process. 

Hey JT! Welcome to the forum. You should consider coming to the monthly REIA meetings, they are on the first Tuesday of the month at the GCAR building on Debuys Road. I am also in Ocean Springs and have one short term rental just outside of the city.

Get rid of the BMW, reliability is low and likely out of warranty. Jetta reliability also trash, but it's relatively new, so you should be alright for a while.