All Forum Posts by: Monika Haebich

@Dexter Crawford, @Gregg Gannett, I completely see where your frustration is coming from. I know they're also planning on raising fees, and I just heard from the HomeAway Summit that by 2016, 100% of listings on the site will have to be bookable online. 

Hi @Loren Thomas! Sorry for the delay in my response. :)

Based on the supply/demand in our marketplace, I'd say we currently have more owners looking to make money from their boats when they're not using them than we have property managers looking to manage yachts. 

I do love the boat names btw! :) 

Thank you, @Sean Walton! Didn't realize I left out the period (it makes a significant difference lol).

I just realized the original article didn't link, so here it is, @Britton Cotton and @Oscar Porter:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/expedia-buys-homeaway-39-billion-what-does-mean-andrew-mcconnell?trk=hb_ntf_MEGAPHONE_ARTICLE_POST

Will any of you be at the HomeAway summit today in Austin? That should make for an interesting conference... 

Just saw this article on the HomeAway acquisition that was announced today. What are your thoughts? How do you think this will affect vacation rentals?

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/expedia-buys-homeaw...

Hi Della,

I work with hundreds of vacation rental homeowners, so I'd be happy to chat! 

Which resort town are you considering? While a lot are booked during peak seasons, they'd still most likely be booked only about 70% of the time. 

Other costs to consider: maintenance, essentials, the value of your time, etc. Here's a link that might be helpful: http://www.rented.com/income-calculator

Prachel, no problem! To clarify, I work only with people who are renting out entire homes, which is why I was asking. I've definitely seen success here in Atlanta. Just watch out for HOA restrictions; I've had managers make incredible offers to homeowners only to realize HOA restrictions won't let them do short-term rentals. It's a total bummer.

Other than that though, most of the demand I've seen has come for downtown or Midtown apartments. 

If you want to chat live or if there's more helpful information I can offer, please don't hesitate to reach out. :) (Just tag me in the post, so I know to look - I almost missed your last response!) 

Actually my company just rebranded because we've seen so much demand for things like yachts and planes! We were formerly called VacationFutures and were a platform for owners to get guaranteed, fixed rental incomes from vacation rentals, but so many people started coming to the site looking to get managers for their yachts, planes, cars, etc. that we decided to rebrand to "rented." 

As someone who works in the sharing economy, I can say that there's definitely demand both from property managers and owners looking to rent out their assets. The sharing economy is also expected to grow to insane numbers, so there really is potential there. 

While we've never considered boats/planes to necessarily be "real estate," they're definitely assets. And while I might not recommend purchasing one for the sole purpose of renting it out to make money, if it is for personal use, there's no reason you shouldn't be able to make a little extra when it's not being used.

Hi Prachel,

I work with a lot of homeowners in Atlanta doing short-term rentals. Would you be offering a room within your home for rent? Or an entire home? And for how long are you looking to rent out the space?

@Zachary Smith, as far as using Airbnb goes, I would recommend having a manager take care of bookings or sticking to HomeAway or a channel manager (like Rentals United). Here's some more information on optimizing bookings:

• http://www.vrma.com/files/2015Annual/Materials/Third%20Party%20Channels%20How%20to%20Generate%20Millions%20of%20Dollars.pdf

Hi Zachary! I'd be happy to chat about resources. I'm not a property manager or vendor, but I work in the industry on outright rentals (where managers pay a guaranteed amount to the homeowner). One of the fastest and easiest ways to learn is just by going to vacation rental industry conferences. I just returned from VRMA in New Orleans, but the HomeAway Summits, Rezfest, and Vacation Rental World Summit conferences are all really great ways to network and learn more. 

As far as blogs go, here are some of my favorites:

• rented.: This is my company's blog, so of course, it's one of my favorites. ;)  If you have any articles you'd like to see on there, let me know, and I'm happy to put something together!
• Short Term Rental Advocacy Center: They have a lot of current information on short term rental regulations.
• VRMA blog: Current information and lots on industry trends
• AVROA: The American Vacation Rental Owners' Association
• Rentals United blog: Rentals United is a channel manager, but they have a fantastic blog on managing your vacation rental.
• Cottage Blogger

To echo @Maura Paler, Matt Landau has a great blog! Definitely worth a follow.