All Forum Posts by: Syed Lateef

@Ted Kuhlmann Thanks for the shout out.

@Anuj Anand

Just be aware that most condo's in Chicago ban Airbnb rentals or must find an association thats more lax.

You would have to check if they are on the House Share Prohibited Building List as a starting point

https://data.cityofchicago.org/Buildings/House-Sha...

@Elliot Rudmann You can consider my place portgage park. I am on Central & Lawrence.

People who travel from around the country dont know the difference between Lakeview or Wicker park. 

In my opinion they look at price, quality of furnishing, reviews, and how far from downtown.

Theres a significant decrease in occupancy in winter months. Sept to Nov were great on Airbnb. 

December is a huge drop off. I have lowered prices significantly as well.

In December in the first 15 days have not been that bad as i luckily get last minute reservations the same day. But my calender is looking skinny for the remainder second half. I hope to continue to get last minute bookings

It has made started starting to advertise on other platforms. VRBO, Booking.com etc. 

Awesome thread. 

SmartBNB is probably the best move I have done for my airbnb business. 90 percent of my communication is done by this software. It has saved me so much time and worries. The automated messages are essential to grow your business.

For pricing I switched from beyond pricing to price labs. 

For am moving away from percentage of revenue pricing models to cost per listing pricing models as my airbnbs  generate high revenues and the other software became expensive.

The only drawback for SmartBNB and price labs is that it's for airbnb only. I'd be nice if it did it for vrbo too.

Currently I manage 17 units in Chicago and growing 

@Joey Nakayama you would be suprised that most locations on the north side of chicago are sucessful with Airbnb. I never would have thought my Jefferson Park Airbnbs would be such high in demand.

The best way to assess it is by simply searching your address and seeing the other Airbnbs in your neighborhood. See if they have many reviews and what people are saying about the neighborhood

https://www.airbnb.com/s/3348-N-Karlov-Avenue/homes?refinement_paths%5B%5D=%2Fhomes&allow_override%5B%5D=&s_tag=Jeq6E8pj

@Joey Nakayama If you dont end up getting leased up i recommend the Airbnb route.  One thing i dont recommend is loosen your screening of tenants. You dont want to have a years worth of headaches with a bad tenant

Awesome local Chicago meetup- looking forward to it

Chicago- @Brie Schmidt

Many people on this site would agree

@Atul Mohlajee Those numbers and deal is great. 0 down?

How did you come across this deal?

Awesome! Congrats.

Great potential rents. 

How did you get it rezoned?

No money down sounds good to me. lol

My family also has a piece of land in West Rogers Park near Devon and Western where a restaurant burned the building down back in 2007. 

Still to this day we have had challenges on developing the 5 storefronts back up. 

Its still a vacant piece of land