All Forum Posts by: Theresa Holl

As far as metrics for hotels, too many people and blogs obsess over REVPAR rather than GOPPAR (gross operating profit per available room). Focusing on profit rather than top line is always my guidance as it encourages you to automate and streamline processes, which often leads to innovations on the guest experience front. Digitizing processes in order to drive down costs really pays off. Of course, NOI is another key metric you'll want to estimate as you write up your scenario modeling.

Hey Merritt - great topic.  What is your key differentiator and target demographic? Without spending a ton,  there are a lot of things you can do around local partnerships and referrals, especially leaning into the amenities and experiences luxury clientele will want.  So you basically approach a potential partner, like a luxury designer, wellness practitioner or tour guide and offer to help promote them to your clients.  They will likely respond in kind and now you each have a lead factory.  You offer their services at a discount to your clients as your differentiator.  You can also partner with a consultant who can get your clients their own websites as long as you're managing them.  It's a pain to move off a website, especially if it has all your leads, CRM and marketing systems attached so they'll likely be a client for life.

Offer eye-catching upsells to guests like concierge services, butler, car service, pet sitting, valet and parking.  Offer wellness gatherings if there's an event space and bring in influential life coaches/yoga types.  

Partner with a local artist and put a QR code on the art so it's available for purchase in the property and take a %.  This is a constant reminder of that property for the guest so they'll talk about that property and that experience in particular, rather than saying "I stayed at an AirBNB."

Tons of additional things you can do.  Make sure the listing has an Instagrammable space with a unique hashtag incorporated in it so the social media posts increase.

Happy to share some more ideas...this is off the top of my head.

Not only do people jump into these websites too quickly sometimes, but they're overpaying.  I've seen people spend $3K to $5K on sites that don't even have Google Analytics or GA4 tags for harnessing your web traffic and running targeted ad campaigns.  So much sloppy work out there these days for way too much money.  At least that's my recent observation.

 Hi Nicole - tons of templates online for this.  You can also enter some of your constraints into ChatGPT and have it draw up a template for you.  Notion also has templates.  They are everywhere.

A buy box is a tool real estate investors use to determine the types of properties they want to purchase. The buy box is usually broken down into columns and details the criteria a property must meet to be considered for purchase. This tool helps real estate investors focus on their goals when analyzing potential real estate deals.

The buy box can consist of standards that are important to the investor. Common criteria may include, but is not limited to location, prices, property type, size of the property, or age of the property. This simple tool helps real estate investors focus on certain properties. If a property does not meet the criteria in a buy box, the investor knows to move on to another project.

The buy box is used as a filter to focus on properties that a real estate investor is truly interested in. Defining the criteria of a buy box also helps investors avoid being overwhelmed by an abundance of real estate opportunities.

Hey Derek - my first impression about you is that it's very reasonable to favor moving forward with support.  All these investments start with building your A Team.  No investor is doing this stuff alone and beyond mentors, even partners to dilute risk are not that hard to find.  A lot of us here have networks you can tap into and other resources to share.  

As far as who's making money and who's not, a lot of people struggling think of it as an Airbnb, rather than a short term rental business.  There are so many revenue streams and upsells available and it's the high end properties that are succeeding right now.  Even something as simple as adding your cleaning fee to your nightly rate will eliminate a lot of the worst guests to deal with and position you as more high end. Upsells include concierge services, butlers, parking, local tour guides and activities (affiliate partnerships), renting different parts of your property at the same time to different clients, romance packages, spa packages, up charging for high end amenities, massage/wellness packages and affiliate partnerships.  Opportunity doesn't sleep.

Also, check out FL house bill SB 280. Might create a profit windfall for prepared hosts in the right cities that have had rental restrictions.

Yes you need to insure your STR. If you need some brokers, hit me up.

I can connect you with someone for this.  I'll DM you.

If you're interested, I have a partner network for STR investors that includes those specialties. Happy to connect you.

Do you have a buy box? Budget and financial goals? Have you created your A team of financial, legal, RE mentors, growth consultants, cleaners and contractors, etc? A lot of being ready is the team you build around yourself. 

And the answer is...ChatGPT.

Seriously, my favorite AI hack lately for STRs is to compile all your reviews you've ever had from every OTA in to ChatGPT and ask it to search all the data for client sentiment analysis.  If there's an amenity there that people love, you'll know.  If there's one missing that people expected, you'll know.

Bonus round...do the same thing with your top 5 competitors reviews and get a full market analysis, for free, based on the most valuable thing you have: your guests' opinions.  

Then have ChatGPT reformat the whole thing into a SWOT analysis and make some strategic decisions about what to invest into your property next.