All Forum Posts by: Tiffany Shan

@Samuel Carmichael did you ever find a solution? we might be able to help - would love to talk.

@Jon Crosby that's an awesome idea, I'll do that. 

What I was *told* by these platforms is that they get manual info from actual vacation rental owners who use VRBO, Homeaway, etc. on revenue and occupancy, then match up that info with their AirBnB scraping to figure out what the delta is and apply that to all homes. 

I like that method if you can indeed get a lot of that data.

Also, it's actually up in the air how much scraping of VRBO/Homeaway that these platforms perform, I didn't get a straight answer the first time I inquired (which is to be expected, this is fairly proprietary info) but I will dig further. 

@Jon Latorre I just take the algorithmically generated stuff and run it by local property managers to get their input, which isn't a very efficient process, but like you said, is very useful.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Fqrb6yrmTn...

I'm in the middle of comparing Everbooked, Mashvisor, and AirDNA (may add Airnalytics). Spreadsheet is brief now but I will add about a dozen homes this weekend so you can use your own judgment and decide whose estimates seem most reasonable to you! Already I can tell they're quite seriously deviating. 

They're all quite expensive (pricing in spreadsheet) so I think the greatest FREE benefit from each is this:

Mashvisor: Can see their estimated annual revenue for homes without paying

AirDNA: Can see estimated occupancy by performance percentile by city (i.e. what an average home's occupancy is, what a top 25% home's occupancy is)

Everbooked: Can see estimated occupancy by size of home, by month, by city (so pretty granular!)

If you're trying to evaluate a potential home, I think you can triangulate pretty well by using all 3 services. If Mashvisor & Everbooked's predictions indicate a home would have to be a top-performer according to AirDNA, I usually downgrade my occupancy or ADR projections. I want to assume all potential homes will be average performers, and that way if they do perform exceptionally (or rather, if I as a host perform exceptionally) it can be icing on top of the cake.  

To me, the next interesting step is coming up with a systematic grading system and running the contents of the MLS through it periodically, so I can spend my time evaluating the top 10% of opportunities.

We're building financial management software for vacation rentals - specifically those owned by multiple people - but I think a lot of the same issues apply. Is there anything y'all are unsatisfied with re: Mint & Hurdlr?

If you're co-investing or sharing ownership of a property and you intend to hold it in a multi-member LLC or as tenants-in-common, my team and I may be able to help you draft very rigorous co-ownership agreements.

We've worked with very well-respected law firms & co-ownership specialists (we're based in SF, where TIC group ownership of large residential buildings is an active niche) to create very thorough, but flexible templates.

Strong co-ownership agreements eliminate ambiguity and prevent friction. We cover issues like:

• How to decide when to sell (and the logistics of selling - choosing brokers, etc.)
• Major disasters: death, divorce, bankruptcy - what happens to the asset?
• Which expenses are mandatory and which require unanimous consent

We're looking for feedback on these as they will serve as the basis for eventual loan products, so I can assure you we are very invested in creating exceptionally well-drafted docs. 

[email protected]

AirDNA recently published a "best places to buy vacation home" breakdown and Napa and Sonoma clearly stand out as unusually profitable: 

http://blog.airdna.co/buy-vacation-home-properties...

I think that's in large part due to the strong restrictions on STR's - when visiting Napa I was told that non-owner-occupied STR permits are hard to come by, STR permits have an annual cap, and owner-occupants get priority.

Starting with North and South Lake Tahoe (other cities coming soon), we run all the homes on the MLS through our system to try and predict potential short-term rental income, using 3 factors: location, #BR's, and sq ft. Imperfect of course, but we've backtested on a few dozen of our friends' homes and so far we're ahead of existing data providers.

We then take the top 10% and manually go through them with local brokers from each side of the lake that we consider savvy & experienced, to choose 2 homes a week that are particularly interesting.

Tahoe's a really expensive market, so yield isn't as strong as in other places. We're working to add cities, but we happened to know way more people with rental homes in Tahoe, so we started there :) 

It's free to subscribe (yes, partner brokers' names are attached, that's why they help us) and we'll start sending out next Monday. If you'd like us to work on another city, let me know: [email protected] 

http://eepurl.com/cWRtpz

PS - if you're wondering why we do this, we're ramping up to offer vacation home loans.

@Michaela G.as someone else said, thank you so much for sharing your story. It's really sobering and eye-opening! 

Woah, great article, thanks for sharing @Andrew Eaton... very thought-provoking. I had always thought AirBnB had less impact on vacation towns that made were used to transient visitors and made a lot of money from tourism, but clearly I misunderstood.

@Andrew Johnson Definitely lots of potential issues with sharing time & allocating expenses - op agreement is about 40 pages and very specific. That might sound crazy, but splitting large multi-unit properties as TIC's is relatively common in San Francisco (because condo conversions are basically not allowed for 3+ unit properties) so many law firms & buyers are familiar with these agreements. I *do* agree that if you are going to find partner(s), it's easier and probably better to find people who have the same overall goal (investors should partner w/ other investors, etc.) but in this case I think their choice of properties just aligned.

@Jon Crosby Diversification - he was able to get a 2nd property in a smaller vacation town w/ faster appreciation but much smaller vacation rental  scene - relatively riskier but I think an interesting choice. The 1st property is relatively expensive with great amenities - the thought was that its rental revenue with 50% of the calendar is larger than the rental revenue of 100% of the calendar of a cheaper home, because in this area, having a lot of bedrooms, hot tub and pool boost your marketability soooo much.

@Account Closed yeah don't get me started on timeshares...! :p Yes, you are splitting a property up by time, but I think the difference is that it's a very small group (2 people) who have a contract re: how long to hold the home, so the investment is as likely to retain value as any home in the area is, whereas of course timeshares are infamous for being difficult or impossible to re-sell. They're also, for the record, friends, and I know there's a lot of cynicism around going into business with friends, but dealing with 1 other friend is definitely easier than 500 other timeshare owners you don't know. 

Thanks for the comments guys! And to answer Michael's Q - yes, interested in co-ownership legal structures & financing options both personally and professionally.