New Host - Sharing Our Story
Hello, this is long so sorry in advance. :)
I've been following this forum for over a year. Now that I'm a host I wanted to give back and contribute to the forum with our experience.
Our journey in the STR space began in 2017 when we were attempting to buy a cabin around the Great Smoky Mountains National Park (we have family that live there and we vacationed there frequently). We switched to custom build and at the end of 2018 we found the perfect lot - Gatlinburg, great view of Mt. LeConte, private, level build area. We bought it sight unseen from the advice of my father-in-law who lives up the street. It was 1 acre listed for 200k. We talked the seller down to 150k. Still, it was expensive for the time and we believe it was the start of the crazy comps in the area. Even today I can't believe we found such a great lot.
Then with a combination of web searches and referrals we found an architect, lender and builder. At the start of 2019 we started the process of designing the house with our architect. In September we finally completed the design. December 2019 we broke ground.
The house - 3500sq ft, 4 bed/5.5 bath/sleeps 16 was finally completed in October 2020. It went live on Airbnb on December 6, 2020.
This is where things got interesting. We launched with what we considered a "minimal viable product" - no professional Airbnb photos, not completely decorated, no hot tub, no built-in microwave, not enough outdoor furniture - we had our first booking on 12/17. This family had a single good review. They were outstanding and gave us a 5-star review despite our shortcomings.
The second family was over the Christmas holiday. Being new to this, we were desperate for bookings. They had no reviews which made us nervous. We booked them anyway. Unfortunately they left a mess (which was forgivable) but they deliberately destroyed our pots and pans by using a screw to scratch the bottoms of the pots. I was "ok, it's part of doing business". But my wife was furious. We stayed in the house ourselves after these guests and saw the damage they left. I actually consider ourselves lucky that we were the next guests in the house because our cleaners couldn't clean the house completely or repair the damages because the day after Christmas was their busiest day of the year. We spent a couple of days cleaning up the mess these guests left (on top of what our cleaners already did).
We agonized on whether to leave this guest a negative review. But then they reviewed us. I assumed it was a good review because our communications were so positive. So we didn't review them but started an Airbnb resolution. The guest denied our request (of course) but Airbnb paid out a little of the damages we sustained. My wife has since gone back to Airbnb to dispute their original decision. What's weird about this whole situation is that the guest gave us a glowing 5-star review. My takeaway is that in a 16-guest group, the person scheduling the stay isn't responsible for the actions of everyone in her group. I am now glad we didn't give her a bad review.
After her, we got a couple of last minute bookings due to snowy roads and electricity outages in the area due to the snowstorm (our roads are plowed because we're in the city and our electric wasn't affected). These folks had good reviews and left us outstanding 5 star reviews.
In the meantime, we've turned down bookings due to people not having reviews or requesting to bring pets (we don't allow them).
Today we've had 4 guests and all 5 star reviews. What's interesting to me is that I don't feel like we've gone above and beyond to earn these. We've simply communicated with the guests with automated messages (via hospitable.com) and manually thru the Airbnb app. The house being a new construction with great views probably helps too.
At first I lamented the fact that we started in the slow season in the Smokies (Jan/Feb) but now I'm glad. It's like we need to have our training wheels on as we get used to this whole STR thing before it gets busy. We're learning more as we go on this journey and feel like we'll be in good shape for the busy season. Also, I feel like the partnership I have with my wife brings great balance to this business (she's strict and I'm laid back).
Anyways, that's our journey in a nutshell so far. You don't need to know everything to get started or to get 5 star reviews. You just need to care about it.