3 questions regarding med. term rental

[Sue Benzuly]

Hi, 

First time with a  medium term rental.My property is currently rented through 2/15. I have a request through furnished finder  for 4/1-6/30. Which is awesome!

Here are my questions - I can legally only do 30 day minimum rentals. This could leave me with a vacancy for 6 weeks. Should I do it?

My plan was to increase the rates during the summer - because of the location. So they saw the property on furnished finder at the winter rate. If I do accept, how do I explain that to the potential renter?

Can I ask them to book it through Air BnB?

Thank you in advance!

Sue

[Chris Seveney]

@Sue Benzuly

I am curious if a MTR will really pay 2x of a LTR will and be worth all the headaches?

I keep seeing people doing this trend, not knocking it but wondering what benefits is it providing? I can see vacancy rates at 30-50%

[Sue Benzuly]

I listed the property the week before Christmas and it rented within days at 1.5x the LTR price, was a LTR until the last tenant moved out. I have already had an inquiry for three more months this year. In the summer (May-Sep) it will rent for double. According to Furnished Finders we are the 17th most requested area in the country. We have a lot of hospitals, Brown University and RISD. 

Hopefully it will work out! It’s a new game for sure!

[Afoma Okwudiafor]

It would be great if furnished finder had the calendar rate option. We are booked through April so we increased our rate on furnished finder to reflect summer rates. I will adjust accordingly as we draw closer to April. Already getting inquiries from Airbnb however. 

also, had a similar problem to yours were I was left with a 3 week gap.i did the math to see how the vacancy affected out numbers. For us it still worked so I was willing to accept it. Run your numbers to see how you fare. You most likely can still get in a guest within that 6 week. But its definitely a gamble 

Ps also in RI. Pawtucket specifically. plan is to move away from the strict 30 day requirement so i cam easily squeeze shorter stays to fill in vacancies

[Allen Duan]

Hi Sue,

How confident are you that you can find a 4-6 month booking to fill that gap? This is a common conundrum with MTRs. We have a pricing strategy for our MTRs where tenants would be paying higher rent when they're dates create an awkward gap in our calendar. This way it makes up for any potential loss you have for not getting the vacant gap booked. 

We also list higher rates on Furnished Finder and find we can always negotiate and offer a lower rate if in interested party has ideal dates. Better to offer a discount than I have to raise the rate on them =)

I don't see how asking them to book on Airbnb helps. They'd be paying a much higher rate with the service fee.

Hope this helps! Happy to answer any follow up questions

[Sue Benzuly]

Thanks for the responses. I also listed the apartment on Facebook Market place and have had a great response. Waiting for a tenant screening to come back and if it is ok, I will have it rented for 6-8 months. For the longer rental I explained the higher rent during the summer months and they were fine with it. 

[Colleen F.]

@Sue Benzuly  Am I understanding that you get a fair amount of  MTR in providence. I was just curious being south of you how the business was. Summer rate by us would be a big issue too. 

[Sue Benzuly]

MTR is big in Providence, we have all the hospitals, RI, W&I, Fatima, Roger Williams and the VA with travel nurses. My rental is about 10-15 minutes from the hospitals. We also are close to Brown and RISD. I have had seen requests for Quonset on Furnished Finder.

[Sue Benzuly]

Quote from @Colleen F.:

@Sue Benzuly  Am I understanding that you get a fair amount of  MTR in providence. I was just curious being south of you how the business was. Summer rate by us would be a big issue too. 

 I would love to own a rental in Narragansett! 

[Colleen F.]

@Sue Benzuly we used to rent narragansett, it is a great area. Winter students, summer STR. Worked out well for us. Now we are there part time and looking to possibly rent it again part time but really looking more at the intern, health professional, moving population. We have some rentals in South Kingstown.

[Nicole Heasley Beitenman]

Quote from @Allen Duan:

Hi Sue,

How confident are you that you can find a 4-6 month booking to fill that gap? This is a common conundrum with MTRs. We have a pricing strategy for our MTRs where tenants would be paying higher rent when they're dates create an awkward gap in our calendar. This way it makes up for any potential loss you have for not getting the vacant gap booked. 

We also list higher rates on Furnished Finder and find we can always negotiate and offer a lower rate if in interested party has ideal dates. Better to offer a discount than I have to raise the rate on them =)

I don't see how asking them to book on Airbnb helps. They'd be paying a much higher rate with the service fee.

Hope this helps! Happy to answer any follow up questions

 How are you setting up AirBnB and Furnished Finder to ensure inconvenient bookings pay more?

[Allen Duan]

Quote from @Nicole Heasley Beitenman:

Quote from @Allen Duan:

Hi Sue,

How confident are you that you can find a 4-6 month booking to fill that gap? This is a common conundrum with MTRs. We have a pricing strategy for our MTRs where tenants would be paying higher rent when they're dates create an awkward gap in our calendar. This way it makes up for any potential loss you have for not getting the vacant gap booked. 

We also list higher rates on Furnished Finder and find we can always negotiate and offer a lower rate if in interested party has ideal dates. Better to offer a discount than I have to raise the rate on them =)

I don't see how asking them to book on Airbnb helps. They'd be paying a much higher rate with the service fee.

Hope this helps! Happy to answer any follow up questions

 How are you setting up AirBnB and Furnished Finder to ensure inconvenient bookings pay more?

 Hi Nicole, essentially I'm setting the daily rates in way so the inconvenient bookings are more expensive. Specifically I set the first 3 vacant weeks at a lower daily rate, week 4 through 7 is at a higher rate, so the larger the vacant gap that is created by the booking, the more expensive the booking was. This only applies to Airbnb, VRBO, and any other platforms you can set daily rates. For Furnished Finder, I list at a higher rate than I'm ok accepting. I find that most FF leads allow negotiation before booking, since there's no instant book option, and that's where I let guest know the best rate I can offer based on their dates and length of stay. I hope that makes sense. DM me if you'd like to learn more, I'm happy to go into more details.

[Nicole Heasley Beitenman]

Quote from @Allen Duan:

Quote from @Nicole Heasley Beitenman:

Quote from @Allen Duan:

Hi Sue,

How confident are you that you can find a 4-6 month booking to fill that gap? This is a common conundrum with MTRs. We have a pricing strategy for our MTRs where tenants would be paying higher rent when they're dates create an awkward gap in our calendar. This way it makes up for any potential loss you have for not getting the vacant gap booked. 

We also list higher rates on Furnished Finder and find we can always negotiate and offer a lower rate if in interested party has ideal dates. Better to offer a discount than I have to raise the rate on them =)

I don't see how asking them to book on Airbnb helps. They'd be paying a much higher rate with the service fee.

Hope this helps! Happy to answer any follow up questions

 How are you setting up AirBnB and Furnished Finder to ensure inconvenient bookings pay more?

 Hi Nicole, essentially I'm setting the daily rates in way so the inconvenient bookings are more expensive. Specifically I set the first 3 vacant weeks at a lower daily rate, week 4 through 7 is at a higher rate, so the larger the vacant gap that is created by the booking, the more expensive the booking was. This only applies to Airbnb, VRBO, and any other platforms you can set daily rates. For Furnished Finder, I list at a higher rate than I'm ok accepting. I find that most FF leads allow negotiation before booking, since there's no instant book option, and that's where I let guest know the best rate I can offer based on their dates and length of stay. I hope that makes sense. DM me if you'd like to learn more, I'm happy to go into more details.

 I appreciate the feedback! I'll keep your offer in my back pocket; we're getting ready to list our first MTR at the end of Q1.