All Forum Posts by: Allen Duan

Love it! I've traveled a similar path. Started with rental arbitrage and now run a co-hosting business. Having the arbitrage experience helped us get our first co-hosting clients since we had the track record and their properties weren't the first ones we're experimenting and learning with.

To a few other posts here, most businesses take grit and drive to succeed. It's not for everyone and though I love entrepreneurship, by no means do I recommend it for everyone. For lots of people, sticking to a W2 career, spending less than you earn, and investing in real estate on the side is the way to go.

We use Hospitable and Hostfully. Hostfully is more robust and a more complete solution to Hospitable. I recommend Hospitable if you're starting out with 1-3 properties. It can definitely work for more, but I made the switch to Hostfully when I needed more features. Happy to answer any specific questions about both apps. I like them both.

Quote from @Kim Leduff:

@Allen Duan how are you able to do mid-term rental in LA? I listed my property months ago and get no bites the minute I suggest they fill out an application considering it would be a 30+ day contract? would you say that is common?

Hi Kim! Where are you getting leads from? Are you getting bites who lose interest at the application step? Or no bites at all? If you're getting no bites at all, you're not marketing it correctly or the property doesn't work for MTR. Give me some more details and I'm sure I can point you in the right direction =)

Sent you a DM @Rachna Condos. Perhaps I may be able to help!

Quote from @Bonnie Low:

Quote from @Allen Duan:

Quote from @Bonnie Low:

Quote from @Allen Duan:

For MTR bookings through an OTA, like VRBO or Furnished Finder, you'll have to get creative if you want to do background and credit checks. I've heard of some hosts adding to the house rules that the guests must complete those steps after booking on the OTA platform, otherwise the booking will be canceled.

At my company, we don't do background and credit checks for OTA bookings, but we do ask why they're renting a MTR and who will be staying with them. The answer to those questions is usually enough for me to know if I want to take the booking or not.

But you do have them sign a lease, right?

 Hi Bonnie, we do sometimes but not always. You definitely can require a lease for Airbnb bookings. Sometimes Airbnb guests find it unusual, so you may lose some potential bookings with the requirement.

 Thanks, Allen. At what point do you introduce the lease when you're using Airbnb? Do you mention there is a separate lease agreement in the property description? What if you accept the Airbnb booking and then they refuse to sign the lease? Do you cancel the Airbnb booking and just take the hit? I'm just curious how this works because I advertise my MTRs on FF only.

 Great questions! We don't require leases for our Airbnb bookings. I can't vouch for this myself since I haven't used this process, but I've heard others report that you can have Airbnb cancel the booking with no penalty to you if you stated that signing a lease is required upon booking. I guess it's considered breaking the house rules in Airbnb's eyes.

Quote from @Joshua Burgeson:

Quote from @Allen Duan:

You're rocking it Jamie!

This year my big takeaways include:

-Hire overseas talent. Any modern business today should have some of their workforce overseas. The basic admin tasks that all of us have to do can take up a lot of our time, keeping us away from the high value work we should be focusing on. For me that's client acquisition, marketing our properties, and empowering my team.

-The need to keep my eyes on the right numbers and metrics to ensure I'm making the best decisions. I'm investing in accounting services with Ximplifi to do this as well as building out the reports I need to see daily. One immediate result, I've let go of some of our rental arbitrage properties that aren't worth it.

-My goal for 2023 was to network as much as I can. And it's paid off immensely. Not only have I met so many cool people and enjoyed the relationships I've built, it's also led me to clients, potential partners, and people I've learned so much from. I'm going to increase my networking next year as well as getting my branding and social media machine going.

 @Allen Duan how are you liking Ximplify so far? I am trying to get my str accounting streamlined and they seem to have a robust platform but my experience with 3rd-party remote accounting firms was shaky in the past. Hoping to avoid some headache and do some research before making another transition. 

 It's been a good experience overall. The have a software option that's affordable and links our PMS Hostfully to QBO to automate a lot of record keeping. The more expensive accounting service is essentially outsourcing to their team. It's not cheap but you get access to their team and they do almost everything for you.

Quote from @Bonnie Low:

Quote from @Allen Duan:

For MTR bookings through an OTA, like VRBO or Furnished Finder, you'll have to get creative if you want to do background and credit checks. I've heard of some hosts adding to the house rules that the guests must complete those steps after booking on the OTA platform, otherwise the booking will be canceled.

At my company, we don't do background and credit checks for OTA bookings, but we do ask why they're renting a MTR and who will be staying with them. The answer to those questions is usually enough for me to know if I want to take the booking or not.

But you do have them sign a lease, right?

 Hi Bonnie, we do sometimes but not always. You definitely can require a lease for Airbnb bookings. Sometimes Airbnb guests find it unusual, so you may lose some potential bookings with the requirement.

For MTR bookings through an OTA, like VRBO or Furnished Finder, you'll have to get creative if you want to do background and credit checks. I've heard of some hosts adding to the house rules that the guests must complete those steps after booking on the OTA platform, otherwise the booking will be canceled.

At my company, we don't do background and credit checks for OTA bookings, but we do ask why they're renting a MTR and who will be staying with them. The answer to those questions is usually enough for me to know if I want to take the booking or not.

Happy to help if you need a MTR property manager :)

Happy to help if you choose to pursue the MTR route in Las Vegas. I own a MTR property management company.