All Forum Posts by: Andrew Wong

Do hotels refund if there's a hurricane?

@Avery Carl, I would suggest having multiple cleaners. You don't want to be stuck in this position again where you're forced to find a new person. Find a new person when you're in control and feeling confident, so when you feel unsure about something you have another person already in your pocket.

I agree with @Daren H.. I would just find a new one. Cleaning is unskilled labor. Almost anybody can do it. Why does it cause you so much headache? 

Are you paying a flat fee for a certain job? If so, that flat fee should have an agreement of what they should be doing. Do you have a cleaner contract?

@John Underwood wow $300 security deposit. I have a $1500 security deposit lol

@Ariel Smith: Holy crap, seriously right? It took FOREVER to deal with their payments system. AND, when they took payment out and gave it back, they removed a certain "fee" for credit card processing? Who does that?! Tagging @Kevin Lefeuvre since he asked for a story.

I think I've griped about VRBO before... Yeah sure they have instant booking, and they have higher fees, but that's not a big deal for me. The big deal for me is that nobody cares about reviews or reviewing their guests on there! How can I trust the instant book as opposed to AirBnB where almost everyone reviews when they vacate?

@Kevin Lefeuvre delisted. I'm not cancelling, I'm just declining reservation requests. I'm not paying the flat fee, I'm just using the free system. Not very interested in paying the yearly fee since in my area VRBO doesn't net as many users.

@Peter R., the guests never respond! They do an inquiry, I reply, and it's silence from there. Also a lot of them for me were inquiries for a month out or so, for a few days, which is not an ideal reservation for me.

I think VRBO just thinks "too many declines" means that I'm somehow circumventing them to do a custom reservation after I got their number.

And I got my listings delisted from VRBO because I rejected too many crappy reservations. *grumble grumble*

Is there a way to contest this? I don't want to pay $400 for mediocre reservations.

I check in at 3PM and check out at 11AM. Good enough for cleaning.

If my guest wants an early check in, I can accommodate for a early check in fee.

@Angelo Wong, good ideas about asking!

Obligatory I am not a CPA, but I have talked to my CPA (Amanda Han) for what it's worth.

What I remember was that a self directed IRA couldn't be used for VRs, as VRs are not very passive income, as opposed to a long term rental. Could be worth asking.