All Forum Posts by: Myka Artis

First off, congrats on renting by the room on Airbnb. My wife and I did that with our first property and were quickly able to scale into more units. I would look at small multi-family units because you still get the low down payment if you move in, and you already understand the process of short-term rentals, so you could turn your next deal into 2-4 more STRs/MTRs, which could catapult your cash flow and portfolio. Good luck to you!

I had about five arbitrage opportunities in Houston for a while, but I pivoted away from arbitrage in 2024. If you plan to arbitrage, ensure you negotiate your rents. If you are acquiring multiple units in one apartment complex, stagger your lease start dates to allow time to furnish them all without incurring rent payments. Also, when you're looking to arbitrage, make sure you fully vet the landlord and put clauses in there regarding how fast maintenance issues are resolved. If you're working with a private landlord on one house, make sure their insurance will cover vacancies and any other loss of income. Arbitraging is dependent on your landlord, whether you will make money or not, so the lease is where the money is made. I could go on for days regarding arbitrage. Still, my final sentiment is to invest all your profits in properties that you can own in the long term, thereby reducing your overhead of rent payments, which can be challenging to sustain over time, and engaging in arbitrage. 

I would list on both. Are you able to link your calendar with theirs? If so, I'd list on the traditional OTAs and with their company. They might already have deeper insights on the people coming to town and possibly have a funnel. You should ask them all of these questions. It's always great to have a spot with the locals rather than the OTAs at times because we can't control their algorithm, and there are dips and spikes.

If you're near an area that can be affected by hurricanes, you should look into diversifying your target audience. It sounds like you would be in an excellent situation for a mid-term rental. What kind of property do you have? Beds, baths, fenced yard? If so, you can even experiment with your listing by trying a 30-day minimum to see if it generates any traction. Always be willing to adjust your strategy, as being OTA-dependent can be risky. 

@Hadar Orkibi Yes, I do, and the markets that have the STR rules in place are always the best ones to operate in. It limits the competition. However, I like the mid-term rental play in that area, so the regulations rarely affect our business model.

These taxes are only imposed on short-term rental stays, so the trick is to find the number of nights considered an STR in the city. You can avoid those taxes by making that number your minimum number of stays. I've operated about five hours south of STL as a mid-term rental, and it's been great. STL will be a great mid-term rental market because it's a drive-through city with I-55 and many people visiting attractions.

I doubt you will get anywhere trying to sue the major corporation. I would start the eviction process and get the media involved to show communities how Airbnb is allowing illegal units and supporting squatters. Whenever Airbnb is engaged, the more media the better.

Airdna, Pricelabs, etc. AirDNA usually has very accurate data for vacation rentals, which is what I have found. If you're in a metro market, I look more towards viewing current Airbnb listings to view their calendars and pricing. I also look at what attracts people to the town, businesses, military bases, etc. This research is very dependent on your market. AirDNA sucks for metro markets and you will probably get better accuracy with Pricelabs for metro markets.

These are the reasons that will irk you as an Airbnb host. I will say documentation is everything. If I were you, I wouldn't even worry at this point because they have already threatened to leave a bad review while asking for compensation, which is against Airbnb's policies and an automatic review removal. You can refuse to refund anything at this point. However, many issues popped up during their stay that would be an inconvenience, so I would continue to give them half the cleaning fee back.

The learning lesson here is to be aware of issues in your unit and how Airbnb support would handle them. If this guest hadn't threatened to leave a bad review, they could have easily gotten a 50% or more refund if they knew how to play the Airbnb system. They could have easily taken all these issues to Airbnb and gotten half their money back. In the future, if you know that there are issues with the water, you might want to consider shutting it down for a time or getting a different unit. A more savvy guest would have gotten almost a full refund for this, so be aware in the future; you handled it extremely well.

@Sherry T. Housing Coordinator, Relocation specialist, Hotel Coordinator, etc.