All Forum Posts by: Shelby Pracht

@Eric Mcginn we definitely drop prices quite a bit during our "shoulder season" to keep occupancy up. Do a few searches on Airbnb for comparable properties this time of year and see what they're renting for. We always end up with a lot of last-minute bookings this time of year! Good luck!

@Lauren B. That would have been sooo frustrating as a guest! I definitely think anytime you use a big property management company, stuff is going to fall through the cracks and you'll end up with guest complaints. It's definitely possible to find really caring and competent small local companies or individuals to help run your STR from afar though, you just might have to do a little digging to find them (and pay more than 10% management fee, haha)

@Sofia Sharkey I know you specifically said that you're looking for somewhere warmer, but my little town is a major tourist hub year round (right near Yosemite National Park and a ski resort). I manage short term rentals for owners here and have a really long wait list of owners trying to use our services, we could definitely use some more knowledgeable investors and managers here! (I have some posts with info about income and occupancy if you're interested, reach out!)

Isn't that so frustrating?! I've definitely noticed as we drop prices during our slower "shoulder season" guests tend to get more and more needy. The worst!

When we were starting Airbnb and began sharing our home with strangers every night. We literally rented out a bunk in the living room of our one bedroom apartment, and welcoming each guest felt like a risk. But using all that extra income allowed us to start our own STR business and definitely paid off!!

@Daniel Reeder

We LOVE condos as rentals, at least at in our area. It's so nice to have all the snow removal taken care of, which can be a major issue here. I've become friends with some of the managers so they keep me updated on any issues or let me know if they have problems with any of the guests/tenants.

@Nick Graham it can definitely work and lots of people use that as a viable strategy. A different form of arbitrage to consider if you're looking to get in to STRs with little money.... manage a property for someone else. There are tons of people that would like the higher income of Airbnb but dont want to deal with the hassle. We had our own Airbnb, we didnt the rental arbitrage thing, and settled with just managing them for others. We take a percentage of the income, handle all the calendars, guests, cleaning, and maintenance, but the owner still pays their own utilities and gets a payout every month. It's been really successful for us, and our owners are stoked on the situation too

@Kenneth Hartog try looking at properties comparable to the one you're looking at on Airbnb, and then message the host! I am pretty open about our numbers and if someone reached out to me I'd be happy to share. Hopefully you can find a few current hosts to get actual numbers from.

@Dave Meyer Vacasa is new in my area at Mammoth Mountain. 35% is really on the lower end here, at least as.far as large companies go. Most major companies in Mammoth charge 38-50%! (some as high as 60!)

As it was starting up I heard some horror stories but as theyve become more established, I've heard of less problems. Good luck finding the perfect property management, it will definitely make or break your vacation rental business!

@Will F. I also ended up with OwnerRez. I don't like that they don't use the native Airbnb messaging system, but send emails instead. I was using a service called AvivaIQ and I loved the the structure and ease of use, but they just got too expense as I started growing.

Sounds like AirGMS could be great if you only have a couple of properties, but paying per an extra $20 per month PER PROPERTY put it out of my price range quickly as well. I only have 10 properties but 2k/ mo would really eat into profit.