All Forum Posts by: Michael C.

@Laura Renner

Hi Laura. I’m interested. Let’s set up a time to speak.

@Nathan Estochen

I have friends who operate in Seattle and it’s really bad out there for STRs - especially for operators using a pure lease arb strategy.

@Ramzi Nuseibeh

Agreed w Lucas here. We operate 20+ units. Going to partner w someone on one unit that you own isn’t likely to be worth the time or effort. Would just do it yourself and earn the $ with having a partner.

For insurance, I use Proper for STR insurance. Rates are competitive and they are easy to work with.

1) Short term rentals in urban, fly to markets will be severely impacted. We operate in NJ and Philly and are seeing the impact.

2) Traditional vacation rental areas - I’ve heard anecdotally that drive to market (Smokey Mountain in TN, Emerald Coast in FL) are doing great. However, fly-to markets like Hawaii are seeing cancellations and slower booking pace

3) Airbnb operators who have high rents and limited runway (less than 3-4 month of cash reserves) will be in a lot of trouble. We operate a highly levered business - 25%+ margins entail a lot of risk. There are no free lunches

4) Had lunch w a partner at a large debt fund in NYC on friend. They lend to big MF developers. Said hotels are already 20% down, retails next (already beaten down by Amazon), office to follow given people working from home, businesses stop expanding/shutting down.

5) Multifamily should be fine unless we really get a prolonged slowdown. Class B is probably the safest.

6) Cash is king. Ray Dalio‘s missive on ‘cash is trash’ on CNBC was ill timed.

Hi Dan - Nice to meet you here and thanks for the kind comment.

There are a ton of proptech firms trying to establish themselves in this space. PMS and pricing optimization are my recurring biggest software cost. Pricing, in my view, is the best space to be in the space. There are so many different opportunities for growth if you have the biggest and best dataset.

My paid software stack is (in order of $ spend) -

1. Hostaway for PMS

2. PriceLabs for pricing optimization

3. Hostfully for guidebooks

4. Zapier for automation

5. Keydata for analytics

6. Skype for customer support (phone line for guests to text or call)

7. Mailchimp for email marketing
 

@Ken Latchers

To my knowledge only Airbnb directly send the required taxes for you. Booking.com and Expedia do not.

@Josue Vargas

We are looking at some vacation properties in panhandle. Would be great to connect.

Great discussion and adding from our experience. I think AirDNA is a great for a high level market overview but less useful after you've decided the property "works." After we identify a viable property, we will analyze nearby listing to see if there are many listings (positive since you know the area works), how many Superhosts (positive, again because Pros have validated it), and then analyze the calendars, reviews, etc. (this gets easier the more reps you get).

I come from a finance background and happy to share my model that I use to analyze deals. We generally try to underwrite the deals both for LTR (so we have a solid exit option if STR doesnt work) and STR.

Here is the link you can download and use it: https://docsend.com/view/ngjz2...

Good luck and please share how you are using it so I can improve it based on feedback.

Hi Ken - outside of having a book keeper or CPA, Avalara is a cost-effective option - 

https://www.avalara.com/mylodgetax/en/index.html

We operate in New Jersey and Philly and are in a couple of private Facebook groups with operators in many different parts of the US

Most folks have had a few cancellation but no wholesale cancellation. Hawaii does seem to be impacted more given it is a pure flyto destination and people are flying much less now.

Separately, many of conferences, meetings, and conventions have been postponed or cancelled. So we are seeing some indirect impact from those cancellations. A friend in Columbus OH got hit bad by a convention being cancelled.