Often hosts get into vacation rental management to cover the costs of their mortgage or general upkeep.
You may just want to make some extra cash on an unused property or empty room in your home. Your current booking rate may meet those needs, but that mindset will only work for a short time.
If you want to not just cut down the cost of property management but make a profit, you need to change your strategy. If you are going to be in the vacation rental business for the long haul, you need to think long-term and develop a model that is profitable and sustainable.
Luckily, it is a better time than ever to be in the vacation rental sector, according to recent reports. More travelers are staying in short-term rentals than hotels, and Phocuswright forecasts that the industry will grow to $36.6 billion by 2018. In 2016 alone, it grew 11%, twice as fast as the growth rate for the entire U.S. travel industry.
The vacation rental industry is booming and when managed effectively, you can generate a considerable profit. Here are some tips from BookingTeam.com to help you earn more revenue from your short-term rentals.
Get serious and be professional.
More travelers want to book vacation rentals with professional hosts. They want the comfort of home, but the reliability and professionalism of a business. You need to change your mindset. Stop thinking of it as a way to make some extra cash on the side and think of it as a business.
This makes you feel more accountable and responsible to deliver exceptional guest experiences on a consistent basis. It also encourages you to think and plan for long-term sustainability.
Invest to increase revenue.
If you put in little to nothing, that is what you are going to earn. It is possible to manage on your own, but as you grow, it often requires more time and commitment than one person can offer. Don’t undervalue the importance of having a support team, or people that have years of experience in the industry. It not only takes some of the workload off you, but it allows you to leverage their industry experience to improve your business.
If you want to scale your vacation rental management, then you are eventually going to need some extra hands. Even if you have a shoestring budget, there are affordable options like BookingTeam.com that combine technology and a 24/7 team of vacation rental professionals.
Work smarter.
Vacation rental management is a lot of work. However, don’t make it more work than it has to be. If you are spending considerable amounts of time listing your properties or performing some other repetitive task, you are losing profits. With vacation rental management platforms like BookingTeam.com, you can easily automate and simplify many tasks, so you can focus on tasks that provide more tangible results for your business.
In addition to these essentials, it helps to be savvy at pricing in the vacation rental industry. Some tactics hosts and BookingTeam.com utilizes are seasonal pricing and yielding. We also recommend the pricing technology PriceLabs to our hosts to help them set the best rates to maximize their revenue. Now, it is an opportune and profitable time to be in the vacation rental market, if you know the essentials to managing your business successfully.