Hello to hosts!
I just found this great community and I am looking to become a host. Can you guys recommend great articles and starting points? Do you guys have a forum we can all private message one another. Loving this site already!
Welcome! Where in socal are you?
Hemet at the moment looking at property for sale San Diego inland empire mountains. Let’s connect!
Look around the site. There are hundreds, if not thousands of “great articles and starting points” – answers to many of the questions that newbies have.
There is no real chit-chat section here – Questions are asked and answered in “public” rather than through private messages. That way everyone learns.
You’re obviously a Tiny Home person – are you intending to STR your tiny home through AirBnb? My understanding is that you may have some legal issues there in Socal if you do not actually own the land on which the tiny home sits.
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There are a few of us in here that have properties in Indio/Palm Springs area, as well as a few SD hosts. When we were looking last year to buy in SD the STR laws were becoming not so favorable.
As a moderator here I would encourage you to converse on the forum openly rather than privately as that is the whole point. Can you please edit your post giving your email address? As Ken says, read over the hundreds of threads on every conceivable subject relating to Airbnb. Post a topic if you have a specific question or situation. That’s basically how it works.
Yes I can remove my email. Sorry about the newbie mistake I am in the middle of investing 500k in Southern California real estate and need all the advice I can get any were. I will look around for the newbie info and I would love to hear what you guys have to say about starting a new air B and B with a 4 or 5 or 3 bed room home. Thank you guys. I am also looking st cabins and would love to see this whole hosting thing be a great success!
It’s really hard work, a big commitment and certainly not a get rich quick scheme. Your questions are way too general. Every market and every house and every listing is different. Also, as mentioned on other threads, many many cities and municipalities are starting to crack down on STRs so you really need to do your homework carefully here before investing 500k in anything. I’m from Southern California, I happen to be here visiting right now, and quite frankly I’m not sure how far 500k will go in this market. I’m pretty shocked at the prices I am seeing. No homes under a million in my parents’ long established neighborhood.
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The market is extremely high!! But I have seen deals bought last week 20k under market value in big bear. The deals are out there but they are hard to get and not easy to find right now. They go fast as well a great time to sell hard time to buy more leg work with out a doubt I am living proof. I am very excited in this path of real estate not just to make a check but to meet people learn about hosting just try to do a good thing through the power of real estate.
Thank you very much for the reply and the heads up on the new laws I just read about in Palm Springs. Would need to consider another desert city. If you had to pick some tops Beach or desert or mountain city’s for air B and B what would you say I am just curious.
If you are planning to do this as an investment, be sure to put together a business plan prior to your purchase. Don’t forget to budget for utilities, wear and tear, someone to manage the property, insurance, taxes, etc.
My caution to you - the reason lots of people love to stay in an “AirBnB” is because the prices are so low. Hotels’ prices are higher because, among other things, they have to pay back their initial investment. You run a real risk of never getting back your investment.
But many AirBnB hosts are only trying to defray their cost of ownership or get a little extra to make the rent more affordable. So rents can be really low.
Here’s an example: Let’s say you purchase the home for $500,000. If you were to put that in the stock market, your average return is about 8%. That’s $40,000 per year. If you have ZERO expenses and are booked 100% of the year, you would get $40,000 in rent at $110 per night. Now, that’s unrealistic. You’ll probably have about $2000 per month in expenses (just guessing), and your occupancy rate will most likely be about 75% (at best). Now you need to charge $235 per night to make the 8%. Will your target clientele pay $235 per night your place? Is the demand year-round or seasonal?
And if what I just told you is completely new to you - go find a good financial advisor/small business owner program and get educated! As konacoconutz says, it’s hard work.
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There’s also seasonal lulls o consider. My rental is in Hawaii and next to some premier snorkeling in an absolutely beautiful location. Yet June through September are DEAD. People don’t come to my part of Hawaii Island then. Why? Who knows. Prices on airfares are too high? The weather gets too rainy? Just no way of knowing… but this has been the pattern every single year for eight years that I have been doing Air. So I plan for it. I have two other jobs because I am not reliant on My STR income…it’s not there in the summer, period.
You sound independently wealthy…in that if you get a dead season you won’t be impacted? You don’t have to rely on Air? I think it’s been stated here before by many of us experienced hosts… don’t buy something with the expectation that you will pay your expenses with Air income alone. It takes a while to get established. One terrible review, justified or not, can really drag down your bookings.
For the best results you need to be on site. Especially if you are new. If not you MUST have… a cleaning staff, a handyman and a property manager.
(Also I don’t know of any inexpensive beach cities in California!)
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Piton that’s a great reply thank you! I am working on those details yes if I bought a property at 500k I would expect the rent to be 300 to 400 a night or more that’s a lot of money in one property. I am looking at cabins in big bear area for 80k to 100k. They can rent from 75 to 330 a night I herd depending on time. You are right I need to do my research. Looks like more meetings calls emails! This site is so great for information and feedback!
Thank you for the Iona message. We are selling a million dollar property in corana California and that’s were the funds are coming from. Grandpa was nice enough to leave us the property and now we own 50 percent. The income from Air is just a benefit and hopefully will cover property taxes bills maintenance things as such and maybe a few extra bucks. I am talking to the property management as we speak. I think everyone should have a cabin in big bear or any mountains! Thank you for the feedback everybody I love this forum already!
Excel spreadsheets were my friend. We wanted a retirement home in the Caribbean, but did not want a small condo - we wanted a large house so friends and families could visit. The one we fell in love with was more than the cash we had on hand, so I told the hubby that we might be able to afford it if we rented it out over VRBO (AirBnB came later). Luckily, the prior owner had already started doing that, so he gave us his expenses. Housecleaning, electricity, garbage, pool cleaning, property taxes, cable, maintenance, cleaning supplies, laundry, etc - I was really surprised at the costs! But we took the plunge and don’t regret it.
But what I was surprised at most is just how much time interacting with guests - even before the booking - takes. And a (fairly high) percent of inquires just evaporate and go nowhere.
Don’t forget - the higher the price on your place, the more guests will expect from you.
Good luck!
Thank you for the comments and support guys. I am taking air B&B seriously and was up till 3 am last night studying. I even read a Air B&B experiment on google he compared short term to long term rents and the short term was 500 more a month on a condo amazing! Any other tips and pointers on running numbers on everything? Thanks guys.
Yes. Don’t believe everything you read. Pay attention to the bottom line - your ending cash flow - and not just the revenue. $500 more rent may sound like a lot, but it may be pretty much the same bottom line after accounting for the extra expenses that go into short-term rentals compared to long-term rentals: wear and tear, managing the guests, damages, scheduling, cleanings, etc. Check out the competition.
Be sure you have a fallback position if it does not work out. For us, we are renting out our retirement home for a couple more years until we retire. I ran the numbers to see if we could afford it if we did not rent it out at all. I came up with that we could cover the mortgage and costs of sitting empty (still has to be maintained even if no one is there) if we stopped saving to the 401k. We decided that was an OK tradeoff as we would be using the 401k money to purchase a retirement asset instead of saving to a retirement account.
And don’t underestimate the amount of work it will take to do short-term rentals, especially if you are not near the rental.
Why not try hosting a spare bedroom in your current home to see how it works for you. We were hosts in San Diego coastal area from 2010 to 2014 when our HOA made new rules against STRs. We had to stop. We have since moved to NY where we are hosting in our own home.
I would never count on Airbnb as it’s an unstable business model due to so many diverse and changing local laws. One day you can be fine and the next day fined! San Diego is looking at str regulations.
Yea I herd Palm Springs is changing the rules with this. I guess locals hate all the traffic but more people in town means more money for all the restaurants and stores??? So I don’t get that. But yes you have a point will have to do it outside of Palm Springs. I was told yesterday that Beyoncé is coming to Palm Springs and there will be like twice the people as last time. Makes me want to air B&B my property!
Hello how is everyone? I am working on getting our taxes ammended and everything so that we can buy some property I been looking a lot of places for sale finding a lot i like. Is anyone investing in San Diego Big Bear just curious? Thank you air B&B!
You’ve already posted this before. Please refrain from duplicate posts. I think you should probably wait until you are actually a host before posting again. You haven’t even bought property yet so you are a long way from that. Thanks.