My husband and I have made the difficult decision to stop short term rental through Airbnb until we feel safer for several reasons, we:
- can only rent one of our three rooms in an isolated manner.
-do all our own cleaning.
-pay through the nose for STR insurance regardless of the number of rooms.
-are both at high risk and thus extra anxious. Our friends and family fear for us.
-know that our children who can now safely visit will stop coming if we open our home
-think that tightening our budget can get us through financially.
We are snoozing our listings for now and hope that unless we move, we can someday open again. I greatly enjoy this forum, but will be taking a break since I won’t have much to add for many month. Good luck to all of you who are sticking it out. Stay well!
In the meantime you are always welcome here. I’d hate to read of any of our members falling ill or passing away.
I’m doing the same, for similar reasons.
There’s no need to do that, so please don’t go!
Wish you the best! With your situation, this seems very prudent indeed. The mere break-even vs STR insurance alone may not be there for a long time.
Please do consider if a short or medium term tenant might be of interest. STR is not needed (landlord law applies - full security, etc). Perhaps a health care professional, etc? You could advertise on Zillow and please note that you have full choice over who you rent to (owner occupied). Just a thought.
Good luck! To you and all of us.
We are seriously considering reconfiguring to isolate part of our house for a longer term rental. In our area graduate students seem to be a good option as well as the occasional person juggling divorce.
Under the cirumstances, you have made the right decision. Think of it as a mini vacation, time to rest, read a few novels and experiment with new recipes. See you in a few months. Hope you enjoy the time off.
Update: In the process of closing indefinitely, I asked my insurance agent to drop my extensive policy that included STR and put me back on a personal homeowners policy. I do have two long term apartments on my same property so it’s always a little pricier than plain old homeowners. Both my agent and I were surprised that my updated personal policy would cost more than renewing my current policy with the STR coverage. It’s tough to compare perfectly since both coverages offer slightly different options for things with detailed limits such as sewer back-up, oil spill, and local ordinance clauses. The change can also affect bundling with auto insurance. Bottom-line, after all that back and forth, I am keeping the policy with the STR coverage for the price. This also gives us the flexibility to get back in business whenever we feel safe with no insurance changes. It’s a little crazy to me. You might want to check comparative premiums if you are one of those hosts staying on personal homeowners with no STR coverage assuming that commercial coverage would be too expensive. It’s probably different in every company and staty
When we switched our homeowners out with the innkeeper policy to get into this I was expecting a huge premium hike. Imagine my surprise when we actually saved a big chunk of money on the commercial policy.
I’m sorry you’ve had to make difficult decisions that I don’t think you wanted to need to make. Strange difficult times. I hope they get behind us soon and rentals return
It’s amazing! People really need to check their options.