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That’s right.
I have not paid for any training from experts. The property was already here. It was not going to be sold. It already was an STR and doing well.
The goal was foremost to relieve the Host of really spending any time with the property except providing guidance to me when needed and approving certain decisions. If I could systemize the process (including managing the property maintenance), improve the bottom line and better manage the risks that would all be to the better.
Thank you for the tip!
I might have missed something you caught but I didn’t get the sense from Vodyssey that an STR is easy money.
I’m not entirely sure what Shawn means by ‘lifestyle asset’ but I think he means that this is an asset to generate income AND ALSO a second/third home that the owner can use to ‘elevate’ their lifestyle by using it themselves a couple of weeks per year or to develop/pay off an asset that will ultimately be used personally (e.g., a retirement home). I didn’t find it off-putting, but your mileage may vary.
I made alot of mistakes. I bought this house not realizing the pitfalls of dealing with an old septic system. The septic guy did not inform me that he was removing my concrete back porch, tearing up the backyard, tearing up the front yard and ripping out the concrete driveway. This mistake cost me 10k in a new wooden deck for back porch, and another 20k in basic looking landscaping for the front yard. It also cost me the entire summer season of rentals as we the landscaping guys were backlogged. All in all I had to pay about 50k after buying the house. A good course could have prevented me from making these mistakes.
Well, if the course was a good one, the first thing it would have suggested was to get a proper inspector and surveyor when buying a property, maybe?
It sounds like what you needed was a qualified home inspector before purchasing the house, and estimates on correcting the issues, and what doing so would involve, not a course in running and managing strs.
I hired one that was recommended. He told me the house needed a new septic system. I was ok with 14k in a new septic system, but the devil is in the details.
Yes, of course when someone gives you an estimate on a major job, it’s incumbent on the employer to find out what the work will involve and what other issues it will cause which then have to be dealt with.
Honestly, we can take all the courses we want, and they may offer valuable tips and info, but every situation is different, so they aren’t a substitute for common sense and due diligence.
Many homeowners could have told you what to watch out for and consider if you needed to replace a failed septic system, but if you wanted to pay me $9800 for the 5 or 10 minutes that would take, I’d be happy to oblige. 
I’ve never had a home with a septic tank but going by what I’ve read about them, they seem to be unsuitable as rental properties due to the restrictions of use.
There seem to be quite a few things that can go wrong with them and they need regular maintenance, I believe.
I suspect that they’d be quite a headache for rental properties, especially STR.
I’m sorry you went through all of that. It’s very helpful that you shared that.
I wonder if a course would have gotten into that level of detail. Maybe the service aspect of the team. I wonder if a good real estate agent would have prevented that mistake, or a very good house inspection (at least on the issue of the condition of the septic system or raising a question on its condition). Even a detailed discussion with the septic guy might have surfaced those possibilities. So you do need to reflect on how you’ll deal with contractors going forward.
Whether this course and its services (it’s not just a course) would have prevented that. I don’t know. I would ask them. Maybe Vodyssey would have raised it if you had hired them before you purchased the home.
Now, though, spending $4,800 or $9,800 just seems like a lot (too much) because you already own the home. I don’t get the impression that you’re open to selling it and buying another property. Are you?
I do think you should take a very close reading of the house inspection for any other issues they could see. I assume that the house inspector was certified by the state or county, right?
If you’re ‘wedded’ to this property for now, the questions I would have if I were you would be:
Anyway, those are a few impressions. There are a lot of seasoned Hosts here who can help you out. The more you tell us about your objectives and situation the better they can tailor their guidance.
I am on a private septic system and just recently had a problem with it after 16 years of zero maintenance since it was installed. I wouldn’t say a private septic system makes a property unsuitable for strs at all, but the homeowner has to be prepared to deal with guests flushing unsuitable things, whether they are handy enough to deal with that themselves, or need to call a plumber. Guests can clog up toilets and pipes in places that are connected to city sewer lines, too.
Of course if one was starting an str business,they should make sure the private septic system is up to code, functioning properly, and that it is large enough to accommodate the guest count. That was what caused my issue- my pre-digester tank is designed for a household of 4. Normally it’s just me here and one guest, but my family came for Xmas, there were 9 people flushing toilets (altho flushing just for a pee wasn’t allowed) and taking showers (3 teenagers, who seem to require 2 long showers a day 
), for 14 days, so the tank overflowed.
I got it pumped out and now it’s fine again, no problems with just me and the Airbnb guest who was here for 5 days.
That’s an important point. @BayBreeze , do you know what size household your septic system can accommodate? And, from what I’ve read here in the States you do need maintenance; every ‘x’ years the system needs to be cleaned and I’ve never read of ‘x’ being greater than 3.
For what’s worth I have a decal from Etsy on the back of the toilet seat saying only toilet paper, nothing else, even so-called ‘flushables,’ should be flushed.
It’s not about being frugal as you call it @HostAirbnbVRBO
I have often paid for professional advice from accountants, solicitors, designers and web developers etc.
Having run a number of successful businesses and having over twenty years experience of heading up marketing and communications for national and international organisations I don’t need to pay for advice on how to market or run my STR business .
I feel that I do benefit from such advice, but I like to get what I can free or at a low cost. I don’t believe that I am a suitable candidate for Vodyssey but that doesn’t mean to me that no one is or that’s a poor value to some.
I can’t comment on whether it’s good value as I don’t know what they offer.
A free lesson in home buying:
Do not buy a property unless an expert YOU pick (not one with ‘skin in the game’ suggested by either party) goes through the entire home and gives you a detailed report on what will be needed after purchase. Bonus: you can use their report to negotiate a price break with the seller.
Do not buy a property unless you have spent some time in the area - you don’t want to be unpleasantly surprised by your neighbors.
Do not buy a property until you find out how the locals deal with contractors and service people.
Do not buy a property for some use without researching local building codes and town/city regulations.
Above is free, but I will accept $4800 as a tip…
Whoa. I bowed out gracefully from that previous conversation because you were kind of new here and I didn’t want to give you a hard time. (And I’m sorry I’m not trying to give you a hard time now either).
But ‘my method’ is not tedious for me. What actually happened is that I explained to you what I do for about 5 minutes ‘most days’ of the week while I drink coffee in the morning. I even explicitly told you that I never ever ever write anything down at all, none whatsoever.
Then you made a bunch of graphs which are not only not necessary but totally useless because the information is already “old” by the next morning. It’s inherently fleeting information. I am so utterly befuddled as to how you made it tedious that I can only blame myself for not explaining it better. 
You’re so dramatic.
So please know I was not being critical of your approach.
I get it. But it was for me.
Some chess masters play a dozen or more of chess games simultaneously. And blindfolded.
The rest of us write down every move and keep staring at the board.
Remember the graphs?
But anyway the larger point (if I can still remember) is that the process that Vodyssey uses to evaluate the market requires a lot of number crunching. Wheelhouse and Price Labs uses lots of data and number crunching too.
Sort of Deep Blue to your Kasparov.
And not all Hosts are Kasparovs.
Is whoa dramatic? 
I really didn’t mean to be.
Ok. It just made me feel like I had misrepresented something and I didn’t want to do that.
Dramatic in a good, fun, quirky way.
I thought you were kind of joking, that I ‘got it.’
You were in a serious mood when you read my posts and responded.
Which is fine.
OMG. So serious.
But endearing.
I remember hearing Robert Kiyosaki ( rich dad/ poor dad) say he is amazed at how many professionals, doctors and lawyers rush into real estate without taking any courses. They spent thousands of hours in a class room learning about medicine or law and then they are surprised they lose money in real estate, although they did not take a single real estate course.
Of course it is all relative to the cost of education. I don’t recommend anyone take on a student loan of 500,000 to be a dentist. And I think $9800 is too much for a real estate course. AT a quarter of the price I would jump at that course.