Get Paid For Your Pad | Airbnb Hosting | Vacation Rentals | Apartment Sharing

Things are changing and evolving in the economy, and with rising rents and fluctuation in the real estate industry, it was bound to trickle down into the STR market. This week Sonder, one of the biggest short-term rental companies in the world, announced it is cutting 20% of its workforce. On this edition of STR Conversations, Eric and I walk you through Sonder's announcement, their first-quarter losses, and the reality of the over-leveraged master leasing model in a post-Covid market. We discuss what we believe the forecast will be for the STR industry as the crowds return to travel with the current economic correction filtering into cost-of-living increases across the board. Listen in to learn how to position yourself to ride the waves. We’ll offer insight into how to take advantage of the opportunities in real estate and diversify your income streams to handle any season and situation in your STR business. Plus, the two places that are always worth investing in, no matter the economy.&n

In this economy, traveling millennials and more are flocking to destinations based on their desire to fill their social feeds with swoon-worthy pictures from Instagrammable destinations. Late to the Airbnb game but ready to take the plunge, my guest Jeff Brown, the Co-Founder at Loma Homes, did the research, and the results told them Orlando was the place to be with excellent profitability potential. But upon closer inspection, they found out there were 10s of thousands of vacation rentals in the highly competitive theme park mecca. To stand out and be competitive, they would need to differentiate their units in a BIG way. On this episode of Get Paid for Your Pad, Jeff joins me to share how Loma Homes partnered with specialty contractors to create their sought-after properties. With names such as Once Upon a Castle and Pirates Pearl and showcasing amenities such as a Cinderella carriage bed and Southern-style wraparound balconies, Jeff and his team have taken leveraging Instagram-worthy destina

We all have BIG things we want to achieve in our personal lives and our businesses. But did you know that unless you get clear on what you really want to accomplish, you can get overwhelmed in building your business without ever achieving your big-picture vision? On this edition of STR Conversations, Eric and I walk you through how to accomplish more in your business and personal life through effective goal setting. We discuss the two biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make when setting goals plus and we’ll walk you through the 3-step action plan we use for setting goals in our businesses. I’ll share a story of a personal goal I’m working to achieve, my WHY, and my action plan to get there, and Eric will share a tool he uses to stay on track when he feels like giving up. Listen in to learn the importance of setting compelling North Star goals for your business and the steps you need to take to get laser-focused so you can achieve them. Plus, the most powerful thing you can do today to rea

Are you thinking of hiring an operations manager to help scale your Airbnb business? Before you start interviewing candidates, it’s important to know exactly what an ops manager does and carefully consider whether that’s the hire you need right now. Aaron Whelan is the Chief Operating Officer here at Overnight Success. He has extensive operations management experience across several industries, primarily serving clients in the coaching, consulting and online education space before joining our team a year ago. On this episode of Get Paid for Your Pad, Aaron joins me to discuss the responsibilities of an operations manager and describe the top three qualities to look for in a COO for your Airbnb business. He explains how to decide what tasks you want to delegate and build a job scorecard for the roles, offering advice on when to build systems and how to train new hires on your short-term rental processes. Listen in for Aaron’s insight around the most common challenges entrepreneurs face

No matter the size, all business owners have the same challenges, just on a different scale. And hiring is one of the biggest challenges any leader can take on in their business. When Eric and I started hiring, we looked for one thing, somebody with the skills to complete a task. Since then, we've evolved in our business and how we seek to fill the roles on our team. On this edition of STR Conversations, Eric and I walk you through the 4 biggest lessons we've learned about finding the right team members. We discuss where to start the hiring process and the tools you can use to scope out the competition so you can be sure you are hiring snipers instead of generalists. Plus, we'll share an insider tip on how to attract and hire A-Players, no matter the size of your business. Listen in for a look at our specialized application funnel and how we measure the success of our team members. Plus, we share the most valuable tips we've gathered from the experts on finding the people who understand yo

Airbnb Summer Release 2022 completely revamped the whole search function at Airbnb. Last week on the show, Kelvin Mah, the founder of Rankbreeze and an Airbnb SEO specialist, and I talked about these changes, but there just wasn't enough time to get everything in, so we're doing Part II this week. On this episode of Get Paid for Your Pad, Kelvin joins me for a quick recap of the 8 changes Airbnb has made. Listen in as we walk through what our research revealed about how Airbnb determines which categories to place your property in, which photo they display with your listing, and specific "art" search terms you can use to get your listing found in the design category. Plus, why the photos you include with your listing matter now more than ever.  We'll share 5 action steps every host can take right now to optimize their Airbnb property listings for more clicks with this new search rollout.  Topics Covered How Airbnb determines which categories to place your listing inWhy A

We officially hired our first team member for our Freewyld brand!We’ve hired a Virtual Assistant (VA) named Mei who will help us start building our brand.On this edition of STR Conversations, Eric and I share how we worked with a company called Virtual Staff Finder to hire our VA and the process they used to help us find the right Virtual Assistant for our Freewyld team.We share the 3 most common questions students in Legend X have about hiring a VA, plus the biggest mistakes people make when hiring that can lead to hiring the wrong team member. Eric shares the plus-minus time tracking process he uses to determine which tasks to delegate, plus, I share my secret for accomplishing more tasks each day.We discuss how to use a job scorecard to improve your job description and increase your chances of hiring the RIGHT person for the job.Listen in for insight into how to find the perfect VA for your Airbnb hosting team, so you free yourself from the day-to-day tasks of managing your business and focus on building y

Airbnb just released the biggest change to Airbnb categories in a decade. They completely changed the search on Airbnb, leaving everyone wondering how it will affect their listing and if it will still show up. Kelvin Mah is the founder of Rankbreeze and an Airbnb SEO specialist. Rankbreeze is a listing optimization software that helps you optimize your listings to make sure you show up in the Airbnb search results. On this episode of Get Paid for Your Pad, Kelvin joins me to explain how Airbnb has transitioned from a destination-focused search to an experience-focused search and what he believes prompted this change. Listen in as we walk through how you can use additional information in all the areas Airbnb allows to come up in more searches. Kelvin says, "One of the rules around ranking on Airbnb is fighting the filter because everything a guest does is essentially filtering."Kelvin shares his insight on how to zoom in and supercharge your listing to get more clicks for MORE BOOKINGS

Last September, when Eric and I started building Freewyld, our new short-term rental brand, we took over an existing Airbnb business—four cabins on three acres in Idyllwild, California. At that time, we took over the whole business, including the staff.But over time, we ran into some challenges working with the existing cleaning team.And then the challenges escalated. We realized the cleaning staff wasn’t the right fit for our company; it was getting so bad that it was putting us in a hectic host position and affecting our bookings and reviews.It was time to make a change.On this edition of STR Conversations, Eric and I discuss why we decided to partner with a management company for Freewyld. We share the most frustrating parts that happened in our situation and walk you through the options we looked at when we decided to move on from the team we had in place. Listen in for insight into how we made this transition from negative team members to a rock-solid A-plus team. We’ll walk you through how making t

With larger property management companies looking to add to their portfolios, we're seeing more Airbnb entrepreneurs selling their businesses. But what can you do to structure your business to ensure it's an attractive acquisition target? Julie George discovered the world of Airbnb in 2016 when she listed her one-bedroom unit on the platform. In November 2016, she established Host My Home, one of Australia's largest Airbnb property management companies. In 2019, Julie sold her lucrative business to a larger company to concentrate on mentoring and consulting other budding entrepreneurs to build a business in the sharing economy. On this episode of Get Paid for Your Pad, Julie joins me to explain the process she went through as she prepared her business for sale and how you can structure your business, so it's attractive to buyers. Julie says, "If you've got ten or more properties that you are managing in a property management portfolio, get ready! You're going to get a knock on the door. I

On this episode Eric and Jasper talk about the biggest Airbnb update in a decade, the 2022 summer release. What are the biggest changes, and what are the consequences for guests and hosts? Listen in and find out! See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Are you looking for another revenue stream for your short-term rental space? Does your property have unique features that would be great for a photoshoot or filming a cooking show? Enter Peerspace the Airbnb for events. Launched in 2014, Peerspace is a global peer-to-peer marketplace that allows you to rent your creative space by the hour for events, meetings, and productions. On this episode of Get Paid for Your Pad, Matt Bendett, the Co-Founder of Peerspace, joins me to share more about the Peerspace concept and some of the unique ways Peerspace hosts are using their spaces. He walks us through everything from cleaning fees to QR codes and everything you need for a great Peerspace listing. Matt says, "The magic for us is when people come together with a great idea. And it gets facilitated because they've entered this really cool space. Every day, every booking, there's a story. It's that intrinsic thing beyond making money itself that a host can be proud of that they were able to facilit

Are tiny homes the solution for our Freewyld experience?The jury is still out!For those of you who may have missed our recent podcast, we are investigating tiny homes as an option to help get our Freewyld community on the road to being completed and profitable much sooner than the estimated timeframes we are receiving from both contractors and counties.If you missed it, you can listen here.On this edition of STR Conversations, Eric and I discuss some of the comments and questions from our listeners about the options available in the tiny homes market right now. We’ll also share some ‌construction solutions being looked at by other entrepreneurs for their own STR spaces in the current economy.Listen in for insight into the different zoning laws for tiny homes and what that adds as far as challenges go. We’ll walk you through a recent experience we’ve had with rising construction costs. We’ll look at how that is affecting our budget and bottom line for Freewyld, and how that’s playing a part as we continue to i

Francisco Arango is an old-school host with over 5000 5-star reviews on his combined Airbnb accounts. He reads and responds to all his feedback because he cares about his guests, learning from and applying it to improve his product and keep things top-notch. Francisco joined me on the show back in 2018, and at that time, he was formulating his plan to begin buying run-down motels to convert into Airbnb’s. Currently, he and his team have 35 doors in operation, with 70 more rooms being rehabbed right now. On this episode of Get Paid for Your Pad, Francisco joins me to share his experience working on these properties and the biggest lessons he’s learned along the way. He explains the journey to financing a business model of this type, the curse, and the blessing behind the Covid pandemic, and how he got his family involved. He shares his unique approach to team building and the high value he places on his company’s culture. Plus as a member of STR Legends Mastermind he’ll share what he’s most look

There are just a few spots left open in the STR Legends Mastermind!The STR space has changed and evolved in the past two years. We’ve gone from not knowing if the industry would survive the pandemic to industry movers and shakers growing from 50 units to 500. There are more professional operators, companies, and entrepreneurs than ever in the STR space, which means more people to network with and learn from.Those changes have shaped the vision of the STR Legends Mastermind and inspired us to take both the live events and the virtual masterminds to the NEXT LEVEL.Listen in to this episode of STR conversations as Eric and I break down our vision for the STR Legends Mastermind. We’ll take you behind the scenes for a look at who has joined us so far to give our listeners a feel for the mix of unique investors that will be in the room with us in Oaxaca, Mexico, June 16th - 20th, 2022.We also bring you up to date on the exciting NEW things we’re doing, including the relaunch of our YouTube channel to document the j

How does a short-term rental entrepreneur grow from two to 100+ Airbnb units? And then leverage the cashflow from that business to buy a boutique hotel? Rebecca Slivka is the cofounder of boutique hotel Hicksville Trailer Palace and STR management company Pillow and Coffee. Rebecca got her start on Airbnb in the Los Angeles market, scaling the rental arbitrage model to a portfolio of 100+ units. Today, she serves as a coach for our STR Legends X 90-Day Accelerator. On this episode of Get Paid for Your Pad, Rebecca joins me to discuss her expertise in leveraging VAs to grow a STR business and describe how she used the revenue from master leasing to invest in Hicksville Trailer Palace. She explores what differentiates the STR Legends Mastermind from other Airbnb conferences and explains how she benefitted from being a part of the first Legends live event. Listen in to understand how Rebecca’s Legends X students grow so much in such a short period of time and get her best advice for smal

We’ve run into some construction challenges that could delay our Freewyld project by up to two years.A massive boom of people moving out of the cities into the mountain areas like Idyllwild, California, has caused a six to 12 month back up of both contractors and counties. By the time we find an architect to design the cabins we want for our Freewyld space and then go through the approval process, find a contractor, and start building, it’s going to stretch our construction process out considerably.So, we decided to investigate some other options that will get our project back on the road to being completed and profitable much sooner.On this edition of STR Conversations, Eric and I discuss how we might be able to use prefab tiny homes to decrease the timeframe that the Freewyld community is shut down.Listen in for insight into the trends in tiny homes and prefab buildings. We’ll walk through the options available in the market right now, plus the risks vs. rewards. I offer my experience and insight into what

We can all agree we need to conserve energy to save money as heating costs soar out of control.But how can we do that while also impacting the environment, the climate, and our future?Becoming an Airbnb host was the last thing photographer and science writer Nathan Welton saw himself doing. He got into the business by accident, with his first review being a one-star. Even so, he suddenly found himself booked months in advance, reinvesting every dime he made into his properties before moving into starting a management company. Nathan Welton is the owner of The Wolf Rentals, a vacation rental management company born from a need for quality, hands-on cooperative vacation rental management in beautiful Estes Park, Colorado. The Wolf Rentals officially launched in 2020, quickly scaling to 25 properties within a year.On this episode of Get Paid for Your Pad, Nathan joins me to share his vision for his custom a-frame Airbnb community and his hopes to drive change through Airbnb.Listen in for Nathan’s insight on

Gas prices are currently up 50% from last year, and it doesn’t look like they will level off anytime soon. After we faced off with the pandemic are rising gas prices the next hurdle that will trickle down into the SRT industry?At first glance, it would seem like the right answer would be a resounding yes. But there’s actually a lot more data that goes into determining if rising prices are going to trip up the travel industry. On this edition of STR Conversations, Eric and I sit down to discuss AirDNA’s report, How Rising Gas Prices May Influence Airbnb Travel Trends.We’ll cover the average amount of miles a guest travels to their Airbnb and we explain which places and types of accommodations will do better as travel becomes more expensive. Listen in to get a broader sense of what’s happening, and at what point the higher gas prices might start impacting your bottom line. We share the data you need to quell your anxiety about the things you can’t control so you can focus on what you can, so you can determ

One of the hardest things about establishing new short-term rental properties is deciding on the direction of the interior design. It’s often overlooked, but it’s crucial to the integrity of your brand. So why do it alone? There are tons of awesome companies out there to help you achieve your interior design dreams and bring your property to the next level.On this episode of STR Conversations, Eric shares his biggest lessons learned on establishing strategies for interior design and renovating short-term rental properties. Eric discusses his new company launched with Jasper, Freewyld, and their goals to renovate four properties while also managing the difficulties of being understaffed. Listen in to learn what resources Eric recommends for designing your short-term rental and how to get involved in the Legends Mastermind program. Topics CoveredHow Jasper and Eric started their company Free Wild and have begun their first project in CaliforniaHow Jasper and Eric are preparing to renovate fo