The short-term rental market has taken off in the past several years. Investors have started buying properties, hoping vacationers find their listing online and book a stay. That's led to a record 2.4 million listings available in 2023.
But despite the rise in vacation listings, you still need a strategy to see success and make money. Follow the below vacation rental income tips to maximize your profit.
Know Your Market
Many vacation rental users have very specific things in mind when looking for rentals. They want a kitchen to cook in, be close to their target destination, need in-house laundry, and other requirements.
If you want to boost rental earnings, you must understand what people look for in your area. Look at your area's other popular rental units and examine what they offer. Ensure you provide similar services to attract those people.
Use Multiple Listing Websites
Airbnb has been the most popular vacation rental website for a while now. However, there is now some competition that gets traffic not available on the Airbnb website. That means you may miss potential guests if you don't list on multiple websites.
Examine the other websites available and their target customers. If the people renting from those websites resemble your ideal guest, make sure you create a listing there to expand your listing's reach.
Optimize the Guest Experience
If you want to increase rental income, you must optimize the guest experience. Yes, you can get by when you provide the bare minimum. But if your goal is to encourage good reviews and repeat customers, you must do more.
Great rental income strategies to boost satisfaction are to offer things like extra towels, coffee pods, extra linens, washers and dryers, and other amenities. All of these contribute to the experience and increase the willingness of guests to leave positive reviews.
Maintain Your Property
Like regular rental properties, your vacation rentals will degrade over time. The HVAC will degrade, you'll have plumbing issues, and you'll experience many other issues.
You must stay on top of these as a vacation property owner. Set up a maintenance schedule to look for problems and perform maintenance tasks to keep things in great shape.
Outsource Where Possible
You have much more to do with a vacation property than normal rentals. People are staying for shorter terms, meaning you have more cleaning responsibilities than long-term rentals.
If you want to optimize vacation rentals, make sure you outsource where possible. One common area this happens is with scheduled cleanings with a third party service. It's also possible to outsource most of the management process to a vacation rental management company.
Follow These Vacation Rental Income Tips
Although there is a boom in the short-term rental industry, that doesn't mean you can just buy a property and expect to see success. You need to do work to manage your rental and promote it to the right people to see success. Now that you've read the vacation rental income tips above, you should be ready to get started with vacation property management.
If you're looking for help managing your vacation properties, PMI Bluff City can help. Our vacation rental services can help you with every aspect of short-term property management. Contact our team to learn more.
