Quote: (09-02-2016 01:29 PM)AneroidOcean Wrote:
Do you feel that you benefit much from "superhost" status versus without? Don't have much knowledge of AirBnB so I don't understand how that works.
I guess what I'm saying is it worth the bang for the buck (effort).
To the point of the thread, I've done some vacation rental stuff and I've never banged any girls as I've had a LTR, but I have met a few hot ones, but since my location is by the beach that's the norm for around here (lots of hot chick options). Don't know if it would be worth crossing the line if I were single.
It's hard to disambiguate why people book my place, but I think that being a superhost is an important part of the puzzle. It's not really that much extra work to become one, you just have to respond quickly to inquiries and get mostly 5 star ratings. My place is much nicer than my competition and so it makes sense that I offer good customer service as part of the package. I usually have my phone with me anyway so it's no trouble to fire off messages quickly, and my office is a short walk away from the apartment so it's easy for me to stop in between bookings if my cleaner has any issues that need my attention. I would be hesitant to host somewhere I didn't live - you'd have to find a friend or hired helper who you could trust to take care of things when you weren't around.
I've only been doing Airbnb hosting since the spring, and first obtained superhost status in the summer. I also had a professional real estate photographer come in and take photos around the same time, and simultaneously started aggressively raising my rates; I had 100% occupancy which implied that I was leaving money on the table. Before all of those changes I was getting around $130-150 per night, and now it's up to $200-250 depending on the day of the week, and I can still get to 100% occupancy if I want to.
On a monthly basis I grossed around $6K in August and am on track for $6,700 in September. My costs are around $2,500 a month. From what I've heard I'm doing better than most, but most Airbnb hosts do a half-assed job. People book my place because it shows much nicer than the competition; it's more like a hotel suite than an apartment full of someone's leftover furniture.
If you live in an area with high tourist demand and relatively cheap apartment lease rates I think airbnb can be very successful - just look at the nightly rate of nearby hotels or vacation rentals and see if you can make a decent return with rates that undercut them slightly.
When it comes to game, being an Airbnb host opens up a lot of possibility. I would recommend treading extremely carefully when it comes to gaming your paid guests, but it can be useful to have a secondary residence to bring girls. It does require advance planning to keep it unoccupied, but if your spot is in a good location and/or nicer than your primary residence it can make things much easier.