Purchasing a vacation rental home can be the best idea you have ever had or the biggest mistake you will ever make, and Abode Sun Valley wants to help you avoid the latter. Investment properties, especially vacation rental investment properties, are potentially the easiest way to earn financial success, and after many years in the business we have learned many different ways to earn top dollars by increasing the number of nights your property is rented while also being able to charge the highest rates that are still in a range that won’t chase off potential renters. And because we aren’t stingy with our knowledge, we have created this guide to five proven methods that will improve your rental rates. They work, and we know this because we use them ourselves!
Method #5: A Coat of Paint Goes a Long Way
Of all the tips we will give, this one is destined to be the most inexpensive and perhaps the most surprising as you discover how well it works. When you think of your own reaction to vacation rental pictures, however, you shouldn’t be surprised, because who wants to rent a space that features dingy, faded, scuffed, or even dirty walls? Appearance matters, and paint can be the first step in turning your so-so rental into the star of the show.
When you paint the walls in your own home, aren’t you eager to get all the furniture and décor back into their rightful places? That feeling when all is normal and orderly again makes you happy, and the fresh and clean surroundings make you wish you could throw a coat of paint on all the troubled areas of your life. That fresh and clean look and style is something renters want out of their short-term rentals, and because today’s travelers are no longer willing to accept anything less than perfection, you are risking your financial success when you choose to save a few pennies and leave the paint as is.
Choosing a color can be like walking through a minefield; one wrong step and it all blows up in your face, which is why most vacation property owners tend to stick with basic white. It’s light, keeping spaces with too few windows bright, and has the ability to make smaller spaces look larger. If you do feel the need to venture out, we advise that you steer clear of neon shades, and because Idaho can be too dark in the winter months (almost half the year), avoid dark shades as well. Moody is all well and good, and dramatic can be fun, but dark is just sad, and you don’t want to trigger anyone’s Seasonal Affective Disorder.
Method #4: Advertising Is Key to Improve your Rental Rates
Although word of mouth and repeat customers are a great way to keep your property rented, it’s a big world, and there is a whole segment of population that isn’t getting the picture. In some cases, the picture, or lack of them, is truly the problem, and in many cases the breadth and scope of your advertising is less than ideal. The math is simple when you think about it. The more sites your property appears on, the more opportunities people will see it and the more people that see it heighten your chances of getting it rented.
We conducted an internet search recently, simply asking what other vacation rental sites are available besides Airbnb and VRBO, and 24 names popped up on our screen. You may have heard of FlipKey and Expedia, but there were sites we had never heard of before, including Getaway House and OneFineStay, and most don’t charge anything upfront, preferring to take a fee on the backside. Of course, having your own web page is important and can even give you ways to offer deals by charging less when booking direct, because everyone loves a good deal.
Humans have their best sides, and believe it or not, houses and condos do too, making the pictures you take and post for your advertising purposes extremely important. You need to capture a potential tenant’s attention, make your property stand out in a literal glut of vacation properties, and if your pictures are of poor quality, blurred, or there are too few, they will keep scrolling. Additionally, it is vital that you update them on a regular basis. Guests are choosing your rental on the basis of the pictures they see, and if they are looking at 10 year old pictures that may still have tube televisions and dingy paint, they aren’t going to bite.
Method #3: Luxury Amenities
In real life, we tend to put ourselves last, giving our children the last piece of pie even when we haven’t had any (and we really wanted that last piece), buying our spouses designer clothes while thrifting our own, and choosing the stainless steel sink over the hammered copper that we really love because the cost is much more reasonable. It is just a sink, right? But on vacation, travelers want to live like a celebrity, and luxury amenities will draw guests right in!
It shows you care about the details when your appliances are all one color, and stainless steel is always looked at as more luxurious. Your guests may not even use the kitchen for anything more than brewing coffee and keeping their wine and beer cold, but they will notice when the dishwasher is beige, the refrigerator white, and the range is black. If you can splurge for the big names—SubZero, Wolf, Viking, or Thermador—even better, but if that is out of your range, ensuring that all appliances are from the same brand is a good thing.
Jetted tubs and steam showers in luxuriously appointed baths, hot tubs on private decks in the backyards, and if you have the room, a pool table, foosball table, or arcade game tucked away in one of the extra bedrooms will entice travelers to choose your property for their home sweet vacation home. Go for the Keurig in the kitchen, equip the bar area with a wine refrigerator, and add a desk and some office equipment (desk, chair, task light, printer and/or extra monitor) to a quiet corner, and your guests can not only work from your home, but they can be tempted to stay longer! If your property is a standalone home, the backyard should be seen as an extension of the interior spaces, providing barbecues or outdoor kitchens, firepits or outdoor fireplaces, and plenty of seating options for relaxing and dining.
Method #2: It Takes a Team
There are a million little details involved with running a vacation rental business, and if you are willing to devote yourself full time and only have one or two rentals, you should be perfectly ok handling everything. But many owners don’t even live in the state where their property was purchased, and many have full-time careers and lives to lead as well, and hiring a team is the perfect way to fill in the blank spots.
Hire a local housekeeping service that you trust implicitly. These are the ones that will be on the spot, cleaning before and after each tenant arrives and leaves, ensuring that everything will shine. They can also keep track of things that may be broken or working poorly, letting you know when something needs to be worked on or repaired, which leads us to the next member of your team.
Idaho is known for its extreme temperatures, and in the winter months, it is imperative that your heating systems work, and you don’t want to wait for your guests to tell you there is a problem. Your dishwashers should get all the lipstick off glasses, your refrigerator must keep the temperatures at safe levels, your stove (if its gas) should not leak gas, and your electric stove should have all the burners working. There should be no leaky faucets, no cracked windows, and all lights should have working lightbulbs. This may seem nitpicky, but your guests will notice the difference, and although word of mouth doesn’t always get your space rented, it goes very far to keeping it from being rented when that word is a poor one. Hiring a maintenance team to keep everything running smoothly will go a long way towards eliminating open nights, increasing your rental rates, and increasing your bank accounts as well, even if you have to pay a little extra to keep your team in place.
Method #1: Choose Abode Sun Valley for Your Property Management Needs
Everything we have listed on here can be accomplished by choosing the right property management company for your partner in success—and by the right one, we of course mean Abode Sun Valley! We have the experience you need, the willingness to work hard, and the ability to pay attention to all those endless details without having to involve you in the equation. Unless you want to be involved, that is. Transparency and packages that allow owners to be as involved as they want to be ensure that you will get exactly the service you need to make your property succeed beyond your wildest dreams.
We’ve been in the vacation rental business for more than a minute and our name is already irrevocably intertwined with Sun Valley vacation rentals, so chances are, guests looking for a rental are going to head straight to our page, knowing they can trust us and what we have to offer.
We have worked with the same housekeeping and maintenance teams for years, and we have a system in place. We trust that they will do their jobs efficiently and honestly, and they trust that we will continue to pay competitive prices for the duties involved.
As we mentioned earlier, not everyone buys a vacation property in the area in which they live, and if you are one of those that didn’t, do you really want to fly back and forth every time something goes wrong? Also, when emergencies do happen, you know that they won’t happen during regular business hours. They are going to happen at 2 AM when you are in your deepest REM sleep, and if you live in California, what are you going to be able to do at that time anyway? Those 2 AM phone calls will be our business when you choose our team to partner with, and yes, we will let you know the details of the incident during regular business hours.
Research, Hard Work, and Financial Success
There are so many more reasons choosing Abode Sun Valley for your vacation property management needs. We do the research to keep your property competitive, doing everything we can to make your investment a profitable one and working hard so that you don’t have to. Give us a call today and let’s discuss your potential financial success!
