Airbnb MASTERCLASS: Start Your Short Term Rental Business with Confidence

1. Introduction: Welcome to the no-nonsense Airbnb masterclass. My name is prior strawberry. I am an Airbnb entrepreneur, Trainer and Consultant, recognized as one of the most experienced host in the SDR industry. I started with one property in 2016, and in a short span, grew to manage over 250 properties worldwide without any investment. I'm an official Trainer and Consultant for AirBnB and have trained over 10,000 host over the last few years. You may be looking to start your first Airbnb or you could be an existing Airbnb owners struggling with the business. Or you could be an entrepreneur are looking to tap into the potential of the SDR industry. I will share all you should do to reach your goals even quicker than I did. All you must do is listen to this course from start to finish. Eighth notes as we go along and use the resources I will share with you during this course. I will start with a few hosting facts. Everyone should know when starting to Halston Airbnb. But afterwards, I will take you through the five stages of Airbnb hosting, starting with planning, setup, operations, maintenance, and expansion phase towards the end, from the basics of punishing a property and dealing with demanding guests. The most complicated aspects of pricing and optimizing listing on Airbnb. You are going to learn all that I have learned after managing hundreds of properties worldwide. This training will save you an enormous amount of time and money and help you avoid all those unnecessarily expensive mistakes which most people do. This training will take you straight to where you want to be in your hosting business without messing around. Practical to the point, no-nonsense training. I will tell you in simple, plain English what works and what doesn't. Mit versus reality. Keep a pen and paper handy and take notes as we go along. Having said that, I will finish this intro here and see you in the next video. 2. How is Airbnb different?: So let's start with the, how is AirBnB different? There are lots of other websites on the internet, booking.com, VRBO Expedia TripAdvisor. And it is really important to understand how is AirBnB different from the others. The first differences, you can rent a shared space on Airbnb. Shared space is if you want to rent a room in your main primary residence. So if you are living in a three-bedroom apartment and if you want to rent one bedroom within your main primary apartment, you can do so on Airbnb. No other websites in the world allows you to rent a room like that. This is how Airbnb started. It's still remains in its essence. But having said that, Airbnb is not purely for shared spaces, 70 per cent of the properties on Airbnb at the moment, our entire properties, these are entire apartment, entire houses, cottages, and stuff like that. The next difference is both a traveler and host gets to review each other on Airbnb. Airbnb started this practice and it was very unique. Up until that point, the entire hospitality industry was one-sided, where only the traveler gets to review the hotel. But this was groundbreaking. You can literally see people's travel history by looking at their AirBnB profile and how they have behaved in the past. A lot of other websites are now trying to copy the same model of reviews where both the parties get to write a review for each other. But unfortunately, on all other platforms, booking.com, TripAdvisor, people do manage to get fake reviews there as an Airbnb, to be able to write a review, someone has to stay in the property. A few hours after the checkout. Both the parties get an invite from Airbnb to write a review for each other. This is the only way of writing a review for the property on Airbnb. And because of that, it cannot be a fake review on Airbnb. The other differences, Airbnb does not remove the abuse the bone removal review just because you don't like it, it is impossible to remove a review on Airbnb. However, you can write a public response to the review and you can share your side of the story, but they will not remove reviews. And I believe that is a good thing because when you're looking at a property on Airbnb as a traveler, it gives you the confidence that there is no possible way the host could have managed to get rid of some bad reviews. Good or bad is all there. But in summary, Airbnb does not remove reviews. And the last differences, host insurance. Airbnb gives you two kinds of insurances. The first one is a liability insurance up to 1 million dollar, and the second is you get a damaged protection insurance, again, up to 1 million dollar. This protects you against any damage done to your property due to guest negligence. No other website gives the kind of protection Airbnb offers. No other website gives you any kind of insurance for protection against damages to your property. You can set a damage deposit on all other websites. But if you look at it, a damage deposit can not be sufficient to cover the cost of replacing everything in your property if there is an extreme circumstance. That is why I believe Airbnb does give you an advantage over the others where everything in your property is covered up to 1 million dollar and it really does work. Me as a property manager, I raise claims all the time. People do spill wines. They do spoiled my pillows and my totals up to an extent they cannot be washed. And when that happens, I raise a claim by Airbnb. And Airbnb compensate me either for repair or replacement of that item. The other insurance is the liability insurance that covers you for any kind of liability, e.g. if someone breaks their leg during this day, Airbnb, we'll cover the cost of fighting a liability claim if the person decides to sue you up to $1 million. Again, these are the five points, I believe help Airbnb stand apart from the rest. Anyone who is new to short-term rental industry, I recommend starting with AirBnB first just because you have so much protection. And once you have gained experience in managing property, dealing with guests, and all those factors, you can slowly start moving to other platforms which are a bit complicated and do not give you sufficient protection. But start with Airbnb if you're new to this and gradually roll out to other platforms, which I will cover later in the videos. I will see you in the next video. 3. Airbnb vs Long Term Renting: Next is Airbnb versus long-term renting. It is very important to deal with this question. When you're starting to host on Airbnb. There are some clear advantages of Airbnb over long-term lending. I'm going to list them here. The first one is higher returns. I personally have been getting up to two to three times the monthly revenue I used to get from my properties by doing Airbnb. It is not just in one place or one property. I've tried the same model over and over again in different parts of the world. And I've always got the same kind of revenue. And I believe if you do it the right way, it is not unreasonable to expect a return like that. The second is frequent access to the property. You can access your property a lot more as compared to having a normal tenant there. You will have people coming in, going out multiple times a week. You can go and visit your property during the cleaning averse. If you want to go and stay in your property, you can simply block the calendar and the property is yours. Or if you have a friend or family coming over to stay, you can just simply block the calendar and the property is available for them. Views. On the other hand, you can try Airbnb for a few months if it works for you. Great. Otherwise you can always switch back to long-term renting there as it's not possible the other way around when you have a long-term tenant, you cannot easily ask them to leave because you want to try short-term rental. The next one is address maintenance issues because you will have a lot more frequent access to your property. Get to pick up on maintenance issues very quickly. You do not have to rely on your tenant to inform you of that small League, which they thought was insignificant, until it became too big, anything goes wrong in your property. The first person who will come screaming at you is gonna be your guest. On top of that, whoever is cleaning the property will be visiting there every single time someone leaves. Because of all this, you get to pick up maintenance issues very, very quickly. Next is irregular Cleaning. Someone has to clean the property every time someone leaves. So for that reason your property will stay in a nice shape and form. There is less veer anterior as well. This is what I have experienced people coming to stay in Airbnb either for leisure or for business. They will try and spend as much time as possible outside the property. And for that reason, your property gets used a lot less. There are additional tax benefits depending on where you are in the world. Most of the countries I'm familiar with, US, Canada, UK. These countries have clear advantages of running an Airbnb business as compared to a long-term tenants. Because of the expenses and business kind of setup, you get to save a lot more and having enlightenment tenant. And the last one is you get Airbnb host protection insurance, which you do not have when you have that long-term tenants when you're running a property on Airbnb, you have the damaged protection insurance to cover all kinds of damages to your property. Along with that, you have a liability insurance to cover all kind of liability claims. And you do not really need any other insurance to cover the losses you may have to deal. These are the few advantages Airbnb has over long-term renting. I will see you in the next video. 4. What kind of property works on Airbnb: What type of property is most suitable for AirBNB? There are multiple factors. The first and the most important one is location. If your property is in a location which is highly desired in your area, it could be the city-center. It could be near a business hub. It could be next to a popular landmark. If your property is in the desired area, you will have a consistent flow of travelers coming to your property. However, there are times when changing the location of a property isn't possible. What can you do in that case? If location isn't the best feature of your property, you can make it special. Try and add something unique to the property and offer an experience along with the state. This works. People do not mind traveling a little bit as long as the property is offering them something which is not very common in that area. And I will give you an example. A few years back, I bought a cottage which was about 1 h drive from the city center of Edinburgh. No one goes there and everyone was telling me why are you trying to set up an Airbnb because no tourist goes to that area. What I did was it was a small cottage. I put a hot tub in the back garden. I gave it a special romantic touch, and I offered it as a romantic experience. Or couples, I offered them champagne, chocolates and arrival. And after that, what happened is I did not need tourists, the book, my property, my property was so popular just with the locals. They were trying to book it all the time for their anniversaries, for their birthday present. And all those things. Try and add a unique touch to a property and offer an experience. If not a unique touch, it really attracts people. And I'll give you another example. A few years back, I met with a gentleman. He had a farm house. It was a 20 acre uneventful farmhouse with a small hours in the middle. And he was looking for ideas and he bought on Airbnb for a few months, didn't get any bookings. When we started working together, we came up with this idea of offering a treasure hunt experience on his property. All he had to do was buy a couple of metal detectors. And we offered the property as a treasure hunt experience for family. And obviously, it was a massive hit with the locals. Try and add something unique to the property. If your property is in a highly desired location, or if your property is offering something unique or an experience, you will never have to worry about getting bookings for your property. 5. How much does Airbnb charge hosts: How much does a AirBnB charged for a booking? Airbnb charges from both the parties. They charge a guest service fee from the guest, and the host pays a host service fee. Airbnb will charge 12 to 18 per cent from the guest. This 12 to 18% varies depending on the amount of the booking and the duration of the booking. It keeps changing in different parts of the world on different bookings. But the purpose of this training, let's say it is 15 per cent. Airbnb charges 15% from the guest who's traveling. And they will charge you, the host at three per cent service fee. To give you a simple example, if you are renting your property for $100 per night, the person who will be coming to stay there will be paying 115. And when it comes to paying you, AirBnB will pay you $97. The difference between this, the $18 is what Airbnb makes from this transaction. There'll be a and B may charge you some tax on that three per cent for providing you the services. It can be a VAT, GST, HSD wherever you are situated in the world. But this three per cent plus tax is all AirBnB will ever take from the host from you. This three per cent covers everything. You do not have to pay anything extra for the insurance, the liability insurance and the damage protection insurance. Everything is covered by this three per cent. They do not charge any card processing fee, like VRBO, booking.com. Other platforms charge you a small card processing fee on top of their commission, But Airbnb does not do that. Three per cent plus VAT is all they will charge from the host. Next is when do you get paid? Airbnb releases the money 24 h after the guests check-in, e.g. if you're checking time is 03:00 and the guest arrives at 06:00. Guests arrival time is irrelevant. The following day at 03:00, Airbnb will release the money to you. This also means that the first 24 h is for the guest protection. They can report any problems with the property if it isn't clean, if it doesn't match the property description and issues like that. But they will release the money after 24 h of the check-in time. The fourth time AirBNB pays the host, it takes them longer because they are required to do all those identity jacks and all that. But once the initial weight of five to seven days is over, you will start receiving money within 24 h of Airbnb releasing the money over to you, you can receive the payments in your bank account, in your local currency bank account, you can also choose a foreign account if your property is in another country, but if you live somewhere else, you can enter your foreign account as well. You can also choose to get paid in a PayPal account or a pioneer account if that works for you. But payout isn't usually a problem. It is just that you have to wait for an extended period before the first payment to come through. But after that, the money keeps coming quite smoothly. 6. How review work on Airbnb: Our reviews work on Airbnb. It's a five-star rating system. The people coming over to stay in your property, we'll get to rate you on a scale of five stars, and you would do the same with the guest. A five-star rating on Airbnb simply means the guest had no issues during their stay and they enjoyed it. Whereas four-star means they had some problems. You will need to try and get a five-star review. Every single time. Every time you receive a review rating less than five stars, airbnb will push your listing down in the search result to get the less bookings for next couple of days. This is their way of punishing you for not getting a five-star review. The way it works is after a few hours of the guest checkout, Airbnb will send an invitation to both the parties to write a review for each other. From that point onwards, you will both have 14 days to write a review for each other. If one person writes a review and the other doesn't, after 14 days, that one review becomes public if both parties right to review at any point in those 14 days, both of those reviews become public straight away. And if no one writes a review, nothing happens. Now, few key things to note in regards to the reviews. This 14 day period is all. You will have to write a review. If you missed this 14 day window, there is no way Airbnb will let you write a review. You are traveling, you had an operation, you were in hospital. They will not listen. So make sure you write a review within those 14 days. The other one is Airbnb does not remove reviews either. No matter how factually incorrect the person is, AirBnB will not remove the reviews just because you don't like it. However, you can write the public response to a review where you can share your side of the story. But Airbnb will not remove a review. Having said that, there are only three exceptional scenarios where I have seen they do remove reviews and these are exceptionally rare scenarios. The first one is, no one can use an abusive word or even a hint of anything discriminatory in their review. Second one is No one can ask you for a refund or any kind of monetary gain in exchange for a good or a bad review. And the third one is guest cannot use a third external factor, give you a bad rating, e.g. no one can say the property was alright, but the weather in the cities socks and we just couldn't do anything. If that happens, you can report it to Airbnb and they will take care of it. But apart from these, there is no way AirBNB is going to remove the bad reviews. You will need to vary your best customer service hat when you're dealing with a guest and don't be scared with the five-star rating system. I just told you it is not so difficult to get lots of five-star reviews when people are reviewing a property on Airbnb. Airbnb makes it abundantly clear to them that do not compare this five-star rating with a five-star hotel, because it is not a five-star rating on Airbnb simply means that the property was exactly as described. So all you will have to do to get lots and lots of five-star reviews, is make sure your property advertisement on Airbnb correctly reflects what they will find when they arrive at the property. There could be some imperfections. Make sure you mentioned all those imperfections clearly in black and white to the people when they're booking your property. So there are no surprises. And you will have no problem in getting five-star reviews one after the other. 7. Which cancellation policy should you choose?: Next is the cancellation policy. Airbnb keeps experimenting with their cancellation policies. They keep changing them slightly every now and then. But without going into that detail, in essence, they have three cancellation policies for you to choose from. The first one is flexible cancellation policy, which means the guest can cancel 24 h before their label and they get a full refund. Second one is a moderate. The guests can cancel five days before their arrival and they get full refund and you don't get paid anything. And the third one is strict, which means people can cancel 14 days before arrival. They can get full refund. You won't be paid anything. Now, although it sounds like people do get full refund when they cancel. But it is not entirely true. If the council 48 h after making the reservation, Airbnb does not refund them the guests service fee, which is that 12 to 18 per cent from the booking. People do lose a little bit when they cancel the booking. And the reason I'm telling you this is it is unlikely p someone will misuse the flexibility you are offering because every time someone cancels, they still lose that 12 present. Now, which cancellation policy is right for you? If you take my advice, the more flexible you are, the better it is. Or my properties, It's always flexible. Ask yourself, would you book a hotel if the hotel does not refund? Once you've made the reservation, flexibility is the way to go. People need flexibility than traveling with kids when traveling in larger group. You never know when they might need to cancel and for that, they need that flexibility. If you are not the one offering that they will go to someone who is to try and be as flexible as you can. It is also true that sometimes people will cancel 24 h before their arrival or so close to their arrival that you could not sell that night to anybody else. But you won't realize how many bookings that flexible cancellation policy will bring to you throughout the year? My advice would be, stay as flexible as you can. You can go over to moderate. But when you choose a strict cancellation policy, you will notice your calendar few weeks out in the future is always empty because no one really wants to commit to a reservation so far in advance where they cannot get a refund. You can go onto Airbnb website and just have a look at the latest cancellation policies they have on the platform and choose the most flexible one. The Ford cancellation policy is the long-term policy you cannot choose it. It gets automatically applied on a long term reservation. And the definition of a long term booking is 28 nights or more. Any bookings which is four consecutive, 28 nights or more is classed as a long term booking and Airbnb applies there long term reservation policy on that automatically it overrides everything else. What a long-term cancellation policy means is you're guaranteed one month's rent. If I book your property for three months, and I decided to cancel it 48 h after I have made the initial reservation. Airbnb, we'll pay you one month's rent and they will refund me two months. That is basically it. Another thing to note is when people cancelled before their check-in time, AirBnB automatically refund the cleaning fee because they did not enter the property at all. But if someone cancels after the check-in, then it becomes a bit more complicated. They do not read from the cleaning fee and then the charge guest for the remaining nights if the cancer let's say if someone canceled their reservation after two days of staying in the property and their reservation was for five days. Now in that case, they will not get a refund for the two nights. They have stayed for the remaining three nights. Depending on the cancellation policy you have on the listing. They may refund them for the final tonight, but for the following night they match either 50 per cent. It becomes slightly complicated, so I won't go into that detail. But in essence, try and be as flexible as you can. Flexibility is the way to go in this business. 8. How cleaning fee works on Airbnb: You can charge a cleaning fee to the guests on Airbnb platform allows it. Everyone does it. Do not hesitate in charging a cleaning fee to the guest. People traveling on Airbnb are used to pay in cleaning fee, so do not hesitate. It is meant to include any labor charge and cleaning the property, and washing any linen, and providing any cleaning supplies or essential supplies, e.g. for my two-bedroom apartment in Edinburgh, I charge 50 pounds cleaning out of that 50 pounds, 30 pounds goes to my cleaner for their 2 h of effort. And the rest of the 20 pounds goes to the linen service for washing the linen every single time. Do not hesitate in charging this, but at the same time, try and keep it the lowest. Do not try and add a markup on your cleaning fee. There are a few key reasons for that. The first one is when people are short listing properties, although they are used to paying the cleaning fee, but it's still stands out because they can see it separately along with the night charge, but they will still notice it. And at that point, you do not want to lose a booking just because of a higher cleaning fee. The second reason is, the more you're cleaning fee is the higher the guest expectations will be. E.g. if I was charging 100 pounds for cleaning by two-bedroom apartment instead of 50 pounds. People coming over will come with sky high expectations and they will try and find something. So for that reason, I try and keep it a very reasonable not too high, and I try and pass the actual cost or to my guest. If you are looking for an idea on how much you should charge for cleaning your property. It's very simple just to go onto AirBnB and look for properties in your area that are similar to yours and see how much they are charging. Look at couple of them and you will get a ballpark figure of how much should be the cleaning fee. When you're doing this, make sure you do not look for properties that are managed by property management companies because their prices are highly marked up because they have so many people in the chain to look for properties that are individually managed by someone, like you would get a fair idea. The other question you might be having is, how do I find cleaners? Binding a cleaner has never been a problem for me. The easiest thing you can do is just go into Facebook and look for groups of Airbnb hosts in your area. Or you can just look for a group of people in your area that are looking for jobs. There are Facebook groups for that. Host an advert and within half an hour people need jobs more than ever before nowadays is posed an AdWord in those local classifieds. Within half an hour or 2 h, you will receive a couple of responses. You might need to try a few of them to find which one works best for you. But finding a cleaner has never been a problem for me. But if you take my advice on what kind of cleaner you should look for, I always try and find them in because I need them to cover for each other because if you have just one person cleaning the property, who will clean the property when they fall sick or when they are away on holiday. You want ideally someone coming in a pair. It could be husband and wife, it could be siblings, or it could be friends, but try and find someone who comes as a team. Another important thing to note is you are not meant to provide any cleaning during their stay. This cleaning that you will charge from the guest is meant for cleaning the property once the guest leaves, no matter how long they are staying for the cleaning fee you charge and Airbnb is for only one clean. After they leave. If they need an extra cleaning during the State, they will have to pay for it. But apart from that, this is a self-service accommodation. They can help themselves, you can provide them cleaning supplies. There is more there is a vacuum, there is a washer, dryer. They can help themselves. If somebody staying for an extended duration, a week or a month or something like that, maybe you can just give them a few extra sheets or towels just as a courtesy so they don't have to worry too much about washing them. But technically, you're not meant to provide any cleaning during the day. And the cleaning fee you charge is for only one clean once the leaf. Another key thing to note is when you're negotiating with the air cleaner, do not let them mislead you into believing that it needs a lot of cleaning. It doesn't. 90 per cent of the people who stay in my properties when they are leaving, they try and leave the property in exact same shape and form. They found it mainly for the reason that they want a good review in return from me. 90% of the people will leave everything exactly the way they found it. They will even make the beds, they will make a pile of dirty pillows in the bathroom. They will wipe all the surfaces. And my cleaner when she goes They're all she has to do is wipe all the surfaces, changed the linen, clean the toilet, cleaning the kitchen, and that's it. It doesn't need 3 h of cleaning. Two-bedroom apartment every time it needs 1 h McLean there most of the times does not spend more than an hour getting the property ready for the next guest. If you're speaking to a cleaner, keep this in mind. Don't let them tell you that they will need 3 h to clean a two-bedroom apartment every single time. There are times when people leave it extra dirty, unfortunately, or if someone was staying for an extended duration. In that case? Yes, there will be times when cleaner has to spend extra effort. When the cleaner has to spend extra effort. But that compensates for the other. But in summary, a two-bedroom apartment does not need 3 h every single time. 9. Just listing your property on Airbnb isn't enough: Just listing your property on Airbnb will not get you bookings for too long. The truth is, only the properties that appear on the first two pages of the search results get lots of bookings, but people generally do not tend to go beyond the first two pages. How many times have you gone beyond the first two pages on Google? It tastes the same on Airbnb as well. When people go beyond these two pages, the field, they are going into something unknown which is not so trustworthy, which might not be so good. The whole trick is to stay on the first two pages. When you list a property for the first time, AirBnB pushes a new property to the top just to get them some bookings, just to get the ball rolling. But after some time, you will be one of those thousand hosts in your area who are struggling to stay on the top of the search results. Now how do you stay on top? This is called search engine optimization of a listing. We will have a few chapters later in this training dedicated to how you do search engine optimization of your listing. But for now, just understand that you will need to spend a lot of time updating your listing, keeping it up-to-date with new features, new options, Airbnb has rolled out on their platform. Roughly, I would say. You will need to spend about an hour every week uploading your listing, looking at various settings, keeping them up to date with the recent changes Airbnb has rolled out. 10. Most common guest demands and how to deal with them: About 70 to 80 per cent of your guests will ask you for either an early check-in or late check-out. And for you as a host, it doesn't work. The key reason for that is the Airbnb insurances. That to Airbnb insurances every host gets the first one is the liability insurance, and the second is the damaged protection insurance. They cover you from the check-in time of your property to the checkout time. If you are letting people in before the check-in time or you're letting them stay longer for those times, your property is not covered. If anything goes wrong, 3PM check-in time, and 11:00 A.M. checkout time is the industry standard most optimal setting. That is what I would recommend. You keep as well. It just gives the sufficient time where you're cleaner to clean the property in that four-hour window, 11:00 A.M. checkout time works almost for everyone. They don't have to rush through their breakfast and getting out of the property if you do it any sooner. And 3PM, checking works great as well. If you do it any later, it will be inconvenient for people who are coming. And if you do it any sooner, you're cleaner. We will struggle to clean the property if it is less than 4 h. The other hand, I completely understand why people ask for an early check-in because not all trains and flights come in the evening. They do arrive early in the morning and they would try and get into your property early if they can. But for you, it doesn't work. If you really want to help them, they can come and drop their luggage, come back later. The check-in, the same for checkout. They can leave their luggage behind and go out and pick it up later. But this option also comes with its own complications. In your cleaner, It'll be there cleaning the property and the guest comes to drop their luggage. It just creates unnecessary hassle for you, for your cleaner. It is a logistical challenge as well. There will be too much communication between you. You will have to coordinate their luggage drop-off. Then you become responsible for their luggage and all those things. To try and avoid all these scenarios in the first place. Feel free to decline people. They ask you my standard answer to. Anyone asked me for an early check-in or late check-out is low. But there is still a human in me. If someone is traveling with kids or they have some mobility issues or something like that, I do sometimes allow them, but I don't make it a habit. That is what I would recommend to you as well. 11. How to safely store extra supplies: You will end up with additional items which you will need to store at your properties such as cleaning items, essential supplies and extra linen and all that. It's okay to keep them on the property, but please make sure they are locked. Not everyone, but few people will try and misuse the access you're giving them if it is not locked. I've had a couple who stayed for two nights in my two-bedroom apartment in Edinburgh. They stayed for two nights and they used 19 towels just because it was all available to them. Not everyone does it, but some people will try and misuse its people try and take away your soap and detergent and that kind of stuff. It's better to keep it locked within the property. And you do not really want to move everything away from the property either because there are times when you will need to let the guest access IT. People do need extra cleaning supplies or they may need extra pillow cover, stuff like that. So it is essential to keep all the essential and extra supplies within the property, but keep it locked. And more importantly, when you lock it, would a combination lock on it. You're cleaner, will be accessing that key very frequently and it just has a habit of missing very frequently. It makes things very simple. When you just have a combination lock and whoever needs to access that storage area, you can just give them the combination and they can access it and lock it back again without the hassle of tracking down that key, which has a habit of going missing. 12. Do's & Don'ts when communicating with Airbnb guest: Unless it is an emergency, don't communicate with the guest Outside Airbnb. Let me tell you how the booking mechanism works. People can send you an inquiry without making a reservation and ask you any question. At that point, unless a booking is confirmed, Airbnb doesn't share all the details about the person video. You can only see a limited information about the guest at that point. You can see their first name, where they are from the world and if they have any reviews from their past stays. But once the booking is confirmed, you get to see a lot more details about the person. You can see their first day with the last name, their profile picture, and therefore number. The reason I'm telling you this is people will send you a message before booking as an inquiry and they will share their phone number or email address with you and ask you to get in touch with them outside the platform. They will say something like, hey, I like your property, but I have some queries. Can you contact me here? Can you message me here? All they are trying to do is book your property outside platform because they do not like paying a 12 to 18% commission to Airbnb by exposing you to the risk. Because when you book a guest Outside Airbnb, anything goes wrong. You are on your own. There is no Airbnb or insurance behind you. You are on your own. I would recommend Doodle, try and entertain such requests by standard answer to all these people is, I'm sorry. I'm not allowed to communicate with unconfirmed reservations outside the platform. If you have any queries, please feel free to ask your question here, and I will be happy to answer it. On the other hand, wants the booking is confirmed, you will have access to their phone number. At that point. It doesn't mean now, it is all good and you can just pick up the phone and start communicating with your guests over the phone and sort them all out. It is a terrible idea to send them any message outside the platform at any point. The key reason for that is, if anything goes wrong at any point at Airbnb starts investigating of what you said, what they said. They will not even look at your email or text message exchange with a guest. The only evidence AirBnB we'll consider is what you said and what they said on Airbnb messages. So try and keep all your communication on Airbnb as much as you can. Absolutely. You have the phone number. You can use it in case of emergencies if they are stuck with something or the problem is just too complicated. Discuss over a chat, pick up the phone and sort them out. But make sure any key decision you make with the guest Outside the platform. You come back and always summarize it on Airbnb. Just for the record, if in case you need to go back to it again, everyone can see it and it stays on the platform. After that. In summary, try and keep all your communication on Airbnb. They have this very efficient messaging system where you can save your message templates so you do not have to repeat a lot of things and all that stuff to try and use as much as you can the Airbnb messaging system for your advantage. 13. Don't fall in these rookie traps: Do not fall for the rocky trap of providing extras like wine, chocolate, cookies. Trust me, I've been there, tried it all. It's not worth it. People will still be rootless with you if you give them a bottle of wine. But the property wasn't as clean, you want to be rated only for the quality of accommodation which you have promised to the guest. Nothing else. All these things are just going to distract you from delivering that. You don't know what contains dairy, gluten, nuts. You don't know who you're giving alcohol to. Their restrictions around giving alcohol to people. Avoid all these hassles. Just stick to the basics. Try and give you a guest a clean quality accommodation. They will appreciate it more than anything else. And the same thing applies to the kitchen. Do not over socket. You don't people have food allergies, so you do not want to put there anything which is not branded, which doesn't have clearly the ingredients defined on its label, you may run into that kind of a trouble. Try and keep things minimal. You do not want to complicate things. Give them the basic tea, coffee, sugar is mostly all you should be giving. You can give them the pepper and salt and all those basic ******. But don't go overboard with it. The more items you provide, more complications it may lead you into. Cleaning is the single most important aspect of having great reviews. Nothing else. And focus all your attention on doing that. Instead. 14. Always keep a secret key: If you're going to use a lockbox to pass the keys to the guest, try and have another secret lockbox within the vicinity of the property. It doesn't have to be literally next door. But as long as it isn't nearby and you can lead people there, it will save you from enormous amount of stress which can be avoided. There will be times where people will lose the key or you have to send someone over to the property to repair something. If you don't have that extra spare key which you can give to people without being at the property, it will save you so much effort. This secret key has saved me from a lot of unnecessary trips to my property at odd hours. E.g. I. Had a group of friends. They get my property. They were on a night out of their way back. They lost the key to the property. They call me late in the night asking for a replacement key. All I had to do was lead them to the secret key, and that was end of the story. Try and have something like that in place. It will save you from a lot of unnecessary trips to the property at odd hours, which you definitely not going to enjoy. 15. Be careful when offering 3rd party services: People will ask you for your local recommendations and when that happens, suggests them third-party services, but never arrange it for them. And I'm telling you this from my experience, when I started, I used to think that I will send a taxi to pick my guests from the airport, and the taxi will just bring them down to my property, passed them the keys, and the guest will love the experience. It sounds great if it happens perfectly every single time. You don't want the bad review when the taxi was late or the taxi didn't even show up, never arrange third-party service for the guest. When they ask you, give them the information, give them the website phone number to call, and let them make their own arrangement. But you do not want to be involved in the booking process because if anything goes wrong, you are likely to be held responsible for that as well. Remember, you want to be rated only for the quality of accommodation you are providing nothing else. And people ask you for information, give them a couple of options. If they asked you for the best restaurants to eat, give them a couple of options and let them choose. But again, if you just give them one option, that means you are suggesting them to go there which you do not want. Keep away from all of these things. Give them a couple of options and let them decide where they want to go, when they want to go. And you are nowhere in the process. Sometimes your guests will ask you for a declaration on their arrival because they are celebrating a special occasion. They might ask you for a flower arrangement or some kind of a chocolate or a wine or champagne on arrival. I don't do that. I give them all number of a local service provider and I tell them to arrange it directly with them. And I will give the access to that service provider when it comes to arranging things. But me, personally, I do not arrange things for them because people have different tastes. And if it doesn't fit their celebration, if it doesn't fit what they were expecting, I don't want to be held responsible for that and I'm not a professional in giving declarations or wine and all that stuff. I am good at giving a quality accommodation. And for everything else, I give them service provider details and let them make their own arrangement. All I can do is let that service provider access their property and decorate for them. But I also make it clear in the end, I just want it all cleared. They will be responsible for taking it all away from my property. I don't want to spend another 2 h of my cleaners time getting rid of all those arrangements they had done while staying. Problem. But it's perfectly okay if they want to have a celebration, if they wanted to have a declaration, I completely understand. Do not want to say no to such requests, but I make it clear that I do not want to be involved in this. 16. Minimise communication from day 1: Next is minimized communication from day one. People coming from Airbnb will inherently try and engage you in the conversation because of this wonderful idea of someone welcoming you into their home in another part of the world and they will help you plan and you stay late local and all those factors, the people coming from Airbnb will try and engage you in a conversation. It will be very chatty. It will be asking you a lot of local advice, what to do, where to go, and all those things. I quite enjoyed when I started hosting, I quite enjoyed this process. Initially, I would spend hours and hours chatting the people, literally helping them plan their itinerary for coming to Edinburgh and what all those things they should do in those three days. But very soon I realized this wasn't the best use of my time and I was merely repeating myself. And most of the times people were not so grateful for that advice I was giving them. I would spend hours speaking to them. But after that, I'd see no mention of what I did for them in their reviews. I had to come out of that is and I can just spin up, pass them the information before they expect are they before they ask? But at the right time, I had to come up with a strategy of minimizing all the unnecessary communication with the guest by providing them the right information at the right time. These are the five things I eventually came up with, which helped me kill all that unnecessary communication. And at the same time, it increases the guest experience. They get the communication, they get the information exactly when they expected to come. The first one is check-in and check-out time. People will try and ignore your check-in and check-out time. They will arrive at your door a couple of hours before the check-in time and knock on the door and say, oh, I apologize. I didn't realize your check-in time is at 03:00, but I'm just here. Can I go in which isn't what you want? People will try and ignore these things. And this all leads to that unnecessary phone call from the guest. And then you're trying to convince them that you cannot go in just now and all those things. The way to kill all this unnecessary communication is remind your guests a day before the event, e.g. you can send them a message a day before the arrival telling them, guys the check-in time starts from 03:00 P.M. tomorrow and you can do the same for the checkout, send them a message. It did before their departure. Tell them, guys, your checkout time is at 11:00. Otherwise you're cleaner will arrive at the property and the guy is still in his pajamas, and it will take them another 15 min to pack and go while you're cleaner is waiting outside for him to leave and you are paying for their time. It doesn't help anyone to try and be proactive and reminding them about check-in and check-out time. The second is remind them of the house rules. On Airbnb. You can set your own house rules and Airbnb makes sure when people are booking your property, they get to see your house rules and only after they accept your house rules, people can book your property and people do read them. But sometimes the book, it's so far in advance, six months or a couple of months in advance. And by the time the guest arrives at your property, forgotten all about that. It is a good idea if you have some specific rules which you want people to follow. E.g. don't veer shoes in my house and that kind of stuff. If there is something which you want the guests to be careful about, remind them a day before their arrival along with maybe you can do along with the check-in instructions, remind them a day before their arrival. It is fresh in their mind again, next is a detailed travel directions and check them instructions. The biggest revelation for me when I started hosting was off the entire hosting process. The most critical step is the check-in instructions. If the guest was able to check in without having to stop anywhere or struggled with anything. You want them. 50% of the battle is, one wants the guest has checked in without having to stumble anywhere. So your entire focus should be giving them super clear instructions on how to access the property. If they had to wait anywhere, if they had to wait ten, 15 min trying to find the property or find the local open the lock, they will not forgive you. It will reflect in the reviews to try and give them foolproof, simple instructions on how to get to your property. In a way, once the guest has arrived in your city or your area, it is your responsibility to give them super clear instructions of how to get to your property, and it may sound unreasonable, but if the taxi driver takes them on a 15 min detour, you will in a way be held responsible for not providing them precise information of what they should have told to the taxi driver to try and give them super clear instructions, e.g. for every guest arriving to my property, I give them instructions on how to get to my property from the bus stop, from the nearest train station, from the nearest airport. And if they're driving, I give them a Google Maps link, which they can just click, and that will tell them the location of my property on Google Maps. Try and give them step-by-step instructions. E.g. anyone coming to my property on airport. This is what I tell them. When you're at the airport, Do not take an Uber cab, take the local black cab because black cab drivers know Edinburgh very well. And when you are in the taxi, tell the driver that you want to go to old Fisher market, close on colgate why our grasp market. And he will know exactly where to take you. Once the taxi starts slowing down, you will see wings restaurant on your right. And the second door to the right of the wings restaurant is the apartment you are going to. And I send them a picture highlighting the wings restaurant, highlighting my door, highlighting what is the code they need to enter into the keypad to open the door. It makes it super clear. 50 per cent of the battle is won once the guests is checked him and the last one is provide instructions for appliances. Things which you believe are common are not so common to someone coming from another part of the country or another part of the vault, people will struggle to use some of the appliances in your property. It is a good idea to keep all user manuals in a big folder somewhere in the properties of people can access it. But people need quick answers. They do not want to read the 15 pages book to find out how does turn something on. They just want a quick answer and they will start falling you at odd hours or small things like how to turn this on because they need quick cancer. And the way to avoiding all those unnecessary communication and the phone calls is the stick simple instructions on all the appliances in your property. Let's take a simple white sticker and write with a pen, press this button to turn it on and this is how you turn it off. Small things like that. I have those white stickers everywhere in my property, e.g. TV, remote extractor fan, how to turn the stove on. And all those things. Try and have simple instructions and it just makes it super clear. People will appreciate the kind of detail you have gone to and it increases their comfort as well. They don't have to struggle with anything. They know how to operate each and every item in your property. Killing all this unnecessary communication will save you so much unnecessary hassle. And it will save you so much time, which you can spend on other parts of the business rather than providing the same information over and again to your guests. 17. Know your biggest enemy: Your biggest enemy can be the most amazing photos of your property. This is what people do when they start, they hire the best photographer in town. They come with elaborate, expensive cameras and equipment that amazing looking professional shots. But when the guest arrives, it's all missing. This is hospitality. It's all about under promise and over-deliver. You do not want the photos to look better than the property is. It is a bad long-term strategy. In fact, you do not need a professional photographer. You can literally use your smartphone to take pictures of your property. Hold it horizontally at your belly button and stand in all four corners of every space of your property and take photographs, open all the drawers in the kitchen and give them a view of what kind of cutlery they will have access to and what kinds of cups and mugs you have, what kind of appliances you have in the kitchen. Give them a view of the bathroom and how big the bathroom is and what other things they will have access to in the bathroom. Give them a view of the window, what they will be able to see outside, give them a view of the exterior of the building. This is very important for people. Interior looks amazing, but everyone wants to know how the building looks up from outside, how the entrance to the building looks, and how safe the street is. This is an extremely important for people traveling with families, not only the interiors, they are more concerned about how the exteriors of the building are. What is the age of the property are safe, is the neighborhood what is next door? All those things are extremely important for people. All these things are more important than having professional looking amazing interior shots. There is no harm in getting a professional photographer if you have decided to get one. But please understand the photos should not look better than the property is trying to arrange the photo shoot on a sunny day, open the windows, get plenty of natural light. You do not want photos lead with artificial light. And the photos should look as close to the reality as they should be. Tidy up the property. Everything should be nice and clean in order to open the windows and take photos, that is pretty much all you need. Again, this is hospitality under promise over deliver is the key. Nowadays you can even arrange a AirBnB photographer and they will send a photographer to take photos of your property. The only disadvantage is the photos they will take will be owned by Airbnb. Technically, you cannot use those photos taken by an Airbnb photographer on any other website. If you decide to list your property on other platforms, technically, you cannot do that. But the Airbnb photographer I've used a few times, they are very reasonable in the pricing. I think the costed me about 65 pounds. Or a property in Edinburgh, which used to cost me about 90 pounds. I think getting a photographer from Airbnb is a reasonable option, especially if you're struggling to find a good, reliable, a professional photographer in your town. But if you don't have a budget or if you don't really want it, there is no need for it. Your smartphone is as good as you need it to be. 18. Attract the right guest with amenities: The amenities you provide, decide the kind of guessed your property will attract. If you have all single bonds, you will get lots of singles and stags coming over to stay. If you have all double beds, you will get couples coming over to stay. If you have a combination of double bed and single beds, you are inviting couples with young kids. If you are offering travel card with a high chair, you're inviting people traveling with infants. You can literally design your property to attract a certain kind of blind of all those amenities and things your ideal customer would need. If you have at high-speed Internet and you have a desk and a chair, you are inviting business travelers. If it is an option for you, if this is something you can easily achieve, try and design your property in a way to attract a certain kind of client. Usually, and I'm not saying for everyone, but usually business travelers is ideal. The least hassle. They will be out in the day, come, come home and sleep. Business travelers is what everyone wants. A second is, personally, I prefer people with infants. Again, there will be no noise complaints. They will go off to bed quickly and they will spend their time, whether whether the property being outside, going around. And the third is people with families. And as you can imagine, turnover really wants to deal with singles and stacks. So you get the hint, try and arrange your property in a way to attract them. The ideal client which you would like to host at your property. And some of these things, e.g. infant amenities, people are very picky about those things. So make sure you clearly tell them what is it that you are providing? Is it a travel card or is it because they are two different things. Are you going to give them a mattress or not? Are you going to give a baby blanket or not? Make sure it is crystal clear to people, there is no room for any kind of confusion or misunderstanding. And this, what I generally do is I just give them a travel card and a mattress and I tell them this is just a travel card at a mattress. Please bring your blanket and everything else you would need for the baby to sleep. In my travel caught with the blanket. We do not provide anything else for hygiene purposes, but please bring your stuff in. So be very clear, especially with baby items. If you have any dinner items for the baby, if you have any cutlery for the baby, you very clear on what is it that you're providing so people can rearrange everything. You do not want them to be in a situation where the baby is not comfortable staying in your property because of various reasons. 19. Be a responsible neighbour: The truth is, no one wants to live next door to an Airbnb. And I can imagine why people do not like it. Because just imagine having a new neighbor every other day and people coming over to stay are not going to be very careful. They do end up knocking on the doors. They do end up pressing the wrong buzzer at odd hours and all these kind of problems are bound to happen sooner or later. The try and be a responsible neighbor. And try and do everything you can to stop these problems from happening right from the onset. These are the two things I do. The first thing to mitigate these kind of problems is in my property house rules. This is what I mentioned, no matter what kind of property it is and where it is. This is my default rule, which says, please be respectful to my neighbors. This is a traditional residential building with lots of families and kids living in the flat and sound travels in the building very easily. Absolutely. No music or loud noises after 08:00 P.M. please do not book if you think it will be difficult for you to stay discrete in the night. And once you add this house rule, airbnb makes sure that people read this house rule before they're able to confirm their reservation. The people cannot just ignore this. On top of this house rule. I send another reminder message a day before the guest is due to a live. The message says, please, if you could be extra careful with the buzzer and the flat door, you ignore and guests that recently have upset my neighbor's, please be quiet in the property after 08:00 P.M. Do not wait for things to go wrong. Try and be proactive. Your neighbors can report to the council or the city. They can make it an unpleasant stay for a year guests, and they can create a lot of hassles for you to be responsible neighbor and try and address all these problems right from the onset to keep it hassle-free. 20. Keep insect and rodents away: Keep your property insect or rodent brain. Airbnb is super strict about these things. And I learned this myself with a bad experience. When I started hosting. I think about in my first three months, I had a couple of staying at my property and they saw a mice in the property. They did not inform me or ask me to deal with it. They just took a photo and they sent it to Airbnb. Airbnb did is to move them straight away into another property. The phone me to say your property is now blocked and you have to get a professional treatment done and give us a proof of the professional treatment. And then we will open your property for bookings. Again, they're so strict about it. And I've seen they will not hesitate in canceling your future bookings. When it comes to these kinds of things, to try and have all those checks and things in place to avoid any kind of infestation or any kind of mice or any rodent problem. If the problem occurs again in the next one year, Airbnb can remove you from their platform as well. So do not take these things lightly. Get a pest control in place before you start. If you are a bad place or if you have a property which is already running on Airbnb, have a pest control person going in there regularly to keep a check on all these things because Airbnb does not have any kind of tolerance for these kinds of problems in the problem. 21. Best amenities to provide: When it comes to providing amenities for your property, you can look at it as a list of two categories. The first one is essential items. I would recommend, try and give towels, sheets, all the basic soaps, shampoos, these things do not cost a lot. You can buy multipaths and keep replenishing them as they run loan. When you're getting the linen for your property like sheets, bedding, towels, or that kind of stuff. Try and get them into white if you can. There are a couple of reasons for that. When you have white linen, it gives an impression that the property has been serviced professionally. The second is, it is easy to get stains off white fabric because you can just simply bleach it. And the third one is washing becomes very easy, and it is all of the same color. When you start mixing colors, you have a different colour sheet, different color Dewey. You will need to wash them separately, otherwise the colors will start mixing and all that kind of stuff. We're all these complications. I would recommend get towels, sheets, duvet covers, linen, all those bedding things in white. You can put fresh towels on the bed or you can pile them up in the bathroom. But there are pros and cons. When you put a towel on the bed, you know, when it is used because if the towel has been moved, you can wash it. Whereas if you put all of them in a pile and the guest just use two out of the five. You want to know what has been used because they could have touched them, they're going to put them back. But when it is on bed, you definitely know that the bed has been moved. Someone has slept in there and it is no longer on the bed. But when it is in the bile in the bathroom, you will need to wash everything no matter whether they have used it or not. So there are pros and cons of that. I personally like to put all the towels on the bed so I know what has been used to try and save my washing costs and when it comes to providing amenities for the rest of the property, try and make it a place that feels like home. People traveling on Airbnb expect that there is no limit to how many things you can provide. But please try and give all those basic things which everyone would need on a daily basis. Things like shampoo, conditioner, toilet rolls. And I've seen people for some reason they do not want to spend money on these things. Like toilet rolls is a hot topic. People don't know how many toilet rolls to provide. They're always not providing enough. I recommend give at least to toilet rolls per person no matter how long the state is. And you can just tell them clearly that we provide only the starting supplies. If you run out of these things during your stay, you will need to help yourself. But try and give these basic thing sufficient so the guests do not have to ask you for the basic stuff. It saves you from a lot of hassle and bad reviews in the long run. And there will be times when you would miss these things or they were just not enough for you to put them on. These things happen when you miss those items. Apologize. So the guest and try your best to replenish them if they have been missed. And remember, people are coming there for a short stay. They just need just the basic items to be there. You do not have to give all that elaborate, complicated kitchen equipment to help them cope. S. And that kitchen is one thing where I've seen when people are furnishing of property, they overlook it. They do not pay enough attention to the kitchen. Kitchen is the most important part after bathroom, even if somebody is not planning to use the kitchen during their stay, the first thing they will do when they come in to check the bathroom and check the kitchen. People open the drawers in the kitchen and try to see what is there, even if they don't intend to cook anything, to try and fill the kitchen as much as you can. It doesn't cost a lot to get a couple of extra cups or mugs or glasses, or plates or spoons. Try and equip the kitchen properly. Do not try and save money on capillary. These things do not cost a lot. About 50 pounds of $50. You can get so much stuff to fill all the cupboards in your kitchen. Try and give a fully equipped kitchen as much as you can. In the long term, that 100 or $200 you will spend extra in inputting a lot of category in your property. We'll give you a lot of, lot of positive feedback from the guess. And I have seen people when they're furnishing a property, they try and get lots of used sub-standard item and put it in the property. Trusts me, as soon as people walk in, they can feel whether the property has been burnished with substantive item. It's okay to purchase secondhand used items, but do not buy substantive items by quality goods which will last longer, which feels good. People should feel the value when they stay in the property. And in the long run, they will give you a good reviews. You will make lot more money with those positive reviews. In summary, do not buy a substandard items, try and get good-quality items. Furnishing the property, it will lead to a better customer satisfaction. And in the long run, you will have plenty of good reviews to bank on. Get you a lot more bookings and money in your bank and make sure you mentioned it on your listing that you provide starter supplies only. Absolutely. You are not there to provide unlimited supply of toilet rolls to someone. Just make it clear that you provide starter supplies of essential items so they don't have to go and buy on their first or second day. But if they run out of anything during their stay, they will have to help themselves. Make it very clear. If someone asked you for an extra toilet roll, as long as you've given them to toilet rolls per person when they arrived, your job is done. They can help themselves if the nipple. 22. Must have amenities to provide: When it comes to must-have amenities to provide, these are a few key things you need to be aware of. When you advertise a product. Makes sure it is there in the property in case you miss it. If in case the guest asks for it and it is not there, try your best to get the item over to them as soon as possible because you advertise it on your listing when they booked it, the soil or list of amenities and they would expect all those items to be there. Airbnb is getting super strict about these things. Nowadays. If complaints to Airbnb that something was mentioned in the list of amenities and it is not there. They offer them a refund up to 30%. In my case, that is what I've seen. To try and make sure everything you have listed on your property advertisement is there in the property and it's okay. Sometimes you might miss fewer items, but try your best to provide all those missed items. As soon as the guest mentioned, set, try and make it a home away from home. Do not try and cut down on essential items like shampoo, toothpaste or toilet paper, etc. These things do not cost a lot, but they increase guest satisfaction by multiples. Try and give them sufficient. You don't have to give them an oversupply of these things, but try and give them a sufficient supply that lasts them a couple of days. And you can always mentioned that you give starter supplies of essential toiletries and they will need to help themselves later on. Next is quality should always be better than quantity. Try and give a quality goods, quality items for them to use. Do not go for cheaper alternatives. Business thrives on good reviews. You need good reviews from people. And the easiest thing you can do to get lots of good reviews. And the easiest thing you can do to get lots of good reviews is to deliver value for money. Try and give good quality items and essential supplies, even if it means that you have to cut down on the list of things you provide, but whatever you provide should be offered decent quality. I will quickly go over list of few essential items you can have in these specific areas in your property, e.g. bathroom, it is important to have a toilet roll, a hand wash, shampoo, body wash, and towel, hot water, toilet brush. Everything else is non-essential, but these items everyone would expect in new property. Second is kitchen, a toaster, a cattle, teabags, instant coffee if you can. This does really add a lot of value to the guest. The really appreciate when they are able to make a drink, try and have sugar, salt, pepper, knife, cooking oil, Capillary, refrigerator, stove, and basic cutlery. These are very essential basic items. Try and provide these items. People will appreciate the convenience you are giving them when they arrived with the property. In bedrooms. Comfortable mattress, mattress protector is essential to pillows per person, room darkening, shades, the way or a blanket. These are essentials. Make sure you have these items in your property. Everything else is not essential. There is no upper limit to how far you can go with these things. But these are the few key things I believe are essential in bathroom, kitchen, and a bedroom. Apart from this, the absolute must-haves are WiFi. Everyone needs Internet nowadays, a fire alarm, carbon monoxide alarm, and these two things increase your protection as well in case something goes wrong. And try and have posted kid and a small domestic fire extinguisher if you can. These things do not cost a lot and you never know when they might save someone's life one day. So to try and have all these essential items in your property if you can. Apart from this list, everything else is secondary. More you can do the better it is, but this is the most essential list of items you need to have in your property. 23. Deal with these questions effevtively: Do you have to provide breakfast? And the answer is no. Just because it is there in the name B&B. You're not meant to provide breakfast. Feel free to say no. If someone asks, no one I personally know who has an entire property offers breakfast. When you save breakfast, people will expect a hot meal. So feel free to say no. It is mainly for people who are hosting a room in their main presidents where they live. And they're going to make a toast with them in the morning, so they will make another one. The guest was no one I personally know who owns an entire property and offers breakfast. So feel free to say no. When you say breakfast, people will expect a Hotmail serial doesn't count as a breakfast. So even if you're planning to provide serial, don't even mention it and let it be a surprise to the guest. But in essence, you're not meant to provide any breakfast with the guest if it is an entire property. The next question you will have is, do you need to clean every day? Answer is no. You can charge a cleaning fee on Airbnb to the guest and please do not hesitate and charging the cleaning fee because people traveling on Airbnb are used to paying clinically everyone chart as a cleaning fee. So whatever it costs you to clean the property every time past the cost to the guest. But that cleaning fee is meant to clean only once after the guest leaves. You're not meant to provide any cleaning during this day, even if someone will be staying there for a couple of months, you are not meant to provide any cleaning if the need cleaning. This is a self service or accommodation. There is everything you can provide them, everything like your vacuum, a mop, and cleaning supplies. They can help themselves. If they need someone to come and clean the property, they will have to pay for it. But you, as the host, are not meant to provide any cleaning during this day. If someone is coming for a longer duration as a courtesy, maybe you can give them some extra towels and sheets so they don't have to worry about washing them and not having anything to use. But apart from that, there is no need for you to technically provide any cleaning during this day. There is washing facilities they can help themselves. Or if you don't have washing facilities in the property, you can point them to a laundry service nearby and they can go and help themselves. But do not hesitate in judging the cleaning fee to the guest. And that cleaning fee is only meant to pay for one cleaning after believe nothing in between. 24. Must hav'es before you start: Here is the absolute must-have list of things you should have in your property before you welcome your first guest. The first one is an identified process to pass the keys with the guest. Makes sure you have clearly defined what the guest needs to do when they arrive, where they need to go, where to pick up the key, how to open the door, and if there is any code involved, make sure it is passed to the guessed correctly. Yet, this process, very clearly defined and make sure you effectively communicate it to the guest. Check-in is so important, people will not forgive you if they had to wait for ten to 15 min in the check-in process, this is the most critical step of the hosting process and make sure you're checking processes clearly defined. It is easy to understand, it is foolproof and people will not struggle. Check-in. The second is comfortable and clean space or a guest to sleep. Cleaning is the most important aspect of this business. People will ignore anything else but not leaving. They will not forgive you. If the property isn't clean. Cleaning is the one part which can make or break your business to make sure you're cleaning always stays at the standard when you start. Keep all those checks and things in place to make sure there are never any mistakes made by the cleaner. The washing is done properly, the linen is properly laid out. There are no hairs on the bed, all that kind of stuff, but make sure there are no obvious mistakes made by the cleaners. The third one is toilet with Lou Rawls and handwash. These two things you will need to keep replenishing in your property. Make sure you have a procedure in place. What I do is my cleaners, they're the special instructions. Them are every time before the exit the property after cleaning, they have to go in the bathrooms and check for Lou Rawls, add if there is a handwash, these things can be missed very easily. You need to have a process in place to stop them having being missed. The next is Internet. Internet is so important for people, everyone, no matter whether they are traveling local or internationally. Everyone wants to have access to Internet as soon as the land to let their loved ones back in their home, make sure internet is working. When they arrive. If there is any hiccup, if you are having some problems with the Internet, make sure you communicate it to the guest before they arrived. At least if there were 24 h notice before they arrive that there is a problem with the Internet so they can make their own arrangement. But having someone come over to the property of the doubt and internet is going to lead you to a disastrous The next one is clearly mentioned on your listing. What is there in the property and what is not. Getting lots of five-star reviews from the guest is easy on Airbnb. And the only trick to get lots and lots of five-star reviews from people is to make sure you're listing correctly reflects your property. There should be no surprises for people. You do not want them to assume anything. Tell them clearly what they will find when they arrive at the property. If you have a list of amenities, make sure you mentioned it clearly on Airbnb. And if there is something very peculiar about your property, like it is next to a noisy restaurant or a pub, or a very noisy street. Makes sure your listing correctly reflect your property. And the next one is keep a big folder with all the user manuals of all the appliances in your property. People who will come from various parts of the world. They won't know all those things which you use on a regular basis and you think they are very common. They may not have seen all those things. And they will struggle with each and every equipment if they are coming from the other part of bubbles. Make sure you have all the instruction manuals in a big folder so people can easily access it. It increases their satisfaction level. It makes their experience more pleasurable one without having to call you every five or 10 min when they start cooking their dinner or when they start watching Italian, they don't know what to do with the remote and all that kind of stuff. Make sure keep all the user mammals in a big folder. The next one is easily overlooked when we're setting up a new property, you got a new property, you are furnished it, but you never slept in it for light. And I've done this mistake so many times personally. Make sure there have been those are properly dark, especially in the bedrooms. People in need dark room when they're sleeping for obvious reasons. So make sure your windows and blinds, whatever you have in your property, does properly cover the window and there are no spaces letting light in when people are trying to sleep. The next one is, if you are in a cold country, eating is essential. Make sure your property has proper heating. If there is any problem with the heating system or the boiler, inform the guessed in advance so they can make their own arrangements. You never know what kind of medical condition or health condition people would be. You do not want to surprise them with no heating there at the property. So make sure if you have any problems, let them know in advance, but try and have a proper heating system in place which people can effectively control. And people would want to control the temperature. Some people will find the same temperature too hot, too cold, and all those things. So make sure The control, the thermostat of the heating is there so people can adjust it as for liking the same for hot countries, you need to have a c in place. You need to have the thermoset easily accessible for the guests so they can control the temperature to their liking. And the last one is emergency service numbers. Make sure you display emergency service number in your property in a prominent location so people can access it in case of an emergency and try and pass the same emergency numbers to the guest in your messages as well before they arrive. So they can keep it handy. You never know when this small detail which you pass them to the guest wouldn't be so helpful and potentially can save someone's life. 25. Stage 4: Supplies: Next is key supplies topped up, okay. You will need to keep supplying cleaning stuff, essential items, toilet rolls, kitchen towels, all the paper towels and all that kinda stuff. You will need to keep supplying it. One good idea is if you are running a small operation, this is what I do. I just tell my cleaners to buy stuff whenever they are running low on something and they can just send you the invoices. Okay. And you pay them. This saves you an unnecessary trip to the property and the shopping, okay. If you're cleaner is happy to do that, let them do it. And they can they can bill you for their time and effort. Tea, coffee, sugar, et cetera. These kind of things clean. There may not be able to get it, but a good idea is to order it from online websites and get it straight diluted to cleaners home or straight to the property. And when the cleaner is there, they can set all of these things up. Okay. Leftover stuff. Again. There will be leftover stuff from the gas. Sometimes they will leave even the cleaning equipment as well, cleaning supplies as well. It's up to you. It's up to you and your cleaner if they want to use the cleaning supplies left by the guest. One of the most common item is they will leave there. Washing, sometimes carry sometimes guests carry their own washing detergent and all that kind of stuff. Let the cleaner decide if they want to use it or discarded. 26. The Five Phases of Airbnb Hosting: In the next few classes, I will be talking about by phases of Airbnb business. Over the last five years, I've helped hundreds of hosts getting started with Airbnb. And I've seen everyone goes through the same stages. Everyone goes to the same phase is o posting. These are going to be the five phases. The first one is going to be planning where I will tell you about all the things you need to keep in mind when you're planning to start having a short-term rental or Airbnb business. The second stage is going to be the setup base. Once you have ticked all the boxes in planning and you're ready to take the plunge, you start setting up your property. And I will be talking about those things in the second phase of this. The third one is operations. So once you have setup your property, then you move on to operations. You start receiving guests every day and then eaten it. It is basically looking after their purposes, how how everything works, making sure there are no hassles involved to the guest or do you or to the team? One is maintenance. Maintenance goes in parallel to operations. You have to stay on top of your property at all the time. There will be issues. Every house, every property has problems. Your property you bill also have problems and how to deal with problems when they occur during the guests stay or after the guests day. I will be talking about all of those in the stage four and the fifth stage, which is an optional stage. But a lot of people, they want to expand their business. Once you have a successful Airbnb business. And then there comes a stage where you want to take more properties under you. William, I will be talking about the various options, the various ways on how you can expand your Airbnb business and try and get more properties. Just like I did. My first property was my old apartment and then I bought another apartment. And then I realize I'm soon going to run out of money if I just keep buying properties. And that's where a scaled by business to properties to a 145 properties five years later. And these are all other people's property I'm managing from the comfort of my home and I will be talking about all those tips and advice as I would if you are looking for something like. 27. Stage 1: Check Regulations: Phase 1 planning is what we're going to talk about in this class. And when it comes to planning, the very first thing everyone should try and find out is the kind of regulations that apply to short-term rental or Airbnb business in your area. A city's councils around the world are trying to limit the growth of Airbnb for various reasons. And it is very common to have certain regulations being applied to short-term rental business in areas around the world. When it comes to finding that information, you do not really have to go into Google or Facebook or a forum and find that information from an unreliable source because sometimes people do spread rumors. Airbnb keeps a central repository of all the local regulations and restrictions apply to them in every area operating. I will drop this link to that repository in the description of this video. The very first thing everyone should do is go into that repository, drill down to your city or area, and find what kind of regulations by them. If you don't find your city or area, that's a good news. That means there are no restrictions for you, okay? But it's very important. The very first thing you check is kind of regulations that apply. Airbnb keeps this regulation page repository updated all the time. So it is fairly reliable source. You do not have to go anywhere else when it comes to finding this information. 28. Stage 1: Financial Viability: Next is the financial liability, okay? Once you have a mature they are restaurant. There are regulations you're aware of any area and it takes all the boxes. The second thing you should plan is the financial viability. And what I mean by that is, you need to keep this keep this in mind. Airbnb is not real estate. Okay? It says hospitality business. In real estate, you get one fixed monthly rent. Every month. You have a tenant staying there and you get paid monthly rent. There is a fixed income coming into your bank account. Whereas on Airbnb, because it's hospitality, there will be low seasons. There will be high seasons. No matter where you are in the world. There will be times where there are less people are willing to stay in that, in that area and they will be peak types. For example, in Edinburgh, we make about half of the monthly rent in January because that's the last one. Whereas August is the peak, we make about four to five times the monthly rent. There will be that kind of fluctuation in your monthly income. Okay. Can you financially take that kind of fluctuation, okay, Very important. You need to make sure your finances are robust enough to take that kind of fluctuation because they are building fluctuation. Okay. Next is try and find tax obligations and relief. So it's very common to have in a tax reliefs in areas in different countries. Speak to an accountant or advisor and tell them, Look, you're planning a star, the short-term rental business. You do not really have to register it as a business. In most of the countries, you just run your property as an Airbnb qualifies for a business benefits. Okay. So speak to an account or advisor in your area. Try and find what kind of revenue other people are Ligonier area on Airbnb sand. It's very simple. Gone to the Airbnb, try and look for properties which are similar to you, very close to your property on Airbnb and just go to their calendar and you can see what kind of monthly or nightly rent they're charging. And based on that, and it's fair to assume that everyone gets about 70% occupancy as minimum to look at various properties, how much they are charging, and assume that it is 70 percent occupied. And based on that work out, how much you financially you can you can expect monthly rent for your property on Airbnb, okay? This kind of financial analysis will give you that comfort and confidence you're looking for. Obviously, nothing is clear until you really start doing it. But these are, this is the due diligence everyone should do before you take the plunge. 29. Stage 1: Suitability: Next is suitability, right? When it comes to running an Airbnb, it it is your responsibility to make sure it is suitable for you and your guests, Okay? There are lots of things you will need to be aware off. The fourth one is exteriors. Is the prop the suitable Properties exterior suitable to run a short-term rental business? Is it is a decent amount from looking from outside. Okay. Is it would people feel comfortable coming into walking into such a property? Is it safe? Is it clean? That is not in middle of a junkyard back and let's think I've had properties where the interiors were great, but they will junkies. It was a very popular spot for youngsters to come around having drinks and all the hemispheres. You have to make sure the exteriors of barrier planning to start your Airbnb are safe, clean, people will feel comfortable walking in to your property. The next is interiors. Make sure your property has a decent enough interiors. There is no limit to what you can do in interiors, but as long as it has decent enough interiors, the properties well looked after and loved. It is clean, cleanly message very important. Interiors should be offered decent shape and accessibility. Again, if your property is wheelchair accessible, definitely make sure you highlight it everywhere in this tree property. But it's not just wheelchair, even if it is not wheelchair accessible. The how to make sure it is safe for people with kids, elderly parents, they're able to walk in or not, is even I am that key handover. You need to figure out how the key handler process is going to work. You know, how the guests will come, where they will pick the keys from, and how they would get into the property. And when moving out, how will they dropped the keys back? You will need to think of all these things at this point. Neighbors. Are your neighbors going to be okay with you running a short-term rental business. And sometimes neighbors are not so friendly and then bad happens. You may need to make them feel comfortable having a word with them, tell them, get them in your confidence. But this is what I'm trying to do. I will make sure I will be responsible neighbor. I would make sure you are not disturb and all this kind of thing. So make sure, you know your neighbors are comfortable with you're running an Airbnb. Safety absolutely. Must. Important topic. You have to make sure that the property is safe. Airbnb will not ask you for any kind of no safety certificate is ramping. It is your responsibility to make sure your property in a complies with all the local regulations in your area. So check everything you need to do to rent your property to any tenant in your area, get all those fire extinguishers for stead cared, carbon monoxide alarm, fire alarm, all those things in place because you know what safety is most important for everyone if it's in your interest and your best interests as well. When you highlight these things on your listing, people feel more comfortable and confident looking at privacy, you have to make sure the problem then the spaces we're the guest will be staying there. We'll get the kind of privacy they expect. For example, they should not be they should have their own private sleeping space. And even if you have a shared space somewhere, just tell them what it is like. This, explain them all of those areas where they will not have as much privacy as you would expect. But make sure there are no hidden cameras or no shared spaces, which are spaces which you have marked as private. Guessed. We will expect a privacy than they are in their private space, in bathroom, in the bedroom, and make sure you get that. Cleanliness is the most important aspect, okay? You will have to make sure the property stays leaned in, pop. The topmost cleanliness standards make sure in a year will be even after sometimes properties are so all, even when you clean it, it doesn't look clean. And that gives you a need to address all those underlying issues. And cleanly less is what I've seen is really makes or breaks a short-term rental business. You will need to make sure a cleaner goes there every time a guest checks out. Noise levels, you will need to pink noise levels. Is there a construction going on next next door, or is it on a very busy street, or is it in a city center surrounded by restaurants and pubs? Those kind of things. You will need to keep an iPhone. It's okay to have these kind of things as long as you set the guest expectations upfront, you know, if you have moist problems in a property, tell them in your property description. And even after that if the bucket can't complain, okay? But it's very important that you keep an eye on these kind of problems because people and they can't sleep properly made it, it's been, it's been very noisy. They will complain at believed to bad reviews. And eventually that leads to less revenue in your property. Proximity is again, very important. You can't really do anything if your property isn't very close to certain spots. But try and find these of convincing gas or this is how you can get to my property, although it is not that goes to that plate. Okay. If your property is close, absolutely. In Uganda, you're going to get lots of bookings if you are in the central area and the city. But if you are not close to the any of the places of interest, highlight how people can easily get to your property in your problem description, you will need to tell people, people will ask you these questions. And convenience is the next one. People should be, when they are staying, you know, they should be able to go and get some groceries and go to the supermarket, gets a Madison's, but make sure you tell people, you will. You tell people come into standing property that these are the places you can go to get groceries, Madison's hospitals, that kind of stuff. And you will need to come up with that list eventually. When people start coming in. 30. Stage 1: Identify The Processes: Next is identify the processes. So at this point, if you've, if you've checked all the boxes up until now, you will need to think of processes, okay, how different things are going to work out? The key handler is going to work. You have various options when it comes to, when it comes to passing though the keys to the guest. You can have a locked box. You can install smart lock. You can have a shop nearby passing the keys to the gas, it could be a meet and greet. But you will need to decide what is the best way that is going to work for you, okay? Identify your key handler process before you start hosting. Okay. Next is cleaning. You will need to find out who's gonna do the cleaning. If it is you're doing the cleaning or someone else doing the cleaning, it needs a commitment. There cannot be a slippage in cleaning as soon as the previous guest leaves, even if you don't have a booking straightaway, the good practices as soon as the previous guests leaves, get the property that it straight away. 11 o'clock. 11 o'clock or cleaners should begin. Okay? Because you never know when a booking arrives. So it needs a time commitment, then even if he if it is you planning to clean the property, value be available to clean the property at 11 o'clock, middle of the day. If you're working somewhere else, try and find some cleaner or can go there. But you will need to think of who's gonna do the cleaning. And obviously the linen comes along with the cleaning. As I mentioned in my previous class, It's a good idea to have cleaning and then done by party maintenance. You will need to think of maintenance. Who's my lookup to the property when there are maintenance issues? You're not going to be around all the time. Okay. And then there is a plumbing fault or an electrical fault who's gonna come and lean the property. So get all those numbers you need. Get all those contacts in place to show them the property. Remember the property, show them this is what I'm planning to do. Can you come and sort things out when there are there are problem will need to have a lock smith, you'll need a plumber, you will need electrical electrician and those kind of things, or a handyman know when things do go wrong, no matter what kind of property you have. There will be times when guests need to plan all those things, who's going to be your point of contact? And the last one is guests, check-in and check-out procedure. It's very important that you identify the procedure, not just for you, and it is also for the guest as well. What would you want them to do when they arrived? They pick up the keys and they walk into the property. Do you want them to check a few things and, you know, what happens when they check out? What do you want them to do when they are checkout? The newborn them to make a pile of all the tools in the bathroom, strip all the beds or not. You want them to clean the dishes before they leave the one them to put them all in the dishwasher. Newport though you want them to put all the limb in the washing machine before they leave bad, those kinda things you will need to think. There are pros and cons of each. But at this point, just think of your check-in and check-out procedure. If you're planning to pass the keys yourself, are you going to show them around the property then they give them the keys, all those things, just picture them in your head. And at this stage, very important because the more you think, more you plan at this point is going to save you a lot of effort and hassle. The long run. 31. Stage 2: Introduction: Hello and welcome to this class 4 of no-nonsense Airbnb program. This class is for you if you have a property which you want to rent or which you all know the rent. Or if you want to give a remote co hosting services to people around the world, widget, which basically means you don't own any property, but you help other people manage their properties on Airbnb remotely. Or if you want to start an Airbnb property management companies, you can you will find this program beneficial. My name is Prius shortly. I'm based in Edinburgh, UK. I'm one of the most experienced host on Airbnb platform. I started hosting back in 2016, and at the moment, and managing over a 145 properties in nine countries. And over the last five years, I've managed together one hundred, three hundred five-star reviews and it is growing. And independent. Airbnb, short-term rental consultant. And Airbnb engages me in various programs and part of their various upcoming internal programs. But I'm also part of their Airbnb Ambassador program there. I train people on behalf of Airbnb, which basically involves the connect me with people who are new to Airbnb and want to start, but they don't have experience or they haven't. Lots of questions and queries. Airbnb connects me with them. And I do a weekly webinar for all those people on behalf of Airbnb. I also run a website, it's called BNB specialists.com. So please feel free to hop onto my website. I do share lots of useful tips and tricks on my website. You might find that interesting. This class is going to be about the phase 2 of setting up an Airbnb. My first class was about, it's a five-step process. The first one is planning, which I covered in my last class, class number 3. This is class number 4. And in this class we're going to talk about how to set up your property and prepare your Airbnb listing to start accepting bookings and start receiving guests. Okay. So we will go into various steps, starting from furnishing their property and then move on to listing the property on Airbnb and then looking after the cleaning process, linen, and all those kind of the intricacies of setting up a property or setting up a furnished holiday lab property. Okay. So I'll see you in the first class shortly. 32. Stage 2: Furnish the Property: The first one is a varnish, the property. So obviously, you know, every property on Airbnb has to be furnished. There are various extents of polishing body. You have to provide basic amenities. For example, beds, kitchen towels, those kind of things you need to have about room for people to use and toilet in that kind of thing. So in summary, property should be furnished, okay. You cannot rent property which is not finished okay, which is empty. Now, when it comes to finishing their property, there are lots of mistakes people make and I'm going to cover all of them, okay? The first thing you need to keep in mind when you're setting up a property is do not purchase a substandard items. Okay. People I know what people think that I'm going to buy a lot of second-hand stuff from internet and then just gonna put it. And then people will come and stay and you will make a lot of profit. It doesn't work like that. This is hospitality business, okay? You might get away with substandard while nature and appliances, when you have a long-term tenant there, they don't really they can complain, but they cannot do any long-term harm to your peer business. Whereas on Airbnb, it's all about getting reviews from people in k. If you are using substandard items, people will start noticing them. Eventually it will lead to bad reviews. And it's in a medium to long-term, it is going to cause you a lot more money because of loss of bookings, then you'd ever safe from purchasing substandard items. Okay. So my advice would be it's perfectly okay to buy used stuff, but don't buy substandard stuff. Okay. Make sure the things you buy for the property are good enough. They are half decent quality. They shouldn't break easily and they should look loved and cared. Okay, That's very important. Do not buy substandard item. Trust me. Do not ignore details. Okay. It is going to be home for someone. People are going to come and stay in the property. It is going to be their home for a few days. And then they use sometimes you don't realize you're missing those smaller details. So when you're setting the property, for example, one common mistake people do is they set up new curtains, but they are not dark enough to make the room completely dark. Or they have small gaps and the light keeps coming. Just a very short example I'm giving you. So you have to make sure all the details are covered. There is nothing people will find which you could have addressed before them and how to resolve that. Once your when you are in the process of setting up your property, try and sleep. They're trying spend day or two or three days in your property and try and live there. That's when you really get to pick up the issues, okay. You do not really want your guests to find problems in your property? Basic problems in a property? Yes, we'll have complaints, but you don't really want them to find basic problems in your property though, and do the key to avoid that it stay in the property before you start UP? Yes. As add add as many items as you can. That is the third. It is about under promising and over-delivering, okay? You people should feel the value when they walk into your home, okay? Minimalistic, small, just a bed and a chair and a couple of hangers and couple of spoons and plates is not going to do do a huge favor to you, okay? You have two vowel, the guest, okay? And the key to doing that is when they walk into properly, they should look around and they should feel a value. Okay. Just try and make it like your own home, okay, get lots of paintings. Make it feel lived. Okay and loved. Get lots of paintings, plants all around the house, lots of different small appliances. Flower somewhere in the kitchen. Flowers in the bedrooms. Make it loved space. Okay. Just pulling furniture is not going to last for too long. You have to buy lots of stuff, especially in the kitchen. People do usually mess kitchen and they're setting the property. Kitchen is the most important, and I will cover that in the next few slides. But add as many items as you can. Because people, it will eventually add you to getting more better reviews in the long-term, which will add more fuel to your business. So do not try and save, bend your polishing a property. It's very important that you provide lots and lots of things for people use when they are staying there. Next is provide white linen. If you can write sheets, white toggles, white Dewar covers. There are a couple of reasons for that. The first one is, just like hotels do. There are reasons why hotels give white stuff. The first is it looks clean and it looks professionally cleaned. Then you have white stuff in there. People and they walk in the, if you are putting printed sheets and giving them colored tones, it doesn't really look professional. But if you have white stuff in your property, people will feel that it has been professionally serviced, okay, so try and make triangles white stuff. The second advantage of having white stuff is it is easy to get stains off. Okay? You can just bleach it when it comes to that. And the third advantage is when you have mixed color sheets and blankets and towels and that kind of stuff, it's very complicated to wash them because colors, if you have all white stuff, you can just put it all together, throw it in the washing machine. And that's it. Even for, even if you're using a laundry service, it is so easy for them to watch. You don't have to separate them out and all that and try and buy white stuff. It looks professional if you're really serious about your business, try and get the white stuff for your property. Kitchen is the most essential. Okay. I cannot stress this enough. No matter who's going to come and stand your property at some point, they will use kitchen try and get your kitchen as much full of appliances, getting them loads and loads of plates, spoons, cups, glasses so people can use them without having to wash them every time. For example, if your property sleeps for people, try and provide eight of each thing, eight plates, age spoons, ate it, glasses, that kinda stuff. It doesn't cost a lot to make a kitchen fully equipped. You will probably spend about $50 or 50 pounds in getting double of everything. But, you know, it, it, it adds a huge convenience to the people who are going to come and steal your property. Kitchen is the most important part. Get them all those small appliances and they get them at toasters, get them in small album. You can get a microwave. People probably are going to spend they're not going to properly, most of them cook a lot in your property because they are on holiday. They'll probably eat outside. And if they are eating, sorry, within your unit, we'll probably bring something do not heat up. So try and give all those things. Give them a lot of small, small things, even if you don't know that is four or if, even if you know that they're not going to use it, just get all those cooking pots and pans and spoons. Because when people open the drawers, they should see the value. They should see, oh my God, they would everything. Okay. And that's where that's where you get better reviews from. 33. Stage 2: Photography Tips: Next is get a photograph. So your property is now furnished. Again. You've got everything nicely laid out, you know, your pad around the upstate in their property and now you're comfortable that everything has been covered, all the basic problems have been resolved. It is now the time to get autographs. And when it comes to taking photographs, you don't really need to hire a professional photograph. There are Yuki disadvantages and it's very commonly done when someone starts hosting an Airbnb, they do hire these expensive photograph. They come with a lot of complicated equipment. Autos look amazing. But keep in mind, this is hospitality. You do not really want that the photographs to look better than the actual property is. Okay. It's all about under promising and over-delivering, not the other way around, okay? You might get better photos. You might be able to sell it to people. But when they arrive, they're not going to find it as amazing as it was in the photos. That is eventually going to lead you to bad reviews. And contrast is enough. You don't really need a professional photograph to take photos, you can do it with your camera, video, with your smartphone if you want. Hold it to your belly button, try and avoid your human eye angle because people, this is basic photographic or interiors. You need to give them a different perspective. And people say it is better if you take photos at a low angle and a high angle to try and hold the phone, your smartphone at your belly button and stand in all four corners of property and take photos. Okay. People would want to see a lot of detail. And k they would want to see every new corner of your property. They would want to see what kind of pots and pans are in the kitchen and what kind of appliances they will have access to. Open up all the drawers, give them the photos of, you know, what kind of spoons you have, what kind of play to how mugs, glasses, old appliances in the kitchen. Give them a view of the window. Give them a view of the property and trends, how it looks. If you have a garden, give them a view of the garden. All these things are a lot more important than having amazing looking interior photos or professional photos. Try and add as much detail as you can. Don't hesitate to upload a lot of photos, okay. For some reason I've seen people they want to not upload a lot of photos. I believe that's a very bad idea because When someone is going on that and once in a year holiday, they would want to see everything ammonia would be before they make a decision. So add as many photos as you can, make sure you add an exterior photo as well. It's very important for people to see how the property looks from outside. It should look clean and welcoming. Outside and inside. Unclutter all the spaces in your property, in open all the windows to let the natural light come in, turn on all the lamps and all the lights in the house, open all the windows and let the photograph, or you take the photos, try and get photos in the natural light. You would see Airbnb doesn't let people when they are doing their professional shoot that in the profession shoot for me as well. Airbnb send a photograph or to take my photographs. And the special instructions they gave to the photograph or is the cannot use any light. Okay. They cannot use any artificial light. It has to be in natural light. That's what Airbnb wants. And in fact, that is what is a good thing to have, you know, use your photographs should be in natural light. That makes it look close to what it is in reality. So make all the bands make sure the toilet seat is down when the photograph or is there an cluttered or clear all the kitchen tops and bathroom tops. Put everything in the drawers and then take photos, show the amenities you have, the guest, they will be able to use him, as I said, open all the drawers, even in the bathroom and in the wardrobes give showed them that hangers they will have access to. Show them where the iron board with the irony IN kept all those kind of small things. Whereas the vacuum, what can a vacuum you have, what kind of mob and all the kind of things that cleaning equipment you will have, give them as much as you can the more you can better it. As I said, make sure you open the bed, open their windows, closed the toilet seat. That is one of the most commonly made mistake. Don't usually in the clothes, the toilet seat, most people. But when it is when you're taking photos, it toilet seat should be closed. That's the first sign of an immature photograph or an immature host. And take images in the highest possible resolution. Okay? When you're taking from your SLR camera or we're taking it from your phone. The key to this is take the photos in the biggest possible resolution. There are advantages to this picking for taking portraits and highest resolution in the search ranking of your website, which I will cover in the next few slides, in the next few classes when it comes to optimizing listings for iron search ranking. But at this moment, just understand that you have to get the photo size and the resolution the highest possible once you have taken the photos, avoid sending them over WhatsApp. Because WhatsApp suppresses the image quality. What you ideally want to do is take the photos in the highest possible resolution and uploaded straight from your device onto AirBnB and without transmitting them here or there. No, because that's where you lose that resolution. It is very, very important when you take the photographs, preserve them. Even if, even if your photograph where is taking them, send them a message that I want in the highest possible resolution. It should be about two to three MB per photo. That's a good size. That gives a very good indication of a high resolution photos. Okay. 34. Stage 2: Airbnb Listing: Next is create Airbnb listings, the year partnership property. You have taken the photographs and now is the time to create your Airbnb listing on the website. There are, it is a science and I'm going to go too much detail later on in my classes when I'm going to show you how to optimize your listing so that it appears at the top of the search result. But for this time, I will just stick to the basics of what you need. Or creating a listing is very important that you have all these things. Otherwise you won't be able to be a dealer listing. First one is, you will need a computer, not a phone. Airbnb. A phone app is basically meant for messaging, or it is mainly focused towards people who are traveling on Airbnb. It's not really meant to create listing. Better. You use a computer when you're creating a listing because then you get to see a lot of options. Okay? Another very important thing to note when you're creating your listing is the first time and you're creating a listing because Airbnb wants to make it so simple for everyone. You know, less their property. You don't get a lot of options there. Just show you a few basic steps. You can add your title description, upload photos, and that's it. Okay. Don't be confused because that is what Airbnb wants you to do. But once you publish your listing, wanted public, once you press the Publish button, then on the next screens, it takes you into an entire new world where you can go deep into setting up your property and amenities. You have the pricing, secured, the security deposit and all that kinda stuff. So the best practices when you're creating your listing is create your listing when the first time, just use a bare minimum details and publish your listing once. Once it is published, unpublished straight after, and then work on creating a proper listing because at that point you will have a lot more details to work on. Otherwise, the first step is just basic stuff. So user computer, when you're creating a listing, don't try and do it over the phone. You will need an email address. So we know you should have basically an Airbnb account and U4 degree at an Airbnb account, you need an email address. And the you will also need a phone number. They will send a text message for number is kinda of mandatory nowadays on Airbnb to be able to register an account when you're creating your account as a host and at 1 and they keep changing this. That's why I won't mention where it comes. At the time of recording this lesson, the new publish your listing for the first time. That point they stop and they ask you to verify your identity. They will ask you to upload photocopy of your ID card. It can be a driving lessons, it can be a passport copy, and it will ask you to pick a live photo. It's self explanatory. I won't extreme explain the process how they do it, but you will need an ID proof when you are registering your property on Airbnb where computer. And obviously you will need your property photos, you know, as I said, try and upload photos in the original quality. You took them to amend. It can be reformed. It can be a DSLR, trust for it straight to a computer and then upload them on Airbnb. And the last one is amenities list. Obviously you will list, you will need to list down all the amenities you have on in your property because Airbnb has an ever-growing list of amenities section where you can take different boxes. I have this, I have this. I don't have this. I have this. I don't have this. At that point. Is make sure you understand your property completely. You try and create a list and take as many boxes as you can. On the amenities section on Airbnb is very important because that really helps you in getting higher search. Now also, if you have something in your property y-naught, tell it to people by ticking the boxes. If you don't take those boxes, no one will know that you have a problem. You have that magnitude in your property. So try and take as many boxes as you can when you're listing your property in the under them in section. 35. Stage 2: Setup Key Handover: Setup key handover process is the next step. Now you want to install or you have identified the right way of the most suitable way of passing the keys, what are the guest? And now is the time to establish that method. The first one is obviously manually parsing the keys. If that is the option for you, you can pass the keys manually. But I had said earlier, it is not a recommended option. People do not really want to interact with someone when they're passing clinical data, collecting the keys because not just because of COVID and all that stuff. People always preferred self check-in because mainly because they don't have to coordinate their labeled with someone. It can be laid that can be early. And there is an automatic process of them getting the key. They don't have to form someone that I'm coming in so and so time. So try and avoid a manual passing the keys because people don't really want it. Even if you have to, if this is the only option for you, if if you live on the property or if you live next door is fine, you can just do it, but try and not engage them in a conversation. When you're passing the keys, make sure they have your phone number and tell them to reach out to you if they need any help. Okay. The next option is you can install a lockbox. It it's cheap device. It it has a combination lock on it. It has police safety. Normal can really break into it. Very difficult to break. And you give the four digit combination cord to the guest, the US use it and open the lockbox, pick up the keys from it and lock it back in. And then living at the time of the checkout, they drop it. They open it again, the drop the keys back in and lock it again. Simple as that. It's a, it's a very cheap device. It costs about 15 to $20 or pounds. They come in various options you can find you can stick them on the wall, you can hang them off the railing or stick them on the tree and that kind of stuff. It's a cheap device and it works okay, more than 90 percent of the Airbnb is, at least in UK, operate on that 15 pounds lockbox. So if you do not want something sophisticated, you can choose a lockbox. The next is a Smart Lock option. If you want something sophisticated in there, you can go for a Smart Lock option. Smart locks are smarter than we think. They connect with Internet and they connect with Airbnb. And when someone books your property, they automatically send a unique code to the guest. That code is valid only for the duration of their state, then it becomes invalid as soon as the checkout time arrives. So yeah, it gives you that much in no additional control over your property. I own my properties. I have the smart locks installed and it gives me lots of various options. For example, my cleaner, she doesn't have she has a code that is valid only for the duration of the cleaning. She cannot just go into our property and the other time. So in a smart lock gives you a lot more options. Even if I had to let a meter reader or a handyman into the property, I can just open the door of my flat by pressing that button on my phone. So it gives you a lot more control. But they are expensive. They are expensive than a lockbox about 10 times. So for example, in UK, you can buy a lockbox for 15 pounds. And the Smart Lock comes to about a 150 pounds. They're more expensive, but they are very easy to install. Okay. So you will need to replace your main door lock. And the way they are designed is you just take your old one out, put the new one, and so they're very easy to install. You won't leave, you won't need a lock smith or a joiner, that kind of stuff. If you're if you're if you're comfortable with your handyman skills. But it is an option, it is a good option, okay? The last is a key handler service. If nothing else works for you, there are third party key handler services. Key nest is one of them. What they do is they speak to all the local shops in areas around the world. And the database boosts shops which are open for extended hours. They basically do the key handler for you, okay? If nothing else works for you, sometimes it is not possible to manually pass the keys or install a lockbox or even install a Smart Lock and can't be smart lock has a limitation. You cannot. You can install it on your own door, but you have a communal door before arriving to your property. Smart Lock is kind of useless at that point. So key handle or service solves all these problems. Because then a local shop, which is open for longer hours, we'll do the key handler for you. So try and look for those, those options. A key nest is, I believe, a worldwide know nothing else works for you. You can choose PNS. 36. Stage 2: Get Home Emergency Cover: Get home emergency cover is the next one. In you being a landlord. The most important thing being a landlord is have that peace of mind that your property is covered. Even if you are not around, you might be on holiday, you might be travelling, might be in hospital. And what if something goes wrong? And for that, I recommend gap, the home emergency cover. Most of the countries you get these landlords, insurance emergency covers, try and get something like that so that guest can reach out to them if the country too, and display their phone number in the property and tell your guests that if if if they can't reach you and efforts in emergency, they can call that number and they will come and sort them out. And it shouldn't cover lots of things. You know, plumbing, for example, in the UK, we have British Gas, landlord's insurance. It covers all the plumbing or electrical issues, even problems with EC, it covers boiler. Boiler if you're in a cold country, boiler is very important. Most of these landlord insurances, they cover boiler and AC and that kinda stuff, washing machine, dishwasher, stove, and all those kinds of things. You know, they're very important for people. Want to make sure it is always working and there is no bad experience or Benji who someone's life. Try and get a whole emergency cover. It gives you the peace of mind. It doesn't cost a lot. It costs about 20 to 25 pounds, is what I've seen in UK. It, depending on where you are, it could be cheaper, it could be expensive. But trust me, it is worth Walter because it takes your stresses away. 37. Stage 2: Ensure Safety: Next is ensure your property is why are safe. So Airbnb will not ask you for any kind of safety certificates or anything else. Okay. It is your responsibility to make sure your property complies with all the local regulations or Tannen. Okay. So just go onto whatever the city council or whatever is in your area, find out what all appliances and safety instrument you have to provide to make sure that the property is safe for people to stay. This mainly includes fire alarms, carbon monoxide alarm, fire blanket, hosted kid. And now note that these two things, fire blanket and foster kid out not usually required as part of the rental regulations in most of the countries. But I would still recommend that you provide these two items that don't cost a lot. You don't have to buy industrial scale or stud kit or a fire blanket, just get those domestic. My blanket and first-aid kid from Amazon or any of the local website is put them somewhere in the property so people can see it from a distance, but at a certain height, so people and their kids can't temper and it can reach them easily. But I believe you should try and provide everything you can because you never know it might save someone's life one day or, you know, it, it may protect you against any kind of liability claim because you've done everything from your end. You have all the safety certificates your required locally. And on top of that, you'd given them fire blankets, fire first aid kit, everything you have done you could do on your own from your end to try and make the properties extremely safe. But Airbnb will not ask you for any kind of bacteria. Or 30. 38. Stage 2: Setup Cleaning & Linen Service: Next is a setup cleaning team. So you will need to have your cleaning team in place even if it is you planning to do the cleaning or if it is someone else you're employed to do the cleaning, you will need to have sodium tanks. The most important of all is having a cleaning checklist. No matter who was cleaning it, you knew you should have two kinds of cleaning checklists. One is a long-term, one is a regular cleaning checklists which you will hello every time you are cleaning the property, that will include things like cleaning the toilet, cleaning, no. Wiping all the surfaces in the kitchen, vaping all the surfaces in the bedrooms, wiping all the doors and that kind of stuff. Changing the linen, changing them sheets and blankets and that kind of stuff. Whereas the second calc and kind of living checklist you will need is the deep cleaning checklist, which will include all those areas which are not practical for you to clean every time. That will include changing the mattress protectors, changing, washing the cushion covers, blankets, all those areas which are, which are difficult to reach, for example, top of the cupboards, windows from outside, glucagon and those kind of things. Okay. This is hospitality. If you do not follow the deep cleaning checklist, the dust will start building up and people will start noticing that the properties naught, well looked after. It's very important that you have these two kinds of winning checklists and regular cleaning chat checklists usually includes make the bank's lean and put obeyed the dishes. You may choose to let the guest put away the dishes. It is a good idea if you have a dishwasher, Just ask the guest while they're leaving, asked them to put all the dishes in the dishwasher and started so that the new cleaner comes to that point. The dishes are already clean and they can just take them out and put in the pelvis. Okay. Sweep and mop, floors. Cleaner has to lean all the areas on the groundless as well. Vacuum the carpets and rugs, clean, toilets, showers, everything has to be wiped clean every time the cleaner is there and take out all the trash towards the end, wipe all the countertops, door handles, light switches, everything has to be whatever has been touched or could be touched on a regular basis. You have to clean every time we are cleaner is add a property, check for damages and report low inventory is one more pain you're cleaners will have to do every time they need to keep an eye on on their family. If any damages, people do sometimes at Washington cost cause damage at the fail to report view. For that in a year, leaners job is because cleaner is your eyes and ears there. They're cleaner is there every time when someone leaves and the cleaner has to keep looking for any kind of hidden damaged. Sometimes people trying to hide the damaged as well. So European or has to be no smart enough to pick those items as well. But, you know, in summary, you clean it has to keep an eye out for them. And also low inventory in a, you have to give soaps and shampoos and T's and coffee. That kinda stuff. You cleaner has to keep an eye, keep topping them up if you have the storage or inform you when something's start going low. And the last one is keep tabs on supplies in toilet and kitchen, for example, kitchen toggles, toilet rolls to keep going low. So you have to have a certain procedures, certain place that every time guest is arriving they should leave 12 other tool for each guest in the, in the bathroom, and they should lay one, each enroll in the kitchen. So those kind of things you're cleaner, we'll have to keep looking out for and keep topping them up every time because these are central supply. And combined to that is linen service. As I said earlier, it is better that you have you're leaning, and linen are both being done by the same person. Because it becomes extremely complicated if you have a separate team doing the limb ban and a separate team during the cleaning. There is too much to coordinate within those three or four hours of cleaning. So try and get the same person responsible for both of these things. If you're cleaning team does not have washing facilities, they can take it to a laundromat Okay. On their way or close by. I try and do that, something like that. Cleaning cannot finish without rash laundry. So it becomes very, very complicated because the cleaner is there, the fresh laundry isn't there. The offender threshold or a person comes to cleaner has to be ready with the dirty laundry for them to take away. It becomes extremely complicated and for that reason, I always recommend get one party responsible for leading. And Lynn 39. Stage 2: Handyman & Locksmith: On-call handyman and lock smith is the next item you need to get in place. You don't have to sign an elaborate contract with these people. You may not even ever need a lock smith, OK, and handyman. You might need time to time. But it's good to have these two people under your wings because for example, Locke Smith, then, whenever the need to come and give you a new key, they need to see ID, proof of the person and the proof of ownership and that kinda stuff. So get them to your property. Ask them they can ask you any kind of ID proof they need to see to establish your identity. And tell them, look, this is what I'm planning to start. An Airbnb in this property. You can have a look around if you have any question, just ask me save my number. If I give you a call coming can you come and sought problems out? Okay. That is all you need from that exercise. Will have their phone number it with you, and pause here for a number to them so they can save it. In case of emergency, there are no hassles. You give them a phone call, go down there and the soul of the problem, okay. Very important. You need to have a handyman on-call. Time to time. You will need a handyman for small things. I won't give you examples, but all those things which go, do go wrong in all the time in our homes. But getting these two people's contact details and having them, you know, I used to your property is very important. 40. Stage 2: Setup Payment Process: Setup payment process is the last topic in this class. Now, if you take my recommendation, keep one bank account or all year Airbnb business. Because there will be so many transactions you don't realize will be doing on a daily basis. Okay. Like in a utility bills, purchasing supplies for the property, would items, decorated items, cleaning supplies, now paying or cleaners being four, council tax and all these kind of things. And it becomes very, very complicated if you mix it with your own Bain account. Because it, it becomes so easy if you have all going, all the money coming in from Airbnb and all of the websites into one account and you make payments from that account but or whatever is your outgoing is. You can open your bank account at any time and see how your business is doing without having to calculate. Okay. It makes it so easy for you to just print out all your bank statements and send to your accountant at the end of the year and then they know exactly what you have made. There are tax advantages in most countries for running an Airbnb. It makes it super simple. So try and get dedicated bank account for your Airbnb business. Setup. All payout methods, a setup, set it up under your payout method on Airbnb account and all the money that's coming in should be going into that account and all the payments you do strictly should be done from that account. It keeps things super easy, nice, and tidy, which is what your objective should be in right from the beginning, simplified things. You don't spend your energy on things which could be quite right. 41. Stage 3: Guest Communication: We're now moving to the base 3 of Airbnb business, which is the operations phase. This is where everything is now set and people start arriving at your property and what are the key things you need to look after? So the first thing in this phase is you need to be looking after is the guest communication, okay? Now, gotten off pointers and couple of advice if I can give you is the first one is a test okay. To send extra information as long as it is posted at the right time. Okay. People will appreciate when you've given them extra information. Do not try and be creative. X tell them exactly what they want to know in a very clear way. Okay? For example, when people are due to come to my properties, I give them different travel directions from all different places. Like if you're coming by bus, follow this. If you're coming by train, follow this. If we're coming by airport, holidays, if you're driving, follow this. And in that followed this, I tell them step-by-step way of how to get there. And Google tells you all that disciplined to Google enter from train station to your property and tell them exactly in a step-by-step instruction to turn left off to a 100 feet and turn right after 200. And feedback kind of stuff give them, people may matures to just completely ignore that because it's a good idea to give them a Google map location of your property as well. And people might just choose to ignore all that and they'll know exactly what they need to do with that Google link. But you have given them everything they needed and more. Some people will appreciate that. Okay. And give it give it at the right time. You know, don't send them a check and instruction six months in advance. It is generally a good idea to send check an instruction seven days in advance. The entire purpose of your communication strategy with a gas should be to provide them all the information they need to stay at your property is not just the travel directions. Tell them of house rules or dial your house rules. Tell them of all the safety. Thinks there is an extinguisher. This is where you'll find in five boosted kid the silver, you'll find a blanket, mentioned it all in your checking instructions. Tell them off water your checkout rules would be needed to do when they're leaving. Okay. And also mention whether the water is drinkable in their property and that kinda stuff in and make sure they know exactly everything they need to do when they arrive in the property. Okay. If there is a switch, they need to turn on as soon as they arrive. How they can turn up the heat, how, how they can control the temperature in the property, and all that kinda stuff. Give them enough information as much as you can. Most people will appreciate it and reduce guest queries is another motive. You know, you want, you do not really want them to be calling you for something which you could give them in advance, give them all the information they need. The other thing is in a make the Guest field rest you're around. It's very important. The guest will message you at, no matter what kind of information you give them, some guest will still ignore all that and message2. And when it comes to responding to guest queries, especially during the stay, it's very important. The new respond to their queries very, very quickly. Van, they are staying in your property. It's okay when there still are their home, they're planning their trip. It's okay to respond to them couple of hours later, or maybe falling day if it is not an urgent query. But when they are in your property, you know, you need to make them feel that you're around. And the way, the best, best thing to do is respond to their query very, very quickly. Even if you can't answer it. Just acknowledged that. Thank you. I've received your message. Let me just call you after I finish this something. Okay. But it's very important to make them feel your around and accessible all the time. And the best thing to do that is messaged them, respond to them as quickly as you can. You may not be able to solve their problems every single time, but responding to them as quickly as possible is the most important thing. 42. Stage 3: Arrange Cleaning: Next is arranged a cleaning. So you will need to arrange cleaning at the best practices. As soon as a guest leaves ghetto cleaners in your cleaners, if your checkout time is at 11 AM, your clean those should be cleaning the property the same day within our okay. Make sure your property is always ready for the next guest. Don't delay, don't wait for the next resolution to come and dance and the cleaners, It's a real bad idea. Okay. As soon as the guest checks out, get the cleaners over there Okay. So that they can clean the property. Now, the reason for that is there if there is any damage to the property, you'd really want to send someone there straight after the guest leaves, because time is of essence when it comes to raising claim against the guest, 30 percent of the reservations are made within the last 24 hours in this industry. Okay. For that reason, always keep your property ready. Very important. Always asked the cleaning team to set the property for maximum occupancy. Again, if your property let's say you're probably sleeps for people and you provide and an air bed forward foot fifth person. Whenever someone requests it, makes sure your cleaner always mix up beds for four people and there is everything the fifth person would need is there in the property because let's say your your property no one has booked for tonight, you're clean, that is there. And at the last minute you receive a booking for five people. And the cleaner didn't put the fifth everything the fifth person will need. So you will need to now run around and make sure everything is there for the fifth version, it's a really good idea on this. Keep your property ready for the next guest for the maximum occupancy. Purchase when you're purchasing the linen and stuff, purchased three sets of everything. You should have. One in use, one set is in use, the second set is in washing, and the third set is always a spare, okay? Because, you know, these sheets and towels, they have a very short life. Usually they last about six to eight months. And you will need to change them so you will need to buy the next set anyway. So why don't you just buy it straight away when you're buying, bank them in the first time. So you can replace them without having to go to the shop when there is a stained toggle. Okay, so it's a good idea to keep a third set in the store. Manure. There is a problem or the guest needs and extra pair. You can just pull it out and give it to them from there. Okay. Keep cleaning supplies stocked in the property. So it's a good idea to keep all the cleaning supplies and everything out in the open. The guest can use it as well, as well as your cleaner. So keep it all in the open, but don't keep all the big boxes laying down there in the open because people are likely to misuse them and all that. So keep all your extras sloped. But cleaning supplies vacuum, more people should have access to make sure you have a cleaning checklist. You know, I'm not giving I'm intentionally not giving you a cleaning checklists as part of this program because every property is different, you have to use your common sense. You need to have your cleaning checklist as, uh, as I mentioned in my previous class, you need to have a regular cleaning checklist and in deep learning checklist. So make sure your property has everything. In a year you would need for a regular clean and a deep clean that just score on the property and make a cleaning checklist. Share the cleaning feedback with the team and the people. There will be times cleaner, missed things, or guest notices, something which could be done better. And when it comes to that, don't hesitate to share the feedback as it is with the cleaner. Okay? Because if you don't tell them, they won't know it every time you receive a negative feedback or not. So positive feedback or any improvement scope from the guest. Make sure you feed it back to your cleaner. No one will able to see the internal comments. Gas leaves and they're cleaner is less likely to go to your listing and keep a watch on the reviews. It's your problem is your responsibility to keep your cleaner updated with the kind of feedback you are getting for the cleaning they are doing. 43. Stage 3 Manage Check in And Check out: Next in operations is managed check-in and check-out. As I said earlier, check-in is the most important step of them, tire hosting journey. So from the time a guest books in property until the checkout and leave the property. And in the end, the lever review. The most important step in their entire process of a guest's journey is the check-in. Need to make sure that check-in is as smooth as possible. If they had to wait at the property or if they even struggled to get to the property, even if, let's say the taxi driver lost their way and it took them another half an hour to get to your property. Guest will not blame the taxi driver. It will be your fault that the instructions you give them who are not the accurate enough. Okay. So make sure you provide them and checking instructions so they go straight in without having to worry about finding your property. You are getting into the property or getting into the keys. Guests should be able to pick up the keys and straight get into the into the property. That's when you know you have one the cast. Okay. Now, it is irregular exercise. Every guest, you have to have a check-in procedure and a checkout procedure. There will be times people will ask you for early check-in and late checkout. Okay? Now, for you as the host, it doesn't work because it just creates more hassles for you. You will need to either finish cleaning early or start cleaning late, and it just creates problems for you. So your standard answer for such things should be no. Okay. On top of that, you know, your insurance becomes invalid. If you're if there are guest people, if the guest is in the property before the check-in and all that. Okay. But leaving all that apart, there will be times when people will ask you for a check-in and it it does, I must admit it does help you get a lot more reviews. Per gay people do have a positive experience when you let them drop the luggage or stay out late, but at your expense. Okay. So try not to do that too often. I do allow the check-ins, checkouts when people are traveling with kids or they have some physical mobility issues, that kinda stuff. But my standard answer is apologies, I cannot let you stay in the property before the check-in or after the checkout, but I can arrange luggage drop off for you. So and it's okay to let them come in and drop their luggage and leave the poor property straight after and they can come back in once the check-in time starch. Okay? But there are few key things you will need to keep in mind. Don't allow the previous guests to drop their luggage behind. And at the same time, don't ask the next guests to come in and drop their luggage O allele as well. Because it just creates a mass. They will mix their luggage and if they see each other, it doesn't really leave a good impression unless you tell them both that this is what is happening. Okay? I've been burned in the past. Don't get things so complicated that two guests we are both trying to access the property the same time and they both have their luggage in the property. Okay. First lesson. Don't lead. I'm a late check-out and an early check-in at the same time. Okay. The second thing is then the late checkout. Okay. Then the guest leaves their luggage behind and they say they will come and pick it up later. And let's say they come to our Slater and your cleaner has finished cleaning the property for the next guest. Now, the problem this leads to is for those two hours guest was going around in a city, whatever they were doing. When they come to pick up the luggage there, we'll try and use the toilet. And they will try and get a drink, a glass of water, those kind of things. And that is going to leave traces behind for your next guest. So when you allow the gas to leave their luggage behind, always make sure you tell them that when they come to pick the luggage up, they can't use the toilet or anything else. Our stem to leave their luggage near the door. They should open the door, pick their luggage and out. Okay. Otherwise, they're going to leave traces behind. Your next guest arrives and they will notice it, and they will complain that the property wasn't clean. Okay. That's why I'm saying these things only complicate things for you. It is not really worth it. Early check-in is fine, but late check-out is slightly more complicated. Also, when you do allow check-in, early check-in and let's see if you're cleaner, is there try and not let them access the property too much. Okay. Inform the cleaner that sometimes I will allow and if someone knocks on the door and if they wanted to drop the luggage, take their luggage from the door, don't let them enter the property because, you know what state the previous guessed left the property. Okay. And that could leave a bad impression. First impression is a bad impression. Let's say if there were a lot of mass and I'm telling you from experience, okay. The previous guess, divorced, staying there for a month. They cooked, they partied hard, and the property was at mass. Okay. And the next guess arrives just to drop your luggage. But when they open the door, that is what they see. Okay. And that is good, leave a good experience for them, okay? So it's very complicated when you allow them to check in early or late check-out, try and avoid that. But if you have to allow make make sure you keep everyone informed, a well-planned okay. Because it can lead it can lead to a lot more complications. 44. Stage 3 Troubleshooting Before Stay Issues: Next is troubleshooting, right? So you will have problems okay. At various stages of a guest's stay. They will have problems before the stay and we will talk about they will have problems during their stay and after the state. And these are just most most common problems I have seen. But I've seen a lot more than this, but there were extreme circumstances. But I will talk about only the general problems people do have and how to best deal with them. The first one is the guest will say, I did not receive the check in instructions and I am at the door. Okay. Or they will say I'm arriving tomorrow. But you will not send me the check and instructions. Okay. Now, because and I'm going to tell you in the next few classes that how you should automate all this. So then you know that you have sent them a check and instructions and they've just been careless. They have not read it. They've not been reading a messages. It is easy to tell them. Is it? It is easy to just send the instructions again to them, but never do that. Okay? It is only going to make things worse for you because venue do that. Guest is going to take an impression because it is an ignorant guest rate. They're going to take the impression that they have to ask you or they had to for new van, they were add the property to ask for instructions and you did not give them instructions beforehand. Okay? So when this happens, always try and make sure you make the guest read your previous messages. Okay. Even if they are standing at your door, tell them Look it. Do you have access to your phone? Can you read my five last messages? And the instructions are in there. They might say, Oh, well, can you just tell me how do I get him? Tell them, sorry, I'm driving. I will need some time and let them spend five minutes trying to figure it out because it is going to leave a good impression when they find that they will apologize where they find your previous message. We are, you have send them everything. They easy. The low hanging fruit is you just give them the instructions and they get in and they forget everything. But that's not going to happen. They're going to leave a review in the end. Next is they will say I can't open the lockbox. The most of the people, they do have the lockbox somewhere close to the property where you give a combination lock to the guest when they arrive, they using the combination lock, they opened the door. They get they open the lock and access the keys. Now, sometimes people will not understand how to access the lockbox, how to open it out to enter the keypad. When that happens, you don't, you don't need to react. Straightaway. Guest will call you and say, I can't open the log box. What do I do? Tell them to keep trying. I will call you back in five minutes because most of the times it's just a matter of time they have to figure it out. Okay. Within five minutes or maximum ten minutes, they managed to figure it out themselves. These things are not so complicated, right? They will manage to find the way out. Okay. Just give them 510 minutes. You don't have to rush to the property straight away or send a response to him straight away, give them time. In the worst case, asked them to ask a passer-by do help them open the lock box. But usually 90 percent of the times I've seen these problems, they just sort themselves out. Okay? You don't need to react every time straight away. Next is people. They will say, I want to cancel, please refund. Okay. Now it's a, it's a, it's a very tricky topic. People who want to cancel 24 hours before their arrival. Depending on your cancellation policy. Sometimes they do get a refund, sometimes they do. They don't write. The key thing to note is anyone who's canceling a reservation on the day of the arrival. Airbnb will invite them to write a review for you. Okay? This is controversial, not ideal, but this is how it is. Okay. Anyone who cancels at reservation on the day of their arrival, Airbnb lets them review the property. Now that's when it becomes a really critical for E from your perspective. Because now you have a guest who's asking for a refund. And if you don't give them a refund, they're going to write you a bad review. Okay? So the best the best option in these scenarios is all this. Tell the guest, look, I'm willing to help you, but please consider that because you're canceling this reservation so close to your arrival, it's highly likely that I'm not going to be able to sell these knights to anyone. Okay? And because of that, I'm just going to lose money. What I can offer you is you cancel the reservation. And as soon as someone books these nights, I will refund you the same mode of money. Okay? What I've seen is people are happy to accept this and no one has come back to me trying to argue with this because they know technically they don't get anything better idea, bad review. They just want their money back. And then you give them an option. When you are not meant to give them an option. They appreciate that. Okay. Even if you don't refund them, I've seen people do not really leave a review or a negative review when this happens. Okay? So very important when somebody's canceling Within the last, on the same day of their arrival. Be very careful, be very respectful. You very cautious of dealing with them. If somebody just canceling few days out of there before their arrival and just be just wanted to refund. You don't really care, just feel free to refuse it. Make sure they cancel it before the day of their arrival. If they're still not canceling it, offer them some kind of a refund, but let them get their booking, cancel that before they arrived. Trick them into making do that. 45. Stage 3 Troubleshooting During Stay Problems: Next is during state, right? So now people have arrived at your property and they are having problems. They will say Smart Lock code doesn't work. Okay. The given them a code for the door or for the lockbox, and it doesn't work. Okay. When this happens, all these the forced response should be, can you tell me where you are? Can you send me a picture of the door or the lock you are trying? Okay? In 90% of the cases, guess is trying a wrong door. Okay. You can cut all that. Confusion. Are asked them to send a photo and that will go to 90% of the times. They are just trying AT wrong lockbox or wrong door. That will solve the problem. If nothing else, you just need to send someone or it is always a better idea to keep a lockbox nearby within the vicinity of the property. So you can lead them to the secondary key, which they can use to open the door. Okay? The door won't open. Again. First thing is ask them to send a photo where they are. Now the other correct. Property. Give them five minutes. Denote tell them Let me let me call you in five minutes and give them that time for them to try all different options. And then if this, if it still doesn't work, they ascend to the photo, the error, the correct door, send a response. Something isn't working. Okay, so very tricky question. Someone will say the TV doesn't work, okay? Some, some people will say the stove doesn't work or something. Any appliance in your property doesn't work, okay? Now, you need a bit of preparation. Do kill all these kind of problems from the start, okay. In need to leave a guest manual in the property. It is going to be the user manual that came with the appliance point in the guest, too bad. Okay. If they are just struggling to operate a certain feature of the appliance and it doesn't work. If the appliance is simply not turning on us the undertone, check the switch, but ask them to send a photo and again give them 510 minutes. Usually they figure it out. If they can't sends a MANOVA. But having a usual manner user manual does really help most of the times when really the appliance itself, the stops working. Okay. It's mainly the features they are trying to use. For example, your washer dryer isn't drying my clothes. That kind of a problem, right? It is just that they're using, they're trying the wrong settings. And when that happens, you just give them some time, point them to the user manual. Try and find some YouTube videos where you can send it to them. You don't really need to rush in, sorted out, don't pan out for them by going there. Now, the next is parting guest. It's always tricky. Someone calls you from the neighborhood telling you there is a party going on in your property or someone somehow you get to know there is they're planning to have a party. It's already tricky guests. They are probably drunk or high on something else. The first message, the best way to deal in these situations is you send them a message first on Airbnb, make sure you keep everything on Airbnb. When these things happen. Send them a message on Airbnb telling them, Look, I've been informed that there is a party going on in my property. This is a guess my house rules and I would need you to leave the property. Okay. This is when you're so ten that there's a party going on. Okay. You just want them to go. So thank them. A message. Tell them I know there's a party going on. I need to leave the property. In 90% of the cases. Guest formed restaurant. Okay. And when they do, they will say no, there is none. There is no party going on. I just have a few friends. We're going out and all that kind of stuff. And this is I'm talking about when you really want to kick them out. Now, event they argue and they don't respond, which probably going to happen. The next message you send is, look, yeah, I'm giving you 30 minutes to leave my property and I'm canceling your reserve in and cancel that reservation, okay. Even if it doesn't lead to cancel, call Airbnb and inform them at the same time. You don't need to cancel it because you can't really cancel an active preservation. Tell them that your reservation after 30 minutes, I'm going to call the police and you will be trespassing my property. Okay. You have to leave my property. I'm giving you 30 minutes. Now when you send this message, it triggers a response. They will straight on answering a message. 50% of the times they're reading the messages. The other times that is too drunk or enjoying with their friends on them. This is the third time, okay? The year you send them polite message, you send them a strong message, and now you're falling them. Tell them, Look at you, your voice has to be strong. Be very assertive. Tell them, I know there's a party going on. I'm not forcing you to argue or know find out whether there is a party. I just want you to Lima property in 30 minutes or 15 minutes, whatever you're comfortable with, You have 15 minutes leave the property. Otherwise, I'm going to call the police because after 15 minutes, you're trespassing my property. Okay. Now, this I've I've used districts so many times. I've never had to call the police. But when you tell them these two words, police and trespassing, they will get out of the property. Okay. Try this. If nothing else works, really literally called the police. Okay. They probably weren't alive very, very quickly. But you done everything in your spoken to Airbnb. You have phoned the police, you've done everything. There is little much you can do a case or between the police and let them sort it all out for you. Next is the place isn't what I expected. Some people will. Passage of this happens very rarely, but it well, the forced response should be okay, Please. I'm apologize for that. Please tell me what is it that you don't find? As per expectations and ban they say, make sure it matches your description, property description or not, okay? If it matches your property description, that's a day we're expecting the property to a cable or satellite TV. And in your property description, you're clearly mentioned there is only Netflix at can they say so this point them to your listing. Tell them, apologies, but here is my advertisement. I've never promised a satellite TV. Apologize, there is nothing. Okay. Then there is a genuine problem than you you just clearly missed something or the cleaner has missed something, or they just don't see the property of the same standard as they saw it on the listing. Apologize profusely, you know, keep apologizing, but make sure you're listening to them. Find out if they're asking for a refund and if you feel it is a genuine mistake, it is a real mistake from your end. Don't hesitate to offer a refund because added at the end of the day is you just want them to stay. Otherwise, if they leave, you're probably going to lose that that might anyway and you will have to get through cleaners back in there and USU will lose a lot of money. Try and offer them a discount. Try that, try and offer them a refund. Keep them quiet. Don't let them speak to Airbnb because if he had been refined so that your your property description is misleading, they are going to start for Nino and making penalties and you next is I am locked out. Okay, so this has happened to me as well. When this happens, secret key, which I mentioned in my previous lesson. Secret key is the key. Okay? You need to have a second pair of key somewhere near the property. Okay. It can be a 15 pounds, $15 lockbox, which we know you can stick anywhere within the vicinity within the walking distance from the property, lead the guest to there, and they can help themselves with the key. That is the key there is, you know, otherwise you'll just have to send a response team with a key or getting locks with to the property. 46. Stage 3 Troubleshooting Atfer Stay Issues: So next is after stay problems, the guest arrived at the property, they had a nice day. And the next is after state. Okay. These are the few problems which I have noticed happen more frequently than the others. First one is misplaced or stolen household items. Okay. So let's say you find nice painting you had in the living room which is missing. The first thing you should do is masses the guests. As soon as you figure that out, that asking them there was a painting, The denote isn't a new place it somewhere else. Okay. Depending on what the gases most of the times they say no, sorry, I didn't even notice it or see that. Now, the next thing is you need to report it to Airbnb. Thinks like this item is not damaged. It's just missing. Okay. It's difficult to prove that it was there, but you have to make sure you have a property photo on the listening, which has that item. Okay. Take a photo of the missing items. A. Let's say it's a painting for taking a photo of the missing wall. Next is because you need a couple of evidence. Get your cleaner to drop you an email telling them that they arrived at the property and they didn't find the painting because that is an evidence for you because you cleaner has stated in an e-mail in a written communication that the painting is missing. Photo of the empty wall along with the cleaners photo is enough. Now you need to start a claim and get the reimbursement from Airbnb for that missing painting or any other item for that matter. Okay. It's highly possible that if they break something it's, you will find it in the bin. So have a look in the bin. If you find the broken item, take photos and attach it to your claim. Next is people will leave things behind and they will ask you to send it to them. Okay? This is very common. Again. The best is to remind them a day before that. You check out this tomorrow, please make sure you leave you take everything with you. But if you leave something behind, there is going to be an additional service charge for getting the items back to you along with the postage and time and effort. Because you're not doing it for free. You do not really want people to leave and it's tough because it is just additional hassle for you, which can be avoided. What, when people do leave things behind, make sure you time, new, charge them for their time and effort. And nothing is free. It is them being ignorant, so they had to pay for it. But make sure you time you charge them for your time. Whatever time it takes you to package that item, take it to a post-office and send it to them and whatever is the actual cost, be very upfront with them. Tell them, oh, sorry, I found your watch. It it's gonna cost you X amount of dollars. Are you okay with that or just tell them, look, I found it. It is at my property. It is at my house. Can you arrange for it to be picked up from here? Pass it on to them. And in that case, you don't have to charge anything extra because they are arranging the delivery and the pickup. Now, a bad review. Okay. No one can avoid a bad review, at least for too long. The be all end up having bad reviews. This is hospitality. You cannot really please every single person that arrives at your property. Okay? So when this happens, the best thing to do is write a public response to that bad review, okay? Whoever is reading that bad review, they will be able to see your response to that to you as well. Okay? And when you're writing a response, don't have another go at the guest. You know, it is. Your response to that bad review is mainly for your future guests. You add in no way want to go down to mud slinging in this response to a bad review, okay. Try and highlight the positives the guest had, even if they didn't mention any positive, right? Highlight all those things which could go wrong and they didn't mention it and highlight them as positive. Okay. But do you have to twist the bad review into a positive and make sure you being, you sound onerous to you. You come out as honest and that if it was an honest mistake, excepted people do understand you're not a professional, you are not a hotel. And they will see the honesty in your answer. Be very honest. But try and stay positive in your response. Damaged items. Again, it's, it's a very common problem. People do leave damaged stuff behind. Sometimes people are so nice, they will come and tell you upfront that this is what has happened. And Apple Pay for the for the damage. And in those cases. And it's supposed to choice for me that if someone tells me that they've broken something and it was if it was a small amount, I will absorb that cost. Okay. Because at desk because they've been so kind to tell me by themselves. But sometimes it's sought unfortunate that people they break things and they don't even tell you. And on top of that, they try and hide stuff and that's when you go off to them. Okay. So there will be times when you will have damages. You will have to at some point make a decision whether it is worth your time trying to get a reimbursement for that item. Or if it is a small item, because it takes time and energy to get money back from Airbnb. You will need to raise damage claim. It goes through different processes. You will need to write responses and all that. If it is worth your time or effort or not. Okay. If it's a broken glass, probably not. But if it is something more expensive, yes, absolutely. Go for it if you have plenty of time. Now, when it comes to raising a damage claim, there are a few key things to note. Airbnb has recently in November 2021, they have released a new kind of rebranded their damage claim insurance. Okay, it's called air cover now. So up until now, they wanted the host to raise a claim. As soon as they figured out there is a problem. And before the next guest arrives, okay, That leaves host to be the very short window to start a claim. For example, the have the previous guessed left at 11 o'clock. Then UV found the problem at one o'clock. You have to start a claim before, you know, three o'clock. So that isn't always practical. And Airbnb era realizes that as a weak link and they have addressed it, okay, Now they've taken that condition off and then you literally have 14 days to raise a claim. They have given you 14 days, but it doesn't really mean you do that in 14 days. Okay. It is still a good practice to raise a claim as soon as you notice. And I'm going to talk about that in this slide. Second thing, I do notice when you raise a claim, you have to give them enough information to make a decision, okay? Three key rules. Who are raising a claim, although they have given you 14 days, timing is as fast as you can be. Okay. Don't wait. Start a claim. You will get an opportunity to revise your claim later on. Not it's not always possible due figured out the correct the overall extent of the damage. It may take you an hour or maybe two days to figure out how much it's gonna cost to repair this. It's okay to start a rough claim. You can let say if you if you have a broken bed, for example, right? You don't have to and know the precise cost of repairing or replacing the bat bought menu. And let's say it is going to cause eventually it's going to cost you $1000. Start a claim for $1500. Okay? Take the upper figure. Because the way it works is when you raise a claim, it first goes to the guest. They will have certain 72 hours to respond to your name. And then once they have declined or they have not responded to your claim, then you can involve Airbnb. There there will be a button that appears there after 72 hours, and then you press that. It will start a process of involving Airbnb in that claim. And that's where they will give you another opportunity to update your claim. You can update the figures, you can add more items, you can remove items from the damage and all that. Okay. So start a claim with the higher amount because for the $1000 claim, let's say you raised a $100 resolution claim from the guest. And let's see if they accept that. That means that 900 is going to go from your pocket. So that's why it's very important that you start the claim with a higher amount than you expect, okay, always to cover your losses. So the three key rules are the first one is timing as fast as you can as soon as an OT is a problem, start a claim, you can revise it later. But starting is very important. Take as many photos as you can. If you don't have many photos and you're expecting a lot of photos to come. Don't wait for too long. Next is evidence, as much as Zoom. You can provide. Take lots of photos. At the moment, Airbnb doesn't allow you to upload videos. So take lots and lots of photos from various angles, directions of the damage to the property. And the next is receipt. Okay. When you finally get the damage replaced or repaired, make sure you get an original receipt from the person who did it and get them to sign with the pen on it. Okay. Airbnb for some reason they wanted to see signatures on the claim. It's I understand it is not always possible to get someone's signature, but when that happens, you know, just get the delivery person or someone do sign on the receipt. Okay, that's very important and that's what Airbnb wants to see. 47. Stage 4: Cleaning Checks: Hello and welcome to this no-nonsense Airbnb training program. Next is phase for the maintenance phase. This includes looking after your property on a regular basis, making sure it still stays in the same shape and order and you're able to deliver the same kind of quality to the guests when you started. Okay. The first thing you need to keep looking after is the cleaning checks. Okay. No matter whether it is you're doing the cleaning or if you have a great cleaning team, you need to visit the property often and look at few things such as dusting. Okay. Dust starts building up in certain areas which are not usually covered in a regular cleaning exercise. So you will need to visit and make sure you're cleaner is following the deep cleaning routine. From time to time. There could be other places which are cleaner is just a regularly missing. Okay. You will need to go there and highlight all those things. Okay? This is hospitality. You need to stay on top of things. You cannot really wait for the guest to start complaining and then you fix it. Okay. You need to stay on top. Thrash him up. We know that things like blankets, cushion covers, curtains, they may need freshening up. You will need to go there and pay special attention to things like that. Poet is discard leftover stuff. This is a very common problem, okay? Guest will leave a lot of stuff behind, especially the foodstuff ok. Kitchen is will usually be left. They will leave a lot of stuff behind. The rule of time-based. Anything which has been opened goes in the bin. Anything which is still not open, which is still in its original packaging, cleaners may keep it aside and you may let the other guests the next guess use it, but informed them informed them that we are keeping packaged stuff left behind by the previous guests. Please feel free to use it. But if you don't want to, just leave it there, okay. Some people might really appreciate all the time. You will gather a lot of stuff in the kitchen. Also, people will leave stuff behind, such as suitcases or their old clothing and that kinda stuff. And even they will even their precious items, sometimes they will leave behind, okay? Now, the key to this is sometimes guest will ask you to send their leftover stuff over to them. Okay? Now this involves your time and effort. Make sure you charge the guest for your time and effort. Make it clear that if they want their stuff left behind delivered to them, you are okay to do that. But they will have to pay for the postage plus the time and effort involved. Oftentimes it is not worth your time being involved in things like that. And the best practice in that case is tell the gas that I'm going to pass through the number of the cleaner and I will let you coordinate with there with my cleaner. Okay. And at the same time, inform your cleaner bad, this guest is gonna call. Please feel free to charge them for your time and effort. And if you want to ship them, their items, when free to do so, this way, you get out of the equation. Let the guest deal with the cleaner and the guest won't paint that you are trying to take advantage of the situation they are in, okay, it's very important that you let you stay out of this. 48. Stage 4: Improve: Next is improve, improve and improve, okay. For the full six months, always listen to gastro views. This is the period, this is the golden period. Then you will get the maximum value out of the reviews. Okay? People will highlight problems which you never, ever taught off, okay? So pay attention, pay very close attention to the reviews. Make sure you act on each review. Okay? If there is a feedback for the cleaning team, make sure you pass it back to the cleaning team. If there is a feedback about your property or the directions or the accuracy of the property you've described. Update your listing k. If there is something which every guest is pointing to which is not clear in your listing. Keep updating your listing based on the feedback you receive. Again, five-star review on Airbnb means. And Airbnb makes it abundantly clear to the guest when they're revealing your property that give them five-star if the property matches the description of the property on Airbnb. Okay? Now your entire objective should be at this point to make sure your Airbnb listing correctly reflects your property. Okay. It won't when you start, but if you keep working, based on the reviews you get, you will get you will get there, your property will start reflecting offline and online. Okay. Keep improving. Respond to reviews as well. When guest leaves a review, if it is a good review, reply to that, that this basically indicates the future guests, then they're looking at your reviews. They will see your response to every review. They will appreciate that you are spending time and you are you are careful about your hosting business and you're doing everything you can. Okay. Thank you. Thanks. Thank the guest for their time for taking time to review you and your property. There will be times when you end up with a bad review as well. Okay? No one can make more a bad review for too long. You will end up having a bad to VO2 to deal with. Now, Airbnb warmed, remove a review just because you don't like it, or just because it is bad or that is factually correct. But you should always write a public response to the bad review. Okay. And when you're writing the bad response to the bad review, make sure you keep in mind the future guest. When you're writing your response, you want to come out as a winner out of that. If it was your fault, if it was a genuine problem, except the problem and highlight in your response that the problem has been addressed. You have taken all the corrective actions and in the end, highlight all other things which the guest didn't mention, okay, turn them into positive feedback. Tell them that this guest had this gap, had this problem. Otherwise, you can notice there was no other problem. They had a great stay, no check in issues. Cleaning was great. That kinda stuff in the unique to twist the bad do you into a positive review at the end. Okay? But there will be times when guest is simply being unreasonable. Okay. And it's okay to fight back at times. You will, you will you will notice this. You will notice a pattern. When a guest wants a refund, they will start complaining and complaining and complaining. They will keep messaging you. That simply means they're after something. Okay. Let the guest ask for a refund. Okay. Let them ask for a refund. Sometimes they do mention in their chat that they want to refund. Otherwise the human right to review, okay, if the CSO that is not allowed on Airbnb and you can report it to Airbnb. No one can tell you that they're going to write a good review. If you give them a refund, that is blackmailing. Okay? So let the guests say something like that and report it to Airbnb. Or don't always be scared of bad reviews, okay, They will happen, but it doesn't really mean that you have to accept everything no matter how unreasonable the guest is. You have to fight them back sometimes. And next is don't mess with Airbnb customer services. Okay? Airbnb is super strict. Okay. No matter how unreasonable the Airbnb customer service representative you're talking to is. Okay. No matter how dumb they are or no matter how competent and incompetent they are. Make sure you always respond to them in a very formal way. Okay? Don't mess with them because they can do a lot of harm. They can report to you. If you've written something wrong in the chat. They can block you, they can get to you off the platform, okay, so be very careful when you're dealing with Airbnb customer services. Now next is then how best to cancel. Then you need to cancel. There will be times when you just you probably double booked or there is a problem in the property, you discount all the guest. Now, if the guest is about 24 hours away from their label, you can cancel it online by plus of a button. You just go to the reservation and plus cancel. If the guest is arriving within 24 hours. Airbnb won't let you cancel from the platform. You have to give them a call. In either case, it is always a good idea to not cancel from Airbnb platform. Always phone Airbnb and explain them the problem, okay? Now the cancellations everyone gets, if you are instant book booked host, you can get three instantly booked. Bookings, canceled every year. Okay? So in simple words, if you've had three bookings which were instantly booked, you can cancel them every year. Okay. The fourth reservation the fourth cancellation will lead into a review, automatic review or no listing. Airbnb will post that, that this guest cancel the reservation and they will permanently block your calendar. Now, the trick is Airbnb. When you call Airbnb Every time they will say yes or no, I appreciate that. And request them that can I get this cancellation done without any penalty? And they say that that they are keeping a track and this is your toad cancellation or food cancellation, but they don't really keep track. This is what I've seen. So that is why it is always good to call Airbnb dat way. Sometimes depending on who you're talking to, they will cancelled reservations, the doubt any penalty. Okay. There is a very strong chance if you speak to them nicely, request them and they will cancelled reservations for you without any penalty. However, if you cancel it from your Airbnb profile, it was oil will always go through that automated process or your calendar being blocked and then automated negative review posted by Airbnb. That is why I'm saying all this call Airbnb. Most of the times I've managed to get cancelled, even if it was my tenth cancellation for that year. They don't seem to keep a track of how many are cancelled over the phone. Okay. Next is be very careful with the last minute cancellation by the guest. Now, I've been seeing until now that you cannot someone has to stay in the property to be able to write a review. Okay. It is not always true. There is an exception to the entire pain. If a guest cancels on the day of their arrival. Airbnb Sam's them attribute request. Okay. They will be able to leave a review a. And I know this is controversial Airbnb. The reason Airbnb gives is that they should be able to review the kind of experience do you have offered to the guest up until that point? Okay. So when the last minute cancellation happens, most in most of the cases, the gas 2 will ask you for a refund, can be very careful when you're dealing with them. Keep in mind that they are going to be able to write it would be for you. The very polite, no matter no matter, you know that they are lying, just be very polite because he is. And when they ask you for a refund, it is a very tricky situation. Okay? They will say my train has been canceled, flight has been canceled. I can't come can you offer me at refund? The best answer to those questions is be very honest and upfront with them. Tell them Look, if I if I give you a refund, your canceling it anyway, My these nights are very unlikely to get booked again for such a short notice, I will let you cancel. And if I get a reservation for these night, I bill for you. That's the amount of cash back. Okay. So if the guest cancels, don't offer them refund, but if someone else books the same night, I will give you the money back because as long as I get paid for these nights, I don't care. Okay. Tell this to the guest. The it has always worked for me. Guest always accepted because they know that if they stick to the cancellation policy, they committed to, they won't get anything back. At least you're giving them an option. Okay. After that, most of the times you will get a booking, a cave. About 50 percent of the bookings do happen within a week. There is a strong possibility that you will receive last minute booking as well. After that, it is up to you how much refund you want to offer to the previous guessed. Most of the times I've seen they just forget about it because and they won't even write a review. But the only thing they will remember, as you were nice to them, you at least give them an option when you are not even meant do. Okay. 49. Stage 5: Expand: Next is Phase 5, which is the expansion phase. This is not for everyone. Some people are just happy with the property they own, but some people do want to expand their business. Some people try and purchase a new properties. Some people try and arbitrage new properties which are rent to rent. And some people try and figure out different ways of managing properties. In my experience, there are a few options for you to get started with. The first one is co-host as much as you can, okay? If you are looking to just expand without buying properties, not everyone has enough cash to keep purchasing properties. Even the arbitrage business needs a lot of cash because you will need to pay deposit. You will need to have spare cash to pay rent until year business starts giving you a profit and you will probably need to flourish the property as well. Now, the perfect model in those scenarios where you don't have a large sum of cash is to manage other people's properties, okay? In my experience, this is the most collaborative way of expanding your business. It doesn't need money. It needs a lot of time, effort and dedication. Try and co-host as much as you can. Okay? Reach out to people around you, to your family or friends, or your neighbor or anyone you know who's hosting on Airbnb, ask them to add you as a co-host on their listing and try and learn from there. Okay, try and enhance their listing. Try and get them more bookings. Try and automate their communication. Try and learn the art of dynamic pricing. All of these things, once you have, once you have learned the skills, offer it for free, okay, when you're, when you're starting, just don't look for money. Look for experience, okay. You need to gain experience at, at certain point. Then you start selling your experience at that's when you make money, okay? Don't be greedy right from the beginning, reaching out to friends and family, telling them you will charge them 20% commission and they will manage your property. They know that you have no experience in this and no one really wants to pay someone who's going to learn on the job, Okay? So offer it for free or for a very minimal amount. But the objective should be not money to gain experience. Okay? Once you have started learning and you have a few profiles on your, on your, on your Airbnb profile, you have few listings on your Airbnb profile. Then it starts getting that. Wait, okay, then you can start reaching out to other people and start to offer your core hosting services. Because once you, when you have five properties on your Airbnb profile menu, go to people. They will listen to you. A odd learn the art of creating an optimized Airbnb listing. And I will do a follow-on session on that as well. You need to learn the art of creating Airbnb listing. Okay? Once you have learned that, you can just offer no listing creation services to people, okay? This model can take you so far away from where you start, because you may start with creating listing for people, but eventually they are your ideal customer who once you've done a good job with their listening, you optimize it well. At that point, offer your costing services to them and they're more than likely to purchase your coaching services because you've been great. You optimize the listing. It works perfectly. They're getting lots of bookings and you need to tell them that you will keep the momentum up. And the next one is networking. You will need to network with people like minded people who are within the same space. Go to these property network meetings in your local area where all the people who are business minded, who are landlords come? No, Tell them the kind of business you do and what kind of returns they can expect from Airbnb. Not all of them will be familiar with how Airbnb works and the kind of returns they can expect, okay, introduced them to the Airbnb model. Tell them, what do you do. Show them what do you have managed to do so far for the people you're managing it, their properties. It won't work all the time, but you will get various people who are cash-rich, who got a property. And if you give them the resource, the skill they need, they will take your services, okay? These are few key things you can start working on. But the key thing is we don't really need a cache in this. All you need is skill to learn and a lot of dedication. Okay? It has worked for me. I've seen it working for lots of other people as well. And I'm sure if you just keep working on it, it will work for you as well. 50. Absolute Must NOT Have's: These are the few absolute must not have in your Airbnb at any point. The first one is a surveillance device as a camera microphone in private spaces. You should not have any kind of interior camera in your property, be the living space or any other space. If you have, just remove them, don't even leave the device. They're just remove the device. Airbnb is super, super, super strict about these things. If the guest complaints that there is a camera, even if it is working or not, won't give you a chance to even explain and share your side of the story. They will simply block you from the platform straight away and they won't hesitate in canceling hundreds of your future bookings. Make sure there is no internal camera or even a hint of a camera in your property. It's okay to have some exterior cameras if you have an entry door camera or if you have exterior cameras pointing outwards purely for security reasons, which is okay. But make sure even those cameras are clearly defined on your listing on your Airbnb listing, there is a section where you can define the cameras, where they are, what they do and all that kind of stuff. Makes sure you correctly and accurately populate the surveillance devices on your listing people when they are booking your property, they should be able to clearly see where the cameras are and what they are for. And at no point you should have any kind of interior camera capturing any kind of sound or noise picture of the guest. The next one is a weapon on the property. There should not be any kind of weapon, even if it is a decorated sword or something like that. If there is any, just remove it, store it. You do not want to get into any kind of trouble. People come with kids and all that stuff. It can make things complicated unnecessarily. The next one is undeclared. You should not have any kind of pad which you have not told the guest about e.g. I. Remember I use to help manage some of their property. It was a big farmhouse and gentlemen didn't tell me that at the end of the farmhouse they had a small yard where they were keeping dogs and chickens and that kind of stuff. It is a strict no known if there is any pet at your property, you need to clearly declare it. Airbnb again, will not listen If the guest reports any undeclared pet at the property. And the next is bed bugs or insects. If you have any of these problems, if you have any kind of infestation or bugs in the property, make sure you do the corrective action before the guest starts coming to your property. Airbnb is again super strict. If the guest complaint about these things, they will not listen to you. They will just ask you to get a professional treatment done and move the guest somewhere else while you get all those professional checks and things in place to make sure your property does not have these kinds of problems. And the last one is loud noises such as construction or traffic noise in the sleeping area. People should be able to have a quiet night sleep. If your property has these kind of a problem, if it isn't a busy area, the first thing you can do is make sure you clearly describe this kind of a problem in your property listing. So when people are booking, they are aware of the noise levels in your property? Something like this is what I do. I have a property which is in a very noisy area. And what I do is I write the first line on my property description says, this property is in a noisy street. If you are a light sleeper or traveling with kids, please do not book this property because it can get noisy, especially on the weekends, nights. That's me done with that. If someone's still wants to book it, they cannot complain. But make sure you describe these kind of imperfections in your property that the guest in your advertisement, they are aware of it when they're making the reservation. Please make sure you have gone through all these things. And trust me, you do not want to deal with any of these problems because it is a nightmare. Airbnb can remove you from the platform if any of these things happen. Even once. 51. Airbnb Arbitrage The Biggest Lie Being Sold On Youtube: See, every time I hit up YouTube, it is the same story, flashy thumbnails, big houses, and promises of making millions through AirBNB arbitrage. It is catchy, right? But let's cut through the hype and see what is really going on with AirBNB arbitrage. Is it a true path to the richest or just a cleverly marketed fantasy? There is no such thing as free lunch. Ever noticed a common thread among all those rental arbitrage gurus teaching this on YouTube. They are all selling something. Usually a training program, and that's their main game. They are not just sharing advice. They are selling you a dream regardless of whether it is practical or not. And often, what looks like a five, 10 minutes informative video is just a disguised advertisement for their training program. That is a huge red flag. What they won't tell you is this model is not for everyone, and it is not the one for you if you don't have thousands of dollars in your pocket to spare. The arbitrage model means you will first be looking for a suitable property by knocking on the doors of tens if not hundreds of suspicious and uneducated landlords. Everybody gets suspicious when you tell them, Oh, can I rent your place to rent to somebody else? And finally, when you do manage to find a landlord who agrees for this, then the property has to be in a desired location. It has to be a desired property on AirBNB. Then you still have to furnish the property at your own expense, and by this time, you've already invested a couple of thousand dollars, and you are legally responsible if anything goes wrong in that property. With the hope that you will get plenty of bookings all through the year, your guests won't cause any damage to the property. They will leave great reviews. Neighbors will have no problems with it, and cleaners will always do great job. Regulations around AirBNB won't change. You will make thousands of dollars in the process. And you will repeat this process several times and build an extensive AirBNB portfolio. But the reality is different. Firstly, if the property is mortgaged, the landlord will most likely be in breach of the terms and conditions of the mortgage provider as most lenders do not allow AirBNB in a rental property. Secondly, your nightly rate and occupancy levels depend entirely on how great your reviews are. A few bad reviews from completely unreasonable guests will dry up your bookings in no time. You will be left with an empty property, utility bills, a monthly rent to pay to the landlord until the lease runs out and a pile of furnishings to get rid of. And let's assume you don't face any of these problems. Simply listing a property on AirBNB with amazing looking photos doesn't get bookings. It is a highly competitive market, and only the properties appearing on the first two pages of the search result get bookings. And in that case, you will be waiting for bookings just like most existing AirBNB hosts are struggling to make profit in the business due to lack of booking? The arbitrage model works only for commercial license properties. It is meant for professional host with deep pocket and a lot of experience in hospitality industry, and it is not for someone new to this business. Stay away from it if you have no prior hosting experience and a lot of money to spare. So what really works? The AirBNB business model, I will tell you needs no investment. It is scalable and it works. This is the method by which I succeeded in this business, and it is definitely not as glamorous as AirBNB arbitrage, but let me briefly take you back to when I bought my first property to rent on AirBNB, which works really well, and one year later, I purchased another property. But then I realized I couldn't just keep buying more property as I would soon run out of money. This is not scalable either. However, what I did was, in my first year of hosting, I learned all the intricacies of being a great host, how to price a property, how to optimize the listing, how to automate all the communication, and most importantly, how to get bookings. So instead of buying more properties, I started reaching out to other hosts in my area. I showed them how much revenue I was making and how many bookings I was getting. I told them, I can do this for you two. I would offer them one month's free trial of my skills. If they like what I do, they can pay me a small commission, and if they don't like it, they can just ask me to leave. There is no obligation. People would throw their keys at me. It was a no brainer for them. And with just word of mouth within three months. I had 35 local properties to manage. It was good money, but there was a problem with this model. Because I was local, people were expecting me to be their property manager who would deal with all the issues in the property whenever anything went wrong, they would expect me to be on site and arrange repairs, et cetera. But that wasn't me. I was the techie guy. I was a smart guy who knew how to make AirBNB work in my favor, but I wasn't someone who would deal with boiler or AC problems. So I decided to change my strategy. In the next six months, I gave all those properties back, and I started looking for properties far away from me in different cities and even in another country, so people do not expect me to be there for maintenance issues. And this is how in summary, I grew to over 250 properties worldwide. I had the skill, a skill which I could offer in exchange for a commission. This model needs no investment, no skin in the game, and no risks involved. I had no financial liabilities to look after. I simply offer them a solution to their problem. The hosts I work with were either overwhelmed by the operations or did not even have bookings. I built systems, processes around these things and used technology to apply and automate all those processes. Stuff like communication and pricing is all done by technology. And I just implemented these processes in all those properties. See, the way to look at it is that many AirBNB hosts are landlords in their 60s and 70s and not all of them are well versed with technology. And if you are someone who can fill that gap for them, they won't hesitate to pay you a small commission to do all this heavy lifting for them. So the bottom line is to learn the intricacies of running an AirBNB business first and offer them as a service to other hosts who do not have time or resources to do it themselves. Reach out to your friends or family members, your neighbors who are doing an AirBNB already. Offer them help for free, help them do it better, and in the process, learn how it all works. And once you are comfortable, start offering it to other people for a commission. And that's a rap. Catch you in the next video, keep watching and happy. 52. When and How to Choose a Channel Manager: Video is to help you solve the mystery of channel managers. There are so many out there. Everyone says you need one, and it can be very confusing to the hosts who are new to this business with all these technical terms used by these companies in cleverly designed marketing plans to impress new hosts. The reality is not every host needs a channel manager, and I will cover when you should think about starting to use a channel manager, the pros and cons of using it, and the features you should look out for. Stay tuned, and as always, I will keep this video to the point factual because I respect your time. So let's begin. What is a channel manager? See the basic function of a channel manager is to keep your calendar and pricing in sync across different websites. This way, you don't get double bookings, your price remains consistent everywhere. So if you list your property on just one platform such as AirBNB, you don't need a channel manager full stop. Another key point to note is when you connect an external software like a channel manager to your AirBNB listing, usual AirBNB commission, which AirBNB charges hosts increases from 3% to 15%, except for people in US and Canada. That is a 12% direct decrease in your earnings. Make sure you use it only when you really need it, and the software you choose is worth it. Don't just go for it because everyone is talking about it on social media, or because you see their advertisements every time you play a video on YouTube. Now let's look at the key features these channel managers offer, which ones are really worth the price. Apart from the essential calendar and pricing sync, there are dozens of add on features these softwares offer, such as automated pricing, Unified, inbox, dynamic pricing, reporting and analytics, PMS, multi channel integration, Owner and staff portals, direct booking website, mobile lap access, integration with third party systems, and Smart Home tools, and accounting module. Now, looking at this list, it generally sounds impressive. But to most people who are just starting or have one property, this list can look confusing to say the least. But the good news is, you don't need most of these features. Let me explain what I mean by that. Let's start with the first feature, automated messaging. Every channel manager offers this. With this feature, you configure your messages once and the channel manager will automatically keep sending those messages to your guests. But do you know AirBNB, VRB, and all big platforms nowadays give this functionality to hosts for free. For example, you can do the exact same thing for free using Airbnb's message automation tool. So this shouldn't be the primary criteria for you to choose a channel manager. Next is Unified inbox. With this feature, you can access all guest messages in one place without having to log in to different websites to check messages and respond to them? This indeed is a time saver, and it is a basic feature everyone offers nowadays. Next is dynamic pricing. Channel managers simply facilitate the integration with an external dynamic pricing software, which you will need to purchase separately at the cost of an additional cost. The dynamic pricing software will send the price to the channel manager, which will then sync it across the different listings you have on different platforms. But on the other hand, all dynamic pricing softwares offer a direct integration with all major platforms as well. You don't necessarily need a channel manager to use a dynamic pricing software. You can still use them by directly connecting them to your AirBNB, irb, or booking.com listing. Next is reporting and analytics. It does exactly what the name says, and it initially may sound great, but you may not use it as much as you think unless you have a massive portfolio of properties and owners to report to. Plus, most of the platforms like AirBNB, VRB provide similar reports to hosts for free. So this should not be a qualifying criteria for a host with just a couple of properties, I believe. Next is PMS, which stands for property management software. It is mainly for managing day to day operations of your staff, inventory, and customer management. You definitely do not need this feature unless you are running a big hotel or a big team to run your day to day operations. For that reason, it shouldn't be a qualifying criteria. When you are choosing a channel manager for your short term rental because you simply won't use it. Next is multi channel integration. Now, this is a biggie, and one of the most effective selling point these software companies use to impress inexperienced hosts. They will show you dozens of websites you will be able to list your property on, and they will sync your property on all of them. It sounds very impressive and a brilliant idea because the more websites you can list your property, the better it is right. Not really so. The reality is twofold. Firstly, it takes a lot of time and energy to create a listing on a platform and to maintain it regularly. Secondly, the only platform which gets booking nowadays are three AirBNB Vrbo, and booking.com. Any other platform you list your property on is simply going to distract you from focusing on these three platforms. You should feel lucky if you ever receive a booking from any other platform. I too fell for this marketing gimmick when I started many years back, and I learned this the hard way. Take my advice and don't let them fool you. AirBNV,vRb and booking.com is all you need to integrate with, and you will have plenty of bookings in your calendar to look after. I is Owner and staff portal, which simply means you can create a login for different people and give them different levels of access, such as you can give calendar access to the cleaners, so they can access the bookings and schedule cleanings accordingly. This can be a useful feature for some busy host, but there are ways you can easily achieve the same results, such as just by adding cleaner as a co host to your AirBN listing, or you can even sync your listing calendar with their Google or iPhone calendar. This should not be a deciding factor for a host with one or two properties. The one is direct booking website. Just like multi channel integration, idea of having your own direct booking website sounds great, but it is not going to give you any result. The reason I say that is because if you're expecting people will find your website on Google and book your property, it is not going to happen. Because AirBNB and all other similar platforms are spending millions of dollars to stay on top of Google search result. Your website isn't going to be visible to people anywhere. Even you will struggle to find your website on Google unless you type in the exact URL of your website. Secondly, let's say your website somehow beats all these odds and you do manage to secure bookings. Then brace yourself to deal with complete strangers who have booked your property without going through any kind of ID verification. You don't have any protection of AirBNB in case they cause issues during the stay, or in the worst case they damage the property or start a charge back on their credit card after their successful stay. In summary, having a direct booking website isn't going to help you in a way that it appears from a distance, and it shouldn't be a criteria when choosing a channel manager. Mobile Ap access is another feature they often advertise. It is a useful feature to have, so you can continue to manage your business when you're on the go. But it is pretty standard now in this time and age. So make sure the channel manager you choose offers a reliable pho app, and you can look for the pho app reviews on App Store to see what other people say about its reliability and usefulness. This is integration with third party systems and smart home tools. This is probably the most important and often underrated add on. Only a few channel managers offer. Being able to connect with third party systems, be it your Smart log, a smart thermostat, a smoke detector, or a noise detector, the possibilities are endless with this feature. You should definitely look for this in a channel manager. It will save you time and money in the long run as having integration with smart home devices also increases the energy efficiency and security of your property. L ast one is accounting module. This helps you clearly see how your business is doing financially. You can generate invoices for owners if you manage other people's properties, and you will be able to accurately report your earnings, et cetera. But the downside is these modules need regular, diligent user input to maintain them. To get anything useful out of them. If you've never used a record keeping software before, you have a steep learning curve ahead of you. Because of that, in my opinion, if you are the owner of one or two properties, you will be better off maintaining your records in an Excel sheet somewhere. Don't freto it. It shouldn't be a deal breaker when choosing a channel manager for your small short term rental business. Before I wrap up, if you're wondering which softwares I use to run my AirBNB business, I will leave the links in the description below for you to check them out. I don't want to mention the name of any software in this video or give any recommendation because this is not a promotional video. I want to keep it factual. My objective is to share the knowledge and experience I have and to help you separate out at from the CHF. Hopefully, this will help you make a wise decision in the future when you're choosing the channel manager. To make things even easier for you, I will leave links to some of the most reliable channel managers out there, which I have seen. Make sure you check them out, compare their features, what they offer, and hopefully you will be able to choose the right one for your needs and at a reasonable price.