STRSS 07 – Airbnb duplex investing on a firefighters salary w/ Kent Ammons

Video Transcript

 

00:00:00

Make sure you try to explain everything up front, even if you don’t think it’s what they want to hear. If you can manage those expectations to be completely honest, then they can’t come back and complain about it. When it indeed happened.

 

00:00:20

This is episode number seven of Short Term mental success stories. Welcome back to short term rental success stories. I’m your host, Julian Sage. This is a show where I talk to hosts about their journeys and starting and growing the short-term rental business. My goal is that you’ll be able to walk away with the practical information. That’ll help you become a better host and learn how to scale your business. Since we are a new show reviews would greatly help us grow. So please go on over to iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Google play YouTube Facebook, or wherever you’re actively listening. And please leave us an honest review and we’ll give you a review or rental a shout out in the next episode today, I have the pleasure of speaking with Ken Ammons. Ken is a firefighter serving in Jacksonville beach and recently finished renovations on a dupe flexi purchase with the intent to short-term rent.

 

00:01:00

Kent’s duplex has only been active for about two months, but he’s already grossed. Over $60,000. Kent took the leap to scale his business after having success renting out one of his rooms in his current house for the past four years. This is a great episode showing you the process of taking the leap into scaling your short-term rental business, starting from simply renting out a single room. Ken shares a lot of great tips on the challenges of renovating a duplex, renting out a single room, dealing with partners and how to transition from a smaller scale operation to a larger one. If you liked my show notes for this episode, go to Short Term Sage dot com backslash seven, or if you’d like my show notes sent directly to your inbox every week and go to Short Term Sage dot com backslash show notes with all that being said onto this week’s conversation. Welcome back hosts that I have the special honor of speaking with Kent Ammons. He’s a firefighter out in Jacksonville beach. Kent, would you mind letting the audience know a little bit about, more about who you are and what inspired you to get into short-term rentals?

 

00:01:58

Sure. Thanks for having me, Julian. I appreciate it. And yeah, I’m Ken as born and raised in Fort Lauderdale and I have been calling Jacksonville my home for about the last 18 years. I got my start with Airbnb, a good friend of mine and a roommate who has been renting out a room in my current house where I live for about four years now, got hired on with Delta and he is based out of New York. So he’s, he’s actually paying dual rents one here in Jacksonville beach and then one in his crash pad in New York city. And so in order to supplement his income, he came to me with the idea of listing his room while he was in New York flying. And then that’s about three quarters of the time. So I thought about it. It was, it was of a little bit of a hump to get over, you know, having strangers in my house with me at the same time that I would be here.

 

 

00:03:07

And meanwhile, we also have a third roommate that’s here all the time as well. So that’s kind of where I got the start. And once, once we got up and rolling it, it was just very easy. It was seamless. I thankfully I have two really cool roommates who is, we each had our own little role in doing this Airbnb listing out of our house. You know, it was, it was my house, so I allowed it to happen. Plus I help with the flipping and the cleaning. The other roommate that lives here also helps with the flipping and the cleaning. And then my roommate who’s the flight attendant helps. His main job is, you know, it’s his room and he helps with the correspondence with the guests. And so we all have our little parts, so we split it evenly and it’s, it’s just kind of been fun.

 

00:03:56

We’ve, we’ve, we’ve met some really cool people from all over the world and this has been going on for about four years and it absolutely makes it worth it. And so the next step, after four years of doing this was to purchase a dedicated Airbnb property. And it just so happens to be five blocks from where I currently live. And so we bought, I bought that in, in late August last year and it took about five minutes, five months to renovate. And for the last two months now we’ve been up and running and we are about 80 to 90% occupancy for the first two months. And it doesn’t seem to be slowing down going into the summer. So really excited,

 

00:04:41

I think, I think, you know, what’s so what’s so great about you can, you know, you’re, you’re the first guest on our podcast that, you know, you you’re, you’re very, you know, you started off just renting out your room and keeping it real simple. And you did that for about four years until it’s like you, you said, Hey, I’m making money off of this. This is actually paying for a mortgage. And in the, in the real estate field, I’m sure that you’ve, you’ve heard of like how sacking before, right? Yeah. Yeah. So basically, you know, you’re, you’re, you’re you you’re, you’re the, you started hacking before house hacking was technically a thing and yeah. And now, now you’re doing that. What, what was your experience like, you know, being a firefighter and, you know, doing something that’s a little bit unconventional, you know, renting out your, your room in your house, how, how did you kind of overcome that, that stigma and that fear of like having strangers and then actually keep, keep that going?

 

00:05:38

Well, going back about four years, you know, I had used Airbnb myself to stay in a few locations, but I wasn’t a huge user. And so it did take some convincing who my roommates are, both. I don’t want to say generation, but they’re, they’re a bit younger than me. And so it took some convincing from their end to make me realize, Hey, Airbnb really has their stuff together. And they have their protections in place from, for both sides. So whether you are the host or whether you are a renter, they really have great security measures in place to make either side feel very comfortable with a letting strangers in your house and being a stranger in somebody else’s house to the point where if you, if someone was going to rent a space and someone else’s house with malicious intent, man, you it’s just, you would the length that you would have to go through to accomplish what you were trying to do would just be so great that it wouldn’t be, I can’t see it ever being worth it. So, and the fact that they backed you with, you know, million dollar life and, you know, host protection policies and all kinds of other things, they just, they, they really are on the ball with that. And so, and being that I was in the house, my other roommate was in the half were, were a couple younger guys and were in and out nonstop. You can’t predict what our schedules are. So that was, that was what kind of gave me the whole initial. Okay. Let’s, let’s give this an actual shot.

 

00:07:27

Now you, you have quite a few people in your house. How much of, of you renting out that Airbnb has been able to contribute towards your mortgage? If, if you’re, if you do own,

 

00:07:39

My portion is, let me see. It’s not that much because we’re, we’re splitting it three ways, because like I said, we all have our roles and, and again, this is just the one room that I’m referring to. So it’s probably, it’s probably a quarter 25% of my annual mortgage for this house that I’m living in.

 

00:08:09

I mean, that’s not, that’s not bad. You, you, you get a house and then you you’re paying off a quarter of it. And,

 

00:08:15

And my roommates probably pay off another half of it. So

 

00:08:21

Now renting out your renting out your room, I think, you know, it’s very, that’s, that’s the thing that I think is so, so great about, about having you on the show, Ken is that it’s like you’re for the person that’s starting off in the Airbnb space or the short-term rental space that that’s, that’s all they might be able to do is like they, they might have an extra room in their house that they might be able to rent out and help to pay for the mortgage. What are some things that you did to be able to set your, to be able to keep your privacy, but also be able to be comfortable living in your house with strangers, staying in it?

 

00:08:54

Well, it was, for me, it was easy. Cause as a firefighter, we go on shift work. So every third day for 24 hours, I I’m not even here. So one third of the time, no matter what I would say, I don’t even meet probably half of our guests because they come in when I’m on shift and they leave before I get home from shift. So probably half the guests I don’t even meet then the other time is when we’re, when I do meet them. You know, people are typically on vacation. So they come here, they go to sleep and that’s about it. So the other times they’re Roman the town or eating at restaurants, they’re out and about. And so man, you know, and I’m in bed ready to get, getting ready for work the next day, if I’m not on at work. And so I just don’t even have much correspondence and people for the most part, I just want to come in. They want to have a clean space to lay their head. They want to have fresh water and some AC and they want to get, and they don’t want to pay a hotel, double what it’s worth. So that’s, that’s really, it, it, it works out great. No

 

01:10:15

You’ve been doing this for, for quite some time. Ken, have you experienced like any crazy, crazy stories or crazy crazy things happen with, with guests staying on your place?

 

01:10:25

Yes. And before I ever even bought the duplex, we’ve had about probably close to a hundred people stay in this one room. One of the unique stays and I’ve had, I call them two bad experiences that neither of them ended up were even that bad. It was, they were just less than ideal. So one of the experiences was we had a couple come in town from, from an inland city called orange park. And that’s only about half hour away from here, but they came in town for Jacksonville beaches, October Fest, and they put on a really fun festival. There’s an, there’s an amphitheater less than a mile from where we are. And they put on a free festival for October Fest where people can wear their leader, hose and internals and go out and drink local, local beers and beers from Germany and, and kind of celebrate Oktoberfest.

 

01:11:28

So they come in one night or they, when they checked in and they seem fine, you know, super reasonable introduced themselves. And I was just kind of at the house piddling around and they, and they get dressed up and they go out about six o’clock and they’re, I’ll get to that later. But so anyways, they go out, they come around nine o’clock at night and I’m already in, and I’m just about ready to crawl in bed and they come back and they’re two sheets still when they are just on cloud nine, the guy comes in, he looks like he wants to give me a hug. And, and I’m just like, man, you guys are having fun. You know? And meanwhile, in my head, I’m thinking who are at least, at least their home and hopefully they’re just going to sleep. So I go in bed and about an hour later, I hear the front door slam and I’m like, oh no, they’re going back out.

 

01:12:28

And so they go back out, they come home, probably I hear him hear the front door slam again. So I hear they come back at about one 30 in the morning. And at this point I’m thinking they can probably barely walk because they could barely walk at eight when they came back the first time. And, and so I I’m, I’m awake for like five minutes and then I’m fading back to sleep. And all of a sudden I hear this giant thud, like on the other side of the house and I wake up my eyes pop open and I listened for another five minutes. I’m like, what the heck was that? And, but I’m exhausted, you know, mid sleep. So I I’m listening for any more, anything else that could be happening. So I’m like, all right, I don’t know what that was, but I’m not hearing any more.

 

01:13:11

So I’ll just go back to sleep. And hopefully, maybe my roommate I’ll have to deal with something in the morning. So I wake up in the morning at six 30, I go and check the other bathroom because that’s where it sounded like the sound came from. And I looked in there and the shirt, the curtain rod had been pulled out of the wall and was resting with the rod and curtain on the floor. And I just look at it and I’m like, well, I gotta go to work. I can’t deal with this right now. So I, I talked with my, with my roommate who was also there and we chatted about it and they were supposed to stay another night. And so we were like, okay, well, let’s develop this action plan. I’m at work. Of course, I’m talking to him on the phone and he’s like, let’s develop this action plan.

 

01:13:57

We’re going to say, we’re going to, we’re going to get Airbnb involved and we’re going to talk to them and say, Hey, I don’t think it’s best that you stay here the second night. We’d like you to leave. But before we could ever have that conversation with them, they had gotten up, went to home, Depot, purchased an identical curtain. Rod repaired the curtain rod and put it back up, barricaded themselves in the bathroom and put it back up before nine o’clock in the morning. And I looked at it, I, I checked it out. I inspected it and I couldn’t even tell anything happened. So I was like, you know what? They messed up. They knew it. And they did the best that I could to fix it. And they did such a good job that I couldn’t even tell anything happened. So all in all, like how mad can I be? You know? And so that was one of my less than ideal situations turned out to be not so

 

01:14:53

Bad. Wow. That’s a, that’s a unique, really unique story. You know, I would think that someone would break your shower rod and, you know, they’re, they’re probably like an irresponsible person that, you know, but that’s, that’s the beauty of doing the short-term rental and that you have, you know, this is your business. So you can choose whether you want to make it an issue or not make it an issue that happens at a hotel. It’s like, well, you’re, you know, you’re, you’re, you’re out of luck because they’re gonna, they’re going to charge you for that. But it’s, this is your business that you’re running. And you’re, you’re able to, to do that. Now, you know, you, you said that you, you purchased a duplex just recently after doing this for four years now, what, what was the most challenging part of getting into the, the duplex and, and trying to scale this Airbnb business,

 

01:15:41

Certainly coming up with the funds, it was just a, because it’s an, an investment only property they make come up with 25% down. And so on a firefighter income, that was really tough. Originally. I had taken out a small loan from my mom and had a business partner that was also a financial part of the financial backing, but also was supposed to be, you know, help with the unit. Unfortunately, that the business partnership kind of dissolved. We neither, one of us were getting what we wanted to out of the partnership. And so we decided to go our separate ways, but in doing so, I had to come up now, come up with the extra funds to cover what he had initially invested. And so thank goodness my mom was willing and able to come up and cover those funds that he had invested so that we, that, that allowed us to go our separate ways.

 

01:17:07

Thankfully, we, we remained friends. So that was all good cause that I can get pretty hairy pretty quick, but it all worked out in the end. And so needless to say, my mom is now my kind of the silent investor, who, who does help occasionally with the unit. And I’m always thankful to have her, but coming up with those with the 25% of the total purchase price was definitely the, a huge hurdle. And of course, try to crunch all these numbers when all I’ve done is one room, part time to figure out if purchasing a duplex with, you know, coming out of pocket $120,000, because it’s a quarter of a, of the purchase price plus renovation fees was going to be worth it. So, so much of it was trying to figure out is this lucrative? Can I make this work

 

01:18:16

Now? You know, that, that, that’s, that’s really bold of. You can to go from, from renting out your, one of your rooms in your house, which you know, is very, very easy. Anybody can, can make an Airbnb account and start renting out a room in their house, but for you to take that leap and try to go into this more with a, you know, a more professional business mindset with the duplex, how, how, you know, how was that, that, that process for you going from, you know, the, the small-scale room. And then now you’re ready to take the leap into, you know, working with investors and, you know, putting, putting money down and, you know, trying to figure out your ROI and we’re dealing with maybe contractors, and now, now you have to have it like a cleaning team. Like there there’s a lot more involved than it just was a room in your house with your roommates. How, how was that, that process for you?

 

01:19:07

Absolutely. And so it was, it, it took us about five months to do all the renovations now because of my job, every shift that I worked, I had off 48 hours. So I was at that house probably 10 to 12 hours every single day. I was not on shift for five months trying to do whatever I could. And, and mind you, I don’t have a background in construction, but I knew what had to be done because of some of the people that I had met that are in the positions of GC, general contractors and people that do work construction. At least I had some people that would come by, give me some tips if I had to help, if I, if I needed help. Cause we essentially renovated the whole, the whole place. Every everything needed to be redone down to the plumbing, brand, new plumbing, brand, new pipes, all that stuff.

 

02:20:14

So the parts where I needed to, to get professionals and licensed I did, but I, I did whatever I could by myself because I knew that I, that the capital didn’t exist to not do it that way. So it was definitely tough going from renting one room, having help managing one room and, you know, with the correspondence with the cleaning, you know, we didn’t have a professional cleaner, we just do it ourselves. So it was just so simple to do one room. So to go from this to two units and doing everything myself was I definitely underestimated the amount of work that it does take to manage it. Just the correspondence of loan on a dedicated, dedicated Airbnb, you know, in regards to even just response rates. And when you get that message that you don’t want to make them wait, 6, 10, 12 hours before you respond, when you get that message, you wanna, you want to respond before they ever have a chance to look at another listing, because if they like your listing, but they’re on the road and they’re half an hour away, they want to hear in five minutes that you’re available and that you’re there and then your responses.

 

02:21:30

So just the correspondence alone takes up so much more time. And I severely editor estimated how much you have to actually reach out to them to make it known that you are there for them, if they need you,

 

02:21:48

You know, obviously you’re, you’re, you’re doing it. You know, you’re, you’re, you’re, you’ve got your, your, your elbows down there. You’re, you’re working hard. You’re, you’re trying to scale and build your business for yourself, trying to, you know, make, make, make something for yourself. You know, I think, I think a lot of people that have that, that fear of like, you know, I, yeah, I can rent out a room in my house, but it’s like to try to scale this up and do something, do something larger. Do you think that it’s worth the amount of the, the, the fear and the, the dealing with the contractors and, and establishing a team for yourself? Do you think that all of that is actually worth it? Or could you have maybe done invested in something else that might’ve been a little bit easier or maybe a smaller scale to start like rental arbitrage or co-hosting what, w w you know, how, how is it for you? Do you think it’s worth it putting all this time and money and energy, you know, while you’re working a full-time job to be able to have this Airbnb income,

 

02:22:50

You know, and it, it, that’s still kind of hard for me to just give a yes or no yet, because we’ve only been open, you know, doors we’ve only had two full months. Granted the two full two full months have been fantastic. They’ve far exceeded what, especially in the beginning, what I would be grossing or netting, I really want to get a whole year to S to say, yes, it’s worth it. But based on the two months, if even if things drop off from the first two months, they’d have to drop off significantly to, to, to, for me to say that it wasn’t worth it. However, the house that I got was built in 46, as I already said, it needed everything. And without me having the knowledge that I needed to renovate it by myself, man, I was stressed to the max and working 60 hours at the fire station a week, and then putting probably another 60 hours at this house a week was draining.

 

02:23:52

So in order for me to go through this process again, and hopefully having this one unit will allow me to build up a little nest egg so that I don’t have to do all this work again, or maybe I can purchase a place that is not built in 1946, and doesn’t need everything done to repeat the process. Maybe, maybe invest a little bit more capital. Initially if I repeat the process and give myself a little bit of a break, because, you know, it was, it was really difficult just looking at this house and not knowing where to go and not being able to say, okay, well, I’ll just pay somebody to do this because the money wasn’t there, it didn’t exist. So I had to just get my hands dirty and I had to figure it out there. There was no if ands or buts about it, there, there, there was only I have to do it. That’s it. So

 

02:24:59

Now, you know how, you know, I’m curious in, you know, why, why, why you would take on such a large project for your, your first like more larger scale investment, and like, how, how did that process like that investing process start for you?

 

02:25:16

Well, really around, around this area, I I’ve been keeping an eye on the real estate market. I bought my house that I currently live in about five and a half years ago, maybe six years ago now. But before that, I’ve been keeping an eye on the market for about 10 to 12 years. And I’ve watched, you know, I feel as though Jacksonville beach has been a diamond in a rough ever since I moved here about 18 years ago, because I’m on a firefighter salary and I just bought a house for two 1400 square feet. It’s modest. There’s nothing special about it, but I just bought a house less than a mile from the beach in Florida. And this is a cool town for $199,000 on a firefighter salary. I don’t think you can do that anywhere else in Florida. And so believing and having the faith in this market is what kind of really sparked the fire.

 

02:26:21

Because I I’ve, I believe that Jacksonville beach was a diamond in the rough, and it’s just a matter of time before people caught on and realized, okay, like we can buy a house or a plot of land for less than a mile from the beach in Florida for less than 200,000. Like, how can you lose, right? Like even if, if, even if you bulldoze the house. So needless to say, my, the duplex that I got is four blocks from the beach, paid a little bit more than what I did now, but the reason I got the deal I did is because it was so old and I knew it needs a lot of work, but based on what I was willing to do and what I had saved up, I figured that I could do it and make it worth it. So I just went for it and, and, and really anything else, the, the opportunity isn’t there anymore to purchase the house for $150,000 that you don’t really have to do much, maybe slap some paint on it.

 

02:27:23

It’s good to go, but that house doesn’t exist anymore in Jacksonville beach. And so I had to kind of go for one of those houses that was beat up and run down. And for me to enter the market like I wanted to, and, and being that it was a duplex, you know, I just counted that as, okay, this is an opportunity to make double the income or at least close to it. Whereas if I just bought one unit or a house, you know, it really cuts down on my, my potential, my revenue potential. So that’s what kind of gave me the, just, just go for it

 

02:28:00

Now. And, and, and I think, I think that that’s really, you know, you, you, you know, you, you’ve been looking, you’ve been in the market, you’ve been realizing that prices have been going up and, you know, the opportunities, like you said, the opportunities for that $150,000 home, right on the beach, it’s not there anymore. You know, you see the value in it though, and you’re, you’ve, you’ve seen that the market’s been going up and, you know, you, you’re willing to take that chance and take that opportunity to be able to, you know, make an income. W what, what, what would you say was the most challenging part of, of, of starting this process and changing your mindset from, you know, this is just a house that I’m going to rent out a room to. Now I’m ready to make this like a, a business, a legit business.

 

02:28:52

The hardest part was, again, probably coming back to coming off of that lump sum of money. Like here I am, you know, I’ve worked for, you know, 10 years as a firefighter. I I’ve never really been a frivolous spender, but I just was kind of waiting for that right. Opportunity to present itself. And we’ve, we actually have a small network of friends here in Jacksonville beach. I’ve probably got close to between five and seven friends that have all just entered this market all within the past year. And so, and we’re all, we’re not just friends, we’re like very, very close friends. So I was able to kind of watch a little bit what they were doing as well before I made the leap to invest this capital and, and enter the market. And so just the idea that, you know, I had, I had this money liquid that was just, you know, we know what happens with school.

 

03:30:02

What’s going to happen with when inflation, just when, when money sits there, it does nothing. It just, in fact it just goes away. And so I knew that I wanted to do something with it. I just didn’t know what, and as my, as a few of my friends got into the market and started kind of hearing some of their successes, I was like, you know, what enough, it’s time to make this move, got to stop sitting on it. And you, you don’t, you don’t, you don’t make any big moves and you don’t make any, you, you, you don’t make 15% or even 10% interest just by keeping your money in the bank. And so if you, if you want to take a chance and take a risk and hopefully make 10, 15, maybe 20%, you got to take the risk. And so I was just tired of sitting on it and I went for

 

03:30:57

Now. Now you said that your you’ve only been up and running for about two, two months now, how with the, with the income that you’ve been able to make off your Airbnb, how much, how much has that, that been able to cover the mortgage? And, and how soon do you plan on seeing that, that ROI?

 

03:31:15

I actually, just, before I got here, I got a friend that just entered the market with a duplex right down my street, really close friends. He just happens to be extremely successful with Excel and formula. So I just had him run some quick formulas for me. And based on just the two and a half months that I’ve been up, he expects. And this is, of course, this is just a very, very small snapshot of, of numbers. So it’s not going to be very accurate, but in about four years, I can expect to be, see some ROI in the positive to cover what I put into the house to get. But again, this is very, very rough numbers. That’s going to cover my down payment, my loan, my renovations, and, you know, that can fluctuate a little bit going forward, but four and a half years to get back $130,000. That’s, that’s not so bad, but that all remains to be seen.

 

03:32:29

No, I think, I think, you know, the, the way that you approach that, it’s, it’s a, you know, it’s very, it’s, you know, very, very smart, you know, you said, do you want, you want to put your money to something that’s, that’s useful that, that isn’t just sitting there and, you know, depreciating in value due to inflation and just, you know, making the bank money, you know, your, your money’s sitting in a bank, it’s making someone else money. It’s not you. And, you know, for you to invest that into something that is, you know, and even, even if, even if there are complications, you know, where w you know, we’ve been renovating our basement, you know, as a, as of this episode, you know, we’re, we’re probably, you know, we should, we should already be up and running now, but you know, our Airbnb from our renovation, you know, we, we went in there, we thought, okay, we’re going to spend this much money.

 

03:33:13

And then it ended up being two to three times more than that. And it’s just like, because things come up that aren’t planned, but, you know, the, the, the, on the positive note, it’s that your money isn’t just sitting, you know, you’re not, not doing anything, you’re doing something. And the things that you learn from that experience of starting and growing and just taking that first step. And that’s what I always preach on this, on this show is that, you know, there’s a lot of noise and there’s a lot of, a lot of things, you know, you went from renting out a room to now, you’re, you’re renting out a whole duplex, and there’s a lot of parts in between that. And, and there’s a lot of, a lot of things. There’s a lot of noise, but the first step is just starting. And then once you, once you do that, then you just start fine tuning it, and then you start coming up and, you know, now, you know, maybe you spend a little bit more, but Hey, you said four years from now, you’ll have made your money back.

 

03:34:04

And then you’re also going to be making more on top of that, which is, you know, I think, I think, you know, and, and you’re doing this on a, on a firefighter salary, you know, I’m, I’m a military guy, so I know the salary is not that good. And, you know, you’re, you’re, you’re trying your house sack, and you’re doing things to be able to, you know, do what you can. And so I think, I think that’s inspirational from, from, you know, your standpoint. And so going off of that, what would you do differently if you had to start from scratch?

 

03:34:38

If I had to start from scratch, I, the, the one, the one thing that, that was, there was more stress. It was tougher than, than anything was when the partnership that I initially started with began to dissolve, because here I am injured, entered the business with a friend of mine, with a substantial amount of money that would, could easily deteriorate the friendship. And so, even though it was even though that, that the security and starting the business with him with that extra capital, I, I, I’m so thankful that I was able to figure out how to separate the business and still remain friends. So that being said, if there was a, I, I probably would have gone into it with, with an investor and, and, and guaranteed them a percentage rather than taking on a partnership that would have say so in the business. So kind of like, my mom is to me right now, she is, she has come to the table and given me a loan and that that’s great.

 

03:36:14

I wouldn’t have been able to do it without her, but the, the, the additional stress that the partnership put on initially was, was so difficult. And so, so draining that did, if I could have started over again, I probably would have just taken even a bigger leap and gone in without that partner. I guess what I was hoping for was that I would have, I would have had more of a partner that shared a bit more in the duties, but it just wasn’t in the cards for us. So that is probably what I would have done different.

 

03:36:54

No. Yeah. I think picking, picking your, your, you know, when you’re, when you’re working with someone like an investor, you know, that’s what they are, they’re investing their capital into you because the numbers make sense. And they, you know, they don’t want to necessarily be a partner. They want you to do the work and they’re going to give you the capital. So their, their say doesn’t have as much, but when you’re going into a partnership, you know, to look for that, that I, that, that capital and that responsibility, then, you know, you get, you get half of the pie and you get half of the say as well. So it’s not always going to be right in your eyes when it’s, you know, when someone else has a say in it. Right.

 

03:37:34

Right. And so, yeah, as, as time went, we, we started having just a different, a little bit difference of plans. Whereas I want it to be, I needed to make everything right. I wanted to not have to rip out the bathroom because we didn’t do the plumbing. And he was just like, let’s get this up and run it and let’s get this going. I’m like, we’re going to be kicking ourselves if we do this this way. And so again, just a difference in opinion, glad we so glad we could remain friends and both grow from this. I think we both learned a lot, but yeah, it was going back. If I could have, if I could have made that leap without taking on a partner, that’s what I would have done this.

 

03:38:20

Now, you also said that you have a couple of cleaners. How did you go about acquiring those cleaners and training them? And what was that like? Because, you know, I think for a person that’s just starting out, you know, like us, it’s, you know, it’s like the idea of, of training people and having people on a schedule and, you know, those are like your employees. How did, how did you go about that?

 

03:38:40

So I actually got really lucky. I interviewed one woman who didn’t speak a lick of English. So she came by and she came with her husband who speaks a little bit more than a looking English. And when I would come up with words that they didn’t know, they would use Google translate and I’m thinking, all right, it’s taken an hour and a half just to explain what I need done here. And we’re doing this face to face. And so, and things are coming down to the wire and the way I finished the job, I was like, all right. Kind of things came to an end quick. And then I was like, all right, we’re ready to go, but we don’t have any cleaners in place. And so I was like, well, I planned on doing the cleaning myself, but man, when we got to do a flip, then I’m on shift.

 

03:39:30

Like what’s going to happen. You know? So I had to have those from, from the point that we started, I had to have those pieces in place. So I ended up calling my mom, gave me a reference of a cleaner that her friend uses. And she said she was familiar with short-term rentals. And so I, I had her come over and take a look at our space and we negotiated a price and she has just been great. She’s not part of a company, so she’s a bit smaller. So I think she doesn’t have the overhead that some of these companies do. She spoke English. So that was awesome.

 

04:40:08

And she has one other cleaner on board. So she can’t get to a cleaning. Her partner can. And I think she’s working on bringing in on a third for the high season, which is spring summertime for us. So it’s been working great so far. She is on the ball. She takes pictures of things that are missing. She, it reminds me when, you know, we’re low on paper towels or toilet paper or soaps, things like that. So they’ve just been great. And I’m actually really excited that I got to come across an app that has been instrumental in organizing my cleaners. And it’s completely free if you bring your own cleaners and it’s called, oh man, I should, I should’ve looked this up first, your turn turnover, BNB turnover, BNB. That’s the one. And so it cuts down on so much communication with you and your cleaner.

 

04:41:20

And it’s just been so huge in fact, that it links directly with your Airbnb and allows them to get notified. As soon as a job comes up, they get notified. If my primary doesn’t want it, she declines it. And then it gets sent to the secondary cleaner and she can accept it. If she doesn’t accept it. Now I have the option to go on to their platform and find a cleaner through their platforms. So if I use a cleaner from their platform, they do take a percentage, but that’s, if my first two cleaners both decline it, the other way that they make money is if you use their payment processor. So if you find a way to not use their payment processor, which they charge 3%, which most of them do, then you can avoid another fee as well. So I’m using it currently. I just use Venmo and it’s been working great. And again, I, I can’t say enough about the app. It’s just, it’s, it cuts down on 90% of the correspondence you have to have with cleaners. I don’t have to ask if they’re available. I don’t have to ask if the secondary cleaners available, they just see it and they accept it. And then once they accept it, I get notified and done deal.

 

04:42:36

No, that, that, that’s fantastic. I think, I think for people that are starting off and looking to get into the space, I think turnover, BNB, you know, just from the interviews that we’ve had before, it’s, it’s something that it’s like, you gotta use it. It’s just as part of, part of the job is using using this app. And I think that’s a nifty way that you’ve been able to, you know, bypass that 3% by just using Venmo and being able to coordinate that with your cleaners. Is there any product that you couldn’t live without in your rentals that is really kind of saving you time and money,

 

04:43:10

As far as cleaning,

 

04:43:11

It could be like a, like a particular like a rag or sheets or towels or something that you use.

 

04:43:18

Well, yeah, we, we did notice that we had, you know, cause we were trying to keep operating costs down initially because a, we didn’t know what kind of what we were up against. We didn’t know if we would have to take a couple months before we started seeing a profit, but we really, really struggling to turn over sheets and time. Each bed had a, had a spare shed, a set of sheets, but sometimes people aren’t able to put their wash in the dryer and then since we, or into the washer and since we have two units, if they both check out at the same time or the same day, and the washer is currently in use, then you know, another set of sheets doesn’t even get started. And so what I always try to do is ask the guests to at least just start the load of sheets, strip the beds and start the load. And that just gives the cleaners a huge headstart, but in the event that that doesn’t happen. We ended up just purchasing a third set of sheets for each bed. And so that way there really shouldn’t be any other, any other backups anymore. So the sheets don’t get done. We got another pair, no big deal.

 

04:44:30

Other than that, I don’t really do the cleaning so anymore. I really was kind of hoping since it’s a proximity to the house where I live is only five blocks away that I would enjoy cleaning more. But I didn’t.

 

04:44:47

Is there anything that you do again, to help your guests leave positive reviews?

 

04:44:54

You know, I, I try to really just give them an experience as best I can, like a hotel would. So, and that was something that was, I really had to consider taking the jump from renting out a room in my house to renting out dedicated Airbnb duplex. So because when people come to your house, they know people live there. It’s it’s in the listing, it’s it explains that you might share the, some of the common areas with, you know, myself or my other roommate, but they were all respectful. But you know, when people know that they’re getting a price because they’re sharing space with other people that live there, they’re kind of willing to forgive, okay, maybe you have addition the sink, maybe, you know, not everything’s put away exactly how it should be. Maybe there’s a pan that’s left out things of that nature because that happens probably at their house.

 

04:45:58

So when that happens here, where I live, it’s forgivable, it’s overlooked bubble, I suppose. But when things happen like that at a place that is supposed to be a dedicated Airbnb or a hotel, well, it doesn’t happen at a hotel. Right? They’ve got places, you know, things in place to where they make sure that, that those cleaners that go down that, that specific checklist, they make sure the toilet is scrubbed. Every single time. They make sure that the shower is cleaned. Even if no one took a shower, you know? So things like that were when they go into my unit, I made sure. And I make sure that the cleaners know that those things are no longer forgivable. When you find that hair on a bed that of sheets that were supposed to be cleaned. Next thing you know, now those clients are looking, looking for other things to go wrong because they’re like, oh my gosh, like you’re worthy sheets clean.

 

04:47:03

And it, and it does give you that impression. Like if I were to rent a space that promised clean sheets and I found a black hair, you know, I’m thinking to myself now, where are these sheets cleaned? Or did they just look clean? And they fluffed them up a little bit to look nice, you know? So, so really just given that’s what I really focus on is to really give the impression that no one lives there. It is a space that is provided for them that is clean, that is professional. And we run it as such. And so that’s probably one of the biggest things that I make sure that I provide. And as long as you manage expectations, and I’m sure you guys have heard that before, but make sure you try to explain everything upfront. Even if you don’t think it’s what they want to hear.

 

04:47:58

If you can manage those expectations, to be completely honest, then they can’t come back and complain about it. When it indeed happens. For example, in a duplex, we have a common stairwell. And so there are times when people pass each other and that stairwell. And so when they ask me, is there any common area? You know, it says the entire place, but it says duplex. So what’s the deal. So I made sure to explain to them, it’s in the listing, that if you rent a space, it’s possible that you’ll run into tenants from the other unit. However, you have your private entrance and the space that you’re renting has the, it is its own 2, 1, 2 bedrooms, one bath full kitchen. But again, you may have people above you or below you, depending on what unit you rent and it’s possible that you will see that.

 

04:48:58

No, I think, I think you’re right in that setting expectations, being clear from the start, you know, and I love what you said. You know, even if it’s not what they want to hear, then they don’t have anything to come back and complain about. I think that that’s a brilliant, really a piece of advice. And if you could give one piece of advice to someone who’s trying to start an Airbnb business, what would that be?

 

04:49:22

I would say you just, you just gotta go for it. Quit hesitating, quit, quit. Wondering if you’ve done your diligence and you’ve ran the numbers. Even if it’s just a room in your house. I’ve already told these guys. And I actually, a couple of my friends that have gotten that were involved in Airbnb before I got involved, they, they make jokes and they’re like, you know, one of these days, Kent’s just going to get smart and kick you guys out. And they’re BNB both of his rooms. And so, you know, I, I, I love the guys that I live with DOE and you know, I, I, I couldn’t, I couldn’t ask for anything more, but you know, the biggest thing that I think that I had to overcome when I started was the, the, the feeling of people in my house. So the do your research realize that there’s pieces in place to make it secure.

 

05:50:22

You can be as strict as you want, and you can make them provide pictures, provide why they’re coming in town, be verified to your email, your phone, your Facebook, your Google account, your, your government ID. If you’re not comfortable with them coming into your house, not verified through Airbnb, then don’t accept him. But the cool thing is is you have that power. You don’t have to allow them to stay. You can say yes or no to anybody that asks, but the thing is just get started. You’ll you’ll see, as you go that you have a lot more power and who’s comes into your space than you initially believed when, before you ever started.

 

05:51:10

That’s brilliant. Yeah. That’s, you know, you’re, you’re the boss. This is your, this is your business. And you know, if you don’t, if you’re not comfortable or if you’re not, if you don’t trust that someone is going to treat your place, your place, the way that it should be, then, then you don’t, you don’t have to allow them. If they give you no reason. If, if one of your rules is you have to provide a photo ID and they don’t provide that ID, then it’s like, well, I’m sorry, you, you can’t stay here. That’s that’s in our rules is yeah.

 

05:51:34

Yeah. And that should be a very simple thing, this like, oh, okay, well, like I just want a cheap place to stay. Then let me provide my ID done deal.

 

05:51:45

Right. And is there, is there one house rule that has saved you before? I know you’ve only been, been up for a couple of months, but is there some, one house rule that has really kind of saved your butt?

 

05:51:57

Let me think about the rules that I have in place. You know, we, we try not to make too many rules just because for the most part, I don’t know who reads them. It’s, it’s kind of like the more rules you put, it might just be like clicking accept to a ULA for using an iPhone. They know you’ve got 87 pages just to, just to use your phone, you’re going to read them all. So we try to keep it very simple. Probably one of the ones that I just read when I stayed in Dominican Republic that I really enjoyed was to keep all correspondence through Airbnb. So every, every experience that I’ve had to contact Airbnb about, which there hasn’t been many, but especially being a super house, I think that helps as well. But every time I’ve had to contact them, Airbnb has just been super responsive.

 

05:52:57

They’ve been great in addressing any concerns that I’ve had or trying to come to a resolution with any dispute that I’ve ever had. However, if someone, you know, once somebody X, once you, you accept somebody to stay, they are given your phone number and email. But now what that allows to do is contact you. And now there’s no record of the correspondence of what happened on that cell phone call or that text message. And so they could be complaining to you about something that is completely unjustified. And the next thing, you know, they’re extorting you because they say, oh, this place wasn’t clean. I want $200 off my stay. And what do you do? Because at this point you give them $200 off or you’re, you know, you’re getting the one-star review. And because there’s no proof of their extortion, the Airbnb’s hands are kinda tied.

 

05:54:09

So I really think implementing a rule of keeping your correspondence on Abe, Airbnb is a very smart idea so that if that something of that nature should occur, which it does happen. It just happened to me two weeks ago. And I just got finished with dealing with it. It turns out I just ended up giving the guy $200 because I just w it wasn’t worth going through, you know, what ifs, like, what if he decides to create more trouble for me than, than, than possible. And so I ended up making that rule and hopefully, you know, that when Airbnb can see both sides, that they can make a justified decision and say, okay, here’s how we’re going to back you up Kent. And so I think that’s just a really smart rule, and I think everybody should implement it, but

 

05:55:09

No, you’re. Yeah. Thank, thank you for sharing that one. You know, and, and that’s, that’s part of the process of learning and starting, you know, you, you don’t, you’re not, nobody’s perfect. And we’re all, we’re all just doing our best and trying, and we’re gonna, we’re gonna mess up along the way, but you know, now, you know, for future, it’s like keeping all correspondence through Airbnb and you’re gonna make that a hash rule. And if people can’t follow that, then it’s like, well, I’m sorry. You, you know, you’re not, you’re not a good fit for, for, for our home. Where do you see short term rental rentals in the future,

 

05:55:39

Nan? I, I see the trend continuing to grow, and I think it’s a kind of a millennial generation thing because, eh, and it can get pretty deep. I mean, you got all these college, college degrees, master’s degrees happening now, doctorates, nobody’s getting jobs they’re in debt. And so when, and if they do travel, they’re look, they’re looking for deals. They’re not just going to settle for a hotel that is one room with two beds, no kitchen for $200. And it’s just, it’s just not, it’s just not there. And so I think it’s, and it’s that millennial generation that is really going to push drive that trend to grow because they’re going to seek out those deals and staying in cool places rather than just your run of the mill hotel room that, you know, what you’re getting. And, and so I see a growing that being said, I’m also a little bit nervous about as it grows the legislation that will come along with it, because at some point I can’t help to think.

 

05:56:50

And I don’t know how far, I don’t know if it’s a year down the road five years, 20 years. I know it’s already happening in some of the bigger cities where legislation is coming in and kind of limiting limiting cities from getting Airbnbs or issuing permits, then coming, coming down heavily taxing them. So I hope we’re still pretty far off in Jacksonville beach as we continue to grow, but I think you’re definitely gonna see a huge shift away from hotels and towards dedicated short term rentals. And, you know, I couldn’t be more thrilled about it. Just we’ll see what the future holds.

 

05:57:34

We’ll see. And is there a, is there any way that anybody can reach, you can’t

 

05:57:39

Reach me as far as

 

05:57:41

Like, if someone had any questions and they, they, they, you know, they want it to get into Airbnb or, or, or some type of question like that.

 

05:57:47

Sure. If you want to have him shoot me an email@aseizethedayninetwelveatgmail.com and a seize the day is kind of a play on words. It’s S E a S the day. If that makes sense. He’s the day since we’re close to the beach. So yeah, if you want to shoot, shoot me over an email. If you have any questions, if you, if you want to come stay happy to send you some links or in Jacksonville beach, like I said, diamond in the rough, this is a cool little beach town and north Florida, about 45 minutes from the Georgia border reach out. And if there’s anything I can do to help, I mean, that’s what it’s all about is growing this community and, and, and, and, and just helping.

 

05:58:36

Yeah, definitely. And I’ll, I’ll include a, your email and your, your listing in the show notes, but thank you so much again, Ken, for, for, for being on the show, it was such, such a privilege to be able to hear your story and your journey. And I’m, I’m really looking forward to seeing where, where you go in the future. And until next time guys keep on hosting.

 

05:58:55

Thanks a lot, Julian.

 

05:58:56

All right. Take care. Bye bye. Hope you host benefited from the show like any exceptional hosts. We all strive for five star reviews. So please go on over to iTunes, Stitcher, SoundCloud, YouTube, wherever you’re frequently listening to the show and leave us an honest review. Let us know what we’re doing, right, or how we can improve, because that’s what we want to do. We want to become better hosts. I want to become a better podcast host and a better Airbnb host. Talk to you guys in the next episode. Peace out.