Julian Sage:                         00:00                     In this episode, we’re talking about how to make more money off of your Airbnb and short term rental guests. So stay tuned.

Julian Sage:                         00:06                     Vacation rental machine helps hosts just like you learn how to start, grow and scale your short term rental business. The show’s all about creating systems that help you automate your business, give any more time and money freedom. If you’re ready to start living the vacation rental life, then subscribe to this podcast today. Come and join us on our Facebook group, the host nation where we’ll be talking about starting automating and scaling a short term rental business. Now onto the show.

Julian Sage:                         00:33                     Hey, welcome back host nation to another episode of vacation rental machine. I am Julian Sage and today I am with Jon Bell and we are talking about how to make more money off of the guests that are staying in your units. In the last few episodes, we were talking about some of the fees that you can make off of your guests such as early check-in, late checkout, the extra person fees, cleaning fees and stuff like this. But those are just some of the expected ways to be able to make money off of your guests. In this episode, we want to talk about the extra things that you can make on top of your guests that maybe you haven’t thought about. So Jon, what are some of the different ways that you can make money off of your guests aside from the fees that you’re collecting from them?

Jon Bell:                               01:08                     So one of the ways that all hosts should really be kind of collecting extra revenue per guest is by offering that early check in and late checkout. We already know that, but you want to make that tiers so that person could pay or pick the package that works best for them. Outside of that, you go into more of an experience based model. So if you can expand on experiences, then you can charge the guests a premium for those. Have you ever stayed at a hotel and they offered you like a romance package or something like that? Sometimes that comes at $85 but really it’s about a $5 bottle of champagne and some fake rose petals. Well, hell, if you want to pay me $85 for that, I’ll do it. I got an assistant, they can go out, they can go populate those things and we can do it.

Jon Bell:                               01:58                     We don’t use real candles in the place, so therefore you can just get some of the fake ones, the battery operated ones and boom! You got a romance package. That’s great. Right. Other services that you can offer really come down to just again, more convenience. One of the things that I do sometimes it’s not all the time, is maybe a guest has a certain requirements that they want to have in place before they get there. Maybe it’s like, Hey, is it possible that you can have soy milk inside the refrigerator? Sure. If you’re asking me, I can provide it. As long as you’re telling me in enough time, I can have somebody go pick that up, have it inside the place. Because sometimes you got traveling families, right? When you got a little one with you and you’re just trying to like go from place to place.

Jon Bell:                               02:45                     You don’t have a vehicle or a car seat. Actually a car seat is another way to offer some extra service. I have one car seat in rotation that I could use and it’s one of those things, I don’t include per rental, but if you ask me there is a fee for it and I’ve probably about six car seats just from that one. One of the other creative ways that you could actually offer just an extra service is when you got parking available, but you really, this person’s coming with two cars, maybe three cars, and you’re parking in a parking garage. In most of my rental arbitrage places, I have access to grant people like guest passes, so I can grant them a guest pass that gets them around. I’m paying the park, but I can still charge them a daily rate or a daily fee. I just make sure that it’s cheaper than what they would pay for in and out at the garage itself.

Jon Bell:                               03:39                     So that could mean an extra $15 in the DC area because parking could be $27 a night. I can give them free in and out for $15 and they have three cars. I’ve really just increased that reservation by $60 per night. Just from the two cars that need to get those passes. So that’s one of the easiest ways you could really just add extra value for the guest. You can also collect something on top. One of the other ways that I provide value to my long stay clients, the ones that stay 10 to 15 days or more is I offer them a mid-stay cleaning and doing that mid stay cleaningwe’re able to go in and swap out all the linens of the place. We’re able to make sure that the place is still clean and tidy, so when they do check out, it’s not such a bear when we have to go in and clean up for somebody that has stayed 30 to 45 days or so, so mid-stay cleanings, you can put those on rotation and that just adds extra revenue,into your account basically based on they’re going to need something.

Jon Bell:                               04:44                     One of the final things is, and it’s more branded for me is the coffee that I provide is somewhat exclusive, so you can’t just go out and buy it everywhere. So I’ll get people that say, Hey, I love the coffee but can I go and get some more from the store? And I’m like, well, you might not find it but I could definitely send some more your way for a fee. And they normally are okay. Right. Just because a cup of coffee is normally $5, I’m giving them, you know, at least 10 cups of coffee for a certain number amount.

Julian Sage:                         05:18                     Jon, I think one of the things that you hit on that was really key was in the beginning when you were talking about creating that experience for your guests. This short term rental vacation rental model is just so different than the hotels. And like you were saying, hotels can put in there maybe generic are rose petals or like, you know, a cheap bottle of wine. But because we’re the ones that are operating these units, we can create a full on experience for our guests. If someone tells us they’re coming into the area because they’re getting a maybe like a marriage ceremony, like it’s their anniversary. Then you can offer it to them to create an experience for them and not only will that, can you charge that because you’re going out of your way and providing additional value, but their stay is going to be so much more and they’re going to look at your unit like a place that they created a memory for themselves, which will make them more inclined to want to come back and stay with you again.

Julian Sage:                         06:09                     Another really good example of this on my other podcast, short term rental success stories. We actually had a guest that had a farm stay experience. So they really combined this whole thing, this whole experience model into one. They had a farm which they were operating, they offered people to stay on their farm and that was the short term rental. But because they were also branding themselves as this farm stay experience, they also had merchandise available so they were able to sell things in their gift store such as branded shirts, coffee mugs, stuff like that. And they also offered experiences because they were on a farm, so they offered farm tours, they offered hayrides, they offered getting to play with the milk, the goats and stuff like that. So you can really take this model and create it so many different ways so that it’s not just one way of making income, which is providing a room. But it is really about the experience. And again, this all comes back to your branding and how you’re setting yourself apart from everybody else.

Jon Bell:                               07:03                     You’re so right, Julian. The services along with just the experiences is so expansive, right? You really could do anything. Even if we are taking a little bit of cues from some of the hotels they offer things like turn down service, they might have a Butler or something like that. These are still things that you could include. They just come at a hefty price. You just got to make sure that your client is willing to pay it at the same time you’re able to offer it, but you can almost do anything; chauffeured service back to and from the airport. Really. It’s endless. Just think of what you want or what could be a part of your brand and you can incorporate those things and just have it as a line item.

Julian Sage:                         07:42                     One last thing that I also want to mention is that on your listing profile you can also put additional information on there. So I actually know of people that they put that they’re a real estate agent and people that are coming to stay in the area, they might see that they are licensed in that area. And that’s also another way to be able to make passive income is people coming to your, to your property. They see who you are and they might even be more inclined to stay with you because they’re looking for a home and you just happen to be a person that can sell a home to them. So question today. What are you doing to make more money off of your stays? Leave it in the comment section down below, and until next time, host nation.

Julian Sage:                         08:21                     Keep on hosting. Hope you hosts found value in this episode. If you did, please go on over to iTunes and leave us a review that would greatly support the show. If you’d like to connect with Jon, the community, and I then go on over to our Facebook group, the host nation,

Julian Sage:                         08:35                     Talk to you hosts in the next episode. Keep on hosting.