Ever thought about earning by turning your home into an Airbnb? If you have gone beyond the phase of letting in people through Couchsurfing. Then, you can try to make some extra bucks from your home through Airbnb.
You can read further to understand how to start an Airbnb business.
What Does It Mean By Turning Your Home Into An Airbnb?
Airbnb is the brand name that has become a generic term for renting homes worldwide.
So, turning your home into an Airbnb means letting it out for people to stay. The stays could be both long-term and short-term.
5 Steps To Turning Your Home Into An Airbnb
1. Have Access To A Property
It is obvious to have a property to let out for others to stay in. You can have a property in your or a relative’s name to rent out. Else, you can also Airbnb a rented or leased property.
My Airbnbs are also on leased property. As long as you have legal access to a property, you can have it listed on Airbnb.
The property could be a tree house, a campervan, or an igloo. It is not necessary to have a traditional apartment. The Airbnb listings vary from castles to houseboats, ryokans, and riads.
2. Make The Property Worthy Of Listing On Airbnb
A place should look appealing to stay in. The property should have attractive amenities worth someone paying for it.
Airbnb lists many amenities and accessibility features to list properties on its platform.
You can mention the amenities that you provide in your listing. That will clarify what you offer/do not offer. That will spare a lot of chaos in later stages.
3. Take Drool-Worthy Pictures
The transactions on Airbnb happen through their app and website. That means the customer does not get to see the place in person at the time of booking.
So, to facilitate the sale, you must provide clear and realistic images of your property.
My experience of running an Airbnb suggests hiring professional photographers to click pictures. The platform also lets you connect with photographers around your listing area. So, you can use Airbnb’s ecosystem to increase your listing’s reach.
4. Set Reasonable Pricing
Pricing is an essential element for a guest to select a rental place. That is why it is perplexing for a host to come up with the ideal pricing.
An Airbnb property is not an established hotel. Thus, it becomes difficult for a complete newbie to set up a rental for their property.
The good news is that the inbuilt pricing feature of the Airbnb app comes to the rescue.
When you upload the pictures, tick the available amenities on the hosting app. Then, the app itself comes up with ideal pricing.
From then on, you can select the “Smart Pricing” feature to let the app decide the apt valuation.
The pricing feature fluctuates as per the competition and seasonality. Thus, Smart Pricing removes the guessing game from the equation. The subsequent bookings and reviews also play a role in pricing a property.
5. Deliver Excellent Customer Service
This is obvious since a lack of service to customers will jeopardize the Airbnb business.
Customer service is a broad term that has a different connotation for everyone.
I have had almost a year of handling five individual Airbnb units. From my end, the service to the guests has been consistent and the best.
Though every guest received it in different ways. I am fortunate that almost 90% of them found my offerings satisfactory. The rest found flaws in my offerings. That was irrespective of the additional efforts made from my end to provide what they asked.
Now I have made peace with the fact that not all guests are the same. Nor am I capable of making every guest happy.
But what I can do is – provide the best of services from my end.
That is why I provide the amenities listed below to make the stay comfortable. The list is not comprehensive but a general Airbnb amenities list.
This post may contain affiliate links. That means if you purchase any of the products mentioned in this article through routing via the links in this post. Then, I may end up receiving a certain monetary percentage from the sale. Though the one who purchases through the link does not end up paying anything extra apart from the mentioned MRP on the product. Full disclosures on the Affiliate Page.
I also provide free early check-ins and zero cancellations before 24 hours of arrival.
Tips For Renting Your Home On Airbnb
The biggest challenge in turning your home into an Airbnb is to handle the dilemmas. Most of us think that the services and amenities have to be at par with the established hotels.
That notion is untrue in its entirety. As a business, Airbnb expects you to provide services with consistency.
So, if you mention that you provide a “fireplace”. Then, the guests should be able to use it when they book with you. Likewise, if you mention that electricity is not available at certain hours. Then, the guests have to adjust to that challenge while they stay with you.
As of writing this article, I can come up with a few tips that have helped me to run a smooth Airbnb business. You can read about them below:
1. Do You Need Permission To Run An Airbnb?
Many society laws and apartment rules do not permit short-term rentals. That could be a deterrent to running an Airbnb business.
I know friends who had to shut down their Airbnb business for these reasons. Hence, it would be wise to pre-confirm the rules before turning your home into an Airbnb.
Even my society and the landlord have laid out rules regarding Airbnb rentals. As per them, I am allowed to let in people as long as they are Indian nationals. Hence, I have to let go of bookings from non-Indians.
Moreover, every state in a country has its rules regarding short-term rentals. You should check with your respective government bodies to know about those.
2. How To Start An Airbnb With No Money?
You can let a portion of your house operate as an Airbnb. In that case, it would mean turning your home into an Airbnb at zero costs.
That is possible if your place is enough for a guest to pay without you spending any money on extra amenities. In high tourism traffic areas, such a scenario is possible.
Else, you would need to bear the Airbnb startup cost to furnish a place to compete with the competition.
3. Should I Airbnb My House Or Rent?
I struggled with this dilemma for months before I decided to Airbnb my place.
The decision is yours to make as per your goals and lifestyle. My life involves a lot of travel, and my Airbnb is in a tourist location. Thus, long-term rentals do not make sense. That is why I opted for Airbnb short-term rentals.
So, I stay at my Airbnb location during the peak season. The rest of the seasons do not gather many bookings. So, Airbnb works best for me.
In terms of earnings, it works out almost the same since long-term rentals are cheaper than short term. So, short-term Airbnb bookings match up the long-term ones with their high pricing.
So, take a call as per your preferences.
4. How To Do Airbnb Without Owning Property?
As mentioned before, you need legal access to a property to run an Airbnb business. So, that can happen even without owning a property.
Leasing would be the best way to run an Airbnb business since it saves capital costs. Else you could also rent and sublet a property.
One of my friends manages Airbnb(s) without leasing/renting/owning any property. She earns a part of Airbnb arbitrage by handling the guest bookings for the actual Airbnb owners. It is another way to make money from the Airbnb business.
5. Can You Airbnb Your House While On Vacation?
Of course, you can Airbnb your house while you are away on holiday. I do it all the time as I spend more than six months each year away from my home.
Before letting guests into your home, you should manage your assets. You can build a safe or keep locked premises for your expensive valuables.
Also, make it mandatory for the guests to adhere to the house rules before booking.
Conclusion
Airbnb seems like a lucrative business. It is cool to let out your space to earn some bucks. The best part is the minimal expenses on marketing as their app does it for you.
Apart from marketing your property, it also manages and brings systems in place. If you get the nuances of hospitality, then it is profitable to run an Airbnb business from your home.
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