House Money Weekly

In this week’s House Money Weekly segment, Lauren and Alan get together with their special guest Austin realtor Danielle Fountain. They discuss blog 145, 7 Things Hosts Can Do to Get More Airbnb Bookings. This article ties to Lauren’s expertise because she is mostly known for having short-term rentals. Alan, Lauren and Danielle share some rules in their states (Texas, Georgia, and Florida) about short-term rentals. Alan doesn’t go through all 7, but they cover a handful. The first is rotating photos for the upcoming season. Often, hosts take one set of photos, and they just leave it up there. What Lauren recommends is for every quarter use seasonal photos and rotate them in so it looks fresh, especially to the places where there's snow and no snow. Danielle points out this is a good idea for “for sale” listings as well. The algorithm prefers active hosts, so if you are doing little things like tweaking your descriptions, moving your pictures around and even tweaking pricing a little bit. They will know that you are active and you're paying attention to your business. Another thing hosts can do to get more bookings is to check amenities quarterly. It can be a Wi-Fi speed or having an outdoor barbecue and displaying this to people can reach the algorithm. One more thing hosts can do to get more bookings is by updating a listing description. The last thing that was discussed to get more bookings is to respond to guest reviews. It is a good practice because people are going to see the responses, especially to negative reviews which are really important.

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Mortgage Minute: Jasmine answers the question: Which loans have PMI? And what is PMI?

Sponsored by: Jasmine Mortgage Team https://www.jasminemortgageteam.com/

Real Estate Is Easy Interview

Lauren interviews Skylar Romines. She is a commercial insurance broker specializing in commercial real estate. shares that they consider apartments, multi-family and built to rent as commercial properties while others consider it residential. Lauren likes that they can differentiate what is commercial real estate and what is not because there’s a lot of misconceptions about that. Skylar shares how and why she became an insurance broker. Although there are a lot of challenges being a commercial insurance broker, Skylar likes that she gets to work with a lot of really great people and she can help her clients solve problems and make things work. According to Skylar, there are two major levers that you have to pay attention to when you're working in real estate and that is the revenue and operating expenses and insurance is one of the biggest operating expenses. Lauren asks Skyler what she means about the “hard market” and she explains that the insurance market is cyclical so there are softer markets and harder markets. Some big factors when you're in a softer market is there are more carriers that are coming who are willing to offer limits and willing to put up with higher limits. An indicator that you're in a harder market is that at a very high level, you have less capacity that leads to having fewer carriers who are willing to offer coverage and they're willing to do it at a higher rate at a lower limit. Lauren asks how to make assumptions about insurance costs when underwriting deals, and Skylar says not assume anything. Another thing is to talk to your broker early and often. A tip from Skyler is if you feel like they can't pick up the phone when you call your broker, then get a new broker. Lauren asks what insurance is for multi-family properties and Skylar explains that it is the most basic level of property and liability. Skylar advises landlords who are looking for insurance to be a good operator because the better the operator you are, the more risk management controls you have in place, the easier it's going to be at the end of the day. And lastly, Skylar makes real estate easy by doing the right thing, being honest and operating well. Alan emphasizes the importance of your real estate team.

Contact our Guest:

https://twitter.com/skylarromines

https://www.linkedin.com/in/1skylar

Guest Host's Segment

Guest Host Danielle talks about interviewing agents. When you start investing and you're interviewing agents, you must interview them. Just because someone's a friend or someone's a relative, you shouldn’t necessarily use them. When working with a real estate agent, you need to dig into their background and also on how far they are going to help you find the perfect home or investment. Alan always says to get an agent that invests themselves. Get one who has experience in the properties you’re interested in. Danielle suggests the agent walk you through Home Buying 101. Lauren wonders what questions she asks potential clients too.

Follow Our Guest Host:

https://theonerealty.com/

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