Booking an excellent vacation rental can be tricky. This is especially the case if you’ve previously had a bad experience with an online vacation rental from Airbnb, VRBO, Booking.com or any of the vacation rental possible sites. It can also be daunting for first-time users wary of unwanted surprises. Following these tips will help you navigate wisely through the listings and make choosing a fabulous vacation rental easier.

​Start your search broadly, and gradually narrow until you have the location(s) that meet your basic criteria.

• Search first by just the city, town or general area, omitting any travel dates. Unless you are traveling to New York City, Boston, or another large metro area, starting with the town name lets you see generally what’s available and what everything costs. (If you are vacationing in a metro area, skip this step and proceed to the next bullet.) My sister and her husband live near Meadville, PA and rent out a little efficiency apartment attached to their home. Searching by “Meadville, PA” lets you see what the general area has to offer.
• Once you have a taste for the area, narrow your search by including your actual travel dates. Your options will almost certainly narrow somewhat. If you’re searching just a few days before you intend to travel, you may see very few listings. Anything that is already booked for any part of your stay won’t show up in your search. This is critical to remember. If you’re booking a 2-week stay and your favorite location is already booked for just one of those days, it can’t show up as a possibility.
• Narrow your search further by pinpointing the type of lodging you want and any amenities you need. Do you simply need a clean bed and access to a bathroom, or do you want a private place with a separate entrance? Is one queen bed in the general living area of a studio apartment fine, or do you need an actual bedroom so that you can rest while your spouse works late into the night?  Is price the key consideration? If so, then use price as a filter. Airbnb allows you to filter by several characteristics including price, number of guests, whether you can book instantly, whether the spot is an entire space, and several other factors.

Carefully look at the photos during the process of choosing a vacation rental.

• Can you mentally piece together the pictures and “see” the entire room, apartment, or home? You should be able to do so. If a listing says the home has 4 bedrooms and 2 baths, the photos should verify that. Listings that indicate more amenities than the pictures show might raise a red flag. Conversely, a listing that clearly shows the loveseat sleeper twice—once as a loveseat and a second time set up as a single bed—earns bonus points for transparency.
• Do any photos give you a context for the location of the home or apartment? Photos should provide an accurate idea of setting. Our first online vacation rental booking advertised itself as a “secluded” cabin. The photos showed a cabin nestled amongst trees. What they didn’t show was that only 2 sides of the cabin were “nestled.” The other 2 bordered a broad open driveway that was shared with the owner’s home which was located just a few feet away. That experience taught us to look carefully at photos and ask for details if we have questions.
• Are the photos blurry, filtered, or taken in an odd perspective? Blurry, filtered, or dark photos can camouflage problems.  Photographing from certain perspectives can literally hide unattractive areas. Careful inspection of what the photos picture and how they were taken can help you see things as they really are.

Read the listing in its entirety before you choose.

• Listings are designed to fill in the gaps that photos can’t fill. They can tell you—for instance—that the neighbor to the left is a professional trumpeter who practices 5 hours a day—with his studio windows open. If you are a light sleeper working the night shift while away from home, you may want to consider another place.
• Listings state the owners’ expectations and often indicate just how strongly they feel about their rules. We have a strict “no pet” policy because of allergies. We aren't being mean, we're being sensible. 
• Listings share details about public transportation options, parking limitations, distance to airports, and accessibility to places of interest. These details may be deal makers or deal breakers for you. 

Read the reviews, and remember that:

• A location with lots of reviews in a short time isn’t necessarily a better listing than a place with fewer reviews in the same time period.  One of our Airbnb listings is a Gulfstream Vintage Cruiser camper. In one stretch from the beginning of June until mid-October, we hosted just two guests in the camper. One stayed for 69 days. The other stayed for 70!  The 2nd guest came the same day the 1st one left. In 4 ½ months, we had 100% occupancy, but only 2 opportunities for feedback. Guests leaving feedback often share tidbits like that, but you’ll miss them if you simply buzz through looking at the number of stars each guest gave the place.

Each of us has different expectations about how clean a place should be, where the line is between cozy and cramped, and what noise level is acceptable. Factor in your expectations as you read the reviews. Note where your expectations intersect with the expectations of guests providing feedback. Pay particular attention to what those folks say.
​

Book your place as far in advance as possible, especially if you have limitations, you like lots of amenities, or you need a very specific location. You’ll have more options early since fewer places will already be booked. You’re also likely to find the places that offer easy access without the need to climb steps, or provide special amenities like complimentary breakfasts, or have a laundry facility.
Assume that the hosts mean what they say regarding their house rules.  Despite our clearly-stated no-pet policy, we occasionally have someone ask us to make an exception. Our answer is always the same, but we hate to have to say what we’ve already said.
Don’t be afraid to ask questions before you book. Good hosts understand that you may need to know some details that their listing description or pictures didn’t capture. We’ve answered dozens of questions about how far our location is from a factory, night spot, or sporting venue. We’ve fielded questions about extra amenities we might provide. We would much rather field those questions before guests book with us than have them cancel their reservation. ​

Out of Money and short on TIME. Wow! If that's not bad enough, yesterday we discovered that we will shortly say goodbye to Health, People en Español, and Parents. We soon won't be InStyle, EatingWell, or enjoying any Entertainment Weekly, either. Today's Content Marketing Challenge looks at a struggling industry.

​I hope it's evident that I'm talking about print magazines, not predicting apocalyptic changes. Yesterday's announcement by Dotdash Meredith CEO Neil Vogel was the latest in an industry that's declined significantly in only a few years. Several magazines, including Redbook, Money Magazine, Marie Claire, CookingLight, and O: The Oprah Magazine, have all recently ceased printing. Others, like TIME (which went from weekly to bi-weekly), Reader's Digest, Vogue, and Sunset, have reduced the number of issues per year rather than stop printing altogether. When the pandemic hit, Airbnb "temporarily" stopped printing its magazine and hasn't yet announced if it will resume publication.

I noticed when Money magazine went out of print. My husband and I had recently subscribed to Money and several other magazines in order to place them in our short-term rentals; we thought our Airbnb guests might appreciate them. Before the last issue went to print, the publisher notified us that, henceforth, Money would be available only in digital format. Our subscription was transferred to Kiplinger's Personal Finance. 

The June/July 2019 issue of Money pictured at the top of this article was their final print issue. I kept it for nostalgia's sake. I stashed away the April 2019 issue of EatingWell because of its cover and its recipes with cauliflower--one of my favorite veggies. In light of yesterday's announcement, I'll continue to hang on to it. 

If the print magazine industry continues its steady decline, I may frame both issues and hang them on the wall to remind myself--and future visitors--what a printed magazine looked like. Perhaps I should gather a few more and display them in the Airbnb units as a unique feature for our guests to enjoy.  

More about this tomorrow.

​You Accept the CHallenge, Too!

If you're nostalgic and subscribe to any print magazines, I suggest keeping the current issues until you know that they aren't the end of an era. 

My husband and I listed our first short-term rental (STR) unit--a tiny studio apartment--on Airbnb almost six years ago. Two years later, we added a second unit--a 2018 Gulf Stream Vintage Cruiser. Two years after that, we added another studio apartment.  All three have been well received on the Airbnb platform.

As you'd expect from the fact that we've increased our number of listings, we have enjoyed our experience as hosts. The benefits have outweighed the difficulties, and we've learned a lot.  If you're considering hosting on the Airbnb platform, this fifth content challenge post gives you an idea of the pros and cons you can expect.  

Note: From what I have learned, these pros and cons are similar regardless of which STR or vacation-rental platform you choose. They vary in degree but exist for hosts on VRBO, HomeAway, Booking.com, or another platform.​

Here are the most significant benefits we've reaped while hosting on Airbnb:

• Earning extra income. Our units aren't always booked, but we've averaged at least a 70% occupancy rate since we listed our first unit.  Bookings dipped only slightly even during the early days of the pandemic.  We beefed up our cleaning regimen and carried on.   
• Meeting some lovely people. The vast majority of our guests have been relatively easy to host. Some have been wonderful. A few have been absolutely splendid guests with whom we have forged strong friendships.  We didn't expect Airbnb hosting to provide that benefit, but it has.
• Expanding our horizons. We've hosted people from all over the United States as well as several foreign countries, including China, Germany, Canada, England, and Australia. We've learned much about other cultures. We've also heard riveting stories and benefitted from experiences different from ours.

Did you just hear a gentle "THUD?" That was the other shoe dropping. Here are the cons of hosting:
Dealing with a few stinkers. Some people are DIFFICULT to host. They look for something to complain about. They don't treat your things well. They do try to take a mile if you give them an inch.  Cleaning up after these folks and repairing what they damaged is time-consuming, expensive, and discouraging. Thankfully, we've had to block only a few people like this from being able to book with us again.
Constantly needing to be available (or make arrangements for someone to cover.) Hosting on Airbnb, or any other vacation-rental site, means we are in the hospitality business. ​As such, we need to be available. Our places must always be clean and ready when the next guest arrives.
Things get tricky when:

• We want to take a vacation. Do we block all the calendars, change the booking settings, find someone to clean for us, or do some combination of the three? 
• We get ill or face another difficulty. We both had COVID a few months ago. Fortunately, we had guests staying for a few weeks and didn't need to be near them or clean for new guests.  However, if things had been different, we would have been between the proverbial rock and hard place.  
• We want to have these units available for our family when they visit. We have four married children and thirteen grandchildren. All of them live at least 450 miles away. When they visit, they like to have the option of staying in one of the apartments. However, unless we can all plan several weeks ahead, it's likely that both will be booked.

Responding to the changing focus of the Airbnb platform.  When we started hosting, Airbnb had the reputation of supporting its hosts. When issues arose, company representatives listened and followed through on the promises of support and financial backing it made to hosts when they listed their properties.  That's changed significantly, thanks largely to COVID, which sent Airbnb stock plummeting and cost the company millions just in the first few weeks of the pandemic. Variants and uncertainty continue to plague Airbnb

To attract and reassure skittish travelers, Airbnb switched its focus. Now, company reps are hard to reach, and claims that appear to fit neatly into the coverage program are sometimes denied. Additionally, Airbnb has added an onerous cleaning protocol, even for hosts with excellent reviews for cleanliness. Hosts don't have to comply; if they don't, however, they risk having their listings removed from the site.

Airbnb uses the slogan, " You have full control of when and how you host," to attract potential hosts. Lately, that hasn't rung true. ​

We've benefitted from being Airbnb hosts, and plan to continue. For us, the pros outweigh the cons. As long as that is true, we will stay with the platform.

For today's content challenge, I struggled to come up with a YACHT that applies to everyone. Here are my thoughts:

 You Accept the CHallenge, Too! 

How would you answer these questions?
If you already have listings on Airbnb or another vacation rental platform:

• What are your pros and cons?
• Have you established a plan to deal with difficulties as they come?

If you don't have vacation rental properties:

• Do you have a passive income flow?
• If not, how could you develop one?

So long until tomorrow.


​

In addition to an old dog, we keep a small flock of backyard chickens. Actually, we keep only hens. Roosters are too noisy for our 3/4-acre lot with homes around it; most real roosters aren't like Foghorn Leghorn. They don't wait patiently until dawn to crow. Instead, they are apt to sound off before dawn, after dawn, and several times throughout the day. That's hard on neighbors. 

​​Fresh eggs taste better. 
Remember last summer when you sliced a homegrown tomato and added a piece to your sandwich? If it was fresh-picked, you probably noted how much better it tasted than the one you purchased in the grocery store. The contrast between a fresh egg and a store-bought egg isn't as stark, but it's there. Fresh eggs taste better. 

Fresh eggs are much . . . fresher.  Duh, but hear me out. By law, farmers have up to 30 days to get an egg from the hen that laid it to the egg carton. Once in the carton, the egg can be sold for up to 30 days. So, if you pick up a dozen eggs with a "Use By" date just a few days away, you could be buying eggs that are almost 2 months old! That's part of the reason that fresh eggs taste better. 

Laying hens are treated better in backyard flocks. I'm not trying to bash commercial egg producers. However, the industry has a reputation for keeping hens in tiny, barren cages that barely allow them to stretch their legs or wings. Most backyard flocks have at least a sizeable coop in which the birds can move around. Many--including ours--also have fenced areas outside. As a result, backyard hens live better lives.

Sustainability is a buzzword that's applied to situations both globally and individually. What's the word mean on both levels? How does keeping a small flock of hens in your backyard help you live more sustainably? 

According to a United Nations committee report, global sustainability is “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." Global sustainability focuses on how nations enact laws that protect or destroy Earth's resources and how responsibly they use those resources.

In contrast, individual sustainability has a down-home flavor focused on what on individuals or families can do to minimize their effect on the environment.  Raising chickens is one aspect of down-home sustainability. Other popular activities include gardening, composting and beekeeping.   

Here are specific ways in which raising backyard chickens helps families live more sustainably:

• Chickens are living compost bins. They love to eat fruit and vegetable peels, grass clippings, and other selected scraps. You don't want to overload their diet with these things, but you can significantly reduce the number of food scraps that you put in the garbage.
• Chickens produce fertilizer. Chicken manure makes excellent fertilizer for your garden. It contains lots of nitrogen as well as moderate amounts of potassium and phosphorus. NOTE: You can kill your garden plants if you use it straight, so learn about using chicken manure as fertilizer before you try it. 

Raising chickens teaches children--and adults--valuable life lessons. Here are a few of them:

• Responsibility. Chickens must have food and water every day. They need a clean spot to lay eggs, and they benefit from interaction with people. Someone needs to make sure they have all these things. Young children may need help with waterers or feeders, but they can tend to nesting boxes, gather eggs, and help socialize your flock.
• "Birds and Bees."  I won't go into detail, but raising chickens provides an easy way to teach children why our hens can lay many eggs, but they can't hatch out chicks if we don't keep roosters.  Surprisingly, we've encountered some adults who don't understand this.
• Death is a part of life.  Even though we're careful, we've lost chickens to dogs and raccoons as well as disease and injury.  Death is a part of animal husbandry. It's a hard lesson, especially when we realize that one of our actions inadvertently put our hens at risk. However, we can't eliminate all danger and still allow our flock to live normally.  

If you'd like to learn more about chickens and backyard flocks, I recommend you go to the website for the Murray McMurray Hatchery  and request a free catalog. (The link is at the top right of their homepage.) The catalog contains a wealth of details about chickens and backyard flocks. It is well-written and full of fun photos, too. I read ours from cover to cover every year. 

Here's today's content marketing, no-strings-attached CTA geared to benefit every reader: 
You Accept the CHallenge, Too! If you could start your own little flock, I encourage you to at least consider doing so. Read the sources I've linked. Talk to someone who raises chickens. 

If that's not a possibility, consider buying fresh eggs from a local market or someone you know. You'll pay a little more, but you'll be eating fresh eggs that taste better and are laid by a hen that isn't confined to a cage.  

Watch for tomorrow's Content Challenge. Drop me a comment if you have questions.

 Today is February 1. According to an article in the New York Post in 2020, most Americans abandon their New Year's resolutions by February 1. The Post article goes on to say that 68% of those polled admitted to quitting well before February 1st, and 1 in 7 admit that they "never actually believe they'll see their resolution through in the first place." 

I wish I could say that I don't understand someone whose resolutions vanish into thin air by February 1, but I do. My single, long-term resolution for 2022 isn't dead and buried, but it's inching closer to the grave day by day. I empathize.

How does this relate to content marketing and a content challenge? 

​I didn't start the year with an official resolve to improve my content writing skills. I should have. As a freelance content marketer and copywriter, I need to improve my skills consistently. I realized my error while taking my morning walk two days ago and decided it was time to remedy that mistake. 

I knew I needed a specific content marketing goal. However, in light of my shaky start with my only New Year's resolution, I hesitated. When I thought of Julie Powell, of Julie and Julia fame, I began brainstorming about year-long writing projects. Then reason kicked in, and I remembered responsibilities with clients, Airbnb guests, and our real estate company. I couldn't realistically expect to tackle anything nearly as ambitious as cooking my way through the 524 recipes in Mastering the Art of French Cooking in 365 days and writing daily blog posts about the experience. I needed to start with baby steps.

That's where this post comes in. Starting today, I am committing to writing and posting meaningful content each day through March 2. That's 30 posts in 30 days. For me, that's a lofty goal. Throughout the 30 days, I intend to improve my skills, increase my fluency, and cultivate a sense of appreciation. Post topics will vary significantly and may address professional development, personal enrichment, family fun, or community involvement. 
​
Posts will not include: 

• Political statements. I have political opinions. You do, too. We won't air any of them here. 
• "Bashing" speech of any sort. There's a glut of that posted each day.
• CTAs (Calls to Action) for you to purchase a product or pay a subscription fee, etc. I will end with a CTA, but it will be motivational and FREE--something designed for all of us. (Details are at the bottom of the post.) 

To complete this task, I'll need accountability. That's where you come in, dear reader. You'll help me complete this "Content Challenge" if you 1) follow the CTA at the end of each post, 2) let me know you've done so, and 3) explain what happened when you did.

That's the gist of the Content Challenge. ​

The obvious question is whether or not we (or other hosts) who are continuing to host are doing so because we MUST keep hosting in order to survive financially. Airbnb income isn’t our only income, but it’s a substantial portion at this point. Staying “open” helps us financially. Several other factors influence our decision. 

Our 3 units are all separated from our home. 

Two of them are 1st-floor and 2nd-floor efficiency units in a 2-story detached garage. The 3rd is a camper. They are separate units with entrances separated from each other and from our home. The only shared space is the laundry room, which guests can simply avoid. 

Our units are close to our home. 

We don’t feel that they are SO close that they present a danger to us or to our guests; we can maintain social distancing. However, since they are close, we have easy access to our units if we need it. If something comes up, we are close by. 

Having the units close allows us to handle the cleaning ourselves. We know that everything is cleaned and disinfected according to our standards and in accordance with Airbnb suggestions. 

Our location is attractive to people who need to travel or to self-quarantine.
We are located 3 miles from an airport and within walking distance of a hospital and medical  complex. People who must fly into Greenville-Spartanburg Airport can easily access our rental units. Medical personnel who want to separate from their family in order to protect them could do so. ​

Even if your location and rental situation mirror ours, you may have already voluntarily blocked your calendars for several months. You may have health issues that put you at risk. You may vehemently disagree with our reasoning. You may think we’re reckless. We accept that.

Each of us has to evaluate the situation and do what he or she thinks is best. Only hindsight is 20/20 vision. This is uncharted ground for all of us. ​

Pricing is tricky, whether you're marketing hair dryers, deep fryers, robes for choirs, strings for lyres . . .or vacation properties for rent. A critical factor to remember when you're pricing your vacation rental units is that the "right" price for you is the price that lines up with your other goals. 

You'll be able to determine the best price for your units when you can also answer questions like the ones below. The bullet points suggest areas to consider. They aren't meant to be exhaustive.

What's my compelling motivation for listing my property on Airbnb or another vacation rental site?

• Do I really need the funds?
• Does listing allow me to meet people and serve them a 5-star breakfast or teach them how to milk a dairy goat?
• Do I want higher-than-average earnings associated with listing only during big events or peak travel season? 

What's my occupancy goal?

• I want an occupancy rate as close to 100% as possible. 
• Occupancy rate isn't as important as earnings/booking.
• I want to encourage longer stays so that I can reduce my cleaning expenses.

If increased competition drives price down, will I:

• Unlist my property?
• Accept the lower earnings and look for ways to decrease expenses?
• Explore ways to increase the value of the service I provide guests so that I can keep my price the same and still have high occupancy rates?

​These questions don't cover all the ramifications of price. Nor can they be entirely isolated from each other. But formulating answers for each of them will drive intentional Airbnb pricing decisions, and allow you to be proactive rather than reactive. 






I