when the raw build community was pulled
what do you prefer 52 percent of you
said you prefer when i get right into
the content too bad because i got a
pretty
funny intro coming your way impressions
impressions wow slow wow
john molina hi i'm john mulaney peter
mckinnon what's up everybody hey you
grams what's up it's guys here
i don't know i kind of think that's
pretty good well i'll never get those 29
minutes back so
hi everybody and welcome to the third
installment of my airbnb series going on
all this month we've talked about what
airbnb is the five different airbnb
business models that you can get started
with and today i'm really excited i'm
really excited to talk about how to set
up your airbnb business from start to
finish i feel like i talk quite a bit
about airbnb strategies how much money i
make but i really wanted to boil it down
as simple as possible and just take you
through the process so i'm going to take
you on the journey and teach you as best
as i can but before we get into it if
this video inspires you to become an
airbnb host consider signing up with my
link down below when you do you'll get a
75 bonus when you host your first day
and i'll be assigned as your airbnb
ambassador which i kind of think is a
neat thing because i'll be able to give
you some direct feedback on your first
listing so go sign up and while you're
down there consider just
the like button you know what i mean
with that let's get into it so i'm going
to take you through all the steps i'm
going to kind of glaze through one and
two here because i have entire videos
dedicated to these steps but step one is
really gonna be deciding on your unit
type are you gonna buy are you gonna
lease and if you are gonna buy what are
you gonna buy are you gonna buy a house
a townhome a condo a house hack or do
you want to go into the glamping space
and do vintage airstreams tiny houses on
wheels tiny a-frames mongolian huts
spaceships potatoes and everything in
between and there's also rental
arbitrage where you lease a place and
then you release it on airbnb my last
video hello me really details every unit
type and business model so be sure to
check that out you want to decide
exactly what you want to do first and
pretty early on because it's really
going to inform your strategy and the
process moving forward once you've sort
of figured out if you're going to lease
buy and what you're going to buy and all
that kind of stuff you now have to
decide the location where exactly are
you going to be investing where are you
going to be starting your airbnb
portfolio now again i do have an entire
video on this that teaches you how to
comp out a short-term rental deal how to
analyze it so check that out watch it
after this video because i've already
got you here i'm not gonna let you leave
when deciding where i'm gonna set up
shop i always adhere to a very simple
acronym sibi
stay in your backyard obviously just
kidding not a real acronym but staying
in your backyard is very important to me
what i mean by this to stay anywhere
from one to three hours away from where
you live when you're first starting out
now if you're already a relatively
seasoned real estate investor and you're
pretty confident that you can handle an
out-of-state airbnb rental then i always
recommend to be by national parks state
parks touristy cities or destination
towns when i say touristy cities i mean
like la or orlando and then when i say
destination towns i mean lake towns ski
towns mountain towns beach cities and
places like that but sibby staying in
your backyard basically allows you to
check in on your property because you're
a few hours away and it just allows you
to get there on a weekend to actually
enjoy your property because again it is
a vacation rental for a reason you
should be able to use it and enjoy it
but it's far enough away to where it's
incredibly inconvenient for you to get
to in case of emergency so it sort of
forces you to build and assemble your
team on the ground that can handle all
of that for you so there's a little bit
of a method to the madness here tldw be
close enough to where you can get there
if you really really need to in case of
an emergency or on a weekend but far
enough away to where it's inconvenient
enough for you to hire someone else to
go address things on the ground for you
and now we're cooking with gas step
number three here is actually acquire
your property whether you're gonna buy
it or you're gonna lease it this is your
time to go through your due diligence
run all your inspections this is going
to be your time to negotiate with the
landlord if you're going to be doing the
rental arbitrage model and if you're
buying a place once you close this is
your time to fix it up to maintain it to
repair it to paint the walls to get it
squeaky clean and sparkling for your
first guest take it for me this is your
time to get it right the first time none
of this oh yeah let's get it together
and then in like three months we'll come
in and we'll remodel the bathroom or in
six months we'll come in and we'll do
all these things that we don't want to
do right now we'll kind of work up to it
i'll tell you what from experience once
you start an airbnb and it's established
and it's running and it's cash flowing
and people are booking and people are
reviewing you and having a relatively
good time there it's very difficult to
go in and do all those things that you
promised you would do when you first
bought the place for a few reasons one
being you get lazy if people are already
booking your place and you're making
money why would you change anything
right if it ain't broke don't fix it
another really important reason is that
if you actually do have a successful
listing and it's completely booked up
for let's say one or two months in
advance then it's pretty tough to block
off dates because it's always booked you
can never actually get in for a remodel
and lastly if you do ever shut down your
place to go and fix it up and paint
walls and change curtain rods and change
flooring or whatever you're gonna be
stopping your cash flow dead in its
tracks now i know you might be saying
well if we did this at the beginning
wouldn't we be stopping our cash flow
too rob kind of yeah but think about it
this way whenever you buy a property
typically you have about a month or two
before your first mortgage is due so
cash flow is a little less important at
that time which is why i always say when
you buy your place and when you acquire
it do everything that you want to do
right then just rip the band-aid off get
it over with and never think about it
again so you've acquired your property
you fixed it up you painted the walls
you made it all nice and cute what next
rob simple you furnish it
wow what knowledge bombs you bring to a
sensei yeah here's the deal a lot of us
get so in our head about starting an
airbnb rental there are so many of you
that comment and send me dms and like i
don't know what to do like where do i
start how do i do friends there's no
need to overthink this it really is a
simple process there are obviously more
advanced strategies here but it really
is a linear process so we're gonna
furnish your unit and you're gonna
decide on what kind of style you want do
you want it to be a boho chic style do
you want it to be a mid-century style do
you want it to be a rustic style do you
want it to be a swedish minimalist style
and you've got a sifub set your
furniture budget
i am on fire with these acronyms you got
to decide how much you want to spend and
you really have to decide here is your
airbnb or short-term rental going to be
a premium experience or is it going to
be a budget experience now i always say
pick one i don't really like to be in
the middle for a lot of reasons i think
it's just there's a lot of clutter there
i think it's not easy to stand apart or
at least with the budget strategy you
can set yourself apart with pricing and
on the luxury and premium side of things
you can set yourself apart by being
significantly nicer than the competition
so decide on a furniture palette i would
try your best not to mix and match too
many styles do i have like a superman
curl going here okay you know it's it's
a delicate ecosystem all right leave me
alone on the flip side of this you also
don't want to be too matchy-matchy
meaning i think it's nice to combine a
couple of styles to juxtapose styles
that don't normally go together i have a
mid-century modern house that we just
bought and it's very caveny on the
inside so we really brought rustic and
mid-century modern together i also have
another cabin on the east coast that's
very cabiny from the architectural
standpoint but i didn't want to just go
full cabin and bare and rustic on the
inside so we went more for a bohemian
cabin type of vibe regardless first you
have the sifaba and then once you sifuba
then you can decide on the interior
design style that fits you now honestly
in my opinion furnishing your space is
typically the hardest part of an airbnb
setup like i think if you can get
through buying a house and closing and
doing all the inspections and the due
diligence then you can furnish your
place and go through all the riff raff
of ordering everything and going to
marshalls and target and ikea and
cosplus and home goods and all that
stuff if you can get through all of that
you've made it through the hard part
because honestly i think the hosting
part is easy i mean it comes easier to
me it's harder for other people but
whenever you're furnishing your place it
just requires so much of your mental
brain space but it requires so much of
your mental capacity to just keep track
of receipts and costs and which credit
card to use and where to buy a can
opener versus a toaster i've actually
been contemplating making a full-on
video that tells you where to buy every
single item but i feel like that would
be too boring if that's something you'd
want to see i guess let me know down
below and as always if enough of you all
want that video of course i'll make it
so when it actually comes to furnishing
your place i think the reason it's so
hard is because it just takes so much
planning and it can be significantly
more planning if you're buying an
out-of-state or an out-of-town rental
because if you're buying something in
your backyard for example one to three
hours away or even in your same city you
can always mail stuff to your house you
can always mail furniture to your house
load it up in a truck or u-haul and
drive over but if you buy something 2000
miles away like a lot of my different
airbnb properties that i've set up then
it gets a little bit tougher because you
have to plan out delivery times you have
to make sure that the different
furniture items and the different
couches and the different side tables
and all those different vendors that
you're buying from can actually ship to
your address on time right now due to
covid and all the different supply chain
issues delivery time's not really
working out right now caleb i have full
faith that you're gonna hook us up with
a funny witty b-roll that connects
perfectly to that last statement and i
feel like you're just gonna delay and
delay and delay
if you're setting up an airbnb in your
backyard one to three hours away give
yourself a week give yourself a solid
week of setting it up that's going to
give you some buffer to go back and
forth to kind of take it slow and fill
up your house little by little every
single day if you're buying a place
really far away out of state for example
then i want to say that you want to give
yourself at least two weeks you want to
go and stay there for two weeks you want
to ship as much as you can beforehand
either to your house or maybe a friend
in that town or maybe your realtor for
example you want to go and you want to
live there and set everything up and
give yourself time to go find different
stores a lot of the different towns and
cities that i'm in don't necessarily
have a west elm or a cost plus or a
costco so we oftentimes have to drive
really far away one to three hours away
to go stock up on supplies and then go
back to our house to actually furnish it
then we're like oh my god we forgot the
toilet paper oh no
and then we have to drive three hours
again to go back to costco so you want
to plan for a lot of road time and
that's why i say two weeks is usually
gonna help you get it done again if you
get through the furnishing part
congratulations you made it through what
i think is probably the hardest part
next you're going to make a listing but
before you make that listing sign up
with my link down below and you'll get
75 whenever you host your first day
because that's a cool thing that you can
do and i just realized this i also have
a full-on video that teaches you how to
write your listing craft the copy and
all that jazz
so when you're ready to make a listing
check out that video and you can also
download my
top 5 listing tips down in the
description below i think this is going
to be one of your more important steps
here because a lot of people really mail
in their listings they'll take cell
phone photos of their beautiful homes
they'll give you a one or two word
headline for their listing they'll give
you one to two sentences in the about
the space section and they really just
don't do a good job marketing and
promoting their own airbnb listing so
this is your opportunity to stand out a
lot of people come to me and ask rob how
do i market my place what do i do and my
answer is always the same put everything
you have into your listing and make it
as good as possible that's what's going
to make you stand out from the
competition so hire a professional
photographer to come out after you fully
furnish your place write a really nice
snappy headline blow out all of your
listing copy to be somewhat of a mini
blog or a mini essay romance me a bit
with your words really make your listing
pop in fact if you're an airbnb host and
you're really proud of your listing
leave it down in the description below
and maybe i'll review it in a video
sometime if you want to be put on blast
in front of 111 000 people
so i'm so happy guys you know ever since
i hit 100 000 subscribers i'm still not
over it it still makes me smile and i
just want to say thanks thanks for being
a friend y'all
mud anyway if you're new to the channel
this is me a big adhd goofball and i
guess since we're here if you haven't
subscribed yet consider subscribing and
hitting the little notification bell so
that you're alerted anytime i post new
airbnb content speaking of friends send
a friend to your listing at this point
you've set it up you've created a
listing now let a friend go and stay
there and let them give you honest
feedback on your place whenever this is
possible this is definitely something
that i'll opt into because i think your
friend can give you the honest hot takes
about your place and if you can't get a
friend to go out then i think you need
to go and stay at your place but you
need to set it up get it clean get it
staged and get it ready as if it were
going to be an airbnb guest then you
need to go and stay there overnight and
try to do things that an airbnb guest
might do in your own house try cooking a
meal and see if you're missing utensils
try taking a shower in every bathroom so
you can confirm that the water pressure
is good try going into one of your
closets and screaming as loud as
possible to see if any of your neighbors
would possibly hear it and if they don't
then maybe go into your backyard and dig
a hole that's three feet by six feet
just to see how soft that soil is and if
any of your neighbors would ever notice
that just in case you needed to dispose
of something in the middle of the night
like
paper plates or something
but either way you're doing what's
called a soft launch you're just going
in tweaking a few things living the
guest experience ironing out any final
wrinkles okay i'm watching this
i hate that so much
no because the more that you do
beforehand the less likely that
something's gonna go wrong when your
first set of guests come and check in
and you really want them to leave you a
five-star review because your first set
of reviews are by far the most important
alrighty you feeling good you feeling
like you got this hopefully i'm boiling
this down as simple as possible let's
move forward here into the next step
which is assembling what i call your
airbnb avengers now these are going to
be the people that are really running
your property because you're not
necessarily going to live nearby your
airbnb avengers are going to be made up
of your cleaning crew your handyman your
pest control service your lawn
maintenance and a contractor in theory
these are all the people that you're
gonna need to help run your property now
there are a few exceptions here if you
buy a place with a hot tub or a pool you
might need a pool maintenance person to
come and perform maintenance every so
often but for most standard rentals
these five people do the trick now i
would argue that the most important
avenger here is gonna be your cleaning
crew these are gonna be the lifeblood of
your operation they're gonna be the ones
that are telling you if something is
broken by a guest something needs to be
repaired if something needs to be
replaced something needs to be restocked
you know all those types of things so in
a way your cleaning crew is kind of like
your unofficial property manager because
they're the ones that are clueing you in
on the condition of your property
they're a lot cheaper than paying a
property manager that's going to charge
you anywhere from 15 to 30 percent of
gross revenue for short-term rentals now
for the most part everyone else your
handyman your contractor pest control
and lawn service those can be sourced as
you go i wouldn't put it off too long
you need a pest control person to make
sure that there aren't any bugs in your
place you need a lawn person to make
sure that your grass isn't overgrown and
then you need a handyman on call just in
case anything breaks down but for the
most part you have a little bit of time
here you have anywhere from one to four
weeks to source these different crew
members but you have to find your
cleaner before you go live because if
you have a guest check-in someone needs
to turn the apartment or the house for
the next guest because if that next
guest checks in and it's dirty guess
what you're leaving them a refund so
you're gonna need a cleaner you just
can't operate the actual business
without having a cleaner then hopefully
maybe a backup cleaner too let's move
really this step is probably the most
important step in making sure that your
airbnb is running as a smoothly oiled
machine
no that's not how that goes a well-oiled
machine or as i like to call it a womb
i'm on it tonight i'm on it tonight and
one final note here and i personally
think it's a very important one don't
skimp out from a pay rate standpoint
like pay people what they deserve don't
go with the cheapest handyman or cleaner
or pest control service because guess
what they're probably not going to crush
it for you that doesn't necessarily mean
to go with the most expensive one just
don't go with the cheapest because you
do get what you pay for so you know just
be like a good person and stuff caleb
let's let's shake it up a little bit
let's make this cinematic all right give
me like the little
maybe the yeah i like this coloring very
nice let's talk about the next step
learn the business be in the business a
lot of people want to toss their airbnbs
over to a management company and i just
don't really support this whenever
you're first starting out your airbnb
journey i just don't personally think
that it's worth it i think that there
are cheaper routes that you can go
because a short-term rental management
company is going to charge you between
15 to 30 of your gross monthly revenue
now i'm sure you can still make a pretty
decent return here but regardless no
matter if you decide to toss this over
to a property management company down
the road i think that you really need to
be the one to learn the business first i
think you need to understand how airbnb
works how you want to respond to people
when you want to refund people when you
want to stand your ground when you want
to have a heart how you want to respond
to broken items and you want to set your
own personal policies instead of just
handing it off to a company because then
you can at least have your own opinions
formed and maybe you can collaborate on
some of those policies with the property
management company if you ever decide to
go that route but before you ever go
down the property management route and
before you ever think about giving up
your airbnb i want you to learn the
business i want you to love the business
i want you to master the business and i
want you to be profitable at the
business or as i like to call it limp
and the best way to learn and master
this business is just by doing it it's
by being in the weeds and running the
daily operations yourself and the other
way that you can learn this business is
by absolutely and i mean just absolutely
decimating that subscribe button down
below so that you get more content from
me about how to airbnb and how to run
your airbnb business shameless plug
shameless plug shameless plug
[Music]
thank shameless it's the way you look
that's putting this off i don't know
what you're going to do with that it'd
be very embarrassing if you did nothing
with that so this is really going to be
where the learning curve comes in and
i'm just going to say that you can watch
as many of my videos as possible you can
read all the books and consume all the
youtube content and you're gonna have a
general understanding of how to do all
of this stuff but you're not really
gonna know how to do it you know what i
mean you're not gonna know how to do it
until you live it and you experience it
as an airbnb host so embrace the
opportunity to learn the business
because you only get to do this once and
i'm gonna say that my first year of
airbnb hosting was one of like my
happiest years hosting like i was new to
it i wasn't nearly as jaded i was making
money it was exciting i was getting
thousand dollar bookings or a two
thousand dollar booking there's so many
celebrations and there's so many
heartbreaks and heartaches and i just
wouldn't take it back for anything in
the world because those were the
experiences that shaped me so look
forward to this process and love it for
what it is because in a couple years
from now you're gonna have a few airbnbs
and you're gonna think back and you're
gonna say wow that first year as an
airbnb host i learned so much i
accomplished so much more than i ever
thought i could ever accomplish and i
built something special that's gonna be
a cool moment for you when that happens
all right i'm gonna change the camera
angle here little peek behind the
curtain usually it's pretty seamless is
this crooked i don't know what i do know
is it's 113. uh nine i don't really know
for keeping track of the steps here but
the one of the last steps here is you're
gonna automate your business so in the
previous step i said to learn it be in
the weeds understand how your business
works but then you need to start taking
note of all the different tasks that are
eating into your day and then you have
to ask yourself how can i automate this
so there are a few ways to automate your
airbnb business and i did a video on
this about a year ago so check that out
after this video but here's the gist of
all the things that you can automate
first you're going to want to automate
your messaging so instead of responding
to people every single day and
responding to every single message and
sending out a welcome message and a
check-in and a checkout message manually
which could easily frazzle you if you
have more than two listings you can
automate all of your messages like
platforms like your porter smartbnb
which i now think is called hospitality
and igms and you can actually set
automation so that whenever someone
books a place they get an automatic
message before someone checks in you
send them an automatic message the day
after they've checked in you follow up
and you make sure everything's okay you
can automate that a checkout message hey
make sure to clean everything up put
dirty towels in the tub take off all bed
linens blah blah you can automate that
and you can even automate asking for a
review and even leaving the review an ai
can do that for you it's crazy what you
can hire robots to do
you can also automate your cleaning
instead of texting your cleaning crew
every single time that a guest is
checking in and the guest is checking
out instead of saying hey i got a
reservation on this day hey i got
another reservation and scheduling them
every single day again you can get so
lost in these details if you have more
than two listings even just one listing
if you have a listing like casa conejo
that's booked like every single day and
those stays are one to three night stays
it would just i would lose my mind if i
had to actually schedule that with my
cleaners there are different platforms
that can help you with this such as
resort cleaning or your porter i use
your porter and it makes it very simple
it sends out text messages to all my
cleaners on the check-in date on the
checkout date and then every single time
i get a new reservation it tells my
cleaners how many people are gonna be
staying there so they know how many
towels and sheets to provide and all
that kind of stuff so this tool right
here has really made things pretty easy
for me you can also automate things like
your pricing if you're in a low season
or in a high season services like price
labs or beyond pricing can adjust your
pricing on your calendar and give you
that optimal price point depending on
the market supply and demand on any
given day i personally use price labs i
would highly recommend them if you want
10 off which is basically a free month
you can sign up with my link down below
and guess what i'll also get 10 so you
scratch it through my back and i'll
scratch with your back no idea what
accent that was old english means
mexican i don't know before you all fire
up the old fingers for the comments i'm
mexican okay calm down and lastly you
can automate check-in you can get things
like a ring doorbell a ring flood lights
that you can check in on your place but
you can also get a smart keypad that you
can control from your phone because
we're addicted to our phones and so why
not just add door locks to that why not
why don't we just let smart technology
just take over everything for us i use a
nest yo lock i'll leave it down in the
description below there's also the slage
or the slash honestly i've never heard
it said out loud but there's a sleigh on
code which syncs up with your porter and
your porter will actually change out the
combination for every single guest and
change that combo to the last four
numbers of their phone number now that
is cool i haven't gotten to use it yet
but i really want to on my next airbnb
and last step and perhaps the best step
is just to make money make money folks
and here's the hot take of the day and
i'll end it here i'll end with a piping
hot take don't spend your money i i
think a lot of people you know if they
get carried away they're like oh my god
i've never made this kind of money
before and they spend it you know
whenever i first started my airbnb
business i'll be honest me and my wife
we spent a lot of the money that we made
traveling and i would never take that
for the world but i quickly learned that
it was also really cool to just stack up
you know money in my bank account and
let it accrue for a year and then decide
what i wanted to do with it and so i
think that if you're starting your
airbnb business and you want to expand
and you want to grow and you see
yourself wanting to do this as a career
and you see a future in this then you
can't spend your money you really can't
you have to just keep saving it and
saving it so you can get into that next
property and then when you're in that
next property you need to save all that
money along with your first property and
use that money to go and reinvest when i
started this journey four months ago i
had nothing i truly had nothing except
for about a hundred thousand dollars of
debt somebody please smack me
unbelievable and fast forward to today
and i have 14 different airbnbs and
after all my expenses and bills and
partnership splits and everything like
that i'm making about 25 000 a month net
it's always because i reinvested in my
portfolio and hopefully in a year from
now i can double that so start small
save invest don't spend i know it's hard
but i promise you it's going to be worth
it that 25 thousand dollar a month
figure uh-oh the lights are okay i'm
gonna end it that's a sign that 25 000
figure that i gave you just barely
happened like not too long ago because
i'm a part of a few deals that i
actually just started getting paid from
after being in these deals for a very
very long time and it feels good to see
this spider web that's been building
very slowly from all sides like finally
come together and i'm like i did it
after four years i'm making a really
really really great income from airbnb
and i guess i'll just end here i really
believe that if i could do it you can do
it too i promise hopefully today's video
i was able to break it down very simply
for you and hopefully you're like a
little nervous but like you're excited
nervous because you're like okay i think
i can do this i'm gonna do this and you
are i really believe that so if you have
any questions leave them down below i'll
do my best to answer them and you're
definitely going to want to tune in to
my final video in the series here that
talks about all the things that i wish i
knew about airbnb hosting before i got
into the business i think it's going to
be a good one and an important watch so
thanks again for watching if you made it
this far you get the special designation
of super fan let me know your super fan
down below don't forget to like
subscribe and i'll catch you on the next
episode of raw build
[Music]
