What Dreams May Come

 🌙 You have to sleep to dream. It's so easy to be go, go, go without pausing. Here's a friendly reminder to take a breather, reflect on where you're at, and plan for where you'd like to go. For those of you concerned about our digging project - don't let it keep you up at night anymore. We got the sign off from the regulator on the completed work and will have a couple more feet of water at the dock this year!

🎧 Listen

AI, so hot right now.

This week's Listen comes from No Vacancy The Podcast, Episode 41. (59 minute podcast episode)

The podcast is a new one to us. We found it while on the hunt to diversify our listening portfolio and really enjoyed it. In this episode, host Natalie Palmer talks through what AI can do for short-term rental hosts with guest Jason Reece.

So, what can AI actually do for hosts? Here are some use cases they discuss.

• Writing the copy for your listing.

• Crafting considerate responses to guests when something goes wrong so that you don't have to do it when you're blood pressure is at clinically unsafe levels.

• Selecting which market to go into (delegating your research to the robots).

• Developing the interior design for your space.

The two primary platforms they discuss are ChatGPT and Midjourney. You can think of these two as a text-based solution and an image-based solution. Even if you do nothing else with these platforms, just playing around with them for inspiration is worth the time to get your juices flowing.

If you don't have time to make it through the whole episode, skip to the last four minutes to hear a fun segment the host does called "Am I the Airbnbhole?" Spoiler: yes, they were. 😂

📽 Watch

This week's Watch comes from the DEN Tiny Home Walkthrough by Storyfilm Productions on YouTube. (12 minute video)

Is there anyone out there that's not taking a drink on "never have I ever dreamed of building a beautiful tiny home"? Didn't think so.

You can find the tiny a-frame's Airbnb listing here.

The video is beautiful and the hosts do a wonderful job of taking us behind the scenes. Some of the best insights we took notes on are: 

• Know that you're going to want to customize it for your specific needs, like extra insulation;

• Build must-have amenities like a utility area for a washer and dryer into your budget; and

• Decide if you have room for a loft space that will make for a cozy sleeping situation.

We'll see you over at landwatch.com scrolling through acreage to put one of these on.

📖 Read

This week's Read comes from Elizabeth Weedon at We Need a Vacation. (less than 5 minute read)We found the site a while back and they do a good job of posting fast-and-ready tips that even Little Caesar himself would be proud of. The site is geared toward the Cape Cod - Martha's Vineyard - Nantucket market, but the tips in the blog are pretty much applicable everywhere. This article covers avoiding pitfalls in managing a vacation rental home.

Our biggest takeaway from the article is screening. Even though we know that allowing instant booking can raise your listing's position in search results, we prefer to maintain the little bit of discretion we have to hopefully prevent a guest with a history of destroying homes from going Godzilla on ours.

We all know this is true, but a certain amount of "am I making the right decision?" comes with declining a booking request. Thanks to the author for reminding us.

☘ Potluck

Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.- not Benjamin Franklin

There are plenty of reasons not to trust things you read on the internet. For example, the quote above is frequently misattributed to Benjamin Franklin. You can read why that's wrong here. 

The internet isn't all lies though. Like the quote says, getting involved is a great way to learn. One place you can do that is over on reddit.

Even if you are not interested in engaging in conversation or checking out any other subreddits (forums), I would encourage you to peruse the r/airbnb_hosts subreddit. You'll regularly find genuine questions with mostly genuine answers along with keeping you aware of trends on the platform. If you're a host, you can reach out to the administrators to get a fancy verification badge so that other users know you aren't just making up the fact that you host a private island in Colombia.

That's it. Whether this is hitting your inbox on the original publication date or you stumbled upon it days, months, or years later, you're now part of STR Recap history. We'll let you know when AI takes our job as a newsletter author.

Thank you for letting us share the STR journey with you. Please let us know if there is anything you would like to learn more about from this edition or anything you would like to see in the next edition. Until then, keep moving forward.

p.s. If you have someone in your life that has a short-term rental, is interested in short-term rentals, or you think could just use some extra homework, please forward this email their way. That is the best thank you we can ask for.