Unlocking Cleveland’s Rental Revolution: Airbnb Insights with EagleStays and Host Pros

In this episode of Lokal Keys and Contracts, host Gabriel Newberry sits down with Bernie Cesareo of EagleStays and David Stokley of Host Pros to explore the dynamic world of short- and mid-term rentals in the Cleveland area. Bernie shares insights from EagleStays, where as an Airbnb Superhost and VRBO Premier Host, he manages a portfolio of properties through http://EagleStays.com, focusing on investor partnerships to acquire homes, optimize operations, and generate sustainable passive income via professionally managed rentals. David dives into Host Pros, a full-service management company overseeing about 75 high-end listings in Northeast Ohio, boasting over 10,000 reviews and Superhost status, while helping owners and investors streamline designs, operations, and revenue to work less and earn more. Together, they discuss local market trends, business strategies, and the importance of responsible hosting through NOSTRA—the Northern Ohio Short-Term Rental Association—a collaborative group educating hosts on regulations, best practices, and community engagement for balanced solutions that benefit all stakeholders. Tune in on March 16 at 9 AM EST for actionable advice on thriving in the Airbnb ecosystem and unlocking Cleveland’s rental potential.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:06

Thank you guys so much for joining. This is Local Keys and Contracts with Gabe Newberry. I'm your host, and I'm here with Bernie over at Eagle Stays and then Dave over with Host Pros. These guys are going to tell you all about the Airbnb market. And we also have um Northeast Ohio Airbnb Rental Association. Right? You guys are also the co-owners, or you guys are in the association together with that. Yeah, I guess you could call us founding board members, but yes, that's true.

SPEAKER_00 0:38

Northern Ohio Short-Term Rental Association. We can talk a little bit about that more later, but it's basically a local advocacy group helping hosts become better hosts and also uh advocating on behalf of hosts in terms of like local legislative issues and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_01 0:56

Excellent. Okay. And with regards to Airbnb market, I mean these guys are Goliaths within their own right. And realistically speaking, guys, can you explain to the audience just what specifically is an Airbnb, what specifically is a short-term rental?

SPEAKER_03 1:13

Okay. So thanks for having us, Gabe. Thank you so much, my friend. So typically a lot of investors will just say Airbnb, but they mean short-term rentals, which is Airbnb, VRBO, and then both Dave and I have our own direct booking sites where we book uh customers directly. Um but pretty much short-term rentals is uh any rental that's less than 30 days. And people are familiar with them uh from going on vacation and doing vacations, and we have some that are uh vacation type rentals where people are vacationing in the area or coming in to visit families in the area in the Cleveland area. But we also have um we we get into some of the longer term, like some workers. Um we have workers that'll come in for a week or two, and we have some workers that come in for a longer period of time, you know, sometimes over a month, which then we get into the midterm rental. So when we say a lot of times when we're talking about the investors about Airbnbs, it kind of covers all those short-term rental situations and midterm rental situations.

SPEAKER_01 2:12

Excellent. And then Dave, I know that guys, just for your information too, these guys are two separate companies, two separate entities. Both of you guys do similar things, but at the same time, too, you guys are really just driving home together the fact that this Nostra, the um Northeastern Ohio uh Airbnb Association, you're making sure to drive home the fact that you guys want to be able to focus on regulations, focus on being investor-centric and making sure that short-term tenants, there there are regulations in place for it, or that there's like specific um specific guidelines?

SPEAKER_03 3:02

Well we like we like when cities a lot of cities now are trying to pass some kind of regulation. What we'd like them to do, and we'll help them do is not make the uh short-term rentals illegal, but regulate them. And the regulation is good for everybody, right? It gets rid of the bad actors, um, and uh it it helps them police us, um, but it also gives us a platform in which we can work.

SPEAKER_01 3:26

Excellent. Okay. And then Dave, please tell us a little bit more about Host Pros as well.

SPEAKER_00 3:32

Sure. Yeah, um, like you said, we're a short-term rental management company, so we we own a uh a number of units, but we also manage them for other investors. Um we've got about 75 units uh mostly in northern Ohio within an hour or so of Cleveland. Um and yeah, I love I love helping investors find profitable properties and helping struggling owners uh fix you know what might be wrong with their with their property, whether that's operationally um from a revenue management standpoint, right? That's a big thing I see is a lot of hosts are uh don't really know what they're doing when it comes to managing the revenue, uh managing the pricing to be more specific. Um what do you mean when you say managing pricing? So I mean, my opinion, Bernie can chime in on this too, but I I think it's one I think it's the single biggest area that I mean I say this lovingly, amateur hosts um are leaving money on the table. Um because the market has gotten much more competitive than it used to be. And it's become a full-time, I mean, for us, a full-time job managing the pricing of 75 units. Uh so we've we've actually hired an expert in this to do it for us. They're in there every single day looking at the pricing, the booking trends, what our competition is priced at. Um and you just have to be on top of it. Like, you know, next week should be priced differently than a month from now. And it should definitely be priced differently than June and July, right? I was just looking at, I was just comping out some properties last night. And I I swear to you, I saw people charging the same for a Monday and Tuesday in January as they were charging for a weekend in July. And to me, you know, maybe the July weekend is pri one of those is priced incorrectly.

unknown 5:21

Right?

SPEAKER_00 5:22

And so I think it's the weekend of January, probably, but it could also be the weekend in July, because that just tells me, you know, again, with all due respect, you don't know what you're doing on the pricing side. And so you you can't leave money on the table, but you also can't leave occupancy on the table. Um and so again, that requires a really deep knowledge of the market and the booking trends and stuff like that. So that's why we hired an expert to handle it for us.

SPEAKER_01 5:48

Understood. Understood. And Bernie, I know you end up having a booking, a booking platform as well within your systems. Now, is that something similar along those same lines whenever Dave is is running his systems? Is is it similar systems and processes?

SPEAKER_03 6:03

Yeah, we we do uh we do something called dynamic pricing. And what that does, uh and today's point, like if somebody has the same price all throughout the year, in January when it's slow, they're probably too high and they're not gonna get booked. But then they get excited in June when they get booked, you know, every day of the month, but because they're too cheap. So they're leaving money on the table. Um and they could they could be making more money in the in the peak months. Um the the private platform, I think are you talking about like our direct our direct bookings. We also do like you can go to egostace.com and you can find the property directly on there and book it, and it's then you know paying the VRBO fees or the Airbnb fees, and you can do the same thing with hostbros.com. Um those are ours are are better. No, no, no. Uh uh and and like what you said with Noser, you know, like we are competitors, but we don't duke it out as competitors. You know, we're very flame. There's uh there's uh a big market out there, and none of us can handle uh all of it. My company's not as uh as big as Dave's. We don't quite have uh 70, we're kind of like more more boutique.

SPEAKER_01 7:09

Um and we both kind of stand out in the sense that both of you guys have thousands of reviews, both of you guys stand out within the Airbnb market, both of you guys are titans within your own right. I mean, realistically speaking, you you also have personal investment properties that you Airbnb as well.

SPEAKER_00 7:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:28

Yeah, I I started out, I think Dave also, I started out, um I've been doing long-term rentals. This is my 36th year in long-term rentals. Um, and back in 2019, I started turning my long-term rentals into short-term rentals. That's how I got started with it. And then from there, I started co-hosting, bringing in other investors that had properties that wanted to do better with the properties. Back back in that time, uh, it wasn't as well known, so we had to talk to investors of how they could make more money as a short-term rental. Now the investors are more aware of that, so they a lot of times they'll come to us and say, Hey, I want to buy a property and make it an Airbnb because I want to make more money than I would make with uh with a buying a property and just doing it uh as a rental. And for that, sometimes it requires slightly different properties, like uh we like uh operating in the areas. So there's two different markets that we're dealing with. There's the urban market, right? Like the inner Cleveland, where it's um uh more people coming in for work and visiting family and stuff like that. Sometimes in the downtown area, we have some that where they come to games, football games, basketball games, baseball games, stuff like that, especially the the visiting teams uh fans, you know, that that follow their teams around. Um so we have to cater to to our competitors there also. Um but then we also like the true vacation markets, right? Like uh we both invested in Portage Lakes and in uh Sandusky and in Geneva and those areas. And we're also both looking to expand even further out, um, like the kind of rural areas where it becomes kind of like a destination, right? Like where you're not coming to Sandusky to go to Cedar Point, but we might have something, say uh I just did one in in Worcester, where you come to Worcester just to be out in the country and just spend a week there with with your family and have a good time. So I like doing those.

SPEAKER_01 9:14

Sure. And I I kind of leaning in too, and Dave, please um touch on this as well. Like with regards to locations, where do you guys see Airbnbs kind of filing through? Is it primarily in those hotspot zones? Because when I think Airbnb, I think, okay, we're going for a quick vacation or something along those lines, but I I've heard some for business professionals too, like executives or things like that, sometimes end up going um inner city. So are you seeing higher degrees of people going towards vacation rentals more so in Cleveland, or is it more so like based and exec stuff like that?

SPEAKER_00 9:54

Um I can tell you from our perspective and experience, we're getting away from the downtown market. Um our properties there have been less successful. There are also a lot of headaches. Um you're typically dealing with an HOA if you have a downtown apartment, uh, which I have no interest in doing. Uh, there's also parking issues downtown for our guests and our cleaners when they go down there to clean. So we're really getting we have a handful of units left downtown, but um a lot of those are probably not going to be in our portfolio within a year or so. Okay. Um yeah, you touched on like who who is coming to these things. That's probably the most common question I get from you know, people I'm talking about this with casually, friends and family and stuff. And the answer to that is literally everyone you can possibly imagine. Because we have we have everything from a downtown studio apartment to an eight-bedroom lakefront home in Geneva on the lake. Wow. Um, and so we've got, yes, business travelers for sure, uh tour downtown tourism, uh, people coming for family friends, holidays, uh weddings, funerals, right? Uh the Cleveland Clinic drives a lot of traffic. But then we got people coming for family vacation and stuff too, especially in Sandusky, Geneva, and Portage Lakes, like Bernie talked about. So we're all over. You know, we have we have stuff in in all sorts of you know, urban to very country. And uh one we have one in a in a village with a population of 124.

SPEAKER_01 11:18

So oh my gosh. It's wild. And how often, like just out of curiosity, now I kind of want to poke around what volume are you guys doing? Like, what are the hot market times? Like, Bernie, I know off camera we were talking about this a little bit where you were saying March is kind of where things kick off. But obviously, I know it makes sense because during springtime, you know, everybody's kind of ripping and rolling with um holidays and stuff like that. Now, is that usually the hot zone, or is there also kind of an uptick during um during the winter time, like during holiday seasons, stuff like that?

SPEAKER_03 11:59

For me, I found the uh you know, March, April starts picking up, but then from the middle of May through the middle of August is the really really the peak season for most of our properties. Um in winter it tends to be it tends to be slower and we have more vacancy, but that's when we get more midterm rentals because the properties are available, so we can book it for a month or two months at a time where we never have a month or two months available in in June or June or July.

SPEAKER_01 12:29

Got it. And I I know like Airbnb's period. I've I have one or two investors that that do Airbnb, but they do it in in um Ohio City. And I have one that's just I mean, she's getting inquiries left and right during the summer. The other one barely gets anything, which is odd. Is there some sort of disparity? And obviously that's where you two come in as the professional leader. I'm calling that. I'm calling. Absolutely. No, as soon as you guys mentioned that, I'm like, oh my God. Because there's not really a lot of people that want to jump into the short-term management market because it's it's so complicated. I don't think people understand the intricacies within all of it. Because God forbid, I mean, everybody gets fixated on the numbers that you can get and the potential rent projections and the income. But the only issue is they forget all of the small details and the tiny details that could be massive expenses. Right. Right. Yeah, for sure. Like, I mean, for both of you guys, how do you end up managing that with new clientele on onboarding whenever you're whenever you're starting to have a conversation?

SPEAKER_00 13:41

Yeah, I mean, it it's a pain point for sure. Um whenever you get into a new house, you always start finding stuff you didn't see the first time when you start digging into it. We're we're dealing with an onboarding right now. Guys put a ton of money into it at our direction. Um, but you know, uh, we got in there, we needed to hook up some dishwashers for us for him. His maintenance, our maintenance guy gets in there, and there's no outlets for the dishwasher. So now we got to run a bunch of electrical for him. You know, we're gonna get an additional, you know, whatever the bill is for that. Um and so those things just happen. You know, I can do I can do a general walkthrough of the property, but I'm not an inspector, I'm not a contractor, and so I'm not gonna catch something like the fact that the dishwasher isn't hooked up or there's not an outlet for it, right? Because um and so it's it's really challenging. But yes, the last 10%, and Bernie I'm sure will agree, the last 10% of getting a property up and running is always actually the most work because there are just so many little things you have to button up. Um it's not like a long-term rental, right? Your long-term rentals don't get reviews, right? Everything like the whole business revolves around reviews for us. And so people will leave you four stars, which is bad in our business, um, for the smallest stuff. Or sometimes for no reason at all. The most frustrating thing is snowed. People expect a refund when the power goes out. I'm like, I need to turn your power off, man. Like, call first energy, because they don't give me a they don't give me a refund when the power goes out. Why why do you think I'm gonna give you a refund when the power goes out?

SPEAKER_01 15:19

Well, do some people even nitpick too on stuff like internet, like internet outages or stuff like that? Always, always. Are you serious?

SPEAKER_03 15:26

Yeah, yeah, they they they nitpick anything that's not there. And one of the challenges we have, and what they was talking about in the last 10%, is we want to make sure we take care of everybody's needs, right? Like all the little things that in the long term I only don't put in, but like you gotta have like a pizza cutter, uh a wine bottle opener, you know, because if somebody goes there and they don't have a pizza cutter, they get very upset. I'm like, you can use a knife. It still works. Wine bottle opener is a little different story. Yeah, but when we're equipping the house, that's one of the surprises that uh a lot of investors don't see like how much money goes in to furnishing the property because they're thinking, oh, a couch, a couple of beds, a dresser, that's it. You know, like no, no, you gotta fill, you gotta have forks and knives for everybody that's gonna be sitting there, all the dishes, extra sheets and towels, extra sheets and towers, expensive, right? Um and there's a lot a lot of little things in there, and then we also do a lot of tech. So I don't know if you want to get into the tech, but like you know, in order to protect their property and let us manage the the property well, we use a lot of tech. Like we use we both use like cameras to see who's coming into the house. We use some kind of a noise monitoring device so that you know if it gets too loud in there and we we don't want to bug the neighbors. Um we smart locks, yeah. So there's automated entry and uh so all of these things are in access, you know, not putting like a $20 deadbolt lock on there, we're putting a $300 smart smart lock on there that we can remotely control and monitor and make sure the battery is good in it. So all of these things add up, and the investors are uh sometimes surprised at that. But when you do it right, you get to the point where you have a very happy guest that's staying there because they got into the property okay, you know, and remind them on getting it in, make sure they don't have any frustrations with with the with the lock getting getting in the door. And um and once they get in there, they have they have everything they need. And then after their uh visit is done, that the cleaner goes there and you know, some sheets and towels get damaged during a stay, so we always have extras at the house. So we always have like when we launch a new property, we usually have you know at least three sets of everything and in the sheets and towels, because as they start getting damaged, we need inventory to to to use up and then and then replace them.

SPEAKER_01 17:42

Well, that's another another huge component, too. And if you guys want to kind of touch on the tech first, that's absolutely fine. But I'm curious too with regards to maintenance on all this and making sure that after people end up leaving, you know, do you have any spot repairs and things like that that you have to do? Obviously, I know housekeeping and stuff you have to maintain. Yeah, that's where all the bookkeeping, I'm sure, comes in. It's like it's trying to make sure that you're keeping track of all of that.

SPEAKER_03 18:08

But yeah, so we use um we we we use we have uh several maintenance people that uh that are kind of on call for us. I know Dave has his own maintenance person that he sends in direct. Um, but pretty much like on our busy season, you know, a guest checks out at 11, new guest checks in at five. If there's something broken in there, we need to get it fixed between eleven and five. So we need to send someone in there to to fix it right away. Now, the caveat on that is I will tell you this that the the better guests don't do as much damage, right? Like you can hear some nightmare stories about uh the guest damaging stuff. For the amount of bookings we we have, it's it's a very low percentage that there's damage that has to be in there. Now, also if you have cheap furniture, it's gonna break easier. Yeah. So like my very first Airbnb still has and it has the most bookings we've had. It still has everything is original except the sheets and towels. But everything is still the same stuff we've had, and uh that one's had probably close to 500 bookings. Still the same bed, still the same mattress, high quality mattress, it's it's still good. Um all the dishes are still good, all the forks and knives are still good, all the um you know, cookware and stuff like that, all the appliances are are good because they were good quality to start with, so they haven't gotten damaged. And we screen the the tenants, uh I mean the the guests, we screen the guests, so we only allow good guests going in, and then they're not they're not throwing a party, they're not doing anything wrong, because they're they're usually there for uh uh a purpose, right? And then as long as the purpose is what they tell us the purpose is, then everything is good, and they usually don't end up uh doing a lot of damage. So yes, there are um the other thing with maintenance, um, and I'll let Dave chime in on that, is also the pre preventative maintenance, right? So either the owner has to have a preventative maintenance schedule, or we kind of like monitor that forum because you know we want to make sure the air conditioners are serviced before each winter, and we want to make sure the heat is serviced before each um uh air conditioning before each summer, heat before each winter. Uh and make sure because you don't want one of those going out.

SPEAKER_01 20:16

God forbid. Yeah, you know. Pipe bursting.

SPEAKER_03 20:20

Yeah, and part of it, and part of that tech is also electronic thermostats, which you can monitor so we always know what the temperature in the house is, because if it's vacant in winter and then it like like yeah, like like right now, you know, if the heat goes out and nobody there to notice it, it'll drop below freezing pretty quickly in a couple days.

SPEAKER_01 20:37

Just so that you guys know we just dealt with a torrential storm. But it's like all help real close.

SPEAKER_00 20:44

Yeah, so uh on the maintenance side, uh we've recently hired two full-time maintenance guys onto our team, which has been huge, huge for us as a company, huge for our clients too, because we save them a lot of money, you know. Um light switch isn't working or something. I can send my guy out there. We bill his time back to our clients at $55 an hour. First, if you send an electrician out there, you're gonna get a bill for a couple hundred bucks before he even starts doing anything. So it's been awesome for us. Just having someone who's on call. So between those two guys, we have uh coverage seven days a week. So anytime there's an issue, we we know we have someone on call who can go out there and um and fix something or at least assess it, right? And and make sure we're not wasting time and money with the wrong wrong solutions. Um and preventive maintenance, like Bernie said, uh we do pretty much quarterly preventive maintenance at our properties. So testing the batteries in the smoke and carbon monoxide alarms. Um, you know, we monitor the batteries in the locks remotely so those get updated as needed. Uh, but like changing out the furnace filter, you know, mechanical maintenance, like Bernie said. Um you also asked about uh gas damage, and I agree with Bernie, you know, very very rare really that there's significant. Damage from guests, but through our property management software that we use, we pay for damage protection. And it's it's $35 per booking. It's actually billed back to the guest as a baked-in cost. Okay. You know, so whatever whatever our revenue manager sets the price at, the software automatically just adds $35. It's much easier to file claims and get them paid through that than it is through Airbnb. So it's a $25 minimum. So even if it's a set of sheets that got stained, we can we can claim that and get it reimbursed. It also covers, if God forbid we get bed bugs, it covers lost income for the bed bugs as well as the remediation service. And also like a little bit of uh liability and actual property protection. So it's a really nice thing that we have. Um, you know, it's uh it's a definitely an investment for us, but it saved us so much time and money. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:56

That's huge. That's huge. And with it with the co-host platform when you're when you're kind of walking step by step with these clients. I mean, how are you guys navigating that as they come? Because I can only imagine, especially for some newer investors that are jumping in, right? And this might be their first Airbnb. For some, it's like, okay, well, it is what it is. Within real estate, you only control about 20% of it. You know, but for some, it's like, God forbid, okay, they're seeing the bills stack up, they're seeing everything, everything going on, even though the income's coming in, sometimes it can be it can be a tough hurdle to go over. How do you guys navigate that? How do you guys walk step by step with your clientele? Um, whoever wants to start off, I'd love to hear both of your perspectives on that.

SPEAKER_03 23:43

Go ahead. Uh I think the the very first step is you know making them aware ahead of time so they know what to expect. Uh so it's a little education up front when when we're setting it setting up the property. Um what what we do is we we tell them the expenses they're expecting to have in there and what they have to pay for and what we can get covered with like uh uh an insurance policy um the the the short the short-term insurance. We we go we go through that, but then also uh a lot of times uh you know, especially if they're experienced long-term rental managers, uh they they they're used to like, well, I make so much a month consistently, but then when the the property is between tenants, that's when they have all their vacancy and all their expenses. So they only see it at one time, not so with us the vacancy and the expenses are kind of distributed throughout throughout the year. So there when as as the year goes on, we're doing the maintenance on it, we're deducting anything like that, and anything that breaks, we're fixing right in between the the guests, not after the after the tenant leaves. Um the the second thing is also we we have like a threshold, like if it's a minor item, like if something goes that we need to send a handyman in that's you know $75 or $100, clothing, stuff, stuff like that, um, then we'll just do it right away. Um if it's anything over $200, then we'll consult with the property owner. Um we just had one that we just needed to replace a furnace, right? So it was a uh heat out situation. We we caught it right away because of our remote thermostat. It started dropping. So we sent a we sent a tech in. Uh the tech said uh the furnace has to be replaced. We called the owner, and the owner had his own team because you know he does it does a lot of rehash, so he's got his own team, so they came and did it. And we had our cleaner go in there and put like a little temporary heat source because they weren't gonna come till the next day. We don't want it to freeze overnight. But that communication, you know, anything's gonna be over $200. Like, I don't want to spring a furnace bill on the uh on the owner at the at the end of the month because they won't be happy about that. But sometimes there's other there's other one, uh other little jobs like with the um we we had one where it was in a particular area where the sewer lines kept on getting clogged. But we get into three four hundred dollar sewer cleaning, so we didn't get them involved and and uh you know went through options. Uh and um one of them, actually, two of them we end up having to get the city involved because you know it ends up being like a little bit further down and uh uh and getting into that. So then you know they know other neighbors, so then we kind of got neighbors involved to discuss with the city, but that's kind of the other question coming into that further.

SPEAKER_01 26:39

No, no, no. But I mean that even that even goes into scope of like navigating through all that, you're definitely able to do all of that because God forbid, I'm sure the unclean is like, oh my god, I'm gonna have to change out the whole super line. Well, wait a minute, now if it's outside of the city, no, I'm not was this out of state owner or was this in state?

SPEAKER_03 27:00

Out of state owner on both on both on both occasions was actually no one occasion was uh out of state owner, the other city was uh in state in state owner. But he lived in a different county, so it was uh well-worth home.

SPEAKER_01 27:10

Okay, and that's that's kind of where guys genuinely this is this is definitely something something huge to keep in mind.

SPEAKER_00 27:19

Yeah, it's all about managing expectations. Um and that starts, you know, from the first contact point. Um, when someone calls me about a property, um, usually something they already own, um, you know, the first thing I'm gonna do after telling them what we do is run a projection for them. And that projection is just not a revenue side thing, but it's also factoring all the in all the expenses. So if that property has a pool or a hot tub, there's gonna be additional expenses associated with that. Um but yeah, we're talking about um things like um uh preva uh what do you call it? Pest Pest control? Pest control, yeah. Um utilities, right? Long you have a long-term tenant, they're typically paying the utilities. Not the case here, so you're gonna have at least a couple hundred bucks a month in utility bills, internet, uh potentially trash removal depending on where you live, right? Supplies, so we're gonna be restocking coffee, toilet paper, Kleenex, you name it, right? There's a cost to that. Um so being super, super transparent about all the costs associated with doing this, too. Um and then I'm always pretty conservative on my projections too, because yes, I want to sign these people, I want my business to grow, but the last thing I want is someone coming back to me in six months and saying, hey, I spent 40 grand to furnish this house, uh, is perform performing 20 grand less than you told me it's gonna do. Um so you know, pretty pretty conservative about that. Um you know, like Bernie, we have a threshold where we'll we'll consult with our owners if there's a major repair, but you know, simple stuff. We're just gonna take care of it. A lot of times we have to, you know, we've got a same-day turn, we've got we've got six hours to fix this problem before another guest comes in. Um and the alternative is to cancel it, um, lose all that money, so you might as well might as well just fix it and get on with it, right? And during the busy months, seriously, when you're dealing with that? Uh oh.

SPEAKER_01 29:18

I'm sorry, I shut that off. No, no, no, no, you're fine. Um No, so when during the busy months, seriously just with navigating, dealing with unit turns on such a quick basis, how do you guys end up getting the contractors on call? Like, do you have them on call immediately, or is it just pretty much like you just have systems and processes that are down that you just have a massive Rolodex? You just go straight through, you get the contractor, file it in the same day, because it god forbid, I'm sure, when you're managing that many properties all at once. Because I believe you you have 70 over 50 for both of you guys, and God knows. So it's like whenever you're doing that, how do you guys keeping keep track of all of those during the busy times?

SPEAKER_03 30:09

Well, it's not a massive Rolodex. Uh I don't have the luxury of having an in in in-store uh maintenance guy, but we have uh contractors, you know, like we try to get them at least three or four deep because you've called the first guy, he might not be available, it might be on another job. But the the ones we use very often, you know, they know our priority, so they keep us as top priority. Um so that's that's the first thing is having some, and we're all in different areas, right? So we're using different people in Cleveland as we're doing in Sandusky, as we're doing in Mansfield, as we're doing in Medina. So I guess it does get to be a pretty massive role decks. You have the three deep in each one, and then uh and then some of them are specialties, like the plumbers are specialties, like for for drain plumbing. Um and the the the worst thing, like when we talk about a cancellation, the cancellation is bad for uh in a couple of reasons. One is uh the lost income, but also if you cancel an Airbnb, like you you get like bad credit with Airbnb, then and that's that's a that's a bad thing. Sometimes the the customer can still review you if it's very last minute, right? And then you're giving you a bad review because they said uh the host canceled on me. Uh and then you fall every has an algorithm, and then you fall down on the algorithm that like this host like the likes to cancel uh bookings. Uh luckily in all the bookings we've only had to cancel maybe like three or four for like really detrimental uh sewer backups flooding the basement, you know. Like we had one, we had one of those last year. Uh and the customer was very upset because they they booked way in advance and we went in to clean it, and you know, the past guest is like I smell something from downstairs. Well, they didn't go downstairs, and we said we sent a guy like oh we we tried to get it cleaned up and but it wasn't. But you can't send them in like that. You can't you can't send another guest in like that. Um so yeah, having a good team and you know, like some of our handy men we've used for three, four years, so they know us real well, we know them real well, and our our lifeblood uh depends on them. And then the most important thing in a turnover is actually the cleaner, and the the cleaners are the hardest thing to manage in the business, right? Um because a a good cleaner will will make make your day, and a bad cleaner will really unmake your day. But the cleaners are the ones that are going in there and noticing if something is broken or if something needs attention. Because sometimes the guests report it, sometimes they don't. If the guests report it, we have a couple extra hours. Like if a guest reports something is wrong, then like the day before they check out or the morning, we can start. But a lot of times the cleaner will walk in there and they'll notice things that are broken, and then our six hour window goes to five hours or four hours, depending when she gets to the point where she notices them.

SPEAKER_01 32:56

And then same similar situations, or is it primarily you have you have people that are on staff? I know you were mentioning about systems that you have already for being able to um get reimbursed. Yeah, but does that also include maintenance as well?

SPEAKER_00 33:14

Um it depends on what it is. If it's guest damage, it can be reimbursed. Um but you know, other things are not going to be reimbursed. Like sometimes stuff just breaks. Like but it's all in terms of handling um the amount of stuff and and that can all go wrong at the same time, it's really just all about having good systems. And you know, uh cleaners like like Bernie, cleaners are our first line of defense. Um we're trying to transition them out of the mindset that they're just a cleaner, right? It's very hard to do. Um but um you know they they identify most of the problems. Either the cleaners or the guests are the ones identifying the problems for us, and obviously we prefer that be the cleaners before the guest finds it. Um but there's a there's uh you know a workflow for them to report problems, and then our team gets the maintenance guy out there um or whoever needs to be out there. And yeah, we've got we've got a bunch of preferred providers, um, you know, whether it's HVAC, plumbing, whatever. Um, you know, like Bernie said, the guy that does Sandusky is not going to do Geneva on the lake. So we've got you know different lists for stuff like that.

SPEAKER_01 34:21

Um is it complicated whenever you're juggling those properties within you say you have five hours, six hours to be able to end up with all that turned around.

SPEAKER_00 34:30

I mean, it can get crazy on a Friday or Saturday in the middle of July when you know the AC goes out at one place, the hot tub's not working in another place, the cleaner doesn't show up at the third place, and you suddenly you've got like your whole weekend is is ruined. Uh and you're uh and you're 100% booked, so you can't move the guests to another place. So yeah, I mean there are times when the business gets totally insane.

SPEAKER_01 34:58

Is that one of the reasons why you guys are are foundational on you guys are creating this Nostra? Is that is that more so the reason for for that is to be able to end up having an association of Airbnb um representatives or short-term rental representatives who are able to help create not only regulations but also be able to help support each other through connections, through vendors, through stuff like that?

SPEAKER_03 35:27

Not not pri I say would not primarily is why we we set it up like that, but it does happen because we have socials, we have quarterly socials. So you do get to know other people. So you can post uh we have a Facebook page, so we can post in the Facebook page saying, hey, does anybody have a plumber that's available on short notice in such and such area? Uh and and people will will share. There's a couple of different Facebook groups uh for that already that are that are well established, but I'm sure ours will get there. Ours has only been up in uh a year. Uh a year ago, we start we started doing that, right? One year? Yeah. Yeah. That's true.

SPEAKER_01 36:02

And then what what how many people are actually in the Facebook group now?

SPEAKER_00 36:05

Do you know? Like uh 125 or something like that?

SPEAKER_01 36:09

I don't remember. Wow. And that's for all northeast Ohio, or is that just primarily like just a few counties for now?

SPEAKER_03 36:16

It's actually northern Ohio, so it'll include we don't really have I don't think we have anybody from like the Toledo area. Okay. But they but they can be in Toledo area and Youngstown area, um basically down almost to Columbus. Jeez.

SPEAKER_01 36:30

Okay. And then with within that, you were saying that's not necessarily the the case. So with regards to Nostra, I know I keep I keep on getting getting tongue-tied with regards to it. Short-term rental associations. Yes. So with regards to that for Nostra, what specifically was your main goal and focus for why did you guys decide to create a chapter? Is it like a chapter here?

SPEAKER_00 36:55

Yeah, it's it's its own it's its own nonprofit entity. Um the goal is is to help hosts be better hosts. So talk about standards, safety standards, um, hosting standards, who you let stay in your property and how you screw how you screen them. Um so yeah, elevate the hosting community, improve the reputation of short-term rentals and short-term rental hosts in the community. Um, and also advocate on behalf of uh short-term rental hosts and owners when there are legislative issues popping up, like cities that that want to ban them. So we do our best. Bernie and I just went went to a meeting uh a couple weeks ago to talk to city council members, um, you know, educate them on what what measures are reasonable and what's not, you know, what's gonna help prevent problems, what's not, um, you know, what's gonna weed out the bad hosts from the good hosts. Um you know, what's what's fair and reasonable and what's not.

SPEAKER_01 37:54

Um Do you direct your clientele towards the the association? Or do you primarily want to keep it within, obviously, within the parameters of like managers or is it anybody who owns short-term rentals?

SPEAKER_00 38:13

Uh it would make sense for them to be in it. I I wouldn't say we I don't direct my clients there necessarily. A lot of my clients are out of state. Not all, I mean, maybe half of them, I don't know. Um, but mostly local operators, I would say, who are really tuned into the uh uh community.

SPEAKER_01 38:30

Sure. And when you say tuned into community, can you elaborate on so other people other other than the regulations or yeah?

SPEAKER_00 38:38

Well, there's a lot of solo operators, right? There's still tons of people out there who are renting out one house or one apartment on Airbnb, and it's just part of what they do, right? It's not their life like mine. Um But those people still have a vested interest in this stuff. They need to know what's going on in the community, and we all need education, right? We all learn from each other. Um so you know, it's those people. Um, service providers like cleaners should definitely be in this group. Um, it's good networking for them. They have a vested interest in legislation and standards and stuff like that. Um the group information will be in the description for you guys to join. Uh it would make sense for realtors to be part of this group. Um you might meet some clients, you might learn something that would help you educate your clients better. Um I think I think everyone in real estate has an interest in property rights and not having governments tell us so much what we can and can't do. Uh it's a fundamental belief of mine, at least. I think most of the people in the group would agree with that. So Bernie, anything to add?

SPEAKER_03 39:48

No, Dave said it perfectly.

SPEAKER_01 39:51

Got it. Got it. And then with with regards to that, I guess along those same lines, guys, what have you seen, especially for I guess Cuyahoga County, and then we can kind of expand out towards like towards portage or places like that as well. What have you seen within local communities, municipalities? I know each one is different, but what have you seen with differences and nuances within the short-term space? I'll let you take that one for very well.

SPEAKER_00 40:24

Are you talking in terms of like regulations, legislation?

SPEAKER_01 40:27

In terms of regulations, legislation, but then at the same time, too, even more so, just I I know now more than ever, they're starting to end up cracking down, I guess, on some short-term for the short-term rental space and potentially even the midterm rental space as well. Like Ohio City, Parma Heights, places like that, Bernie and I were discussing. I'm just curious if you can kind of let us know just some of the noise behind that as well as what's actually legitimate to worry about.

SPEAKER_00 41:02

Yeah, it's uh complicated to say the least. I don't imagine.

unknown 41:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:07

So, you know, to start with, there's something like 56 municipalities in Cuyahoga County alone. And so they all potentially have their own rules or lack thereof regarding short-term rentals and other property use restrictions and stuff like that. So just knowing what the rules are is hard enough. I don't know what they are for all 56 municipalities. I don't think anyone does. Um it got more complicated. You know, some places have always had regulations or have had regulations for a while. You know, that's been pretty much illegal in Shaker Heights for a long time, Bay Village for a long time, North Olmsted, and those are just off the top of my head. Um a year or two ago, uh there was some legislation at the state level that was introduced that would essentially ban cities from banning Airbnbs.

unknown 42:04

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 42:06

Um and so the most recent iteration of that bill that's still in committee grandfathered in any existing regulations at the time that that bill may be passed. So all these cities saw this and said, let's get some regulations in place so that if they do pass this bill, we're we're protected. So we've seen um a lot of cities popping up right now trying to pass some sort of regulations. Some of them are just flat out banning it, some are doing much more reasonable things like just saying, you know, you have to fill out a form, pay us a fee, and you know, whatever, renew that every every year. And we just want to know who you are in case something happens, we can do something about it. It's the type of thing that we we totally support. Um I think cities should know who's operating those types of rentals in their in their communities and be able to deal with the ones that are doing it wrong.

SPEAKER_01 42:57

Um are they also kind of grandfathering in, say, Airbnbs that are doing certain things that after regulation they're a little bit more lenient on, or is it immediate fines and immediate problems?

SPEAKER_00 43:10

We're dealing with that right now in a number of cities. Um, I think in a lot of cities, there's a legal legal right to be grandfathered in, you know. And and again, this is a complex legal issue. I'm not a lawyer. Sure. But uh, we've spoken with a lot of lawyers, and I believe in a lot of circumstances there's a legal case to be grandfathered in. The cities don't come out and tell you that. They say we passed a new law and you're now in violation of it. And they don't say if you thought uh send send our law director a letter, you can get grandfathered in. But we believe that's the case in most places that are banning them. So if you're already operating, I think you have a good case to get grandfathered in. But do you want to hire is it worth it to hire a lawyer? It's part of what NOSTRA exists for, is we Can we can bring 10, 20 owners who've been shut down together, have a group of people, a more forceful case, and have one lawyer representing all of us, and it's more uh more affordable to do that too. So yeah, so like I said, it's very complex.

SPEAKER_01 44:17

I can imagine. And I I I knew it was a nuanced question. It's it's just more so. I I just am curious with what have you seen more so over, especially this past year, yeah, with regards to all the changes. Yeah. Like what have you seen over the course of the year with regards to the Airbnb market, the short-term rental market, yeah, even potentially midterm rental market? Maybe even we'll just say Cuyahoga County. That has been the biggest hurdle. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:50

Yeah, I mean, I think regulation is an existential threat to our businesses at this point, uh, which is why we're being active about it. Um, from my conversations, and I think Bernie would agree, we've talked to a lot of legislators who, frankly, don't know the space well enough to be regulating it without input from people who do know the space. Now, yeah, I get it. Serving on small town city council, it's really impossible to, it's not a full-time job. Um, but the answer is not just to shut it down. Let's talk to all the stakeholders and figure something out that works for everybody. From an investment standpoint, it's shifted my strategy and philosophy, and and this is why I'm looking more at tourist locations that have already regulated this stuff. Sandusky already has regulations in place. Pretty restrictive, actually, but if you know how to work within them, it can be very, very profitable. And you know, regulations are good, like they're just the rules of the game, right? Like you can't play the game if you don't know the rules. Every game has rules, things you're allowed to do and things you're not allowed to do. So just learn them and work within them. Geneva Lake, another example. You know, they've already regulated their their whole economy is based around tourism, so they're not gonna they're not gonna shut these things down.

SPEAKER_01 46:07

Sure. Yeah, and that's that's a whole nother reason, guys, why having professionals who are managing these properties are all the more uh important. And it's not necessarily driving home the fear factor of regulation, because regulation across borders always going to happen. But the reality is, I mean, just from what you're hearing from Dave's perspective, it's more nuanced. And unless you want to be spending high dollar amounts towards lawyers, you also want to end up having proper representation for these properties. People like Bernie, people like Dave that are consistently dealing with this on a daily basis, they're always in the weeds. They know this process in and out. They're able to help you navigate through that. And um Bernie, too. I'm I'm curious to hear, like, I know Dave touched on majority, but is there any other input that you would say, primarily for the Cuyahoga County um itself, regulation-wise, that you feel like is is a main pain point or a main struggle, or is it same to his his point of regulation?

SPEAKER_03 47:14

I'll I'll agree with his point. I'll throw in a positive because I like to be a positive guy, right? So so besides these things, you know, like and when we've gone to some of these meetings, there are some of the uh like the city council members that understand the economic impact that it's having uh on on their city, right? Because it's bringing in an a lot of extra money into that city. It's employing local people, right? The handymen are local people, the cleaners are local people. Um a lot of times even it could be an investor, it could be a local person also, like especially in the in the mom and papa operations where somebody just has an extra house or two in in their neighborhood. So it is an econom an economic driver, and their constituents are benefiting from it. So um Cleveland itself, in in general, when you think of how many thousands of Airbnbs are in Cleveland, when you have the big events, there are hotels, but the hotels only offer so much of an experience. And the Airbnb experience is uh one level above that where people tend to come in for a longer period of time. They're spending more money at the restaurants, at the ballpark, at all the different venues that they go to. Um and I do like going into other communities that are underserved on the Airbnb side, right? Because then you're you're bringing in a new source of business in and you're supporting their local people for working and their local restaurants and their local attractions and stuff like that. Um some some uh areas that we're going to would be you know like a a quick travel destination for like from the Cleveland area, you know, it's like a one-hour, two hour trip. But with uh decent Airbnbs there, now it's attracting people from further and further away and they're coming on overnight, like maybe some people from Cincinnati that might have a three-hour trip and they don't want to go back and forth, so they'll come in and they'll stay overnight, stay a couple days and spend more money in that city. And it's it's a good it's a good win-win for everybody and for the for the Airbnb, VRBO, the short-term rental users, you know, we're just giving them a whole different plethora of options that they can do. And if you look at our properties and like if you go on our sites, you can see the the different layouts of the properties, different amenities, different games and gathering spaces where these families have fun and enjoy. Um and then even in in the in the midterm space, like in the in the workers, a worker doesn't want to just be cooped up in a hotel if they're here for two months, right? They want to cook their own meals and stuff like that, and and they have all that, they have a safe place to park their truck and all that. So um so we're obviously we're very bullish on on this this space, right? Like we we talked a lot of the nuances, but it's a great space to be in, you know. I get to wear a Hawaiian shirt every day for work, you know, because that's the space we're in. I I enjoy that. Uh um but yeah, I think.

SPEAKER_02 50:18

He's living the dream, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:21

And that's kind of leaning in out to the positives of it. Like moving away from regulation and and all the all the tough questions. Like realistically speaking, with Airbnb, I mean short-term, midterm space as well. What are some of the crazy stories that you guys have?

SPEAKER_00 50:42

The fun, the beauty, the the great things going on. Nothing bad ever happens. All good stories. Um I can go first and then you can see if you can help me. Um, one of my favorite memories, um I got called out to uh weekend, probably Saturday night. Um at this point, we still had it was a triplex in Cleveland Heights. We still had a long-term tenant in there living on the second floor between a first floor and third floor Airbnb. Uh and they called us because there were noisy, noisy Airbnb guests on the first floor. Um, and we asked them several times to be quiet, and they were still making noise late into the night. And so um I eventually drove out there, and uh it ended up being like a kid's birthday party. I swear to God, in the middle of the night, there were all these kids there. I don't think the parents were there, or there was maybe one parent there at the time. There were like pizza boxes stacked to the ceiling, like all this food. Uh they're like the fridge was full of juice boxes, not an ounce, not an I swear to God, not an ounce of alcohol in the place. And I had to kick this kid's birthday party out of our out of our place in Cleveland Heights because they wouldn't they wouldn't shut up and respect the neighbors. And so people always enjoy hearing a story about me breaking up a kid's birthday party. So it could have been worse. They were probably 13, 14 years old. Um, so you know, not a worst case scenario, but kind of a funny, funny example of what you what you have to deal with. You never know. God forbid. Jesus.

SPEAKER_03 52:33

Can I one-up that? Well, I haven't kicked any kids out, so uh I do have one really interesting. Uh we have an Airbnb in Mansfield that's right across from the Shawshank prison. Like it's literally right across the street. And we get a lot of ghost hunters that'll come there. Yeah. And they'll sleep all day, and at night they are all walking with their sensors and all that. They're going into the prison around the prison properties and around our properties. And I always ask them if they found anything, and we never get any feedback. So either they didn't find anything or they don't want to tell us what they what they found. So we always wonder. Do you hear anybody screaming on the camera? One of our most interesting uh guests that we had there was the Wiener Mobile, which has stayed there a couple of times because we have very large parking. Yeah. So I have great pictures from the from the ring camera of the Wiener Mobile parked in front of our place, right in front of the Shawshank prison.

unknown 53:29

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01 53:31

That's perfect. And one huge thing, too, is honestly, on a real note, I know I've I've talked about across board, we've gone over regulation maintenance. Why do an Airbnb funny stories? But why do Airbnb over long-term rental or over like midterm rental, what's the main thing that's a huge draw for why people should really consider? Because frankly, like not too many people really understand it, let alone or they they look at it and they're just like, oh, it's a hotel, but not a hotel, or you know what I mean? So if you guys can kind of walk us through numbers-wise, you know, like it loosely, how things can break down that really make Airbnb attractive.

SPEAKER_03 54:28

To me, uh from from a management style, if if you have the right property in the right area, you can generate probably I'm gonna say net net to the owner, maybe 30, 40 percent more revenue than uh than a long long-term rental. Now, you know, in 2021, 2022, that number was like a hundred percent more, two hundred percent more, it was double. It's not quite quite like that anymore. So you really have to look at like this the supply and demand of of the particular area. Um we both do that with with uh people looking to get in because a lot of times they want to go into a place where they know there's already a lot of Airbnbs, where if there's already a lot, then it's overserved. You're not you're not gonna make duratios. A couple of other reasons is that um overall, and like I told you, I I've done long-term rentals for a long time, um, the houses stay in much, much better condition as an Airbnb. So as a long-term investor, that house after four, five, six years, it's in tip-top condition. You're mentioning that one that still has pretty much all the same furniture, all the same amenities, all the same. Right. And for the all the long-term rentals, like it's very rare that a long-term tenant leaves a house and you're not doing a bunch of work. And especially like I have some long-term tenants that stay for a real long time. Like I've had some that are 14, 15, 16 years. And but when they move out of it, you pretty much have to redo a lot of that house, right? So you're down for for six months and uh uh and and stuff like that. And the third thing is and this somebody was just telling me this, like actually they mentioned this at one of the council meetings. If if if you're in an Airbnb, if you have a long-term renter and they're bad people and they're bugging the neighbors, they're in there in a year for a lead, uh, at least for a year, at least, right? And you're not gonna with us, we get somebody bad, you know, they're there for a weekend, for a week, and and then we're done with them. And then we can readjust and we say, okay, we gotta make sure on the next guest we screen that we don't get people like like these. You get the same opportunity in long-term rental, but it's a year cycle and it's uh it's a slower progression. So I think the properties, um, all my properties that I've had um as short-term rentals, they're all in as good a condition as they were day one. Um, sometimes even better because you know we keep improving, improving, improving uh on the property because we're improving the guest experience. So we're adding amenities, adding stuff. Uh like this time of year and in the in the winter when it's slow. This is when we do all the little fixing, right? Because so try to make better revenue next summer than we did last summer. Got it. Got it. And it's a similar situation for you as well, David?

SPEAKER_00 57:20

Yeah, I mean the um, you know, I I would also add, yeah, there they are just really it's a cash flow play, right? Um so you know, I I we have several houses in our portfolio that are probably uh $400 to $450,000 houses, uh, but they're gonna do $100,000 in gross revenue in a year. Uh so just much bigger cash flow. Also, we don't we don't really manage apartments for other people anymore. We're really focused on higher-end single family, but I own a couple two-bedroom apartments that would probably rent for $1,400,000, $1,500 a month. Uh, they do $34,000 a year on Airbnb.

unknown 58:00

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 58:00

So almost double there. And and you know, that might not make sense if you hire a company like mine or Bernie's when you're paying us a lot for that sort of margin. But it does make sense for me because I own them. I get forgotten. So if you're gonna manage it yourself, well, what I'm saying is if if if you're just gonna manage it yourself and you only have a couple of them where you know you're willing to spend the time on it, something like that can make sense too. Uh, something else I want to touch on, I'm not an accountant, but there's also this concept of accelerated depreciation, which I know Bernie's familiar with too, and cost segregations. And so this is really popular strategy with high W-2 income earners. So uh doctors, um, people in the tech industry, especially in California, uh, where property is also very expensive. So we get a lot of calls from these people. You know, they might make four or five hundred thousand dollars a year salary from their job. They're like, man, I'm paying this huge tax bill. I have one I have one client who who consistently tells me, Dave, I need more expenses. I love clients like that, right? Um, he doesn't want to give his money to the government. And so the basic idea of this is that you buy um a higher priced house, right? We're typically talking at least $500,000 house for this to really make sense. Right. Um But you can you can accelerate 100% of the depreciation of that house in the first year that you own it and make it live on Airbnb. So if I buy a $500,000 house, I might be able to accelerate $250,000 of depreciation, take a $250,000 of depreciation in that first year of owning that house and not pay taxes on $250,000 of my income. You do that every single year. You could stack these investments, you're stacking tax gains on top of that. So talk to your accountant. Like I said, I'm not an accountant, but hugely popular strategy, part of a big, beautiful bill. Um, this was made permanent, I think, right? A permanent measure. So uh it's a popular tax strategy for short-term rent. And that's only short-term rentals, you can't do that with a long-term rental.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:14

Okay. And with with regards to short-term now, when you're does that also coincide with midterm rentals as well? Or that's strictly short-term? Strictly short-term. Strictly short-term and short-term. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:29

Yeah, average stay of under seven days, I think.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:32

Yeah. Okay. And then with regards to midterm rentals, also, I think people kind of always think that it's interchangeable, short-term and midterm. They're not really understanding of the short-term play, is more so going to be extremely bad, more so Airbnb verbo when people are staying for short take short stays. Midterm is more so along the lines of like six months or so, would you say, or somewhere along those lines?

SPEAKER_03 1:00:59

Anything over 30 days. Yeah, anything over 30 days. Yeah, because we got 30, 60, 90 days. We get we do get some that are over six months. Yeah. But the 30, 60, 90 days are the more popular ones.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:10

And would you say there's a lot more Airbnb presence and short-term rental presence within your mark, our market? Or would you say that there's more midterm rental, or is it very nuanced in and of itself? And I'm just not sure.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:26

It is nuanced, but uh some of those do come in through Airbnb and verbal. Because people will do we we have had a six-month that was all on Airbnb. Um I got a year-long booking on Airbnb. You did? Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:41

It's like a one-bedroom apartment, so it's still like 18 grand or something on Airbnb.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:47

That's good, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:47

Yeah, that's crazy.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:48

Yeah. So it does happen like that. Because also like the the company, sometimes it's the company that's putting somebody up, whether it's a construction company, they they they know and trust Airbnb, so they're going into a different market. Maybe they've never been in Cleveland, right? They're from some other state. So they their policy is wherever we put our workers, we put them in an Airbnb. So then they book it through Airbnb. So it's a great platform for that. And Airbnb themselves, they are pushing for more th greater than 30-day bookings. So they have an internal initiative and they're a great marketing machine, right? So they're marketing for us to bring us those customers. So all good all good on our.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:26

And the other thing is with the reviews that both of you guys have, you guys are staples within those platforms. And that's that's I think a huge thing. Like, are a lot of your um a lot of your uh bookings coming through verbo and Airbnb as opposed to your I know both of you guys have your own websites and your own platforms as well. Yeah. And would you say it's primarily Airbnb and Verbo, or even your websites as well?

SPEAKER_03 1:02:55

Where you're driving traffic? For me, I'm about 60% Airbnb, 30% verbal, 10% direct.

unknown 1:03:03

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:04

Yeah. We're yeah, probably about 60% Airbnb. We're also on booking.com, and some of our homes are on Marriott homes and villas as well. Um, but yeah, we're probably about 60% Airbnb, 10% direct, and the rest is coming from those other sources.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:20

Yeah. That's absolutely phenomenal. And guys, that's all the more reason, seriously, having proper management. Even though if you do it alone, there's possibility to be able to end up facilitating a loan. However, having that direction, having that in-house, it's literally like having in-house counsel. They're not attorneys, but they're literally going to be the people that you go to, similar to having a property manager. If you're out of state or even if you're in-state, their knowledge base, their awareness, also their understanding of the regulations and systems that are in to save you money is going to be ten times worth, I'm sure, what the management fees bake out to be. Because frankly, you don't ever want to be in a situation where something happens, you're not there, and you have to deal with the problem straightforward. Um, guys, thank you so much. Some of the main things I want to take away from for everybody is please short blurb about your business, short blurb about Nostra, and please tell everyone in front of the camera what's going to be coming up for 2026 for your businesses. Whoever wants to kick off.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:33

All right. Um I definitely say reach out to us. Uh, we love talking to people, whether uh you go in through Nostra to find out about how to run your business legislation, whether you want to do one-on-one coaching consulting with us, uh, help you in different parts of the business if you struggle with it, if you wanna uh you wanna have us help you find a house, set up a house, or run it for you as a as a regular co-host. As far as what's coming up big in 2026, um Dave mentioned the the cost segregation and doing that. Uh I'm doing that a lot with uh investors where we're we're co-investing together and giving them the bigger part of uh of their tax deduction. If they're if they're high W-2 earners, that's that's really good. And we're gonna we've done that in 2025. We plan to do a lot more of that in 2026. Um, and we're still looking for big, beautiful properties. If somebody has a big property, like something something I'm looking for is like a nice big the I I like barn dominiums and a nice big barn dominion in the country. Tell them burning. You know, especially like people can bring collector cars into barnuminium. All the collector car people, they don't have anywhere to go in the winter, they don't they just keep them in the garage. So bring them in a trailer. So somebody has a barn dominion and we can do other events uh in barniniums. It's uh and a lot of times it To be in wide open spaces where you can have a little bit more relaxed atmosphere. So that that's that's what I'm looking for for 2026. It's been on my bucket list to have a nice barnuminium in the country. Please send Bernie a Barnum Minimum. Barnuminium.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:14

Barnum Minimum. Barnum Minimum.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:19

Yeah. I mean, 2026 for us, we're we're trying to grow by at least 50%. So we're going to be out there networking. So find me at a networking event or call me if you need a speaker or podcast guest. Happy to do that. Thanks for having us, Gabe. If you're thinking of buying a short-term rental, please, please, please call me or Bernie before you buy the house. I can't tell you how many people I just bought this house. I want to do short-term rental. Like, sorry, that's not it. That's not a short-term rental. Please call one of us before you buy that house. And either of us will be happy to offer you some coaching and some feedback and even some help finding the right property.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:04

Guys, you heard it here first. Local keys and contracts. Thank you so much for watching. Guys, thank you so much for being on the show. Everyone, Eagle Stays, Bernie and then Dave with Host Pros. Definitely pay attention and make sure that when you're looking at short term rentals or midterm rentals, check these guys out first. Thank you so much. It's Kate Newberry, local keys and contracts.