Intro
[00:00:00] Liam: So welcome along to the Boostly podcast. This is the podcast that gives hosts the tools, the tactics, uh, the training, and most importantly, the confidence on how you can go out there and get more direct bookends for your business. Easy for me to say today, we're going to be, uh, talking about metrics and all the things within your short-term rental business, because it is a business that you should Or could be tracking.
[00:00:23] Um, this is something that not everybody does, and I'm certainly guilty of it in the early stages. And to help us do this, we're going behind the host with a successful short-term rental host who's based here in the UK, and we're going to dive into his business, hear about his journey and the sort of metrics that he tracks in particular, we've got some slides and, uh, yeah, leave, let me introduce, uh, Ron Jansen.
[00:00:45] He's from 12stay.UK. So if you want to go and check them out, uh, he's got 30 doors himself, but as has over a hundred on his website, and we're going to talk about how that works in just a moment. So welcome along Ron. Thank you for joining us today. Thank you very much, Liam. So to get started.
[00:01:03] Why don't you introduce yourself and your business, uh, tell us where you are in the world and anything you'd like to share. Right.
A bit about Ron
[00:01:09] Ron: So I'm Ron, I am Dutch and I left the country many, many, many years ago in 85 to be precise. So I'm, I'm a bit of a flying Dutchman because I've been living all over the place.
[00:01:26] And of course, right now I am at home and home is in sort of greenish, but cloudy Hampshire, old Hampshire, not New Hampshire.
[00:01:38] Liam: It's always cloudy in England, isn't it?
[00:01:41] Ron: Well, yeah, but that's a good thing because then you appreciate the fact that it's sunny. Absolutely.
What kind of model do you use?
[00:01:48] Liam: Very true. Very true. Talk us through what kind of model you use and why?
[00:01:54] Ron: So I'm really in An IT guy, I like to systemize things. I think about, let's say very, very logical structures. And that means of course, that I always like to see things from a sort of block perspective, as Lego blocks almost. And, and that means that anything that I sort of do has to hang together in a proper, robust fashion.
[00:02:26] I can go back in time a little, maybe not yet, but, uh, literally what I like to do is make sure that all the components that are used within the hospitality industry are. glued together in a very, very coherent way. And also making sure of course, that you keep control. If you want to grow, let's say grow wisely, because having one property that you lived in before, for instance, and you want to rent it out.
[00:03:07] That's a different model than when you run up and scale up to 30, 40 by a hundred or a few hundred. And then clearly you have to think much more about, okay, how do the professionals approach it? And then clearly you looking at a, let's say, a Marriot or an IH group, A I H G group, things like that.
[00:03:32] So it's, it's, that's a different, uh, approach. But of course, it means still, you need to have the basic building blocks in place to make sure that everything stays robust.
[00:03:48] Liam: That sounds fair enough. Um, we will dive back into your background of, uh, how you got started in hospitality, but just before we do at this.
How does it all work?
[00:03:56] In the intro bit, we mentioned you've got 30 doors yourself and there's a hundred on your website. Talk us through, are there 30 other ones you own or manage and the, the extra ones on your website? How does that work?
[00:04:07] Ron: Back in 17, I tried to manage myself. The problem was that 70 miles away. Is not convenient.
[00:04:19] Clearly, it means that if there's an issue, you have to go up and down. In those days, we, we, we had an electronic lock August, and that was very fiddly, but at least, at least we were able to say to a guest, here's the code. You can enter the flat. However, if something goes wrong, it takes an hour to be there.
[00:04:42] And, and, that's not very practical. Plus, of course, all the cleaning and stuff like that. It's, it's extremely difficult to do anything like this remotely. If you don't have the right people in place on-site. And of course, if you're running your own, uh, Let's say short-term rental, and it's, let's say, within five minutes drive or several within the, let's say, time now radius.
[00:05:12] Yes, you can do things, but then still, you can't do that much unless you have extra people, because if you do it yourself, all of it, welcoming the guests. Cleaning, maintenance and there are many, many bits and pieces in the background as well because you have to do your admin which is quite intrusive.
[00:05:37] If you don't give it the right intention, you may make mistakes and make mistakes on the admin side. ramp up, then you have your marketing, you have your sales. And so it, it, it becomes a lot quickly. And so, uh, stepping back to the first Flex in 17, that was in Woolwich. And of course, another interesting bit is that You think quickly, okay, all you need is a flat, put territory in it, put it on, uh, Airbnb, booking.
[00:06:15] com, anywhere, and it will sell. It doesn't work that way. You have to do your marketing. Secondly, you need to have your maintenance in place, your cleaning, etc. But then, of course, most people forget, if it's flat, do you have permission from the freeholder? To run a business activity, because after all, it is a business activity.
[00:06:41] And in this case, it's quite funny. This, this flat is in a very, very nice block of flats, uh, in Woolwich, Royal Arsenal, very nice development, very modern temps. However, the leach clearly says you can't run a business like a short-term rental. However, in those days, when you look at Airbnb bookings. com, you see about 70, 80 hosts in that area advertising.
[00:07:14] Of course, if that's already in breach of the lease, then clearly it's an accident waiting to happen. And so that's a typical example, people just off the cuff, start a business as you know, I can do that. But I don't think about the consequences, or let's say the viability long term,
[00:07:38] which is a typical thing that again, if you don't think about it as a business, how sustainable is it? How, how robust are the foundation blocks? then yeah, it, it, it, it is risky to be honest, even if you're having a healthy turnover. And I'm sorry for all the people who are relying on OTAs. Again, it's like you're having a flat with a freeholder who does like this.
[00:08:11] However, it's not allowed in the lease. If you're running your business and all your bookings are coming in from OTAs and other websites, and you're not in control, actually, you don't even get the real contact details. Unless you're a bit clever about it again, you're too dependent or too dependent on others.
[00:08:35] And, and that's, that's a business risk. To be honest,
[00:08:38] Liam: thank you so much, uh, Ron for spending time with us. Appreciate you sharing your, um, your business with us and your story. And I hope to speak to you again. So thank you too. If you're listening to this on Facebook live, um, that's it from us, from this live recording of the Boosley podcast.
[00:08:54] Uh, I know there's a lot of places you can put your attention and I thank you for putting it with us. So that's bye from me and bye from Ron. See you on the next one. Having a blast. Gonna get it on the Boostly
[00:09:03] Ron: podcast, Bruce Lee. Let Bruce Lee 'cause it's so hard on the tea loose leaf, making up those rhymes.
[00:09:09] Don't write it, just do it loosely.
