Well, I first fell in love with Airbnb as
a guest. So the experience in the first apartment was in North Bondi, actually here in Sydney.
And it was this beautiful little apartment, little ocean, glimpses, vintage furniture,
some surfboards in the corner. And they even left some beers in the fridge. And I thought
what an awesome experience this is. And I'll have to do this again. And again, with my
work, it takes me all around the world. And so my first choice is always Airbnb. You just
seem to have much more personal experiences, and you sort of get a little sneak peek into
someone else's life and, and what their style is. And so when I purchased my own beachside
apartment, I knew that I wanted to become a host and sort of share my my life and my
experience in my, my little apartment with other people from all around the world. How
much you can make on Airbnb really depends on the sort of place you have. So I actually
had a look in the most expensive Airbnb is $12,000 a night in Tuscany. So of course,
I'd love to have their place and I'd love to have those rates. But for example, if your
price is about $150 a night, and you've got about 80% occupancy over a month, you might
make about three and a half thousand dollars. So if you're $300 a night, you might be around
$7,000 a month. I lived in my apartment first and enjoyed it for myself. And then when I
was moving out, I didn't know whether to rent it out to full time tenants or to Airbnb it.
In the end I just took a punt and I just took a guess to put it on eBay and see what would
happen and in the end, it's turned out to double my income as opposed to you know, renting
regulars in there. So it's it's been a much better decision financially. So if you're
a new host, and you want to rank really high on the air b&b searches, there's a few things
you need to know. And there's a few things that Airbnb absolutely love in terms of their
algorithm. And that is five star reviews. Response times, it's always great to respond
really quickly to your guest. And also pricing. And its studies have sort of shown that if
your price is in line with the average of your market, then you're going to show up
first. Qith your Airbnb listing description, it's really important to be really honest
first, so talk about how great your apartment is, but also just let people know if there's
any little tricks to putting the shower on or with the lighting and things like that.
Also just give some tips and tricks to you know, local cafes, bars and might be in the
area. And you really want to get across your personality but also the personality of the
suburb and you're street. Being a professional photographer, I'm a little bit biased and
saying how important professional photos are in an Airbnb listing. But I'm always surprised
to see so many listings with dark and photos taken on their iPhone. I just think they're
really doing themselves a disservice because they might be great apartments but you just
sort of skip through those ones because they just don't look appealing at all. So you know,
nice light, bright photos will just change your world and will get you more bookings.
In our instance, we've got a beachside apartment. So the most important thing was its location
being close to the beach. So I actually got a drone shot got the drone out over the ocean.
So you can looking back at the unit and really see where it is located. Water sand and then
our apartment and I put a big yellow arrow pointing to the apartment just to really make
sure of it. And I found that really helps with it with bookings don't think they're
doing it yet but I want them to do more video with if you're a host. Like I would love to
create a little story around my Airbnb like get up in the morning have a coffee go for
a surf, comeback. Just read a magazine on the couch, like just create that real like
yeah, that's probably not for everyone. You really want to have clear communication when
being an Airbnb host and just going above and beyond to make sure that your guests are
safe and having a great stay, really to have some attention to detail. So soaps, towels,
maybe artwork on the walls, it's really the guests really enjoy just saying that personal
touch. Something we do a little bit different with our listing on Airbnb, I guess is we
offer our surfboards up to guess we're on the beach so I thought it was too good of
opportunity for guests to miss out on surfing. So I've got a you know, a surfboard that I
don't use anymore. And guess you're welcome to use that.
On a regular week, I don't spend that much
time at all actually on the Airbnb app, I might spend half an hour to an hour, just
sort of checking the dates, updating prices and making sure everyone's okay with check
ins and check outs. I bought my Airbnb listing at about three years ago for $300,000. And
I've spent about $25,000 on renovations. It was really dated when I first bought it so
brand new bathroom and re tiled painted the place and just it gave it a real facelift.
When I first became an Airbnb host, the biggest mistake I probably made was not being as crystal
clear with communication as I could have been. So for example, LL car park our dedicated
car park is like a little bit tight if you've got a big full drive, and I just didn't tell
people that I forgot to sort of mention that. And when people would come if they had a big
full drive, they would be like, Hey, where do I park? It's a bit tight. So just little
things like that. Just being ultra clear and honest and transparent with your listing I
think is really important.
Hey, guys, my name is Maurice and I'm the
producer of Side Hustle Finder. We're actually testing a new concept where we're trying to
help Australians find the best side hustle that's for them. So if you're interested in
side hustles, or ready to do one, just drop us a comment below. I've also written a guide
on Airbnb and how to actually make money on the platform. So if you're interested, just
check out the link in the description below as well.