January 18, 2023

Episode 166: You’re Leaving These Items For Your Guest But Probably You Don’t Need To

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Finances

How to build an Airbnb Business: You’re Leaving These Items For Your Guest But Probably Don’t Need To

As occupancy around the nation has slowed slightly (although not in all markets) we really need to consider our expenses.

Afterall, we earn more if our expenses are less! There is one consumable item I have been using in my properties for years but just realized something…

Maybe we don’t actually need it. Well, we’re now testing that theory.

And the chances are you might not need to be leaving this consumable item as well (and I can guarantee it’s something you are currently leaving).

I’ve found that Hotels (even with kitchens) don’t leave this for their guests either so after reviewing how much it was costing us we have decided to cut this expense.

This week we will discuss:

The consumable items we leave guests and whether they are all necessary
Have you considered alternatives?
Do you know how much they are costing you?
Will forgetting something lead to a bad review

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So as short-term rental host, a short-term operator, we have to leave consumable items in our properties for our guests. These are things like shampoo and toilet paper, but there’s one that I bet most of you are leaving and you might not need to be leaving which means it’s an extra expense out of your pocket. I want to talk about it this week, stay tuned.

Welcome to short-term rental riches will discuss investing in real estate but with a specific focus on short-term rentals quick actionable items to acquire, manage and scale your portfolio. I’m your host Tim Hubbard.

Welcome back to the short-term rental riches podcasts are so many intricacies that go into a short-term rental property. We’ve talked a lot about them on this show over 160 episodes now. So welcome back once more this week we’re talking about consumables, these are things that we have to have in our properties but we don’t necessarily need to have all of them. Toilet paper, that’s an obvious one. We’ve got to have toilet paper, but this week, I want to talk about paper towels. I know it’s not the most exciting subject but the reality is these things can add up in every expense that comes out of our pocket comes off our bottom line and that means we’re making less money. So, if there are certain expenses that we don’t need and it’s not going to impact Our Guest.

Well, we should eliminate those. So, this is something I’m experimenting with my properties. We just took all of our paper towels out of all my properties and you’re probably thinking Tim, that’s crazy. People need. Nothing to clean in the kitchens to use his napkins, all these things and they do and we’re providing something but not paper towels. So, we decided to switch to Bar mop towels. These are all white. There’s something that we can bleach and it’s something that we can reuse.

And the reality is that these bar mop towels are less expensive even than one roll of paper towels. So, it really got me thinking, it’s something we’re testing out and I wanted to share it with you. Now, I want to talk about Other. This is right for you because this doesn’t make sense for all properties. If you only have one property and you’re putting a few paper towel rolls in there, each month is not really a big deal, right? But if you start adding more properties your portfolio, which I hope you’re doing 235 properties. In each month, you’re spending ten fifteen fifty dollars on paper towels.

Well, this really starts to add up. So aside from just paper towels, I want you to really think about all the consumable items that you are purchasing for your T. There are Necessities ones that you absolutely need to have one about soaps. For example, I did a whole episode on soaps. Yes. I know not all these episodes are super exciting and super fun, but the reality is they’re real things that we need to consider with our short-term rentals. So, you should have soaps in there. Multiple different kinds should definitely have toilet, paper. Of course, we want towels and linens, but paper towels are one of these kinds of green areas and I had a friend tell me recently that they decided to go green in it, so they’re using less of these paper towels and the reality is that we can rewash these bar mop towel. So, you want to make sure that you’re getting pure white ones and you can bleach them. So, you might actually be using a little more paper towels than you’re thinking too because I bet a lot of your housekeepers out there are using your paper towels for cleaning as well.

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Okay. So that’s just a little bit on paper towels. So, should you actually be leaving them? Well, let me ask you a question. If you have a roll of paper, towels sitting in the kitchen and it’s pretty small. You know, it’s got less than half. For example, do you think that’s a good idea to leave that? I would say no? Why because your guests are going to be thinking about the person that was using that before you said, Cooler to the way. They will think that if they see a roll of toilet paper, that’s not fully used. Now there’s some things you can do to dress it up. You know, you can put a little sticker on it or stamp showing that you’ve professionally touch this, your housekeepers have and then it’s ready for the next guest use. But a lot of times you might be throwing those out.

Your housekeepers might just be using up the rest and then you’re having to replace them. So, think about that first. Do you want that look in your property? The second question you want to ask yourself is how much you really spending on this consumable item if you’re not spending a lot. Then this bag has isn’t going to help you out that much, but I hope it gets you thinking about the other consumable items that you are purchasing to see if there might be a way for you to save concert without cutting corners too, we don’t want to come off as being cheap with our rentals, right? Of course, every rental has different standards, but toilet paper, for example, is one of those areas where we do not want to buy that toilet paper.

A third question, you might want to ask yourself, is how long your guest actually staying, because if they’re staying in your property for a long, long time and you put one paper towel roll out to start. Well, you’re not going to be replenishing that that’s one of the side benefits about having medium term stays or longer-term stays is that we have a little less expense with consumables. So, if you’re only doing medium term stays, you can afford to put a few more consumable items in there for your guests.

So, let’s get the cost here. When I started looking at this, I couldn’t believe that we could actually buy a bar mop towel brand new for less than the cost of a paper towel roll. That’s crazy to me. So how are we? We doing this and still making our guest feel comfortable and having something to use. While we’re leaving several bar mop towels, freshly cleaned. Of course, you don’t want to have any stains on them. If you do have stains on them though, after washing your housekeepers, can use these as cleaning rags.

So, we leave some fresh ones and then we’re also leaving a separate. One is a hand towel just to dry their hands. And that’s one that we will leave hanging over the dishwasher or right there next to the sink. So yes, there is going to be a little It’ll more laundry. But, you know, it’s not going to be a whole bunch, and if you end up saving half your costs, this is quite a bit of money in here can really add up at least. It is for us, you know, we’re doing hundreds of reservations every month for any of those of you out there that are running property management companies, we have bigger portfolios.

Every expense that we take off, and that is unnecessary that comes right back to our bottom line and that goes right into our pockets. So, consider your consumable items, make sure that you have the necessary. STDs, but everything over that see, if that’s something that you really actually need were trying this out right now, part of this podcast is just to get you thinking and understanding and evaluating your business a little more. We might get some feedback on this and if we do, well then, we will make a change but if we don’t, we’re going to end up saving a lot, a lot of money. So, until next time, there is a little bit on paper towels. I hope you’re having a wonderful week out there and look forward to talking with you soon.

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