How Can We Make a Real Sharing Economy for Vacation Rentals

in #business7 years ago

When Airbnb first launched in 2008, it was this new, innovative model that was disrupting the hotel business. Today, it and many rental sites that have started since, are key players in the hospitality industry. However, none of it would have been possible if the sharing economy, the idea of “renting” out unused assets, wasn’t also becoming more popular, it was quickly becoming the norm.

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Ten years ago, renting a room in someone’s home or swapping houses for vacation was highly unusual. When going on vacation, most people would rely on traditional hotels and occasionally hostels. Now, it’s the norm. Thanks to the sharing economy and startups like Airbnb, Uber, and Upwork, anyone can make some cash on the side or grow a side-hustle into a full-fledged business.

At BookingTeam.com, we work with our customers to maximize the earning potential of their properties. To survive in the vacation rental business today, property managers and owners need to have a sharing economy mindset.

What is the sharing economy and what are the benefits?
The sharing economy came about because it offered the ability for people to monetize unused assets. At its core, the sharing economy is about finding the most efficient use of money and resources. It’s about making businesses leaner and working faster and smarter.

1. Adopt a zero-waste mindset.

According to numerous statistics, people are wasteful. We throw out food and clothes, while others starve. We spend a significant amount of money in repairs, gas, etc. to keep a car on the road when we could share the costs by carpooling. Now, technology has made it possible to decrease the amount of waste we create while also generating a profit.

In the hospitality industry, allows people that have rooms or houses that they don’t use at least part of the year to make a profit. Instead of leaving it empty and still pay for the upkeep, rent it out and make money.

2. Increase productivity.

Part of the sharing economy concept is finding ways to do more with less. This is especially true when it comes to time.

Time is a commodity, more precious and valuable than money, so how you use your time is key to running a successful business.

If you are managing a vacation rental, it is important to make your business processes as efficient as possible. Repetitive tasks should be automated with technology. For example, BookingTeam.com offloads the tedious work of creating listings and answering guest inquiries plus automating dozens of repetitive but important tasks. Our platform shares your listings with the most popular rental sites so that it can reach the highest number of potential guests, while we optimize your pricing and overall performance.

3. Use data and technology.

The sharing economy wouldn’t have been possible if it weren’t for the advances in data and technology. We can now quantify how much waste we produce, get a better idea of why, and take steps to turn that waste into profit. In vacation rentals, waste is usually those properties that sit vacant for weeks or months.

Embracing the sharing economy means managing properties with efficiency and zero-waste in mind. By using data and BookingTeam.com’s platform, property managers, and owners can team up with booking professionals who adjust pricing, promotions, booking dates and other factors to more effectively influence booking conversion rates across all main booking sites, this saves our hosts loads of time so they can focus on excellence in hospitality and happier guests, which is what it is all about!

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I really like hearing about these new projects coming to the market with the philosophy of "zero-waste mindset."

There is so much waste (such as underutilized accommodation) it's great to see companies taking the initiative to take advantage of this.

@bookingteam.com I would like to know your thoughts about renting a huge fully renovated four bedroom single family in Washington DC to corporate.

That sounds like a place that will have good potential. Feel free to sign up on our site and team up with a pro booking team. They will add your property to all sites, including sites that tend to have more corporate guests such as booking.com and agoda.com

This all sounds very idealistic. But if I may say so, Airbnb pretends to be 'sharing' but is in fact getting very rich. They calculate abnormally high service costs the owner of the accommodation knows nothing about. They do not know the amount Airbnb gets. Plus they collect this money right away, weeks or months before you even stay there. Think of all the interest they get with your money. All of this is fine, but Airbnb should'nt pretend to be so idealistic because in fact they just get very very rich over peoples backs. This is just a perspective we should keep in mind if you ask me (:

Hey @bookingteam.com... I totally support the idea of shared economy. Making the most of everything that one possesses, is the way to go.
As they say, in this world there is enough for everyone's need but not enough for even one person's greed.

It is pretty wild how much the rental industry has grown over the last ten years. Airbnb completely flipped the market upside down. Before Airbnb a normal home owner might not have been inclined to try to rent out any free bedrooms in their home. Now people are using it as another source of income, kinda like Uber.

I have actually been able to stay for free the last few times I went on vacation. I did this by switching homes with another person in the area I was planning on vacationing. At the same time I was using someones home in upstate New York, I would be renting out my house in California....or even better make a straight up trade with the other homeowner.

That way my house is making me money while on vacation :)

Another great, informative article. It's amazing tho think how far we have come in the past ten years or so. Most disruption enabled by the internet. AirBnB, Uber etc plus smaller enterprises to rent your car, garage, tools and even your drive.
It has allowed the normal individual to benefit from their assets when not in use, whilst allowing people to access these things at a much more reasonable rate!
The next stage is blockchain!! It will be really interesting to see how far we go in the next ten years!!

Don't you think decentralised blockchain applications in the future will do what Airbnb and Uber do for us with a fee, without a fee?
Please check out our macroeconomic analysis, seems like you might be interested.
https://steemit.com/economy/@obhutara/trumphoria

YES! We sure do think so! Real sharing economy is something like swarm.city - where no centralisation is required at all. Thanks for the great comment! Keep on sharing @obhutara !

Hey Bookingteam, best regards from Rik Pennartz in the Netherlands
@Bohdissatva

You're very excelent. It's a post have given me a new information and that's very usefull and very benefits. I am very intetesting to your post. Thank you so much you have the things that very amazing. I have upvoted you and I hope for you to upvote me and support me. Thank u again

Ohh that a good post, thanks for all of this info @bookingteam.com

This comment has received a 0.15 % upvote from @booster thanks to: @hamzaoui.

Very interesting I will look you up, great outlines posted here, I agree with the fact we can be much more efficient, everybody having 2 cars is too much, it seems that technology in general has made us lazy and we forget that we didn't have it 10 years ago, for instance there were no smartphones that you can use to watch internet videos on, not to mention there were almost no true internet "apps" like we have now.

If we use all the advancements we are getting every day and use them efficiently we can really make a difference :)