Get Ahead Of The Short Term Rental Game

We are back with another episode of behind the Host podcast and today I am really excited. We're joined by Stacy St. John. Stacey St. John is a CEO and founder of a short term rental business, Cosy Getaways. It's based in Myrtle beach in South Carolina in the usa. Stacy owns a seven figure real estate investment portfolio. She's a short term rental mentor, a keynote speaker. She's the creator of the wildly popular Facebook female Facebook group for short term rental investors. She also founded the Short Term rental society in 2021. She's recently become an international best selling author in hospitable hosts which I'm excited to talk to her about. And her signature approach is teaching women how to set themselves up for success, to grow their wealth and to live their best life. And just before we dive into Stacey St. John's story, I just want to give a great big shout out to Guinea Coles in Boostly Academy. Guinea has recently managed to get a direct booking by extending by reaching out to existing guests and extending the stay and also then getting a new direct booking off the back of it. So well done Guinea Coles. So Stacy, welcome along and thank you for joining me.

Oh my gosh. Well, it's such a pleasure to be here with you. Thank you for having me.

As pleasure as ours. It's just great to have you on. So let's really dive into it. So for the listeners of behind the Host podcast, what we really want to know is about your business and any tips and any experience that you can share to help others on their journey within the short term rental industry. So let's talk a bit about your business, cozy Getaways and what the motivation was behind starting that business.

Yeah, sure. So prior to starting to invest in short term rentals, my husband and I were investing in long term rentals and we were also doing some real estate flip projects here in Ohio, where I live, and we were actually just finishing up a flip and Covid hit and we had intended on taking the profits from that flip and purchasing another long term rental for our portfolio. But here in the United States there were all types of eviction moratoriums popping up everywhere and we were both a little nervous about buying another long term rental because if our tenant didn't pay us, we would essentially have no recourse at that time. So we had been talking for years about having a vacation rental and we felt like that was the right time for us to pivot our strategy and explore short term rentals. And so I actually did about six to Seven months worth of research and just soaking in as much education as possible before we purchased our first short term rental. And I think from there we really discovered how much we love it. You know, we obviously it's something that's near and dear to my heart, but I had no idea just a few short years ago how much I would absolutely love this industry. So we got started really because of COVID And I look back at that scenario and think, man, there were so many just heart wrenching, horrible things that came out of COVID and at the same time there were many beautiful things as well. So I can share a little bit of a positive about my own story.

It's brilliant to listen to a success story which has come out of the pandemic. And thank you for sharing that with me. So take us back to when you first got started. During the pandemic. What was it like setting up your first unit and any lessons that you learned along the way?

Oh, golly. How much time do we have? No, so a couple of key things that really jumped out to me when I started out, when I first purchased or when we first purchased our short term rental, we had intended on buying one and we flew down. When we were ready to actually acquire our properties, we flew down and we ended up buying two in the same weekend. And you know, my own angle or my own strategy is to really focus on properties that may not be beautiful, but we take them, we rehab them and turn them into something really. And so I think the first lesson for me was, number one, making sure that I understood the complexity of managing a rehab from 11 hours away. Because that did add a little bit of challenge at the beginning, just working through logistics. Secondly, when we actually launched our property, we had our property with a third party property manager. And you know, I manage my own properties. I actually help people manage their properties now. But you know, at the time I really felt like that was a fantastic strategy for us to be able to ease ourselves into the industry. Obviously, you know, you can read all the books in the world about swimming, but until you jump in the water, you're not quite sure if you know how to swim, right? And so we took that same approach where, you know, our third party property manager was kind of our life vest around us when we jumped into the pool and allowed us to really get our sea legs underneath us and build out our team and build out our overall hosting approach. So that by the time we were ready to transition into self management about nine months later, we felt like we had a more seamless transition than literally diving in the deep end all at once. So that was a really big takeaway for me. And, you know, a lot of people, again, jump into the industry and do jump into that deep end, and there's nothing wrong with that. But for where I was at the time, I really felt like that would fit into my life better. And again, that's what I'm all about, is building out a business that you love, but also making sure that you're building out a life that you love and you're not feeling overwhelmed or stressed or thinking at night, why on earth am I doing this? So it really felt like for us, that was a great approach.

Sounds like it was a really brave move finding places which are 11 hours away. And like you say, with the right help and with the right people on the ground, then you're able to learn the ropes. It sounds like you've really been bitten by the short term rental bug. And, you know, you've. You've really got going there. So why Myrtle Beach? What was it about that area and how many properties have you got now under your. Under your control?

Yeah, so we actually sat down and kind of built out criteria of what we were looking for, not only from a distance perspective, from a type of vacation area. We were both, my husband and I were both very familiar with the Myrtle beach area because we actually grew up vacationing there. So again, there was a sense of comfort for us in that. In that location specifically. And, you know, fast forward to today. You know, we're really glad that we chose that market again. We went kind of through a whole set of questions where we asked ourselves specific questions. And then again, I went and did research to understand what areas might fit into the criteria that we had built out for ourselves. And Myrtle beach was indeed, obviously one of the contenders, but we were also looking at other markets as well. And so I kind of went through an entire strategy to look through, okay, what is the best market based on our budget, based on our buying criteria, that seems to work the best for us. And obviously, Myrtle beach is where we landed. Currently we own eight oceanfront properties, and then I manage another nine oceanfront properties in Myrtle Beach. I actually just started helping other people manage their properties. And that has been a really neat learning experience as well. You know, I had people coming to me because our properties do stand out in the market. And because of that, our calendars, our booking calendars are really full. And so people started saying, well, can you help me get what you have? Right? And in the state of South Carolina, you actually have to be licensed to manage other people's properties. So I went through a licensing program and obviously became a certified property manager in charge, which allows me to help other people welcome guests into their oceanfront homes as well. So that's been really fun.

Sounds like a really exciting journey. And just so the listeners get an idea of what's the time period from going from that first one to now, looking after nine other ones that got your own there as well and helping people on their journey. Yeah.

So we closed on our first purchase in September of 2020, so about a year and a half.

Wow. I mean, that's amazing. That is absolutely amazing. And I'm sure there's a lot of people listening in, and one of the questions would be that I'm sure they'd wonder is, how do you manage from afar? What systems do you need in place and who's on your team to help you with that?

I always say it takes the village. Right. I do not claim at all to be doing this alone. So I have a variety of people. First and foremost, boots on the ground, folks that I can trust are really essential, especially me being so far away. I have a fantastic team of cleaners and I have different cleaners that clean in different pods. So the Myrtle beach market is really comprised of about 60 miles of beachfront. And what I didn't want to do was have one cleaner jumping, you know, from north to south. So I have cleaners that kind of clean in pockets throughout the Myrtle beach market for me. So obviously, cleaning teams, and they're really, again, I consider them one of the most important partners to me in my business, because without an excellent group of cleaners, we. We run into problems as hosts. Right. So really, really fantastic cleaning teams and turnover partners. I also have inspectors that are my second level of eyes and ears to look at my properties and make sure that, you know, the cleaners are doing an excellent job. We also have a whole team of maintenance folks that, as you might imagine, are really, really critical to our success. Not only from a preventative perspective, making sure that we are doing preventative maintenance so we can keep corrective maintenance costs down, but then we also have people that are corrective maintenance. If there's an H Vac issue, we've got folks or plumbing electricians. So having a really robust team of people there locally has been tremendously helpful. Second to that, I've purposefully built my own business so that I am not tied to this thing all the time. And so I have a fantastic team of People that kind of support me on the back end. From virtual assistant team, I've got a 24, 7 concierge team that takes care of all of our bookings and guest inquiries, calendar management. So again, when our guests reach out to us, they're getting responses within a matter of moments. And they are really a fantastic backbone to my business. I also have, you know, what I would call a strategy advisor. And she sits, she's my right hand person and really helps me, you know, address day to day issues. There are always things I'm learning, always. And I really feel like as a business owner it's critically important to surround yourself with people with either skills or knowledge that you don't have. So again, I've got a right hand person that really sits as my day to day phone a friend. But she also takes care of, you know, updating our listings on a daily basis so that our listings stay on top of the search results when, when they're served up on the OTAs. And then I've got, as you might imagine, you know, a finance team and an attorney and a cpa. So again, it does take a village, I think, to, to operate a business. But what I would say to someone listening is you can evolve over time. So I didn't just walk in one day, flip on the lights and have all these people around me, right. It has taken continuous improvement, continuous evolution. So I would just encourage someone. If you are just starting out or wherever you are on your journey today, be okay with that. Celebrate where you are, look to where you want to be in the future and don't listen to other people's stories and say I can't get there. It is reframing that to how can I get there? Who do I need to have around me in order to get there? Because again, anything that we set our minds to, we can accomplish it is just figuring out the how.

Absolutely love that. They say success leaves clues. And we see often, you know, people who have built big short term rental industry sort of hospitality businesses. They've got good people around them and people that they can rely on and just going back to. If you were starting again, who would be your first kind of hires and who were the people you first got around you to start that journey on the very first early steps?

I think it would depend. So again, depending on the overall strategy, if someone is wanting to get into this business, but they're working a full time job and may not have a lot of time to dedicate, my first hire would be a property manager. So that again I can begin operating my business and have the confidence that the day to day is well taken care of while I'm building out my backend systems in teams. So that's one set of individuals, there might be another set of individuals that are like, I have all the time in the world on my hands and I just want to dive in head first. And so if someone is listening and wanting to again, self manage right from the start, absolutely. Making sure you have strong partners when it comes to your turnovers and your inspection teams, as well as making sure you've got back end systems in place. So an excellent property management system, revenue manager, dynamic pricing tool strategy or a system in place so you can proactively market to your guests through email marketing. So again those back end systems as well as the front end teams would be really, really essential. If someone is maybe already have that in place and want to take their business to the next level, then I think it's really again surrounding yourself with people who can help you upskill or scale your business in a way that push you and nudge you outside of your comfort zone. I think one of the most dangerous places we can be in life is inside of our comfort zone. So, you know, outside of that comfort zone is where the learning and the growth really happens. So aligning yourself with people that actually force you to do that I think is really, really helpful.

One of the sayings that Mark often says on his podcast is get comfortable being uncomfortable. And it's so, so important to do that to just you never feel 100% comfortable, but you start to get comfortable feeling uncomfortable as grow, which is fantastic. So now feels like a great time to dive into. You mentioned your systems and some of the tech there. Let's dive into the tech that you use in your business. So for the inspections and the pre EMP sort of maintenance that side of things, what sort of tech do you use to cater that side of things?

Well, I tell you what, you know, I again, I'm always looking to level up my business and so I just started using a system that I have fallen in love with. It's called Maintain X. And I'm looking at my phone because it has an app on my phone. It has a way for me to communicate with my inspection team as well as my maintenance team right through the system and it allows me to log it to each property so that again I can go back and share with my owners. Hey, here, you know, not only for my own properties but for those that I manage. Here's what happened, you know, with your property this month. And it also allows me to establish specific checklists for each property. You know, Sarah from Thanks for visiting always says each property is a snowflake and each guest is a snowflake. Well, having a checklist from an inspection standpoint as well as a maintenance standpoint that aligns with each individual property I find is really, really essential. So with that particular piece of tech, it allows me to create again, very customized inspection checklists as well as maintenance checklists and again allows the teams that are boots on the ground to report any issues in real time. I get a text message. It's literally amazing.

It sounds as it makes life a lot easier. And that aspect you mentioned about being able to send the reports to your clients at the end of the month, it's one of the things which is different from managing your own portfolio to when you start managing for others. You have to just keep track of everything all of a sudden. And having them, the tools and the tech that you can just send across the reports just makes life so much easier. So that sounds really Good. You mentioned PMS. What PMS is your PMS of choice?

I use OwnerRez.

OwnerRez, yeah. Very, very popular. And I couldn't help but notice and for anybody listening, it's worth checking out your website, www.cozygetaways.com and it is a Boostly website. I noticed.

It is, yes. So we, we were so grateful to the entire Boostly team for really helping us not only give a beautiful facelift to our previous website, but to make it mobile first. Because I know, you know, these days so many people are scrolling through their phones and while our previous website was functional, it really wasn't mobile first. And so what we found when we looked at analytics, we had a lot of people browsing but not a lot of people booking. And so we're excited about again, the opportunity to really serve people and meet them where they're spending the most time every day.

There's a mad percentage at the moment which says that 98% of people making a book and do so on their phone compared to on a laptop these days or on a desktop. So it's just so important to be mobile friendly first. And how has taken being able to take direct bookings, has that always been a one of the pillars of your business?

Yeah, absolutely. I think, you know, again, as I've evolved over time, I think obviously the OTAs are tremendous pillars of our business. Meaning, you know, especially as we're just starting out or we were just Starting out, you know, we really, really relied heavily on places like Airbnb and vrbo. As we continue to, you know, build out our, you know, our roster of guests who stay with us and build out our portfolio of properties, what, what we find is having the ability to market to our guests inside of our properties and to drive them to our website as well as, you know, through social media being, being able to drive people directly to not only our website in general, but maybe we have a specific property with an opening for a couple of days that we want to run a special on. It really, really allows us to pinpoint and drive direct bookings in a whole new manner.

Just having that sort of manner of being able to contact your guests directly. Did you say you do email marketing is one of the channels that you use to communicate and how do you do so at the moment? And what sort of content do you send your guests?

Sure. You know, we have a variety of different things that we do. We use mailchimp for our email marketing. It's a great tool. It's free, you know, under a certain number of subscribers. And we will share out things like things to do in the area, the Myrtle beach market specifically. There are a lot of different events that happen throughout the year and so we will share out those events. For example, coming up next month, there's a huge country music festival. So we'll share out things to do. We also share out trivia or we have kind of a content series called Know youw Myrtle where we just share out random, you know, trivial facts about the Myrtle beach market. And again, in addition to that content, we're always inviting people to come back and stay with us as well.

It's one of the things which I always love about email marketing is that you can put any of these stories out and usually you'll get somebody reply and go, oh, that's great. Love the story. I'm coming to stay in the area next month. You know, what was available for these dates and you just get so many points of contact. And when people know you're not continually selling to them through email marketing, that you're telling stories that you're talking about events, it actually makes people want to read the emails and want to want to visit. So yeah, that's amazing. You mentioned social media and we can't not touch on, you know, your amazing Facebook page. So the female short term rental investors Facebook group, which has grown wildly. So how many members have you got of that, of that group? And tell me how that.

So we just hit 28,000 members. We've got women from literally all around the world, all walks of life. And it is the most amazing group, if I do say so myself. It is so wonderful on so many levels, I can't even begin to describe it. But we really have a safe space for women to come and ask questions and be vulnerable and get answers that are not judgmental or snarky or unkind. We're really about helping women throughout their journey, wherever they are. You know, we've got women in there that are literally just researching short term rentals or they've heard about it and they, you know, they want to find out more. We have women again with multimillion dollar portfolios and they're looking to continue to scale. And we have women with everything in between. And so it's a collective brain trust. And again, I really, really am proud of the fact that it is a safe zone. So each woman inside of our group is empowered. If she sees something that is unkind, unbecoming, not aligned with, sharing feedback in a positive, loving manner, they report that. And those people are ousted from the group immediately. There's no warnings, there's no reach outs. I'm sorry, you know, this is your, this is your official warning. Don't do it again. No, they're gone. Right. Because I really, really wanted to build a place where we could help women without them feeling uncomfortable.

The values and the passion really show through and this was how I actually discovered or first heard about you. Stacy was through Jody Sterling and Sasha Herman, fellow authors of the Hospitable host book. They mentioned how awesome the community is. So, you know, really well done. And to build that in, in such a short space of time to go to 28,000, how is social media helped your business both in, you know, the aspect of your Facebook group, but in general as well?

Yeah. Well, I will tell you I rely on social media a lot to build out my team members for my Boots on the Ground team. So I, you know, I leverage local Facebook groups not only to promote our properties, right, to get additional direct bookings, but to build out my team members. I'll go into those local groups and ask for recommendations. I'll put out what I'm looking for. And you know, I will say to people, don't just hire somebody right off of social media. You know, you still have to go through your due diligence and interview people process, but what it's allowed me to do is get recommendations from other people and to expand my network. And that has proven to be tremendously. Helpful. In fact, probably 50% of my local boots on the ground team have been sourced from social media originally.

It's such a powerful tool, both for advertising, you know, places to stay for, like you say, recruiting team members and just for growing your brand. I mean, it's free as well. It's amazing, isn't it, you know.

Yeah.

And I've also, you know, sourced off market deals for people on social media. So, you know, I always share, put out what you're looking for. Right. And there may be things that come to you one day and there may not. But if people don't know what you're looking for, how would they know to send them to you?

That reminds me of the story that, you know, we sometimes share in the Bouchely Academy, which is there's the old saying which says if you build it, they will come. And there's almost like, well, if you build it, they won't come. You've got to build it and shout about it on social media and then they actually come along. So important. So we just touched on the other authors in the Hospitable host book, which, which you're a best selling international author and we've had a few of the authors on recently on the behind the. Yeah, we've got to do it. It's a bit bright where I am, so. But yeah, we've had a few of the authors on and it's a real pleasure to have you on here. What inspired you to get involved in the project which was brought about by Jody Sterling and for anybody listening who hasn't heard about this, we've been talking about it since the book launch on the 16th of May. The book is available if you go to www.hospitablehosts.com you can purchase a copy and all the proceeds go to children's charities, either Great Ormond Street Hospital or Children at War charities as well. So it's an amazing project. What inspired you to get involved, Stacy?

Well, I tell you, I was actually on Clubhouse with Julie George and Tracy Northcott one day and they were talking about this book project and I thought, oh gosh, that sounds intriguing. And Julie, who is one of the most incredible women I have ever met, actually introduced me to Jody. And when Jodi shared the project with me and invited me to participate, I was just so excited for many reasons. One of the most important reasons for me was to be able to share with other people that again, you can do this, you know, regardless of where you come from or whether you have any experience in hospitality or in real estate investing, wherever your background is, you can absolutely do this and it can unlock new rewards in your life. If I could encourage just one person from my chapter, you know, as well as all the other chapters to say, hey, you know, this sounds not only intriguing, but it sounds like something that I can actually do and inspire someone to start living their dreams. That makes it all worthwhile to me. So that's why I decided to participate.

The book has been so inspirational and motivational. Just reading through everyone's chapters and seeing the stories of how short term rental has changed people's lives. And the other theme I see throughout it is just how important it is not just with the, you know, the income that you can earn from short term rental, but actually how you can impact people's lives. So these are people's holidays that are coming away to stay in our properties and just how important that is to us as hosts. And for anybody listening, if you haven't picked up a copy, please do, because there's educational, you know, the stories are very motivational. And, yeah, I've sort of read chapter by chapter when I've got time, and each time I come away just thinking, wow, this is such an awesome industry to be part of.

Yeah. And, you know, again, I just want to congratulate Jodi as well. You know, what an amazing accomplishment and idea that she had. And she's going to be impacting. We're all going to be impacting. But again, knowing that, that Jody really spearheaded this project, you know, this will leave a legacy. So I think that's really neat.

Big shout out to Jody and like you say, Julie George as well. I got to meet them in London recently and they are such inspirational and really personable people. You know, Julie with how she is on clubhouse and social media, to see her in person and to listen to her energy and, you know, just really, really inspiring. So I know you're getting to meet, you know, some of the people from the book and also from the amazing people in the industry in Nashville. So hope that goes well.

Thank you.

No worries. So I can't believe how quick the time has gone. We've really, we've really dived into your business and to really learn a lot about how you got started. As we reach the end of these podcasts, what we like to do is do a couple of quick fire questions just for fun. So the answer can be short as long as you like, but let's, let's just dive into those. So, Stacy, if you had a superpower what would it be?

Ooh, a superpower. To think about that if I had a superpower, I'm going to say time travel.

Awesome. And what time period would you go back to?

I actually think I would go forward.

Oh, nice, nice.

I would go forward probably in five years and then in 10 years and then 15 years or maybe 15, 10 and five. But yeah, I would go forward.

Nice. Nice answer. What's your favorite season?

My favorite season is probably springtime and summertime, so I love warmer weather. Springtime is my favorite because I'm getting out of the cold weather. But summertime, I like to be outside by the pool or by the ocean.

Reading in your chapter about the vacations by the sea and how important they were, that completely resonates. And finally, what is one inspirational quote or some advice that you've received or read that really comes to mind and you sort of really like, well, I.

Have this sign behind my desk and it says progress over perfection. And I am all about inspirational quotes. So you know this gold digger, have an amazing day, best day. Like, I like to surround myself with things that inspire me every day, but progress over perfection is something that is really important to me because I always share with people. I'm a recovering perfectionist. Perfectionism will cripple you. It will paralyze you. And so I would just encourage anyone write down three things that you want to accomplish every day. And don't go to bed until they're accomplished. And don't make everything have to be perfect. Just keep moving one step forward at a time. I think once I understood that making progress was more important than being perfect at everything again, it really not only allowed me to move forward as a person, as a human, but also took a lot of weight off my shoulders.

So is a saying that we have, and that is that get to 80% perfect. We're always telling website clients, you know, get it 80% perfect, get it launched. You can always tweak after it's launched on feedback and that side of things, because ultimately you learn more once you're progressing than you knew before. So. And too many people do get caught up on that perfection, like you say, and that you can get stuck, can't you? So what a great lesson to end on there. And Stacy, if. If the listeners want to get in touch with you or find out about your amazing communities, what's. What's the best way to do so? Sure.

So obviously I'm on Facebook. You can find me on Facebook. You can also go to Stacy St. John.com I also have a link tree which you can find me there. I will say I'm not so much on Instagram, Liam, I need to. I need to get on the stick with that. So. But best place to probably find me is either Stacy St. John.com or on Facebook.

Cool. And we'll add a link to the link tree as well, below the video on Facebook and if you're listening on the podcast, that'll be on there as well. So, Stacy, thank you so much for joining me today. It's been an absolute pleasure. Did you have any closing sort of comments or message for anybody listening?

No, I would just say thank you, Liam, for an amazing conversation and thank you for all the work that you do and for the entire Boostly team that I know you guys are equally as passionate about helping people and I appreciate you and I know so many thousands of other people around the world appreciate what you folks are doing as well. So thank you.

Thank you so much. If it wasn't for the bright light you'd see I'm blushing at the moment. And you know, it really is a goal to help over a million hosts cut down on the reliance on the OTAs like Airbnb and booking.com and get more direct bookings and retain more profit for themselves. So thank you, Stacey, so much. And I look forward to speaking to you again in the future too.

Liam. Thank you.

Having a blast. Gonna get it on the Bruce Lee podcast. Bruce Lee like Bruce Lee. Cause it's so hard and the tea is loosely making up those rhymes. Don't write it, just do it loosely.