Julie George describes her Airbnb origin story starting in 2016: she converted a one‑bedroom long‑term rental to short‑term, raising weekly income from AUD 240 to AUD 600, then built a hosting business (Host My Home). Within ~2.5 years she managed 130 properties and generated $8M on Airbnb, wrote the book Million Dollar Host, and sold the business. She emphasizes treating short‑term rental operations as saleable assets (use LLCs, contracts, leases).
Chapters
Good morning everybody. It's 6am in Australia, so up bright and early. But I can tell you the future is looking bright and I hope that everybody's done their stretches ready for this marathon. And let me be the very first to say, this is the only marathon you'll ever see me run. I'm only ever caught running if somebody is chasing me. So guys, fabulous to be here. My journey and claim to fame is a full, full 360 circle with the Airbnb. So back in 2016, I'm going to give you the brief overview. I had a one bedroom apartment that I had a long term tenant in it. Now this is a property I owned and I wanted to find out what all the fuss was about with Airbnb. So when this tenant moved out, I decided to furnish it, put some linen in, connect the wi fi. Within within hours, I think I had my first booking. Within days I had my first guest. I went from $240 per week. So we're talking weekly rates in Australia, 240 to $600. And that's when my light bulb moment went off. I thought, wow, I'm making great money, I'm meeting great people and I'm having a fabulous time doing it. I was working as a real estate agent at the time, sitting working in a flat market, open homes. I was dealing with property investors having to sell low in a very depressed market or put a long term tenant in which they weren't too thrilled about because that wasn't a great option. Look, I guess really the clincher came for me. A property investor looking for a positive cash flow property came to me and said, how do I get one? What do I do? I said, let's create one. Let's go out, find a property that you would like to buy and vacation in yourself. So she did. So I sold that to her. Income stream number one, Cha Ching. She said I need to get it furnished. And I said, well, I can do that. I can go after work, I can go to Kmart, I can put the flat back furniture together. But I charged her a fee. Cha Ching, income stream number two. And then I suggested to her that she should do the same as what I had just done with Airbnb. So I'll manage that process for you. Cha Ching. Charge her a commission. Income stream number three. That process worked so beautifully that within six months she had contacted me to ask me to go out and do it all again. And I had purchased her a second property, put it all together, furnished it and managed it for her look. That was the start of a hosting company that I came up with, Host My Home. Within, well, within two and a half years, I was managing 130 properties, $8 million income on Airbnb, had written a bestselling book about it called Million Dollar Host, but then also got a tap on the shoulder to sell. So, guys, as we're talking today about building a business in Airbnb Short Term Rentals, you are building a saleable asset. Be very clear about that saleable asset. If you have. Even with the arbitrage model, putting your contracts and your leases in an LLC will mean that you can sell that business in the future.
Having a blast. Gonna get it on the Bruce Lee podcast. Bruce Lee, like Bruce Lee? Cause it's so hard and the T is loose leaf Making up those rhymes? Don't write it, just do it loosely.
