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    Vacation Rental Confidential
    Vacation Rental Confidential
    Vacation Rental Confidential
    Ebook204 pages2 hours

    Vacation Rental Confidential

    By Michael Hamilton

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    About this ebook

    Have you ever thought about making money with vacation rentals? If so, you're not alone. It's the dream of many to make income from vacation rentals and create the freedom to live their own lives. But for most people, the dream remains just that—a dream. Even those with the courage to take the plunge have a hard time avoiding the typical landlord hassles of dealing with short-term rentals, resulting in stress and burnout. But what if a host had a proven blueprint? One that could increase the likelihood of success and truly make this dream a reality? Imagine what life would look like with additional income streams, retirement security and the opportunity to build a legacy in a place you love with those you love. If you're serious about renting out vacation homes, and if you believe success leaves clues, then Vacation Rental Confidential is exactly what you need to fuel your lifestyle, create more options and live your dream.

    You'll learn the following:
    • How author Michael Hamilton created a "systems dependent," scalable, short-term rental business that allows him to be his own boss and generate income from anywhere
    • How to build a boutique brand, differentiate your rentals and get paid premium rates
    • How to remove yourself from operational headaches and avoid becoming the burnt-out "landlord"
    • Live Swell's Proven Process, our blueprint on how to create top-performing properties, get more bookings and create raving fans
    • How to develop a strategy to protect, secure and insure your vacation rentals the correct way while limiting personal liability
    • How to hedge inflation and short the U.S dollar with good debt while building wealth with short term rentals
    • How to avoid the costly mistakes most newbies make and how you can win from the start
    • An introduction to how successful entrepreneurs and the wealthy think and invest

    Vacation Rental Confidential showcases the proven business model of Live Swell, a boutique brand of top-performing and top-ranked vacation rentals. In Vacation Rental Confidential the reader will learn a wealth of information designed to provide a higher probability of success, create more options and fast track goals in the hot short term rental space.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBookBaby
    Release dateApr 5, 2019
    ISBN9781543968804
    Vacation Rental Confidential

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      Book preview

      Vacation Rental Confidential - Michael Hamilton

      Chapter 1

      Open Mind Open Doors

      It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble.

      It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.

      —Mark Twain

      Have you ever dreamt of owning a beach home, vacation rental or hosting on Airbnb? Have you ever wished you could make money on your terms and do more of what you love? What would you be doing if you didn’t have to work and had more options in life? Like most of us, you probably have romanticized about winning the lottery or possessing a healthy stream of ongoing passive income.¹

      Lifelong memories, quality time with family and friends, and unique experiences in places near and dear to us are things most of us desire and are a fortunate consequence of getting involved in vacation rentals and Airbnbs. Imagine what life would feel like with a flowing passive income stream and the opportunity to build a family legacy while having fun. Picture the opportunity to spend time with loved ones and build wealth in a home most people wished they had away from home. What would that look like for you?

      For me, I’m grateful to have more options and time to spend with people I love. The opportunity to create amazing guest experiences and top performing vacation rentals has been a blessing and a testament that following your heart and pursing meaningful work is worth it.

      Every story has a beginning and mine starts like most with some interesting twists, I’ll get into later. So like many of our friends and most of you reading, I finished high school, later did some college and after a bit of travel and wanderlust entered the rat race. On the hamster wheel, I felt stuck, unfulfilled, overworked, underpaid and pretty much like a drone. There was a voice inside my mind—I’m not sure where it was coming from—that continually was telling me that I am capable of more, that there is more to life than the soul-crushing grind and that life goes by quickly.

      I want to be clear from the get-go. This is not another book on escaping the nine-to-five drudgery. It doesn’t follow the hype of divulging a get-rich-quick magic potion. There is a load of such books out there already. If that is what you are looking for, this book is not for you.

      This book is about pursuing meaningful work, designing a freer lifestyle, and giving yourself and those you love more options in life, safely. Having mentioned that, when a person invests in real estate wisely, with financial and business education, they are very likely to build wealth—a lot of wealth, in fact!

      The more time I spent in the rat race, the more I began to realize one important thing: Employers absorb and control their employees’ best brain power and productive time. Whether their employees like their job or not, they allow the situation to drag on for twenty, thirty, or more years. Most of them do it on the cheap too! They are undercompensated and overworked, and the work environment may even be toxic. No wonder so many people seem tired, unexcited and feel stuck like Bill Murray’s character in the movie Groundhog Day. Hope you’ve seen it and can appreciate the reference.

      For me, it felt like an emergency to work so hard, sacrifice most of the best years of your life, and retire hopefully feeling youthful in your 60s, assuming you make it. I’ve observed that most people take their dreams, ambitions, ideas, and greatness to their grave. Indeed, they say that the graveyard may be the wealthiest place on the planet. Realizing this was a wake-up call for me. I did not know much, but I knew that following a similar path would lead me to similar results. There had to be at least a few other options to come up with another life plan.

      In college, I witnessed a few friends start businesses. Of course, I figured, I could start one too. And so I did! After a few months, the sensation of being free that comes with becoming a new business owner wore off. I began to realize that I didn’t know shit about running or building a business to achieve the special status I longed for. I did nothing more than create myself a job in my business as an energy consultant. Thus, I learned one of my first business lessons: The lone ranger approach can lead to feeling like an octopus on roller skates.

      ../Desktop/Octopus%20on%20roller%20skates.jpg

      Being open to new ideas, a friend of mine from Boston named John² said to me in a conversation with his distinct Boston accent, "Hey Mike, you’re a technician. Feeling confused as to what John was trying to communicate, I asked, What do you mean, bro? He replied, Yeah, you own your own business. But you do everything in your business, including counting light bulbs one by one, putting together research findings, presenting and pulling teeth for $1,500 invoices. Mike, a technician is a person who trades time for money. Why don’t you come to this real estate training with me? Initially, I declined the invitation. In response, John said, Look, whether or not you ever participate in real estate investing, you will learn some principles of the wealthy and entrepreneurship that will help you either way."

      I was skeptical but did some research and eventually said Yes. The real estate training was a FortuneBuilders 3-Day Work Shop, and coming in I had a negative vibe. But, as the seminar got going, it reminded me of a book, Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki and Sharon Lechter, which I had read in my teens, and of a more recent read, The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss. The book and the training introduced and explained such concepts as the way entrepreneurs think and the secrets of the wealthy. I began to understand that there was no mystery as to why I was struggling. My initial attempt at starting a business was very different from what I thought it would be. What I learned was that a person can fast-track their results and reduce risk by modeling successful people and businesses with superior results.

      I began to realize as I looked back on my life that I had neither significant influence or education in business nor financial literacy. Like most people, I learned from parents, friends and teachers in the traditional school system. I, like you, was taught to do what most people are taught: Go to school and get trained to get a job, work for some of the best thirty years of your life and save for retirement to hopefully make it there without outliving your retirement savings if you do. Sad yet true, it turns out that an average American doesn’t have nearly enough savings to cover them through retirement. An estimated average retirement account³ balance of a person in retirement age is in the low to mid $100K’s. After a couple years, the hourglass runs out. Yikes!

      ../Desktop/Octopus%20on%20roller%20skates.jpg

      From: Vanguard Pressroom 2018 How America Saves ⁴

      Hi, I’m Michael Hamilton. Some may see all the aforementioned as normal. To me, the need to develop other streams of income became very, very clear! I’ve enjoyed success as a real estate investor and with my business partner, Maria, developed passion for the Vacation Rental and Airbnb niche. Several close friends, our guest visitors and investor friends were very curious about the path of getting started and investing into a vacation rental or Airbnb of their own. Lots of these folks had a burning desire to get started in this exciting space, just like us.

      There didn’t seem to be only one reason why our friends and investors were so excited and interested. The investors seemed to be seeking greater returns in a hot niche, and some also liked the idea of being able to use a property in an area special to them. Some simply desired a beach house for themselves and their family, which they could rent on the side, cover most of the expenses and pass on as part of the family legacy. Others viewed it as part of a retirement plan. And a few were forced to relocate due to career obligations but didn’t want to sell their property.

      From our first vacation rental acquisition, we approached our vacation rental business differently from most owners. What do I mean by that? Our approach, which we will take a deep dive into in chapter 2, The Approach, involves guiding principles and beliefs of successful business owners and wise investors, like Warren Buffet (WB), who taught us many things, including how to effectively short the U.S. dollar with good debt. We have always treated our properties as investments and our brand as a business. Since the name of WB came up, I have a quick question: Would your life have a different course if you grew up in WB’s house? Why do you believe that?

      Any business must generate a profit to function as intended and be sustainable. I’ve lost count of how many rental property and business owners I’ve met that hemorrhage cash monthly and simply don’t know their numbers. Have you seen the show Shark Tank? The presenters, the business owners attempting to raise money for a business opportunity, who are not prepared with their numbers and financials get eaten alive by the sharks (and for a good reason).

      Just to be clear, I’m not suggesting that our approach, or any approach or business model, is wrong or right. There is more than one way to skin a cat as there are many different approaches to a business. Each leads to different results. The beautiful thing is that a person has free will to choose which approach is right for them. It is, however, important to consider the implications of the various approaches. What is the danger of a buyer not knowing the numbers before purchasing a vacation rental? What is the danger of not having a budget?

      Our vacation rental business has performed very, very well and exceeded our initial performance projections. It has evolved into a passion, where we have created a profitable systems dependent business model and a brand, Live Swell, whose mission is to open the doors to the laid-back surf lifestyle.

      We aren’t perfect, and my team and I are still learning. In fact, I was a very slow learner as a child and was pulled out of grade school classes for one-on-one special attention to, what they referred to at the time as, the resource room. It took my small team and me just short of three years to build Live Swell, which has created hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of equity and produces a revenue in the $130,000 range annually—regardless of whether we decide to go to work on any given day. One of the best parts is its significant growth potential to build

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