Mortgage Free by April 2017

JimLad

atypicalblonde wrote: »

Hi Jimlad, I will follow your progress with interest. Inspired by your thread I took a look at Air BnB and am considering listing our spare room on there. We have two small children though so not too sure if people would be put off by that!


Best of luck with your quest x

Its really great! Funny you should post that as we just had a booking for two nights, friday and saturday. Really pleased as August has been quiet so far.

Do you live in a touristy area? Kids would prolly put us off, but might not everybody, depends on the price i guess! We started low (19 a night) to get reviews before bumping it up to 32. A private bathroom is also a good selling point?

A_Frayed_Knot

Please tell me more, was considering letting out one of my spare rooms, and only heard about this website around 2 weeks ago from work collegues but they were actually booking accomodation through them.

I'm more into how, when guests arrive. Things like do they roam your house, use kitchen, living room etc, or do they just arrive and keep to the room/bathroom and you still have your own space. Do you need to be there all the time or do yo give them a key. As you can tell, quite unsure of boundries(?) with the guests, and how things work.


I'm a singleton and actually have two spare double rooms but only one bathroom so this would generate spare income on my quest to be mortgage free asap.

JimLad

A_Frayed_Knot wrote: »

Please tell me more, was considering letting out one of my spare rooms, and only heard about this website around 2 weeks ago from work collegues but they were actually booking accomodation through them.

I'm more into how, when guests arrive. Things like do they roam your house, use kitchen, living room etc, or do they just arrive and keep to the room/bathroom and you still have your own space. Do you need to be there all the time or do yo give them a key. As you can tell, quite unsure of boundries(?) with the guests, and how things work.


I'm a singleton and actually have two spare double rooms but only one bathroom so this would generate spare income on my quest to be mortgage free asap.

How much or how little of the house they have to use is entirely up to you. On your listing you specify what the guest has use of. We have put down that they can use the kitchen and living room along with their bedroom and bathroom, but in reality hardly any guests use the living room. Most people are staying to visit the local area, not your house We have had quite a few people use the kitchen for cooking meals but I think that is part of the appeal of airbnb over a hotel for example. Not only is it cheaper for the room, you dont have to eat out all the time. We have a lot of business visitiors for this reason. Everyone always clears up straight away after themselves.

If guests are staying more than one night we give them a key to let themselves in and out and tell them to always make sure all windows and doors are locked when they go out. In theory, if your a wrongun and your going to make trouble or steal, your not going to book through a website that takes your credit card details to pay for any damages. Airbnb also cover you up to 500k. If your worried you could begin by only accepting people with a few good reviews. After every trip, hosts and guests have to review each other.

I would highly recommend it. We have met really interesting people from all around the world who were amazing to talk to. We have also made lots of extra money. £600 was our best month so far this year.

Let me know if you have any more questions. I will message you a referal link to signup through if you havent already!

MissWillow

I am loving all these words of encouragements and I'm amazed with the amount of replies we have had since the new version of the diary went online. Thank you for all of your positive words, i'm feeling very motivated to get going and maybe try and shave a month off our target.

turtlemoose

I will second Penny Bridge in saying that you are definitely fortunate to be ' on the same page' . My OH begrudges every penny of "his" money spent on anything that isn't for his leisure!! :rotfl: I have quite a bit of a higher income than him, to put it in perspective if I earn 100, he earns 67, but on a monthly basis he has double the "spends" money I have. Each month I put some of my spends money in DS' savings, I also buy things like clothes, shoes etc when I need OR want them, I go out with a friend for a meal occasionally etc. He is always skint a week before payday and never has money for clothes/shoes/books/cds/whatever because he spends it all on (imo) junk. :cool: He has debt from his previous relationship (around the 8k mark) all with debt collectors, frozen interest..he's paying it at £16 a month.... you get the idea. We are like chalk and cheese when it comes to money!!!!!

JimLad

turtlemoose wrote: »

I will second Penny Bridge in saying that you are definitely fortunate to be ' on the same page' . My OH begrudges every penny of "his" money spent on anything that isn't for his leisure!! :rotfl: I have quite a bit of a higher income than him, to put it in perspective if I earn 100, he earns 67, but on a monthly basis he has double the "spends" money I have. Each month I put some of my spends money in DS' savings, I also buy things like clothes, shoes etc when I need OR want them, I go out with a friend for a meal occasionally etc. He is always skint a week before payday and never has money for clothes/shoes/books/cds/whatever because he spends it all on (imo) junk. :cool: He has debt from his previous relationship (around the 8k mark) all with debt collectors, frozen interest..he's paying it at £16 a month.... you get the idea. We are like chalk and cheese when it comes to money!!!!!

Oh crikey I dont think i could cope with that! You will just have to keep nagging away at him and eventually he will turn away from the dark side

Watty1

Love your time line - and - that you are clearly a real team in this. Mr Watty said he was on board with our plans but 2 years in he has only just realised he could be thrifty in the supermarket Mind you I'm no example in that area.


£600 in a month from Airbnb was impressive. Might think about this ourselves - although - it might take a major effort to clear a spare room here. And the dog might be offputting. Still worth considering.
Good luck with the journey.

JimLad

Watty1 wrote: »

Mr Watty said he was on board with our plans but 2 years in he has only just realised he could be thrifty in the supermarket Mind you I'm no example in that area.

Misswillow took a bit of persuading to convert to Lidl from Tesco. It took a good few visits before she would try all the lidl brands. Especially the cereal!

JimLad

A 10 night airbnb booking for september was this morning reduced to 7. Thats a shame as thats £100 gone :-(

MissWillow

Well August is looking like a good savings month, saved slightly more than we were expecting. That is mainly due to get some tax back was I was over charged. Still every little helps.