Rabbu Closes It’s Doors on Short Term Rental Management.
What now?
Who is Rabbu?
Rabbu has succeeded in becoming one of the largest short term rental or “Airbnb” management companies in the Charlotte market since their formation sometime around 2016. Navigating the early growth and volatility in the emerging market by leveraging technology and a professional culture that had been up to that point notably missing.
In recent years their focus has included a suite of tools aimed at helping investors acquire short term rentals by providing revenue estimates, market data, and available listings underwritten as short term rentals.
Rabbu has decided to follow through with their tech-sighted pivot and is exiting the property management space, their website describing the company as follows:
Rabbu is a short-term rental data and technology company that helps you find, analyze, and acquire short-term rental investments with our suite of free tools.
What does this mean?
When one of the largest operators in the Charlotte STR market closes their doors, an entire portfolio of clients now must find a replacement property management company.
Collecting a list of STR property managers is relatively easy and can be done in minutes, but that’s where things get difficult. We’ve written this article to help property owners navigate the challenges in taking this monumental leap with their most expensive assets.
What to do now?
Stop and take this time to evaluate the historical performance of the property!
Review the annual gross rent and net earnings against any projections that were provided. You’re looking to confirm that the property is performing as expected, and if that’s not the case you may want to consider pumping the breaks.
If the unit was projected to cash flow around $1,000 per month, but has declined over recent years this is an opportune time to rethink the short and long term plan for the property.
A licensed real estate professional can help you evaluate the highest and best use of the property, and ensure they are aligned with the goals of the property owner. Some units will perform best as short term rentals, while others may benefit from the mid-term or long-term rental markets. Some units will not meet the goals of the owner regardless of rental model, at which point selling the home may be the best option.
The best route depends on many aspects of the property and the ownership situation, each should be carefully considered when moving forward.
This can also be a good time to review the physical condition of the property and address repair or maintenance issues.
How to pick a new Property Manager?
Picking a property manager may seem simple, but several factors can make or break this decision.
- Who owns the previous listing and marketing materials?
- Listings and reviews can not be transferred. So if your previous PM owned the listing then a new one will need to be started from scratch.
- If the property owner originally created the listing, it may be possible to continue with the same listing depending on the PM company’s PMS or property management software.
- New photos may be needed as well if the previous PM owns the photos
- What services are included?
- Different management strategies exist that include varying lists of services. Generally they will fall into either full service management or co-hosting, but within these categories there is still plenty of variance.
- Evaluate what services were previously offered, and compare with other PM companies.
- Important items to consider: Repairs and maintenance, larger renovation projects, accounting, utilities, cleaning and turnover, dynamic pricing and calendar management.
- Hardware and compatibility
- Technology has greatly improved security and efficiency but comes with a long list of dependencies. Review the hardware at the property including locks, thermostats, wifi/routers, TVs, noise/smoke monitors. Discuss these with prospective management companies to make sure they are compatible with the systems and processes they have in place.
- Supplies
- What inventory management practice has been done at the property? If no linen rental or supply subscription model exists, knowing exactly what supplies were provided at termination.
As always, MyTripify recommends ONLY working with licensed property management firms which we’ve previously covered in detail.
Leads for PM companies can be found in many places, but not all leads are created equal. Network with other investors through local RE groups or social media. Having qualified leads with a solid references goes a long way.
You will need to decide on a local property manager vs a larger national brand. There are pros and cons to everything in life but ultimately you want to work with a company that has scaled enough to have ample experience but isn’t so big that they lose personal touch with their clients.
Important things to note:
Time is money! These rental properties (generally speaking) are guest-ready and may potentially sit vacant while in the onboarding queue at a new PM firm. Most of the work needed during this transition will be on the new PM company, so be sure to properly vet the onboarding process in terms of capacity and timeline to ensure the properties are back up and running quickly and accurately.
All decisions are not final. Understand the term and renewal of the management agreement and termination clauses. If things are not going well, you want to understand your options to move on and find a better fit.
MyTripify STR Property Management Services
MyTripify is a licensed real estate firm that specializes in short term rental property management. Our background in IT allows us to leverage technology to offer top notch service to our guest and to our clients.
As part of our free rent-ready consultation we provide our investors with projections to help analyze the rental potential of their property and help them make the decision best aligned with their goals. Our market experience and portfolio size allow us to compare our own analytics from all across Charlotte against data providers like Airdna and Rabbu giving the most accurate information to base your toughest decisions.
No pushy sales, our mission is to educate real estate owners and investors and help as many people as we can to make educated decisions. We’re located in the city of Charlotte and service all the way from Lake Norman down to the SC line. We offer a full-service model for passive investors, and a cohosting for the more hands on owners.
Our experience in converting existing short term rental listings, and can simplify what is often a complicated process. During the onboarding process we meet weekly to confirm the status of deliverables and confirm the timeline. After the property is listed our owners are never more than a phone call away.
Reach out for more information about our services.
Ryley Beaumont
(704) 286-6994
Ryley@MyTripify.com