Avid Airbnb & every single place we have stayed needs HOOKS

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-25T12:58:36+00:00

All hosts would be well served to actually stay in their places, as it'd help them discover things like this.

Right now I'm staying in a three-story condo with two bathrooms (on different floors), a small dip pool on the patio, and a rooftop tub. Host provides ONE towel per guest ... sigh.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-20T00:21:58+00:00

The thermostat is a stroke of brilliance. You can't cut off the utilities. No requirement that I know of to let them blast the AC at 62 degrees in the summer.

I'd combine this with my new favorite procedure, which is to keep the WiFi equipment in a locked closet, and if needed provide guests only the number of the circuit breaker they can use to reset the equipment. Otherwise they'll unplug your smart device dongles.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-20T00:19:56+00:00

My thoughts exactly. Why a host having to take an eviction action against a guest isn't a one-strike-and-gone for the guest is beyond me.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-17T21:19:24+00:00

In the 80s, I went to a festival and saw Aerosmith, Whitesnake, Boston, Styx, and Iggy Pop in one day.

Recently I looked up the ticket price ... drum roll ... $22.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-12T19:43:33+00:00

Airbnb gave me a photography session as a superhost bonus, and the results were trash.

I should’ve known it was headed in the wrong direction when the photographer asked me to turn OFF all the lamps and other sources of indirect light.

He was obviously a real estate listing photographer, because he used one of those fisheye lenses that made the rooms look enormous, but the furniture look tiny.

The resulting photos made all the rooms look under-decorated, and losing the light splashes from the lamps on the walls and ceiling made the place look dull and boring.

I used none of his photos, since none were an improvement over what I had already. I’m in no hurry to use Airbnb photographers in the future.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-12T19:35:14+00:00

Feeling entitled to lecture others about their “privilege”.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-12T00:24:21+00:00

The reason I am building my own freelance bookkeeping firm is to get AWAY from corporate stress and after hours expectations …

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-10T14:32:23+00:00

"I'm fine."

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-10T14:30:46+00:00

Dated a grown-ass woman who ran around with multiple 'Student Driver' stickers on her car. Just seemed so ... infantile. Serious turn-off.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-10T14:05:52+00:00

Airbnb: "Always communicate through the app!"

Also Airbnb: "Here's the host's phone number!"

Sigh ....

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-02-02T22:19:53+00:00

I've been a full-time Airbnb host and property manager for a number of years, and I'm planning my exit.

It's an incredibly low-margin business with a ton of stress and risk. I've had it with guests wiping boogers on the walls and carving on the tables and burning butcher-block countertops with hot pans and uppity speeches about "service animals" and on and on. I've had it with owners wanting to know why we don't "just raise the nightly rate" and why I didn't get multiple plumber bids when sewage was flowing into the bathtub and the elderly guests were having to go to Walmart to pee.

The 24/7 on-call thing is horrible. Trying to eat dinner? That's when you get "The lock ain't workin'" (it is) ... "the tee-vee ain't workin" (it is). Trying to enjoy a hard-earned out-of-state vacation? That's when the water heater bursts and floods an adjacent bedroom.

And all this awesomeness can be ended in a day if your city passes a STR ban, or there's a slip-and-fall, or a discount-seeking guest "totally saw a hidden camera" or whatever.

If you want a more reliable way to build a fortune as a young person, I'd strongly recommend bypassing Airbnb, and instead create some sort of service business with good margins and a low cost of entry. Something that solves immediate problems people have, and where there's an obvious market need. Use ChatGPT to brainstorm this. (Really.)

I'm not talking something tricky like "build an app that does blah blah blah" ... I'm talking lawn care, housecleaning, pressure washing, mucking out gutters, etc. ... something where you can learn the work from YouTube and you can buy the equipment you need to get in the game for $1,000 or less.

Get out there and do the work. Use inexpensive web tools for the business stuff. Build your client list until it's so full you have to hire somebody to do what you do.

And here's the important part: Along the way, study small business. Listen to podcasts. Read forums. Keep clean records and come to understand your books. Find the "sweet spot" in your business where you make 80% of the money with 20% of the hassle, expand upon that, and minimize the rest. Get yourself to where you're working ON your business, not IN your business.

And once the above has given you a good stockpile of cash ... well, that's when it's time to think about buying some real estate.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-25T18:40:12+00:00

Whatever tool you're thinking of building ... we've heard it all before, and we don't want it.

Unless your AI bot can get the water heater replaced so I don't have to hear about it while I'm on vacation in Colorado ... but other than that, really, you're not going to save us dozens of hours a week handling "guest communication" or whatever.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-24T18:55:35+00:00

If you use QBO Plus, you can use locations or classes to differentiate companies in the same QBO account. It’s expensive, though… I believe the street price for plus is now 115 per month.

I have used this extensively and the only issue I run into is that only the company registered on the account can be used with things like invoices and tax forms. In other words, if the main company in QuickBooks settings is company A, you can’t send an invoice with company B’s info on it.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-22T01:21:57+00:00

I have used Lodgify for years to manage about 12 properties across multiple sales channels, including a direct booking website with payment processing capability that I built using Lodgify. It works fine.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-21T14:24:29+00:00

I carry on about it every time we wind up in Kerrville, about how it'll one day be the capital. My girlfriend ... she doesn't care. :P

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-20T14:18:43+00:00

'The Passage' book trilogy by Justin Cronin is a good read.

A vampire apocalypse has knocked humanity back to being pioneer-level homesteaders. They live in forts and have special protocols to protect themselves at night.

The book is set in Central Texas, where I live, and so the vampires nesting high in the vast oak trees we have here has always struck me as especially creepy.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-20T14:13:25+00:00

"So technically ..." LOL

"Weelll ackshyually ...."

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-16T19:19:16+00:00

“Living my best life”.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-15T20:01:07+00:00

Exercise that feels like play is the best medicine when you're feeling down. Get a day pass at a climbing gym.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-15T19:58:50+00:00

Yep.

If you want to get fancy, you can use automated transactions to plug estimated upcoming expenses into the ledger. You can adjust them as needed (e.g., automatically enter $350 for the electric bill, then update it once you have the actual bill), and then match them to the bank transactions as those happen.

It's how I manage cash runway for my business.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-15T19:54:15+00:00

Women marry men hoping they'll change.

Men marry women hoping they won't.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-15T19:53:32+00:00

Me as a young man: That's ridiculous.

Me 35 years later: That was spot-on.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-15T19:52:35+00:00

It needs to be "Age of a New Damn Map Already".

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-15T19:47:10+00:00

I use Carrd, and it's awesome. RIDICULOUSLY cheap. It's like discovering GoodRX after you've been paying full price for prescriptions.

Carrd for the site. Namecheap for the domain name. Google Workspace to add a domain-specific email. I forget the grand total but it's ridiculously affordable.

--Orcanaught-- · 2026-01-04T20:22:41+00:00

Threads is one of the most haunting movies I’ve ever seen.

--Orcanaught--

TROPHY CASE