Cold open

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Live Let Thrive, a podcast about the Airbnb life, the share economy, and everything in between. Here are your hosts, Micah and Steve.

SPEAKER_01 0:11

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome back to another exciting episode of Live Let Thrive. This is Stevie Stacks coming at you from Fort Worth, Texas. And this is your favorite short-term, mid-term, long-term Pat Split podcast in the world. And um just wanted to hit record today, see what happens. I've uh we've been putting up some new episodes, and I hope you enjoyed them. Uh, one that's really uh I liked a lot was the vending machine episode, the last episode where we um talked about vending machines, and so I learned a lot, and it's just not not just about vending machines, but about business in general, how to grow, how to scale, systems you got to put in place, all that fun stuff. And that that works with any business. Uh, and if you have a short-term rental business, you gotta learn all that stuff too. Um, so I share whatever I can share on this show, as as does Mike. I've learned a lot from him. Um our listeners have hopefully learned something from us. We try. Um, and this is episode 343, I believe. It's a lot of episodes, and um, I still enjoy doing this show. And what I wanted to talk about today, excuse me, is

The Grand Prairie pool house arbitrage arrangement with Susan's team

SPEAKER_01 1:30

funny. There's so much stuff going on, right? Uh, one thing is people are I still do, I still have some arbitrages. Um, and I know that you guys out there probably have an arbitrage or multiple arbitrages. Um, I have I own, you know, thank God, 11 houses, and um closing on another one. But one of my houses I'm doing an arbitrage um out of, I'm I'm renting it to an arbitrager. Shout out to Susan and her team, um out of Canada, and and um they're renting it from me and they're doing short-term rentals on it and uh long midterm, whatever, everything. Um which is interesting because I I the reason I did that I bought the house originally, it's a pool house in Grand Prairie. I bought it originally because I was gonna do uh short-term rentals there, right? I thought it would be a good house to do short-term rentals. Um and I, you know, it seems I have I always have a lot of projects going on. And at that same time I was buying that one, I was fixing up, I was getting another house ready. Either a house I bought, I think I purchased another house, or either that or one I was arbitraging. Anyways, I had a lot of stuff going on. This deal came across by plate, pretty good deal, so I went ahead and got it. And um, anyways, I was getting to know um Susanna and her team, and they um we I don't know, one thing led to another, and we and we decided that they wanted to rent it from me to do arbitrage. They wanted to they wanted a pool house, you know, really bad. And so I was like, you know what? I got a lot of stuff going on, and um if you guys want to do this house, that's fine. Y'all can rent it from me as a long-term rental, and then y'all can do uh your thing. You can do the the short-term rental stuff, and so that's the arrangement we made, and it's worked out pretty good

Burst pipe, thousands in repairs, and Proper Insurance denies the plumbing claim

SPEAKER_01 3:38

so far, you know. Um ups and downs and all the stuff that comes with arbitrages, but something recently happened um that uh a pipe busted underneath the house, and they're and it's getting fixed right now, right? Uh my guy Pablo's doing it. Um Susanna, of course, luckily there's there's no bookings this week, and and they closed off the calendar so they can fix that pipe, right? And they do have a big booking coming up on the first, I believe. Uh so that's what four four days or so away. Anyways, um so here's here's what the what happens. Um, you know, I'm out money because this happened, right? I'm out of pocket because you gotta get the people in there to to vacuum all the water out and humidifiers and all that stuff. I got my handyman Pablo in there busting through walls, busting through concrete to try to find the leak, right? He spotted it, but he's still gotta do his his rest of his work. And so, I mean, this is thousands of bucks, right? And so I have insurance, and I I'm pretty sure I'm gonna claim on it because you know I think the the deductible is two thousand bucks, and then the work's gonna be way more than that. Um and hopefully they cover it. But in the meantime, um Susanna and her team are hoping it gets fixed before the big booking comes in, and I do too, because you know they're gonna be out of money. And and just sorting through all that, and they have here's the thing, they have proper insurance, right? Which is supposed to be there for you when a maintenance thing happens or or something happens with the house where it can't be rented, then they're supposed to reimburse you for the time that it's you know not being rented, that it can't be rented. And and so she reached out to them and they pretty much told her they're gonna deny her because it's plumbing, and which is like the number one thing that the the number one issue with houses is plumbing, right? And I don't know how the the insurance was written up or whatever, but apparently um they're not gonna cover her at all uh for lost uh revenue, which sucks. So screw screw proper proper insurance, I guess, unless you know, unless you go in there and and then you can choose to have plumbing and pay extra. So you're paying a lot of money for this insurance. It ain't cheap. I know it's over a hundred bucks a month for a house. And for them to say, yeah, we're not gonna give you anything for lost revenue, that kind of sucks. But I told I told people a long time ago, yeah, people, you know, when it first came out, they were paying out claims and people were saying, Yeah, yeah, you know, my house, you know, I couldn't rent my house for whatever a few weeks or a month. And they paid, they paid the money. I said, Oh, that's cool. Um, but quickly they grew to like the number one short-term rental insurance company out there, right? And and be, you know, I I I'm assuming they were growing because people, you know, people were talking about it and saying they pay out, they'll they'll they'll keep you from losing money when something happens. But with what I always was saying is like insurance is insurance, their goal is to not pay, to make as much money from you as possible and pay out as little to nothing as possible. That's their goal. That's always been insurance since the beginning of time, since the beginning of boats selling across the ocean, you know. Their goal is to they might insure those boats, but they're not gonna pay out if something happens and they're gonna try to get out of it. It's it's just that's how insurance works. So I told people, is it really worth it to pay 100, 150 bucks, 200 bucks a month, depending on the house, for something that they might end up denying you, anyways? And um, so this might be a case in point. Hopefully, I mean, you know, we'll see. They're gonna send someone out anyways, but they pretty much told her it's gonna be a denial. Um so back to me. I'm the owner of the house, I'm getting the problem fixed as quickly as possible. Now there was a a little slight back and forth. Uh, are we gonna have to pay full rent? Because this happened, this happened. I was like, you know, I know there's nothing in the contract saying that if if if something maintenance-related happens at the house that I have to I I stop accepting rent.

Who pays rent when maintenance shuts down an arbitrage?

SPEAKER_01 8:14

Um but that being said, you know, I I I explained to her, you know, I'm out thousands of bucks with this. I'm trying as fast as I can to fix it for you. Um and I've been in situations with landlords that don't want to fix nothing or take forever, and then they don't give a crap about me making money. I care if they're gonna make money, but at the same time, we never we never uh wrote down how who's gonna be uh responsible uh for lost revenue. You know, that's what proper insurance is for, right? Not not the um not the landlord. Every place I've ever rented an apartment complex or or um a house, you know, to do arbitrage, they've never said, oh, you don't have to pay rent this month because uh blah blah blah, because AC's out or whatever, you know, whatever's out. I've never been in a place where they they've they've offered to reduce my rent or or let me you know stay there rent-free uh because of an issue, because maintenance issues happen. It's just part of it. So maybe that being said, that you know, that being known, um going into your next arbitrage deal, maybe think about how you can word something like that with the owner. Now, the whole thing is to get an owner to agree with you to use their house as a short-term rental, which is already, you know, kind of a big ask for people because people are concerned about who you're letting in their house and all that stuff. But then on top of that, to say, hey, by the way, if you ever have a maintenance issue at your house and I can't do Airbnb there, um, I don't have to pay rent. Uh of course, don't say like that, but try to come up with uh with uh a common ground, I guess, you know, to say things must if things aren't fixed in a certain amount of days or if things aren't fixed in a month or or something like that. I don't know how you want to word it. But you do, it's another thing to think about when you're arbitraging from a house because I've been in a situation before where a pipe bust at an arbitrage and they took like 15 days to get it fixed. Finally they did, but I was out, I was out, you know, over two weeks of revenue because they were just, oh, we're gonna assess things, oh, we're gonna this, and I'm like, okay, we know it's a leak, we know the floors are kind of you know warped. Uh I got a handyman that could fix it, but it's gonna cost. Um, let me know what's gonna happen. And um finally they fixed it, but it was just like two over two weeks without revenue. And that was there's not really nothing I could do. There was nothing written in the contract saying that I could skip out on rent if I didn't um if something happened at the house. So um definitely have that in your leases, try to work something out, try to explain to them listen, if you if your house is down, I can't make any money, and it's gonna be hard for me to pay the rent, you know. Maybe word it like that, but it's something to definitely consider when you're doing arbitrage out of someone else's house, uh, the maintenance side, because the maintenance is huge, it can make or break you, it can make or break the landlord, you know, uh at a regular house. If an AC goes out during that year, you hey, guess what? You didn't make any money that year, which kind of sucks. Or or a leak or whatever. It's part of the it's part of business. Um but that being said, I I'm yes, that sucks for um for my tenants. It sucks for me. You know, it's a couple thousand, it's a few thousand bucks so far that I didn't know I was gonna spend.

Garage conversion Pad Split in Arlington finishing up - three-bedroom to six-bedroom

SPEAKER_01 11:44

But at the same time, I'm still pushing forward with the projects I'm working on. I'm getting uh uh Pat Split finished in in Arlington, and it's it's almost done. It's the it's just uh the final touches left. It's turned uh we converted uh a three-bedroom into a um a six-bedroom. Had like a loft upstairs, we closed it off, made it a fourth bedroom, and then making two bedrooms in the garage. So that's my first garage conversion. You know, I never really wanted to do one of those because I thought they always looked ugly, but it's actually come out pretty nice. And and um I'm I really like it. It's even got a little hallway in the where the garage was, you know, and they painted the floors and it looks it looks nice, like a little hallway chill spot. They have their own fridge as well. Um, six people, I think I should put two fridges in a place with six people. And so I I'm still pushing forward. I'm getting that that um Pat split up and running, and um, and that one that house I bought owner finance. I probably talked about it on a previous show, but I bought it owner finance, um, 10,000 bucks down. We agreed on an interest rate, 7. something, 25 or something like that. Not bad. Um, and then you know, payments reasonable, but my whole goal was gonna I was gonna be um doing the um pat split there. So I've been making double what a regular a regular rental makes in that area, so that's pretty good. So I'm getting that I it's not stopping me, you know. Maintenance stuff happens, you gotta deal with it, pay for it, move on. But as long as you're pushing forward, as long as you're you know gaining uh assets is in my eyes, assets, properties, whatever, as long as you're you're still um you don't stop and let something stop you and let something get to you, uh then you'll be all right, I I believe, because every single house I accumulate or every single um arbitrage I get, even though I'm trying not to do so many arbitrages anymore, or every single or every new client I get for management, you know, it's it's it's more income for the company, right? So that's that's what I'm aiming for. And that being said, I got the so I got the the passplit up and running. It should be done. It should be done by Wednesday and have it cleaned and everything. I have my first guest checking in on Thursday. So they already booked it um for Thursday. Um so they already booked it for Thursday. There the first guest is moving in. I I spoke to them. Um if we're gonna talk about Patsplit a little bit, I always reach out to them with a preliminary message and say, hey, thank you for choosing our place. Once they try to book your place, you get 24

First Pad Split guest books: three months to stack cash for an apartment

SPEAKER_01 14:28

hours to either accept them or deny them, or they're automatically accepted. So um it's uh a young lady, she she booked, she requested to book the place. I sent her a message, you'll tell me a little bit more about yourself. Everything seems to check out pretty good, but I'd like to know about more about you, and plus let's let's chat later. And um yeah, she told me a little write-up uh what she's doing. She's just trying to save up to you know save some money to get her own apartment, which is which is great. I think a lot of um Pad Splitters do that. They're trying to get their own place, right? And and that's and that's cool. Uh that's what I like about about Pad Split. You can you can rent a room from a house for a while, stack cash, as they say, uh stack some money, give build you up a down payment or or enough money to get down payment, first month's rent, turn on the utilities, all that stuff because it costs money, and then you can hop into an apartment if you want. Um or you could save up and uh purchase a car, you know. So so that was her plan. She just wants to um be able to, she says she'll be there for at least three months, you know. I think most people choose that three months it's a they call on on Pass of Day, they call it 12 weeks stay, you know. It's three months, same thing to me. But they say if someone rents your place for that agreed upon initial three months, then they pay the whatever the advertised rent is, right? So whatever like uh mine is like um you know seven something a month, 750 bucks a month, whatever, depending on the bedroom. And but if they choose not to, if they choose to go week to week or whatever, or month to month or week to week, then they pay a premium to do that. So she's she's not doing the premium to be able to bounce whenever she wants, so she's gonna stay there for an initial three months. Um, so that's cool. I'm getting that one up and running. Uh the the you know, like I said, I got the listing on point. Um I'm teaching my team to create the listings now and to interact with the guests. Um, yeah, pushing forward. And and I'll tell you, you know, I'm I'm closing on another house that's gonna be subject to that I'm gonna do corporate and um short-term rentals out of because it's uh close by where I'm at, and it's really pretty, really nice house, and I I think it's gonna do well in that because I have a few others in that in that same area, in the same area that do really well, and so there's I noticed there's a demand for it. So I'm getting it subject to um 10% down payment, which is pretty cool, and um 30-year uh note on that interest rate. I think it's also 7.25. Yeah, I think we uh we negotiated that. Um so I close on that next week if everything if everything goes good. And like I said, moving forward, pushing forward. Um quick note on on um on the the pad split front. So here's what I always learn, right? I always try new things, you know. Uh it started with long-term rentals, then I jumped into short-term rentals because of mica, and then corporate rentals because that was the new thing, and then um and then pad split because I just like wanted I want to try pad split. Um, so uh something I learned, I'm today years old, um, was all this craziness was happening, right? The the the the leak and all that stuff, and then I'm getting calls from Susanna and her and her team, and I'm getting calls from you know Pablo, I'm trying to communicate with Pablo, and uh, you know, everything in Airbnb, everything messed up happens on the weekends, right? And so all that fun stuff. And I'm I've been going back and forth to the new Pass Plot, trying to get it helped get it set up with the furnishings and and all that stuff, taking the photos just to get

Dead keypad batteries lock out a guest on Sunday night

SPEAKER_01 18:19

the listing up. And um real quick, I love professional photos, I still get them every time. But if you go, if you're gonna go, you can get some pretty badass photos now with ChatGPT because you you know you take them sideways like you're supposed to on your iPhone, boom, boom, boom, boom. And chat GPT will will just touch them up a little bit, make them look like professional photos. It's freaking crazy, man. Uh, I love my photographers, but a little nervous for them, a little nervous for them because as iPhone technology gets better, and or uh Android or whatever you're on, and then you're taking badass pictures, and ChatGPT gets freaking exponentially better every single day. Man, I'm just saying these photos, ooh, ooh, it's gonna be hard for the stand and click folks to keep up. And I have really amazing friends that are photographers and they run a badass business, and I still use them, but I'm just saying a little bit nervous, a little bit nervous for photographers out there. But, anyways, that being said, um all this stuff was going on, and then I get a call, of course, Sunday night. Uh well, not a call, uh it was a pad split message, right? And of course, my team answers those, but I see him come across too, and I saw the one of the guests, a new guest. Um, he was locked out of his room. He said the the keypad doorknob was not doing nothing, not lighting up, nothing when he pushed it. And so I was like, oh man, um I guess the batteries died. It seems that's what the what the cause is. Um I have here's the thing. I have some key, I have made keys. I made um actually every lock came with two keys. So I always bring I always bring a set to my house from from locks. You know, I have the manual keys at my house, and I keep keys on site on the property in case there's an emergency where someone needs to get in. I mean, just like I've always been doing that with Airbnbs, right? Every Airbnb, I have a set of keys at my house, and I have a set of key in a lockbox at the house. I have the similar the same situation at this pad split that I have. Um I have keys on on the property in a closet, right? Then a locked closet, like a maintenance closet, and I have a lockbox outside of the house with the key to that closet, right? So I'm already thinking of ways to do things better. But like for example, that lockbox closet, I should put a keypad uh doorknob on that thing, just to make it easier so I don't have to go to a lockbox to get a key to open it, whatever. Um, but that being said, that's my favorite saying. That being said, um I was thinking it through last night. This is the first time one of these excuse me, one of these um doorknob keypad locks um died on me because they're not they're not doorknob smart locks. I just um I haven't done that because the bat I mean it's cool technology and all, but then they go offline a lot. Uh and also they have their battery life is terrible, man. They're like within a month those batteries are sapped and you're buying new expensive batteries for those smart locks. So being that it's local, being that my yeah, my pad splits are local and I can put keypad locks on them and I can go or I could change them out whenever there's a turnover, or or my my handyman could change them out if there's a turnover. I just I just went with the manual keypad doorknob locks, you know. You buy them on 30, 40 bucks on Amazon. And they work fine. This is the very first one that the batteries died. And of course, it happened after all this crazy stuff's happening. That's exactly when it's going to happen. And so I went out there and I met the new the new guy. And he's real cool, dude. Real cool dude. We you know, we just asked him how he's doing. He's like, Oh man, I'm doing better now that I got my own spot. You know, I'm I'm I'm happy. I feel less stressed. It just just it was cool in that regard talking to somebody who who really values getting a spot on on um on Pat Split.

The lockbox-per-room system: spare key, batteries, QR code instructions

SPEAKER_01 22:35

And you know, just telling me, you know what, hey, he plans to do, you know, plans to save up and get a car and all this stuff, because he's been doing Ubers and there's a there's a there's these vans in Arlington, Texas that are called Via, Via. And they'll take you anywhere in Arlington. Arlington's pretty big, five bucks for the trip, nothing more than five bucks. It could be lower, I think, if it's like a short trip, but it caps at five dollars. So it's kind of like Arlington, Texas, and I think I've heard somewhere that Arlington, Texas is the biggest city in the country without public transportation. They don't have buses and stuff, but this is kind of their like compromise. Okay, well, this is we'll we'll we'll work with this company called Via, and they'll be like the buses for our the people that don't have cars and stuff, and it works out pretty good, right? Um, but they're not they're not always he can't always use them, so he'll use um Uber when he when he can't use those. So, but like I said on the shows before, about half of the people at my pad splits, I would say about 50% have cars. That's just been the ratio, you know. It's been um so a six unit, um, about three people out of six unit will have cars, and and that's cool. I you know, a lot of people they they do fine without cars. I had I've had um pad split guests or or pad mates, whatever, that had electric bikes, and that's when they get around. I mean, people are using those electric bikes just like um little mopeds, you know, and little that's their vehicle to get around to or from work, and they just sidewalk it all the way to the to their job, and I think that's really cool. Um But as I was saying, I went out there and so I I I used the key, opened the door, and and and unscrewed the back of the of the um of the doorknob lock, uh doorknob keypad lock, and I took out the old batteries, put some new batteries in, and it worked like a charm, it works fine. And um, and I was just talking to him. I was like, you know, I I I do you know I had some keys on site, but I just thought, you know, I think what I need to do. Well, I wasn't telling him all this, but never mind. But I was thinking in my head, I I went out there, even though there was keys on site, I just really was like, should I give someone access to this closet that has a key for each room? And I was like, you know, I shouldn't do that. When I when I I like I said I'm changing coming from the mindset of Airbnb, so I considered this house as one unit, and I have keys on site in case you know things in case it you know uh locks don't work or something like that. I have keys on site. But what I should have thought of, and like I said, I don't beat myself up over this, but what I should have thought of initially, it's it's like uh it's a small apartment complex. Every unit is unique, you know. Someone lives, a different person lives in each unit, each room is its own unit. So I should have looked at it like that. Every room should have its own lockbox, like every room is its own Airbnb or corporate rental or whatever, it should have its own lockbox along with the keypad lock. So what I did, because you always whenever you've you you come across something that that saps your time, always figure out a way to um create a system that will prevent that from happening again, right? And so what I did, I went ordered, I went out and ordered uh because I have three, now it's gonna be the third uh uh pad split. So that's 18 units. That's pretty cool. They they they grow pretty quickly when you're doing pad split. That's 18 units. So I went and I went and ordered like a 20-pack of these um uh lock boxes, right? 20 pack of these lock boxes, and um and I ordered like uh triple A's because all these the locks I'm using are triple A's. I ordered a bunch of triple A's, and then I ordered um uh little little screwdrivers to keep at each property. Just like, oh you buy like 10 of them for like five bucks, these little screwdrivers, right? They're cool, and just leave them at and they have a flathead and they have a Phillips head. So I leave those in a drawer at the property. I leave extra screwdrivers everywhere. And so what what my what my thought is because they just came in right now, they just arrived right now, is to put in the lockbox, put four triple A's in each lockbox, and then a key to the bedroom in the lockbox, close it, either stick it on the doorknob, or I'm gonna just you know um screw it to the to the wall right there beside beside the room. And so every room's gonna have its own lockbox with a key in there and four triple A batteries. And my my thought behind this is of course, if the if the the batteries go out, they can um I'll give them the code to the lockbox. I don't give it to them on day one, but if if something happens and they need to get a key, they'll be able to get into their room. So they'll give them the code, boom, they can open the door to the room, and then um I'll have a video ready how to change the batteries out of your keypad lock. Here's the batteries too, you know. Uh some people they have like the QR codes, and I'm thinking I might I'll get my wife to I'll I'll plaster a QR code right there on the door, and they just scan it, and it shows you step by step. You just and then I'll say the batteries and uh the the screwdrivers are in the kitchen in the drawer, whatever. All you gotta do is unscrew the back, pop the old batteries out, throw them away, put the new batteries in, close it, screw it in, and you're good to go. Please put the key back into the lockbox, you know, to never be heard from again. And so so that's my remedy. Um, at least, you know, I don't know. I mean, I'm sure there's gonna be some uh pad mates that are might not be too savvy or not want to do something like that, but at least like they can get a key and get in and out of their room that night. So if something happens at midnight, I don't have to go drive out there at midnight, or I have to call a handyman and they charge me a premium for going out at midnight to get someone back in their room. Then get in and out of the room, and then I can send the handyman the next day, or I can go by the next day and just put the batteries in for them. But I want to have I want it to be able to where they can do the whole thing, the whole process. So, anyways, like I said, always learning. There's always new situations coming up, and so that was something that just that just occurred. I'm looking at my other topics to see where I can bounce to next. Um setting up the pad splits. Uh what's cool with older old Airbnb furniture is that you can um use it in these pad splits, and it still looks

Rental grade furniture: $15 Amazon sheet sets and recycled Airbnb pieces

SPEAKER_01 29:15

pretty nice, you know. It's uh what what Micah said on a previous show, because I was saying I don't go super high end on my pad splits, you know. Some people are going. I do put I do provide sheets and a comforter, you know, Amazon brand. Um 20 bucks would get you a whole kit, right? Or 15 bucks. I don't know. It's you know, they're cheaper on Amazon. If you go to the Walmart, it's expensive. But you can get your whole like a sheet set with the pillowcases and the and the little white comforter for like 15 or 20 bucks. It's cheap. So I I I uh I I leave those in the room. People say don't do it. To me, you know, to get to a room and it already has sheets and it's already the bed's made looking pretty. I think that's psychological. You get like a good feeling. Or the transversely, transversely, big word, is to walk into a room that you're just renting day one and you just you get there and it's just uh uh a mattress on a on a bed with um with a mattress protector on it. And and you know, what if you forgot to bring sheets that night? So I oh crap, so now I gotta go to Walmart and get some sheets, or I'm gonna sleep on this uncomfortable ass uh water protected, uh you know, water shield mattress protector. Um anyways, or worse, they'll take the mattress protector off and just sleep straight on the mattress, which would suck. And then you're gonna end up buying another mattress. But like I said, I'll provide, I'll pay 15 or 20 bucks to provide some decent looking sheets and decent sheets, and then get a good night's sleep right when they get there. They don't have to worry about making a bed and all that stuff. That's I'll do that, and also I'll provide a nice bed. Um, like I said, you can get you can get these metal frame beds on Amazon, they look pretty good for like you know, anywhere between 60-70 bucks for depending on the size. If you want, you know, twin uh all the way up to king. Like I said, you can get them for you can get it cheap. Um, and they look cool. And you and you get a mattress for um 100 or something bucks, 200 bucks, depending on the mattress, and then you get that bedding bedding set, and then I get always put a desk and a and a chair in there. A lot of people work from home or they need a place to sit and chill, and then um a dresser, you know. Like I said, I don't go all out make it like a super amazing uh Airbnb experience, you know what I'm saying? It's a place to sleep, be comfortable, maybe work, you know, if you work from home. Um, and then you got a dresser to put your stuff and you got a closet. If you don't have a closet, then you got like one of the hanging things, the racks that you can set, you know, by the by the wall, you can hang all your clothes on that, and then has a spot for your shoes in the bottom. So I get those too. Um, so I I what what Micah called it, and and I, you know, for the living room, I I have um uh pre-owned furniture from other Airbnbs that have upgraded, but the furniture's still good, and I'll have those in the in the living rooms, and um yeah, yeah, it's good that I get to recycle some stuff. So what getting all the way back to what Michael said about how I'm setting up my Airbnbs, he called it rental grade. And I thought that was a pretty accurate description, you know, it's not super high grade, it's not it's not low grade, but it's it's rental grade. It gets the job done. You walk in there, the house looks nice, it looks clean, place to sit, place to whatever, chill, and you got a nice room, nice bed to sleep on. So that's what's cool about about Pad Split. Um, you know, you get to reuse a lot of stuff that's still good, you know, just throw it away, fill up landfills and stuff like that. Um, or you get I got a lot of used stuff from um um what's it called? Uh Facebook Marketplace, and you find some really good deals on there, man. I got like three like badass bar stools the other day for like 60 bucks. It's insane. And like one bar stool at IKEA cost like $140, like a decent one with the pad and everything. Um so I will say that um I'm kind of digging pad split and I'm kind of learning it better and getting really good people in there, knock on wood, and um, and learning to keep bad people out. And then the main thing is just to talk talk to them once they once they try to book your place and and see if your spidey senses go off, right? And I've I've been denied, I've denied a lot of people from renting my place. I could have I could be full 100% full all the time, but I just I don't want to put any just anybody in my past splits, right? And um so photos of all the rooms. I did all the photos, as I said before, um and take some really take some good photos, but then chat GPT will like make them look professional, it's crazy. Um oh, here's something really cool. Because I know we're a keyless society, and that's I love it. I love not dealing with keys, but as an Airbnb, as a corporate um person, as a long-term renter, as a pad splitter,

Walmart's key kiosk saves copies to the cloud - backup keys in your email

SPEAKER_01 34:18

you know, we still gotta have keys, right? Because these these um these modern marvels will run out of batteries or they'll stop working or they get a glitch and then you're screwed. You gotta use a key. If you don't have a key, then then what? Then what do you gotta do? Um bust the door down, anyways. Um what what is is and and you know, keeping track of keys, like I said, I have kind of a system. I I bring I make extra keys, I keep a set of keys at my house at all times for every unit, and I keep a set of keys on the property. Now, as you know, let's say an incident happens and someone had to take the key out of there and to get into the house, and they got in the house, and then they misplaced the key. It's a little freaking thing, right? And they misplaced it, and all of a sudden there's the backup key there. And let's say I can't find or my kids got to my keys for somehow and they're all mixed up, and I don't know which keys to what. I don't have a key either. So both of the keys are gone, right? Of course, I make more than just two keys now. Um, but and Schlage, I love Schlag. I used the Schlag deadbolt, um, you know, where you manually turn the deadbolt with the keypad. I use those, but they went from giving you two keys, they give you freaking one key now. Come on, cheap ass. I'm paying, I'm paying over a hundred bucks for this lock, and you're giving me one key. Okay, whatever. I just venting a little bit. But what what's what's really cool, and what I do every time I get I get a new a new place and I go make backup keys, right? I go to Walmart. And I think they have them, they have them at Home Depot too, but I I usually just go to Walmart, right? And they have a kiosk. A kiosk, that's pretty funny, pretty clever, where you make your own key, right? You you go in there, there's a touch screen, you type in what kind of key you want, you stick the key in there, and it like scans it, like, and then it and it makes you the keys right then and there. But what's cool about this, right? And they used to suck at first, they used to make keys and they wouldn't even freaking work when you got home. It but they've gotten a lot better. They've gotten more throwing some AI on that crap, I don't know what they're doing, but they it works really well now. I I've all the keys that I've got from the Walmart kiosk, it they work amazingly, right? So five bucks get you a key, and then you get if you buy two keys, you get like one free. So I usually get two keys, then I get another one free. So you're paying 10 bucks to go make extra keys, right? For uh for a lock. But what's really cool is that you'll it'll ask you, hey, do you want to save this key in your account, right? So you make like an account with this thing, with this um kiosk, and and then you I'll at first that when I was when I was doing this, I said, yeah, I don't want to do it. I just want to get home, I just want to get to the place and and whatever, I don't have time. But I was like, you know what? I'm gonna start doing that. And so I started doing that. So one of the one of the places, you know, whatever, uh Meadow Drive or whatever the place, whatever the house is, you know, it I'll go, I'll I'll make the keys and then it'll ask me, you want to save the key, and I'll say, Yeah. And then you go in there and you type in what houses for, right? The address, uh, and then um and it saves it and it sends you an email, right? And you have the key saved in your email, and you have saved in your account. So I have a bunch of keys saved in my account. So let's say something did happen where the guest, you know, misplaced the extra key because they needed to get in at midnight one night, and I can't find my key to that place. I I have it saved in the system at Walmart, and I can go to one of them kiosks and type in my stuff and pay, and boop, it'll plop me out the freaking key, and I can go to that house and open the door. Isn't that cool? Sorry, locksmiths, because I think AI is gonna replace y'all too. No, I mean there's always a need for locksmiths, but um, but that's the coolest crap ever, man, because I have a backup key in the cloud, man. And so if I need to get a key and I lost the backup keys, I can still go to Walmart and then type in the my account and it'll plop me out a key for whatever house I I look up. So that's a a key point today, right there. See, that's pretty punny. Um yeah, man, I just wanted to hop on here and then empty my brain a little bit about the stuff that I've been going through. Um I've I've really I I talked about it before. Um I'm I'm reading uh Xiona's book, new book called uh Creative Close The Creative Closer. Because I'm all in on trying on just buying houses, owner finance, and subject two now. I'm not even trying to go through the Wells Fargo's

Zaona McIntyre's Creative Closer book club and Substack AI audiobook feature

SPEAKER_01 38:52

or even DSCRs, any of that stuff. I'm just going, I'm all in on it. And this book came at the right time where I decided this, you know, where and so I talked to um I talked to Zaona and I and I joined her Substack group. So Zaona McIntyre, look her up, the creative closer. You can jump on the Substack and we can even interact on there too. I didn't have Substack if I try to keep off the socials, but Substack's pretty cool. You can follow like news uh and stuff like that. Screw news, but you can follow people that you like like uh real estate and stuff that you like you know interest you. Um so I'm in her group, she releases a chapter a month, uh a chapter a month, a chapter a week. Chapter a week? Yeah, this is how she's doing her book. So her books in the process of getting finished, but us we we got privy to read chapters each week before uh the book is released, I believe. So, and then she's also working on the audiobook herself. But what's cool about Substack, so I we get the chapter, right? And then um, but I'm always on the move, you know. Uh and I like to listen to books, but like I said, she hasn't done the audiobook yet. She is recording it, but she hasn't done it finished it yet, um, or released the book yet. But we're getting, like I said, we're getting a chapter a week, so we're getting the preview of the book before anybody else gets to read it. It's really cool, and it's amazing. The book's amazing, it goes into every aspect of creative finance, you know. And um, but what's cool, you know, on Substack, you got the little app on your phone, the Substack app. I can go on the treadmill, which I need to spend more time on, and I could uh pull up that chapter, right? You know, whatever chapter that she released that week, and I could there's a little play button up there, right? And boom, you hit that play button, the the AI processes it and it freaking reads your book, man, and it sounds almost as good as uh as a professional uh reader or whatever, a professional audiobook reader. So um that makes me nervous too because AI is AI is probably gonna take those jobs. Um I'm sorry. I was just rushing off AI for so long, but I'm starting to love AI um and then be afraid of it at the same time for taking everybody's uh all these jobs that are just um that people have had forever. But I mean it's it's um so yeah, it'll read the book for you. And it'll get it pretty damn like I said, this is like the beginning. We're in the infancy stage of AI, right? But it gets it pretty damn close, like it's a real person. At first I thought it was a real person reading it, but then it'll say something like uh dollar side one one zero zero zero- you know, it'll say something like that instead of a hundred thousand dollars, right? It'll say dollar sign one zero zero, comma zero zero zero. And you know, oh this ain't a person, this is AI. Who'd read it like that? But all it takes is uh a programmer or another another AI to teach that AI. No, no, you say it this way, you say a hundred thousand dollars. But there's little things like that that you'll notice, but pretty much it'll read that whole chapter for you and it'll do an outstanding job. It'll put infliction inflictions in the voice where it should be and where it shouldn't be. Um so that was that was the trip. So I'm enjoying that that book. Um I'm looking forward to picking up more properties with creative finance. And um, so shout out to Xiona. Join her book club, it's really it'll change your it'll change your life. Um I you know, I just I think that might be a good place to stop. I uh proper shirt. Did I talk about everything? Uh different ways to purchase.

World Cup strategy: eight-month corporate lease beats the gamble

SPEAKER_01 42:26

Um yeah, I I'll dive in some more some some more stuff later. World Cup's coming up. Um I'm still not I'm still not don't know how I feel about the World Cup coming here. I know it's gonna be a lot of people coming here, um, but are they gonna be is it gonna be uh a lot of people dumping their houses on on Airbnb just for the World Cup? Will that spike the supply and then people won't make as much as we thought we were gonna make? I don't know. Uh hopefully we all do pretty well. Um, but that being said, I still prefer to have an eight-month corporate lease at a place that'll run right through the World Cup. I don't care. I'd rather have eight months guaranteed at whatever, six or seven thousand bucks a month than to just try to hope for that home run, that one month of World Cup bookings, you know, to get that one, you know. Oh, I made twenty thousand dollars. Oh well, but I made, you know, more than that, doing renting it out for eight months guaranteed. I don't have to worry about it. I mean, you don't have to worry about uh someone getting pissed at their team lost and they'll go destroy your house. You know, that could happen too. They spent $10,000 for tickets and their team lost and they they suck and they destroy your house. Oh well. But anyways, uh, hopefully that doesn't happen. Hopefully we do pretty good for the World Cup. But um, like I said, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, as they say. So I'm banking on getting those long corporate bookings. I love those. And um, I'm banking on uh expanding the the um uh pad splits corporate pad split Airbnb is still there, I still do Airbnb and I still manage Airbnb's. Our team knows how to do an amazing job. If y'all need management, hit me up. Uh R Just Rentals, uh hit me up uh Stevie Stacks. Um uh yeah, you'll you'll find us rjustrentals at gmail.com. Um also hit up Live Let Thrive. You can find me there too, livelet thrive at gmail.com. And um still rocking the Gmail after all these years. And yeah, and just hit us up um if you have any questions. If you want, oh like I said, I have my my Amazon list of of how to set up your your pad split. Uh six bedroom pad split has everything. If you want me to share that with you for free, I'll share it, I'll send it your way, and you'll have the Amazon list uh for rental grade uh pad split, right? Um, so that's pretty cool. Uh you I can I I think I would say I got this pad split done uh under 3,000 bucks. So that's pretty crazy, right? The whole six-bedroom house uh under 3,000 bucks. I'm factoring in also that we you know what I would regularly pay for some sofas that I that I just inherited, right? So I counted that in with the 3,000. So you can do a whole six-bedroom house for 3,000 bucks, rental grade, you know, if you do it, if you know what you're doing. And I got the list for you. So just follow my list, and there you go. I could even set up an Airbnb like that. I think I can make it pretty. Um, anyways, thank you all for listening. Uh, Stevie Stacks, uh, Live Let Thrive hit us up. Money Micah hit him up too. And we thank you for listening, and we'll see you on the flip side. Peace.

SPEAKER_00 45:34

Thank you for tuning in to this week's episode of Live Let Thrive. Be sure to tune in next week for all the latest in the world of Airbnb and all that entails. Bye-bye.