How To Create Your Airbnb Side Hustle With Theresa Decker
As people are seeking more unique experiences in their travels - both in their accommodations and activities - the popularity of Airbnb businesses has surged. What started off as a small site to find homier places to stay has boomed into its own industry and business model. Theresa Decker is a Short-Term Rental Strategist and certified Airbnb Superhost. Stefanie Peters chats with Theresa about all the fundamentals of running an Airbnb business, whether you're considering it a side hustle or its own full operation. Could this be the beginning of your Airbnb host journey?
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How To Create Your Airbnb Side Hustle With Theresa Decker
As you know in 2020, I am doing all things real estate-related and helping you bring in a solid stream of income stacked right on top of what you're already doing to leverage your time and to help you to live the life that you crave. I have my amazing friend, I call her my Wonder Woman. She is the secret sauce to all things real estate-related with short-term rentals. Let me give you a little rundown on her bio. She's a short-term rental strategist. She's an Airbnb Superhost and she's crushing it in her own right. She's not only talking about it, but she's also walking her talk. She has spent the last few years as a licensed mortgage loan originator. She has had an extremely successful career helping people build wealth and achieve financial freedom through real estate. As a short-term rental strategist, she combines her lending experience, financial creativity and hosting experience to help guide ordinary people through the process of buying vacation homes, to enjoy themselves, share with their families, and create an explosive stream of income. Theresa Decker, thank you so much for joining us.
Thanks for having me.
It has been fun getting to know you. We met through one of my friends, who I was in a mastermind with. We met in Minnesota and then we flew out to California and he said, "You've got to meet my friend, Theresa Decker." Shout out to Jesse Mills. I am glad that he introduced us. It has been incredible getting to know you and your financial acumen is through the roof. Let's dive into your backstory on even how you bumped into loans. How have you been able to do amazing in the loan business, but then scale that and then bumped into Airbnb? Now, you're doing amazing with that and you're helping other people and paying it forward. Let's start at the beginning.
For short-term rentals, I never had a plan of getting into that business. I didn't know anything about it. It was foreign territory for me. I know you can see through history, going on vacations that people have been doing this forever. People have been renting out condos on the beach as an option. Instead of staying in a hotel, you've seen that. We've seen condos throughout the years for as far back as can remember. In the years, I had this goal. Just a little bit of background, I was born in Florida. My family all lives in Florida, in the Sarasota area. I spent my childhood flying back and forth. We would go once a year for a week and visit the family. As an adult, I thought I have a choice now and I wanted to purchase a family home so that we could all have room to have the family over at our place and do that thing. The way to make that happen for us, and it did not cost an arm and a leg, was to leverage this idea of a short-term rental. In that the plan was we would buy this property and we would rent it out a little bit when we're not using it. I didn't know how crazy explosive that would end up being.
Running Airbnb Businesses: If you're doing short-term rentals or Airbnbs is passive income for you and you have a full-time job, take it one property at a time.
Why don't you share? What was the first home that you bought? What has your return been on that? How you found the right people to put them on the bus to make it a well-oiled machine? What are your plans for the future with that as well?
We own a couple of properties. We have another one that we're closing on. We have two. We purchased the first one with a little bit different intention with it. We weren't as concerned about different things like regulations in that. The first property that we purchased is in an area that has a regulation that allows you to rent out for one month or longer. That property, that's the one that we go down there, we stay in that we enjoy the heck out of it. We have our family over and then when we're not there, we will rent it out a month at a time. In the first year, my intention of breaking even was blown out of the water. On that one, we quickly covered our expenses. First, it was mortgage payments made. All of our expenses are made. We're making a profit. For this last year on that property, we ended up netting after expenses about $24,000 on that property. That's property one.
How about your other property? How much did you bring in gross? How much did you net in 2019 on that one?
Taking the idea of what happened by surprise on that first property, I started thinking about it and saying, “If we decided we are going to have over one county and look into what properties are available there? What if we were to purchase a home in that county with no regulations so that we could rent that out for 3, 5, 7 days? How much more profit could we make?” That's exactly what we did. We purchased another home and these are four-bedroom cool homes. They're great for bigger families to come and vacation together. We purchased that one and the growth was explosive compared to our first one. On that one, we are up to shy of $101,000 in growth, which is a profit of about $42,000 for the year. That one is crazy.
What are your plans for the future? You are going to be closing on one in a couple of weeks. Where are your goals as far as where you want to take your real estate empire and your Airbnb?
We want to add another property. We wanted to add two more in 2020. We're accomplishing part of that goal by adding our third Airbnb property. We would still like to find one more in 2020. That's the short-term goal for that. I want to take the property at a time and I don't want to overload myself because this is meant to be passive income for me and I do work a full-time job. I want to make sure that every time I add a property, I settle into that and I enjoy what I'm doing. It's so far so good. A couple more properties for sure.
I've done buy and holds for several years. Learning about student housing, Airbnbs, flips, wholesales and hotels, it can all seem overwhelming if you look at the real estate opportunities as a whole. When you can dial into one lane and ask, "What can I accomplish in this one vein?" I'm such a huge advocate of success leaves clues. Find a mentor who knows what the heck they're doing. Pay them a premium price point for them to guide and direct you to the goals that you want to accomplish. Make sure that they are going in that same direction and they've already accomplished what you want to accomplish.
What I think is a beautiful gift from you and I connecting is I connected you with my parents. You have bent over backward not only in helping them with the loan but helping them with the process afterward in their Airbnb like, “Who's the pool guy? Who are the cleaners? Who are the people that take care of the lawn care?” You help with the backside of setting up the Airbnb property. Who's the real estate agent that you can know and trust to get you the best deal and get the negotiation? There's a lot of moving pieces in whatever lane you decide to drive. It's awesome to have you as a mentor to help guide and direct every single step of the way. You even have an Amazon link where you give them everything they need for their Airbnb. How simplistic is that?
Running Airbnb Businesses: You're always taking a risk when you jump onto any property, but you can mitigate that risk by waiting to order furniture or supplies.
The Amazon shopping list, I love that.
Why don't you share with the readers if they are intrigued by potentially looking at an Airbnb to bring in another stream of income, walk them through the process from A to Z of how you help them?
I like to think of myself as a short-term rental strategist. When you come to my first short-term rental strategies, that part's free. The reason why is when I'm helping someone with the financial side of it, there are many different dynamics. There are many moving parts with the financials of it. It's not as simple as what's my mortgage payment going to be and how much do I need to put down. You're creating a new business. It’s, “How much can I bring in do you think on an annual basis when we average this thing out? What are my expenses going to look like?”
I'm an open book. Anyone who's asked me, I'll send you my spreadsheets that show exactly what I'm paying out in each of those categories. That helps remove whatever fears that I can. That's step one is figuring out what does this business model look like? The second thing is the loan, to get financing if you're not paying cash. That's a big piece of it to figure out what are your financing options. The next step is connecting you with a real estate agent who can be dialed into which properties make sense. How can we get you the best bang for your buck as far as that’s concerned and properties that are going to attract the right folks to rent? That's the next thing. Once you're under contract, that's when the fun part begins because that's when you can start dreaming about what furniture is going to go into this? How can we sleep the number of people that we want to fit our business model? Those are the fun pieces.
As you mentioned, Amazon shopping lists. I like to order most of my things online and that is to streamline the setup process. It's getting that over to you, helping you pick out some of those special things that are accustomed to your house. The last piece is getting you onto the platform. Most of my clients do Airbnb. There's Vrbo as well. It's getting you set up on the platform. I usually will happen to my client's listing and help them in a co-host mode to help get their listing up and running. Making sure that they are not missing out on any of those things that you need to have in there. As far as house rules, policies, making sure you're charging all the fees that you need to and disclosing anything. That needs to be in there. You get fired up and get your listing going. The price that your rental is going to be at and guide along all of that. That's what it looks like from start to finish.
It's powerful that you can help people plug them into a turnkey system that they don't have to try to recreate the wheel and get them up and turning a profit right away. You can even share how much you've helped my parents in buying their Airbnb. Why don't you share when they closed on their property, how much they have booked out already? I don't think they'd mind if you shared their stats.
Stef, your parents purchased their property at the beginning of November 2019. They took their time getting their property up and running. I'm one of those people who I have closing day and a week later I have people in there. They took their time, they recruited a friend of theirs to help decorate and they took a few weeks to get it set up. It's beautiful. I want to say that we started marketing their property around mid-November 2019 out for a future date. That's a couple of months and they have $56,000 on the books in gross revenue for that property. They're about 50% of the way to what I am on my property that’s in a similar area. That's in a short couple of months. They're well on their way to doing similar numbers to what I'm doing.
I'm actually closing on a property. I am looking forward to that and that's my same goal to gross over six figures on one property alone. If you can add that as another thing to your portfolio, in real estate, you can't go wrong. That's fun. Going back in time, if you would have bumped into this Airbnb space, what is one thing that you maybe made a little mistake or a big mistake on and you would do differently moving forward?
Running Airbnb Businesses: If you want to be the boss of your own life, you have to do it. You can dream and set goals, but it always starts with that first step.
Honestly, if I had gone into it with the purpose of pure profit, which house two was, I don't know if there's anything that I would change. I would have in advance known a little bit how to collect certain taxes upfront maybe. Arbitrary things that I learned along the way. My first property wasn't for the same purpose and still isn't for the same purpose. I wouldn't say that would necessarily change it. It's exactly where I want it. It more than surpassing what my goal was on it. I don't know that there's anything like that. I learned things along the way about homes that are easier to insure and different things like that affect the bottom line. Ultimately, there's always a trade-off. It's always some benefit you're gaining if it's more expensive to insure. There are things like that, but I'm learning.
You earn as you learn. It's neat that you can jump into the Airbnb space with whatever intention you want. Maybe you do want it to be your ultimate dream, second home or vacation home. By default, you start turning a profit or if you want to go all-in and say, "I want to max out my profits at whatever the cost, then you can go in like that and put some goals together." That's the thing that is such a beautiful gift that you have been able to give to several people is you can ask, "What are your goals? What are your intentions? What do you want to accomplish? Here's where I would go to get furniture. Here's where I would go to get some of the different things to stage the home." You can help people every single step of the way. You answer your phone at crazy times of the night and usually, you return to text at crazy times the night. You've got type-A crazies like myself that are like, "What about this? What about that?" You are on it, white on rice and that's why I appreciate you, Theresa.
I love what you said too about how you can have different goals with this and it doesn't have to be they're going to turn the most profit possible. On that point, my best friend, Christy and her husband, own a lake cabin in Northern Minnesota. Their goal is not the same as mine is on our house down here in Southwest Florida. They wanted to own a cabin on a lake and they want the expenses covered. They potentially block off their calendar from September through May. It's for their families. That way, they can go up there as many times as they want. If they want to go up during the week, if they want to go up just on a whim one weekend. Chris is an avid snowmobiler. He and my husband ran up this weekend because the snow fell perfectly. They love having that freedom of having that place for themselves for several months of the year. That summer, they know is the summer is paying for the rest of the year. They still block out times for themselves in the summer too. You can customize it to fit what your goals are. It's great. It's been a fun adventure. I love seeing what different people are doing with theirs.
It's fun when you create a goal list of, "I want to have an Airbnb in the mountains in Tennessee or I want to have a place in Hawaii. I want to have a place in Florida." You get to call the shots on whatever you want to do and then customize it accordingly. Call Theresa, you are good to go. The other piece is there's been a roller coaster of the emotions as far as an entrepreneur to take a step back and looking at the big picture of the career that you have. When we were chatting, there was a not-so-great scenario that you bumped into. You put an offer in on two different homes. Things didn't go exactly as planned and both of them potentially fell through. I want you to even share with the readers let's call a spade, a spade. There is the rollercoaster of emotions when you're thinking, "I got this house. No, I didn't. I ordered all this furniture. What do I do?" You do a great job of keeping your emotions stable. I would love for you to share with my tribe how you keep your head in the game. You don't let those knee jerk moments or those points where someone could bawl and freak out, not get the best of you and how you power forward.
You always take some risks when you jump in on any of these properties and you can mitigate that risk by waiting to order furniture, waiting to order supplies. You can do that. That's not how I'm wired. I am like, "I have a closing date on the calendar. I'm going to order and prep for that date because I don't want to lose any time." That's the polar opposite of your parents' situation. They took their time. They didn't order anything until we closed. You could take that approach that they did and wait, I didn't. I created a snowball of consequences for myself that I had to unwind. I had a situation come up with a crazy situation where we found out about a fraudulent transaction previously.
In the history of the properties, I was supposed to purchase and it puts the deal dead in the water. It's not my home I'm going to move into. The fact of the matter is I didn't have a moving truck with all of my possessions sitting in it ready to uproot my whole life. This is a business deal. I told you, I know I had a conversation with you on the phone and I said, "Whatever is happening, I know that I am protected. God protects me. You know that peace and that there will be something better." That is exactly what happened. That deal fell apart. I did have to cancel the furniture order and store some things that I had purchased. In the end, when things are a business, you have to have an attitude where you roll with it and you figure out how to move to the next thing. There's always something good out there.
Your attitude as far as your rebound is incredible. I admire that about you, Theresa. Let's say there is an entrepreneur that has had a lot of success in their business. They have some side hustle money that they want to invest, what would you tell someone that's a little bit on the fence, there may be a little bit unsure or nervous about jumping into the Airbnb space? What would you suggest for them as far as their first step to start doing a little bit of research on it? Where should they go from here?
I host a group on Facebook, it's called Airbnb Investing 101. It's a group that you can join. What we do is six days a week, we put out a tip of the day and its little tidbits about how we run our Airbnb. Sometimes even your parents' house, but I have little different things picture that they do well. That some of my clients do well or that I'm doing well. It's little tips that help you. It's a great way to see what people are doing in the space. See what the culture's like, what it's like to own a home and what people are doing? That's step one. Christy and I host that group together. We also put on a monthly Zoom call, which is more for people that are interested in the space and are curious about the backstory of how we got into it. What are those steps to get into it? That's a great way to get some more information. Pick up the phone, call me and we can strategize knowing your specific situation. There are people who are already rocking it at their businesses that are entrepreneurs already maybe commission people, people who are used to creative ways to do business and handle their finances. Those are perfect people who like this thing.
Thank you for sharing those resources, Theresa. Even the online course that I'm going to be launching soon, I give a lot of people that want to become the boss of their own life a complete step-by-step plan to help them get to where they want to go. Number one, envision your ultimate boss' life. Number two, how to dominate your doubts? Number three, how to dare to jump and walk them through a lot of the business basics that I've learned in being a full-time entrepreneur for several years. The reason that I wanted to bring you onto the show is to share with people your awesome resource and step-by-step on how to get started in the Airbnb space. You take away a lot of the guesswork and you can spend hours on end trying to figure it out and making truly massive mistakes along the way that you can sidestep if they connect with you. That's why I was like, "Theresa, would you come and share your zone of the genius of how you've turned such a nice profit even on one property alone and how you keep building that?"
What I want to offer my audience here is if you take advantage of Theresa’s services and you partner up with a real estate agent, you decide to take advantage of what she has to offer anywhere throughout the US, I will give you my online course, the Boss Life Blueprint for free, which is online for $297. I believe in the gift that Theresa's giving many people. When you contact Theresa, when you can give her the password, Boss, then she will know to track that and she can let me know so I can give you that course for free. Your zone of genius when people can dial into that and take advantage of that, it is a win-win for all parties involved. Theresa, why don't you share where people can get ahold of you? You can share either your cell phone number, your email or any online links.
A lot of people will find me online through Facebook because that's where a lot of my resources are. You can find me, Theresa Decker. Otherwise, my cell phone is a great place. You can text me, call me at (651) 402-3696. That's probably the best way to reach me.
I've got three last closing questions for you, Theresa, if you don't mind. If someone met you and said, "Theresa, I want to become the boss of my own life and call the shots. What's my first step?"
You’ve got to take some risks. I noticed that many people play it safe. That's okay too, but you are going to be punching somebody else's clock if you want to play it safe. I don't know anybody who hasn't taken any healthy risks at explosive success. That's probably step one.
Jump and the net will appear. If it doesn't, you can build it on the way down. What is your definition of a boss?
The person who calls the shot.
Solid and to the point. Any other words of wisdom, Theresa?
If you want to be the boss of your own life, you’ve got to do it. You are the perfect example of showing people what that's like. You can dream about it. You can think about it. You can set goals, but you got to take that first step. You got to do something that you've never done before.
Theresa, I love that you are always short, concise and to the point Wonder Woman, that's always getting it done. I appreciate you taking time out of your extremely busy schedule to connect with my readers and my tribe. Thank you for being you. Stepping out, taking the risk and not only taking the risk for yourself but guiding other people through the process of doing that same thing. The riskiest thing you can ever do is not taking a risk because if you decide to settle for second best, good luck. If people think the 40-60-40 club, they work for 40 years, 60 hours a week and now they retire on 40% that most can't even live on in the first place or they get laid off in the process. Take the bull by the horns. Call your shots.
It might be a little bit nerve-racking on the frontend, but when you find the right people and you create that infrastructure for growth, you build that dream tribe. Everyone's rising at the same time. It's much more fun when we can link arms together saying, "We're putting ourselves out there, but we know we're doing the best thing that we can do to set up and build that empire for our families." That's going to permit people around us to do that same thing. Thank you, Theresa, for being who you are and shining your light bright. Your never say die, gritty attitude is inspiring to me. Thank you for being you.
Thank you.
As you all know, at the end of every show, this is my challenge. This is your day to fire your fear, build your faith and become the boss of your own life. Get after it. Call Theresa and let's get rolling.
Important Links:
Theresa Decker – Facebook
Airbnb Investing 101 – Facebook group
About Theresa Decker
Theresa Decker is a Short Term Rental Strategist. She is an Airbnb Superhost, and has spent the last 10 years as a licensed Mortgage Loan Originator. She has made a successful career out of helping people build wealth and achieve financial freedom through real estate. As a short term rental strategist, she combines her lending expertise, financial creativity and hosting experience to help guide ordinary people through the process of buying vacation homes to enjoy themselves, share with their families, and create explosive income streams.