Day 26: When Opportunity Knocks, Answer the Door

Misty66
Level 4
Louisville, KY

Day 26: When Opportunity Knocks, Answer the Door

First Snow of the Season, Dec. 1, 2020  - Great Smoky Mountains, Gatlinburg, TNFirst Snow of the Season, Dec. 1, 2020 - Great Smoky Mountains, Gatlinburg, TN

 

We’re baby hosts, I guess you could say, having only joined the AirBnb hosting community in September. But to be honest, we had no intentions of ever joining the vacation rental ranks. That is, until opportunity knocked one day during our own vacation.

 

In July of this year, my family and I spent my birthday week in Gatlinburg, TN like we’ve been doing for several years. We rented a condo via AirBnb so we could have the place to ourselves and keep out of the crowds due to the pandemic. It was a gorgeous property – spacious, well-equipped, and with a stunning view of the Smoky Mountains.

 

During our stay, we discovered the dishwasher was broken. No biggie. But we contacted our host to let him know. Not only was he an amazing host who replaced the dishwasher the next day, but over the course of the conversation, he mentioned he was looking so sell the place if we happened to know anyone who was interested.

 

Oh, we knew people who were interested, all right. My husband and I had casually discussed buying property there for over a decade, but we’d never had the time or budget to start the search in earnest. It had always been one of those “maybe someday” things. We spent the next few days of our vacation, when we weren’t hiking or sightseeing, discussing if we should even consider it.

 

The easy thing to do would have been to just let the conversation fade and go back home with the hopes that we could stay there again next summer. However, the more we talked about it, the more we realized this could be a perfect opportunity. After all, we’d both worked hard, paid off debt, and had superb credit ratings. As icing on the opportunity cake, the owner made us an offer we would have been crazy to pass up.

 

Of course, owning the property was one thing. We would have to keep operating it as a short-term rental property to comfortably pay for it and better yet, to make it profitable. What the heck did we know about being vacation rental hosts? We’d stayed in several short-term rentals all over the country but hosting and renting are two very different sides of the same coin.

 

Once again, we took our hard-earned years of experience into account. First, we’re from Kentucky, so hospitality runs in our blood. We’d been raised to always be ready for company with some good food, a pitcher of sweet tea, and a ready guestroom. In addition to that, I had spent a couple years after we’d married working in a hotel in Louisville. I did every job but maintenance there, and boy, did I have some memorable experiences. I had even written a rom-com series based on those tales.

 

As I'm sure you've guessed by now, we decided to take the chance.

 

By the time September came, we had the deed in hand, we had read several resources about hosting on AirBnb, and listened to numerous podcasts about it. We even attended some webinars. I built us a website and started Facebook and Instagram pages. In mid-September, we hosted our first guests in our Gatlinburg home-away-from-home.

 

It’s been an amazing experience so far. Sure, it’s a little challenging at times, especially being remote hosts. But we have a solid system and schedule, along with a great team of professionals to help us make every guest feel like they’re right at home.

 

We’re now keeping our eyes open for a second property. You better believe, if that opportunity comes knocking, we will not hesitate to open the door.

 

Happy holidays and happy hosting (and vacationing) everyone!

 

~Misty

18 Replies 18

Just a little backstory about that spectacular and incredibly beautiful region that others may not know @Helen427  (I'm sure @Misty66 can concur), The Great Smoky's have a rich history of being the home and birthplace of some of the most prolific Moonshining in the nation if not world (Personally, I'm an admirer of  Old #7, Gentleman and Single Barrel Jack Daniels Tennessee sour mash sipping whiskey to anything else period, doesn't get any finer taste.   I digress, those mountains have been the home and battlegrounds of Revenuers against Bandit Private Distillers and Distributors (and now Reefer Growers) that has been the spawn for 100s of Dukes of Hazard type movies  based partly or mostly in reality. 

 

Meet The Cast - Moonshiners | Discovery

 

Its one of the most popular TV "Reality" shows in the US, "Moonshiners" examines the past and current lives of renowned Moonshiners Like Marvin "Popcorn" Sutton" and living legends like Tim Smith, Jim Tom and Tickle.  Its such a perfect location for an industry that moves its manufacturing locations in the back of a pickup truck silently, often and quickly and only needs sparkling clean cool water, cornmeal, rye grain, sugar, yeast, (other top secret ingredients), some Mason Jars and a little privacy to git-er-done.     Its not all peaches and cream, bad Shine, exploding stills and the war against Shiners has caused the death of countless participants and folks that had no part in it other than bad timing. 

 

Moonshiners - Jim Tom's Song - Bing video

 

Recent changes in laws in many states in the USA have allowed many these folks to come out of the woods and  do it legal but there are still lots of folks that would rather load their pick up with a still, mash pots and sacks of supplies to cook it in the mountains where the tax man gets no cut of the profits, only the angels get their share! 

 

What is the Angel's Share? | Distillery Trail

 

Just thought I would entice those of you that are interested to take a little trip to Misty's Condo and get you a little taste of Tennessee White and Dark Lightning for yourself!   Stay well, JR

Trudie7
Level 6
Sydney, Australia

@Misty66 One of those wonderful stories about grabbing an opportunity with both hands and running with it. Very inspirational!

 

@Misty66 thank you for sharing your story with us Misty! i love hearing how or why our hosts start hosting. And every story is different but all are so interesting. What i love most about your story is the fact that you grabbed the opportunity with both hands. Something we all talk about doing, but so often procrastinate until it is too late. You will learn lots more about hosting from the incredible hosts here in the Community Centre. No question is too silly!

Happy New Year to you and your family,

Best wishes

Catherine

Miloud0
Level 10
Rabat, Morocco

Salute @Misty66  

 

Thank you so much for sharing with us this interesting topic 

 

Thanks, 

Miloud