Toucan Talks
Toucan Talks is a podcast for Wilmington-area business owners and entrepreneurs who are eager to learn from those on a similar journey. Each week, we talk with an area business owner about their successes, challenges, and experiences in business. Don’t worry – we keep it fun as we bounce from topic to topic.
Toucan Talks
11 - Mikey Hayes talks Advantages of Direct Booking Website for Short-Term Rentals
Are you ready to uncover the hidden advantages of direct booking websites for short-term rentals? Wilmington's very own Mikey Hayes, owner of a duplex in Carolina Beach, joins us to illuminate the path. He shares his personal journey transitioning from traditional platforms to direct booking, revealing how it's not just about diving into a new venture, but also about dealing with potential market fluctuations.
You might be wondering, how does one maintain control amidst the dynamic world of vacation rentals? Mikey and host Luke take the conversation beyond the surface, discussing how they manage their own properties and face challenges ranging from hurricanes to guest complaints. They touch upon the importance of owning your own business, having a diversified portfolio, and even how your personal productivity levels play a crucial role in effective business negotiations.
Mikey shares his experiences meeting locals who've achieved his same goals, offering an insider's perspective on Wilmington, and underscoring the importance of mentorship and networking. He also reveals why he chose direct booking over Airbnb, highlighting cost savings for guests and the potential for longer stays. So, gear up to be enlightened with unique insights on short-term rentals and invaluable advice on navigating the ever-changing rental market.
Learn more about Mikey Hayes at https://thesunriseshack.com
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Meet your hosts and learn more about Kickstart Collective at kickstartcollective.co
Kickstart Collective is a creative marketing agency based in Wilmington, NC. We offer our clients a creative advantage through creative content and marketing strategies.
Welcome to the Two Can Talks podcast, where we bounce from topic to topic with our guest to give you an inside look at their life as a business owner. No question is off limits as we talk about what has led to the successes, the challenges and more.
Speaker 2:And this podcast is brought to you by Kickstart Studios. Kickstart Studios is Wilmington's newest video podcast studio, equipped with multiple camera angles and an in-house producer. Creating a high quality video podcast has never been easier. Don't let the tech and gear learning curve hold you back from jumping into podcasting or created video content any longer. Our team takes care of it all for you, so you can focus on the message you want to share. You simply show up record and receive the final product. No more wasting time setting it up and breaking down the gear, setting up lights or doing sound checks on your own or in-house producer. What Everything set up and ready to go for you. Check us out at Kickstart Studios. We're live.
Speaker 2:We're here we're not live, though this is pre-recorded for everyone out there, this is not currently happening. I am in a different location than the one I am presently in.
Speaker 1:What does that mean?
Speaker 2:It means we're here with Mikey Hayes, first time caller, long time listener, mainly just long time friend first time podcast guest. He does some cool website design stuff. I'll let him talk about that a little bit. But for everyone that doesn't know how this game goes and by game I mean podcast there is a game incorporated to it where you drop a chip from the top of this lands in a one or two. It'll either land on the one or two and then we'll pick one out of this can, which is business questions, or if it lands on a two out of this two can, two can.
Speaker 2:That is more of a party question, so more of a Truth or dare. Truth or dare, truth or hair.
Speaker 1:Hair.
Speaker 2:Okay, fine, you can have some of my hair, but first of all tell us a little bit about yourself and what you're here to talk about.
Speaker 1:Sure, it's a big honor to be here on Two Can Talks. Thank you for having me. Of course, I don't watch any TV, but I've seen all of your episodes, so I'm really excited to be here.
Speaker 2:Good thing we're not on.
Speaker 1:TV. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2:Oh, this isn't TV. No, okay, just because there's cameras doesn't mean it's TV.
Speaker 1:Which, by the way, you guys have an awesome studio. It's really awesome, thank you. Thank you. I'm very excited to be here. My name's Mikey. I'm a local Wilmington resident. I grew up here and so I call this place home, like this is where I want to have my kids grow up, so I'm rooted here and I want to do everything I can to invest in this community. So my wife and I have a duplex in Carolina Beach. We lived in the bottom of the duplex for two years and then the upstairs was our rental for us, so we recently moved out. We're renting out both units for this summer and so we are. We're hosts. We host people on Airbnb, verbo, tripadvisor, and we have our own direct booking website. So we've been doing that for two and a half years.
Speaker 2:Awesome, and that's what I want to talk a little bit more about today.
Speaker 2:Hit the direct booking a little bit because it's a cool, it's a different approach. Like a lot of people, myself included, I have a short term rental in nowhere Louisiana, not nowhere Venice, louisiana. Hit me up if you want the link, if you like fishing or hunting, but I rely on Airbnb and VRBO. But you have, you know, like taking the reins. You're like you know what? I'm going to make a direct booking website and this way people don't have to pay as many of those fees and that you will, in turn, make a little bit of money because you're not paying all of you know your side of the fees. So I want to talk about kind of like that cost benefit analysis and then kind of what pushed you that way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2:Because it's a cool. I mean, it's definitely a different thing. So it's more, I think, to me it makes it more of like a business than a side hustle, you know, because for me, like I have someone that kind of handles everything and it's just, you know, I have to check in, but with you, with the direct booking, it's like you're kind of in it daily, which is cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So I guess to answer your question, with the benefits, like financial benefits to having a direct booking website, basically there's a couple, but there's a couple other benefits to that are not really financial, but the financial benefits are really. With a direct booking website, people book your place directly with you and they pay right away. As opposed to like Airbnb, you really get paid out Once that guest checks in. You get, like the payout two days later. So with if someone bucks three months in advance, you get that cash. You know you start cash flowing right away as opposed to waiting three months, right? Another benefit is we're basically making the same payout that we would if the booking came through Airbnb or Verbo. Yeah, but it really saves the guest on like the service fee. So like Airbnb has a 14% service fee in the United States on the guest side the host side you pay 3%, so total 17%.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 1:In other countries the hosts are already paying the full 17%. So like people that are fully dependent on Airbnb or Verbo right now like you, luke, potentially like if they ever were to switch, that you know the market would fluctuate and stuff, but you you know the transition might be like a little difficult for a little bit right.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because we're not in control of that service fee.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:So with a direct booking website the guest doesn't pay that service fee at all, unless you want them to.
Speaker 2:Right so for us.
Speaker 1:We don't have them pay that.
Speaker 2:So that's awesome. Well, that's a good little synopsis about what you do and why you do it. So let's go ahead and jump in to the old game. So go ahead and drop your first chip from the top. Alrighty, let's do this. Let's see if it works. One Do you remember what questions these are?
Speaker 1:Business.
Speaker 2:Yes, you were paying attention, all right. Well, this is probably a great way to get started. So we're going to. We're looking at this through the lens of building direct booking websites, because you've not only done it for yourself, but for others. So how did you get into that line of work?
Speaker 1:I have started. I'm an entrepreneur, so I've started multiple companies and organizations and for some of those I haven't really had the funds to hire out a developer. So really just started learning like web design and web development like six years ago. And then it wasn't until your brother, Jacob Tippett, invited me in to the pioneer lab here at Wilmington and really coached me through just like web design and web development and stuff.
Speaker 2:Sure yeah.
Speaker 1:So I've been doing that professionally for like three years now and just kind of learning on my own, surrounding myself with like-minded people that are doing similar things both creatively and in the web world, and just kind of watched a bunch of YouTube videos and read a bunch of articles and just kind of learned on my own as well. So that's really how I started. And then when Jesslyn, my wife, and I started doing like Airbnb and Verbo and short term rentals almost three years ago, you know, I wanted to kind of branch out and like own the land and the business that our short term rental is on and not be fully dependent on these other things. That could, you know, prove challenges down the road.
Speaker 2:Sure, yeah, cool. Well, I mean so you got into web development because of necessity and then you got into building these specific websites from necessity. It's like you're like, we got this short term rental, so we might as well, you know, take control of like Absolutely yeah what that looks like, which is just cool, all right, let's drop another chip.
Speaker 2:Okay, let's see what goes on on this one, all right. Thank you so much. Sure, oh, my gosh. Alright, let's try again. It's always terrifying. Ooh, another business question, this guy. Ooh, I like this one because this is custom for you. So some of these are like stock questions and some of them are like custom. But Cool, why is designing a direct booking website valuable to a short-term rental owner?
Speaker 1:That's a great question. I feel like I could talk to you about this all day.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I think it's important to start with why anybody would want a direct booking website, and I think, just like with any other parts of the business, sometimes renting or leasing something makes a lot of sense, but there's a reason why so many people want to own certain things.
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:In the United States, it's very common to buy a house and then also own the land that the house is on. In other countries, where parts of Hawaiian stuff it's not always the case. However, it's just very valuable to own the land that your house is on because, or own the land that your website is on because it's your business and you can. There's more controlled parameters you have, as opposed to being dependent on other channels Like Airbnb and Verbo, which are great, by the way, but they might make really big decisions that really affect your business. So it's really valuable in that way too. And even if Airbnb doesn't make a big decision as a corporation, if you run into an issue where a guest parties and it's a booking through Airbnb, they could block your account for a month.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And if you have multiple units, your account might be blocked because of a party or some kind of issue you had. So it's not even really big things, but it's small things too that could come up that could really affect your business. So having a direct booking website really puts some control and power and the hands of the host and the owner to own the business.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. That makes a lot of sense. I mean because it's like you're saying, it's not even huge regulatory changes that have to happen. But if you're, especially if you're relying on it for part of your income say you have like three or four properties or something, right, you've got two units that are being rented out, right, and they shut that down and because of you know, a guest complaint that may not even be valid, mm-hmm. I mean, that's your whole income stream. If you don't have other places, it's listed, you know, if you're also on VRBO, great, but all of those bookings on Airbnb are now blocked.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And if you don't have something that you know people can turn to and say, hey, I guess we could just book it directly through here.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:You're kind of out of luck.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if all of your eggs are in that Airbnb basket and something happens.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Those are all your eggs.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So yeah, it's important to like diversify Same thing, like our places in Carolina Beach, if all of our you know we want to expand to kind of grow this side of the business but and buy other properties, but if we, if all of our properties in Carolina Beach and we have a really bad hurricane, or something like we might be fixing all of our places for, who knows, couple months, you know, weeks, months, who knows?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So we can also diversify our portfolio that way and like invest in other areas too where we feel called.
Speaker 2:For sure. Yeah, I think about hurricanes a lot, since my short term rental is a floating houseboat in Venice, louisiana. But you know that's life. Oh yeah, we're going to get this party question one. We're going to get the switch phones one, because Mikey said we got to take that one out of the can. You always pull that one. So you know the first one we're going to pull is that pick a good one, please. It's going to be that one. Just telling you oh no, it's not. What's your favorite thing that comes out of a can?
Speaker 1:Um, any kind of can favorite thing that comes out of a can.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:If you ask Sam B, it'd be the Croy. I'm still thinking about what I like out of a can.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you, you have to take on your own. All right, this is kind of weird. Okay, I like it. I like where this is going.
Speaker 1:But but out of a can there. There's this can of like potato sticks that I had when I was a kid. You know what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2:I know exactly what you're talking about.
Speaker 1:And like every other potato stick you eat, you like it's stuck in your throat.
Speaker 2:Those, dude, I know exactly what potato sticks you're talking about.
Speaker 1:I like those and those are out of the can.
Speaker 2:All right, this is going to be more work for Josh, but can we pop those up like right here? Yeah, this will happen. This is happening right now. I don't know the name of the dude. I do know what we're talking about, josh, they're there. I think they might just be called potato sticks. They're at the dollar store like STI X or something like. I don't. We'll find out when they pop up right here. Yeah, yeah, they're real, they're totally real. But yeah, they're super. It almost looked like they'd be a garnish on a salad.
Speaker 1:You know they're like, they're so like thin and wispy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like the perfect pool, or?
Speaker 1:beach snack and all of the stuff that you're talking about. It's like a beach snack.
Speaker 2:And also they. I just remember, even at a young age, knowing that these things are just so saturated in grease that they're like like you just bite into it and your teeth just slides right through.
Speaker 1:It's true, they're like very greasy.
Speaker 2:It's so greasy.
Speaker 1:So delicious.
Speaker 2:But you just, and you couldn't help but get greasy because you just grab a handful of them. Anyways, that was a trip down memory lane. Thank you, that was a great answer we only have two left. Oh, no, no, no, we'll recycle.
Speaker 1:Don't worry, I'm glad you guys recycle here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, especially our cans. Back to the business, business, business. We're on the business end now. Are you more productive in the morning or the afternoon?
Speaker 1:Is evening, not an option, nope.
Speaker 2:All right, so afternoon? No, actually, let's make evening an option. You're more productive in the evening.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think so. I think we're going to be in the background, in like some management and manufacturing overseas which like 2pm here might be, or 8pm here would be, 8am there starting work time, so I kind of like to work in the evening sometimes.
Speaker 2:Man, that is odd to me, but you know, I did that for one of our brands back in the day. It's like you've you always like negotiate your deals at like 11pm With them, it seems like, or 2am, yeah, yeah, and that. I don't miss it, though, but I'm glad you're productive at night.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my wife and I are opposite.
Speaker 2:She likes the she's really productive in the morning.
Speaker 1:Yeah, more so in the evening.
Speaker 2:Gotcha. So how does?
Speaker 1:that play out at the house. I think it's a really good balance because we're really strong in this area and really strong in this area. We work really well together that way.
Speaker 2:So does she like go to sleep and you're like, okay, now that she's asleep, I'm going to be productive. Yeah, does that legitimately happen. Yeah, she's like you know her bedtime is like 8pm. Yeah, wow, that's early, but she wakes up early. She's got to be at the house a little early.
Speaker 1:Yeah, she'll wake up like 5am.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's not really for me, but sometimes yeah, I'll get up at 5.
Speaker 2:That's your time, Dude, that's not yeah, I'm a really kind of riser. It's when the fish are jumping, it's when the fish are jumping and I'm not out there catching up.
Speaker 2:It used to be All right, let's drop another. All right, drop it like it's cold. Okay, sorry, drop it like it's hot. It'll stay on this time. Bidness Well, this is like a business podcast, so I feel like that it lands on one more than two, but as it should. You know what's the best business advice you've ever received? Um, I think so. I've gotten lots of advice from some really amazing people.
Speaker 1:but I think one thing that came to me first today was, um, I think I've gotten a lot of advice from like just being really creative and like what's the source of that creativity? And for me, I have a really strong faith and that's like from our creator. Um, so all things that come through my business and like my life, it's like all because of like our father and our creator, and like he gives me the creativity to do all these really amazing things.
Speaker 2:Awesome. So as far as advice goes, is that, is that, uh, are you getting yours getting advice from the Lord? Is that what we're talking about? I think so.
Speaker 1:I think too like also, um like, why do you want to have an Airbnb? Or why do you want to buy like an investment property?
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:Like what's your heart behind doing? That is the motive to make money and that's it which there's nothing wrong with making money, but like, or is your heart really behind? Like wanting to serve people and love people, and like share with people. Like why Jess and I love Carolina Beach and share that with them. You know is out of a place of like abundance, um, you know.
Speaker 2:so yeah, Well, it's, it's all. It seems to always come off better when something's instilled inside of you and you kind of harness that and you give that away, instead of just trying to manufacture something just for the sake of manufacturing something so yeah, good words.
Speaker 2:All right, let's let's reset the deck here. Let's reset the deck. All right, drop them. Okay, let's start. Thank you, thank you, bye. Okay, all right, one more. Let's all malign my body しょ. Oh gosh, I knew it, I knew it. It's that side. Just do it again, though, go right back in it. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1:I thought that was a good one. It's going slow.
Speaker 2:It was going so slow To party. I wonder like once the viewership comes up on this show, guaranteed first thing in the comments is going to be get a different board. Those chips always fall off and then the other one is going to be. Why do you call them chips and not by the name of?
Speaker 1:why not potato sticks? Why not potato sticks, the thing that obviously is when I was watching online I thought there was like a glass board layer the glare. Yeah, but there's not one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we do. We do need some glass, plexiglass and more glare is what we're going for.
Speaker 1:Don't come back, we do need that Okay, projects All right.
Speaker 2:This is out of the fun party. Can hot take? What is your spiciest opinion that most people disagree with?
Speaker 1:I was thinking you might ask a question like this Um, let's start with. Airbnb is ruining neighborhoods, oh, okay, I love that pretty spicy.
Speaker 2:I, I, it definitely is, it's definitely spicy and I definitely feel like even pre Airbnb me and you talked about this, so I want to hear more.
Speaker 1:So it's definitely something like I'm learning a lot more about, and I think it kind of comes down to like where is your heart before you buy an investment property? Um, cause there's a lot of different things, like are you buying a house that was previously? In a neighborhood and there's a family living there, and then you you buy this house because you want to make money, and then you're the only house in neighborhood and there's new cars in the street every day. Um, I think that could be pretty detrimental to family's neighborhoods.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Or the neighborhood that the house is in. Um, so yeah, it just really depends on what, like, that person is really doing, like what's their motive behind wanting to own real estate, and buy investment properties and do something like an Airbnb. Um, so I think it can get. It can get pretty spicy because, um, there's millions of people out there that hate Airbnb because they think Airbnb is ruining neighborhoods.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Um, but really I think, which you know, some of that might be true, but I think it's like the people that are doing it for to like make money, like they just kind of have the wrong motive and that's like the only thing they care about and they don't care about others around them. They're very self focused on themselves. And it's kind of like this is not just in the real estate world either, Like this is kind of in other industries too.
Speaker 1:But so it kind of just comes down to like really that person's motive and their heart behind doing what they do Right.
Speaker 2:So first of all, let me just say this is the first time we've had a spicy opinion that directly relates to what you're talking about, like from a business perspective. So that's cool. But secondly, um, so what would be and I know the way you you talk about it, it's probably a more case by case basis, but what would you propose would be a solution for for that? Would it be a zoning thing or would it be, um, you know, a cap of how many units people could own? Because then we get into talk about regulating what people can do with their freedom and their money which is a weird thing, yeah.
Speaker 2:So like what, what? What are your thoughts?
Speaker 1:on that. I'm glad you asked that. Um, so I think if you're buying a house to do something like Airbnb, I think it's important to look at you know how, where and why the house was designed the way it was. Was it designed for a family to live in? Is it in an area where, like, short-term rentals might not be really that great? Um, or they might not really serve the community, I think.
Speaker 1:Asking that question like is this going to serve people well? Um, if it doesn't, then you probably shouldn't be, you know, buying an investment property to put an Airbnb.
Speaker 1:but I think things like like zoning, like you said, if you're like a mixed commercial use zone, um, then I think that's you know pretty clear, like it's probably a good short-term rental area or like a really, high densification rental area, right, um, but it's been designed that way, like the town is literally saying this area, this location is designed for, you know, this type of use, this mixed use, this commercial use, um if you're buying a house that doesn't really have those qualities.
Speaker 1:Um, if you just love people and want to like love hosting people and and or you create like a really unique space, like I think those are great qualities too, and like are totally open for short-term rental as well, so it doesn't always have to be like in a vacation area, but like just really comes down to like why are they? Why are they doing that?
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:What's that motive?
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, exactly yeah Well. Since everything you're saying comes down to kind of like personal motive, I wanted to ask you kind of where you, where you fell on that and what your reasons were. So that all makes sense to me, Cool.
Speaker 1:All right.
Speaker 2:Let's drop another one.
Speaker 1:Please.
Speaker 2:Please stay on. Ooh, another two. He's on a roll. All right, let's see. Ooh, this is actually. That was a great leading question to this one. If you could wave a magic wand and change anything, what would you change about Wilmington?
Speaker 1:Hmm, I love Wilmington.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean there's a reason why I still live here. I've been here for 25 years. I know there's been lots of development over the years, but I still absolutely love Wilmington. Um, so the thing I would change um, I'm not sure people get really amped up about like more regulations and things, but I really like like the trees in Wilmington, like, if you just take all the development away, the actual like trees and live oaks, like that you see in early gardens, early garden areas still like that's beautiful, like that's Wilmington.
Speaker 2:Yeah so.
Speaker 1:I don't know. I mean, I'm not really one for more regulation either, but having more like trees planted, I think would be an awesome change.
Speaker 2:We need some live oaks. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So if you cut down trees to build your home or build something like maybe plant some trees somewhere else in Wilmington, like if you have to do that, you know.
Speaker 2:Sure, mikey likes trees. Let it be. Let it be known Trees are good, Trees are good. I like trees too. I like live oak trees specifically. Those are beautiful.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're beautiful yeah.
Speaker 2:Sweet, all right, more trees, let's drop another one.
Speaker 1:I'm going to try this again.
Speaker 2:I think you should.
Speaker 1:I'll be the first in the show to get it.
Speaker 2:Let's do it.
Speaker 1:Oh.
Speaker 2:That rolled straight to the hands of the producer today, Josh.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I'm pretty sure one of the pegs broke.
Speaker 1:That's okay, we'll get that one after.
Speaker 2:Go ahead, do it again, do it again, same spot, same spot. I didn't learn the lesson yet Last time. This is the last time, I think our fourth time.
Speaker 1:The peg. It was that peg, it was the peg dude, it was straight down.
Speaker 2:It was so fast too. That's like straight to two, straight to two. Oh my gosh, that's awesome. I can't believe you did it. Oh, this is a question I put in here specifically for Mikey. Can we go to, can we cut to the wide shot if we're not there right now? How are them kneecaps?
Speaker 1:cold. I can't believe you're asking me this. The kneecaps are cold because it's 65 degrees in here and I'm wearing shorts. You're welcome, how are?
Speaker 2:your kneecaps. Kind of kind of hot right now, to be honest. You wearing pants. Yeah, jeans.
Speaker 1:July out there.
Speaker 2:I know, I know it is. It's honestly every time I put on pants, this time you're like what am I doing? But me and Mikey have a running joke where he I think you pretty much strictly wear shorts. I don't know if I've ever seen you in pants.
Speaker 1:Probably eight, nine months out of the year. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he'll never wear pants, definitely in the summer. That's just uncalled for, but so I always ask him if his kneecaps are cold. I feel like we go into a cold room or something.
Speaker 1:Kneecaps are good. To be honest, though, I've been playing lots of sports past couple of weeks, months, so they are sore. Yeah, they're very sore.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But they're all right.
Speaker 2:Okay, well, that's good.
Speaker 1:Thanks for asking about my kneecaps.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I typed that up, printed it out and put it in this can specifically for you. That is awesome, so go on to the next one brother.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:He's an animal. Oh, that was impressive. It's stalled. Commercial break during that one please, yeah, all right Back to the business side of things.
Speaker 1:Thank you.
Speaker 2:What advice would you give to a person either about to start a business or early on in their business ownership journey?
Speaker 1:I think there's a lot of value in meeting with people in your community that are doing something that you see like important or valuable, and just meeting with them and learning from them, whether that they're just a mentor or somebody you know or don't know. So just like meeting with people that are kind of doing something that you're interested in because you learn so much.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:A lot of times. The wheel has already been invented so you can talk to people that are doing what you're doing, and there's just so much value there. Yeah, so, yeah, so meet with somebody and just ask questions. There's no such thing as a dumb question.
Speaker 2:Yeah, just dumb people. That's what my I had this substitute teacher and he would say to the whole class and this is like pretty famous substitute teacher apparently, because everyone kind of remembers this guy he would always go up in front of the class and be like this is at Hoggard High School here in Wilmington. Shout out, guys, remember, there's no dumb question. Never be afraid to ask questions. But there are dumb people.
Speaker 2:Hopefully he's not watching TV right now, because this isn't TV still, but and he would like, if someone asked a dumb question, he would say that and then he would look right at the person that asked the question. Dang that's pretty savage, brutal. But when you're like I don't know, I would say he was in his. He was an older gentleman and he was just ready to tell the kids how it was.
Speaker 1:Were you ever terrified that he would do that to you? No, okay.
Speaker 2:I just didn't ask questions.
Speaker 1:So no one thought it was funny. They're like oh no.
Speaker 2:Oh, I thought it was hilarious. No, no, people thought it was funny for sure. Was that connected to a question? What question do we have? Sorry, oh, you were saying meeting with people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like mentorship and stuff. Oh, start there. Yeah, that's good advice for sure.
Speaker 2:So I'm gonna ask obviously you mentioned hanging out with Jacob and learning some of the web development stuff. But how would you go about? Like you know, if I'm starting a business, say we're starting a marketing business, I'm not just gonna go to another marketing company, most likely, and be like, hey, teach me how to do marketing. I'm starting a business that's gonna compete with you and you know, maybe I would if I had a relationship there. But how would you go about like approaching someone from that like mentorship angle?
Speaker 1:Yeah, like I wanted to learn.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I'd just be very transparent and say, hey, here's what I'm doing, here's what I'm gonna do with it. Yeah, do you have any time or would you be available to meet with me and like answer some of these questions I have?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And maybe buy them lunch or coffee or yeah. So I would start there and I ask people questions all the time and I'm really transparent about, like, what I do. Yeah so people have clear expectations, right, and they don't, you know, they don't think I'm trying to take advantage or anything like that, right, because they know what I'm doing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. That's a good point. It's just for, I think for a lot of people it's intimidating to go up to someone and ask like, hey, will you teach me? Like I want to do this one day too. Will you help me learn? And then, on top of that, like, how do you add value to the person that's gonna invest their time in you, right? Like, can you do something for them? You know? Can you maybe help them on a project at no charge? You know, just because you wanna learn.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:So that's something because it's great advice, like connecting with people and even not just like from the mentorship angle, but like the networking angle too. Like I don't think there's, I mean, I don't know. I tend to think even like networking with like not just like-minded but like industry people together, like even though you service the same industry might have the same customer base. Like I would much rather knock around ideas with people and grow the industry rather than try to take other people's clients from the same industry Like.
Speaker 2:Learn how to grow the industry, learn how to be like a bigger business, a better business, a more efficient business together, anyways.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's definitely this mindset of abundance and, like you just said, you don't wanna take, take, take. You also want to give, and that might be like teaching someone else that is also just wanting to start out after you're six months in, or whatever it is too.
Speaker 2:Right Cool, let's drop another one.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Back on the business. I whispered Business, business. Okay, this is a good question. What led you to start designing websites, like in general?
Speaker 1:I okay.
Speaker 1:So I've always been really creative in the kind of artsy like my whole life and so I kind of have that background.
Speaker 1:I was in like healthcare software and then COVID happened and I got laid off and then my wife and I went on a five week long cross country trip and one of my best friends, jacob, flew out to meet us in Yellowstone. He, you know, at the time I didn't really think he loved camping or anything, but he actually like enjoyed it so much. He actually drove all the way back to Wilmington with us and he is a full time, you know, web designer and developer and he was like Mikey, you already have like a little bit of experience doing this. Have you ever thought about like doing that full time as like a profession? And when he asked me that I was like no, I haven't really thought about that. And he just invited me into the co-work space he had at the time and really just opened up his book and told me and they shared everything he has with me. And it was super amazing to learn from Jacob.
Speaker 2:Nice. So moral of the story is just like go on a trip for five weeks and you might come back with a new career path. Just go, go to Yellowstone. That's awesome. So it's like that same person that like motivated you, also helped, like guide you, like you're a Sherpa. They took you up the mountain and back down.
Speaker 1:And I definitely want to like provide for my family, so like using my creative outlet to do like web design and also put a little bit of food on the table to help my family and do the things I like, along with the flexibility and working with people that are also doing really cool creative things Like that's like right up my alley, so it's where I found myself.
Speaker 2:I love it. All right, we're gonna do a couple more and then we're gonna put a bow on this thing. What are we sitting at time wise? Oh, awesome, Great yeah. So let's do a few more and then we will.
Speaker 1:Time's flying by.
Speaker 2:I know we've been here for a minute. Ooh, that was kind of cross board, I like that. It's gonna ask us switch phones. I know it is. Oh, it totally is.
Speaker 1:It wasn't the first question, though, so I'm cool with it.
Speaker 2:Switch phones and posts on each other's Instagram stories.
Speaker 1:All right, let's see you still have Sam Stegers Nipple on your, I guess.
Speaker 2:Okay, do stories stay around for a long time? I don't think they do right. 24 hours, then that is long gone. Let's see, I just opened up my Bible app on accident.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna give you the Sunrise Shock.
Speaker 2:Oh, I love it. I'm gonna give you mine because I don't really have access to any other. Unless you wanna post on Venice Fish and Hunt, which is my short term Airbnb here, I'll let you do that all right.
Speaker 2:Because that's funny Story. Create a story. Let's see the looking super serious. I'm gonna make a. I really don't know what to do to make this. I'm just gonna do this. Oh yeah, I know what I'm doing now and sorry for all you people at home that are just like what the heck are you guys doing? Oh my gosh, I am purse. Oh my gosh, I don't know. There we go. I'm trying to post some music on his story what kind of music? Some good stuff.
Speaker 1:I'll find out later, I guess yeah mine's very professional mine says tune in to 2kantox for fun podcast on business real estate investing and I tag kickstart that's so nice.
Speaker 2:Mine is a song title title titled red hot summer by Alex blue don't know who you are and it just says this is hype, with a pink background. So we're just gonna go ahead and do that. Oh, did I just share this on your Facebook story? Nice, yes, not even an Instagram story. I love it. That was that I that was. I feel like, since we talked about it so much, we kind of built it up to a thing and then it wasn't what I wanted to be.
Speaker 1:I'm sorry it's you want to redo it yeah let's do another one my kneecaps are ready for it yeah, they are.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, you're an animal over here with the party questions. Alright, oh, this is a great question. The last little. Like you could, you could take this where we want to. But what is your favorite local go-to place for whatever? So this could be a place to go grab a drink, place to go grab some food, place to go just hang kick it with the boys, okay.
Speaker 1:I have lots of really great places I like to go, but one of my favorite if not my favorite place to go is the Carolina Beach State Park nice if you're ever in there, you might see me drive around the campground, because I check it once a week just to be in the park.
Speaker 2:I love it. You just drive through there yeah, I love it.
Speaker 1:I like to see, like, how people are camping and like typically people are really happy yeah. I like watching, I like seeing people happy and I like to check out all the new camping gear that's come out. And, yeah, I roll the windows down just like really enjoy, just being in the Carolina Beach State Park mainly because you're trying to not suffocate in your car. Yes, because currently does not have AC which has been like that for a year and a half. So I need to get my AC fixed, yeah.
Speaker 2:I think you should do, but that's awesome because you're it's it's right down there near your short-term rental, yeah, and it's a cool place to just go totally for a hike.
Speaker 1:It's cool that we have a state park that close.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's right there, yeah, on the river. That's cool, alright, let's drop one more, okay, and we'll put a bow on it. That was gonna be a two, I think. I think it was too. I don't think they. The Lord wants us to end on the two. Guess he didn't just going with that. That's packed, alright, so wrap it up. So, going backwards a bit from designing websites specifically for short-term rentals, what got you into wanting a short-term rental initially?
Speaker 1:um, a lot of people think about like their retirement and like what they want that to look like when they get older. I kind of learned that I wanted real estate to be kind of part of that, and it wasn't really until some really good friends of ours, grant and Laura Desjardins they bought an investment property in Caroline Beach and it was their first one and they did this thing called house hacking, which means you buy like a multi-family and you live in part of it and rent the other and it was really we didn't know anything about it. So just having really great friends that were just teaching us and sharing with us, what really inspired us to wanna do something like that, and so did that answer your question, yeah okay, I was just figuring out why you got into it.
Speaker 2:So it was for you more of a long-term point you know I wanna set myself up for success in the future. And then you were kinda inspired by your friends.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and we definitely. We love Carolina Beach, like I grew up going to Carolina Beach every day. Yeah, and I wanna share that with other people. So that's a huge part of it and why we do what we do. So, yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 2:Just to kinda wrap up the episode here, I just few questions that have been rolling around in my mind. So are you seeing more like return on your investment with going the and it's easier for you because you designed the website, I guess. But for designing your self-booking website, are you seeing like greater profits because of that Going with direct booking over using Airbnb, or is it mainly a savings to your guest?
Speaker 1:I think the direct booking website and we didn't really talk about this, but like the big benefit to that is really like a long-term goal. So, this is really our first year doing direct bookings with a website. That's like instant booking guests. But really it's like a long-term goal. Like in 10 years I hope to really have like 90% of our bookings through the direct booking website.
Speaker 1:So there's a lot of things we're still kind of uncovering. We only have one, we have two units, but like basically one property right Cause it's a duplex and kind of lost my train of thought, what I wanted to say. We're still like learning, so there's a lot of like things that we haven't really come across yet, just because we're still super fresh in it. I think you know, since I'm a developer, I developed our own site.
Speaker 1:It makes sense for us. It might not really make a lot of sense for someone else that has one property, but I think it totally does if you have like four or more properties?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think so too, because it not only do you have the ability to have more control over what happens, like who's there the frequency, you don't have to play by all the rules and restrictions and regulations of the bigger booking sites, but you can have all of your properties on one website for people to look at, which is a cool thing, and it's more of a you know. To me it would feel more of like a community centric experience if I'm booking through something like that.
Speaker 1:Another benefit is like we're still learning with the direct booking website, but I think people are booking longer stays on the direct booking website compared to like Airbnb, which kind of has averaged like really like 3.4 nights on average, so we're getting like six or seven night stays through a direct booking website. People are paying in advance, so that's been kind of cool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's awesome Cause they're saving money on those service fees, so they're probably more apt to spend a little bit more money with you. And then that's the last turnover, last people in and out. It probably ultimately a benefit to you guys on the long term.
Speaker 1:Which is cool. Another thing, too, like you were mentioning having all of your properties in one place on the direct booking website. There's not competing properties on your own direct booking website. So, are they gonna book with you or not? They're not gonna see another similar listing which I still have the mindset of abundance and there's enough for everybody to share. But that's also a quality of like you owning your business and the land that it's on and you get the control what's on your website.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, finally, to wrap up. So, obviously, like Google is the search engine of everything, airbnb is the search engine of short-term rentals. So, to keep up with the marketing efforts that you get for free via Airbnb, cause if you sign up on their platform I'm not gonna say easily found on their platform, but it's kinda easy so, like, what have you had to do for, like the direct booking side, to kind of make up for what you lose, in that you know that exposure from Airbnb or VRBO, yeah, so I've done Google ads, I've done Facebook ads, I've done giveaways, so I've collected over 500 email addresses.
Speaker 2:Nice.
Speaker 1:And I've kind of dripped some MailChamp campaigns.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Emails too. I've made physical rack cards that I did last week and I put them in like 25 different locations.
Speaker 2:Nice.
Speaker 1:In Carolina Beach. So, they're there right now. Yeah, the front of it is just information on the Sunrise Shack, which is the name of our property, and then the back of it is some really helpful information about Carolina Beach. Like there's fireworks on Thursday nights, which is tonight.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And there's movies at the lake on Sundays, so it's helpful information that people might not really know about when they're visiting Carolina Beach for the first time. So those are some of the like ads and the marketing we've done. It's very organic.
Speaker 1:Some people might have to like hire some of those things out which is awesome and it might really make a lot of sense for people to do that. But we've really had to try to like brand our place because we're not just an Airbnb, we're not just a Verbo property, we are the Sunrise Shack, so we're branding it ourselves.
Speaker 2:Sure, yeah, that's cool. I mean, yeah, that's one of the questions that pops into my mind, like if I were a if you know short well, I am a short term rental owner but if I was like a multiple short term rental owner, it's like and I guess kind of the beauty is, like you say, it's kind of more of a long term play anyways, so you don't have to take it off Airbnb and VRBO. It's like use that exposure and then the really the follow up marketing is kind of a bigger deal, right, like figuring out a way to collect their email address or figuring out a way to get them to go to your website at some point you know prior guests and then kind of feed that into your direct booking.
Speaker 1:Yeah, totally, and I think Airbnb and VRBO are great. So like don't try to get rid of those right away, Like they're very valuable. But the direct booking website helps now and then will be a longer term Cool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, awesome, cool, all right. Well, anything like I guess question we always ask is like what can people expect from you and Jess?
Speaker 1:next, we're in Carolina Beach. We would love to host you and your families, for anybody that's interested. If you've never been to Carolina Beach, like, please reach out to us. We'd love to teach you everything we know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we'd love to host you guys SunriseShackcom.
Speaker 1:Yep theSunriseShackcom.
Speaker 2:TheSunriseShackcom Check it out. Are you so you aiming to like grow your portfolio, or is that kind of just like one step at a time right now?
Speaker 1:We would. So we're currently looking for our next place, ideally in Carolina Beach. The market's a little tough right now, especially with interest rates, but it could be any day. So like we're ready, and we're just ready for when the next door opens.
Speaker 2:What are you looking for specifically? Tell people. Maybe someone out there will know of something.
Speaker 1:I am looking, my wife and I are looking for anything that has like a unique second unit. Could be a duplex, could be a triplex or quadplex or zone single family with like an ADU which is accessory dwelling unit anywhere on the island.
Speaker 2:Gotcha Gotta stay over that bridge.
Speaker 1:Yeah, otb, otb.
Speaker 2:That's what I hear people say. Anyways, I stay at OTB this side. Any final thoughts? Wrap it up. What do?
Speaker 1:you think I am just super excited to be here with you guys. You have an awesome studio Really appreciate your time. I'm excited to watch two Can Talks.
Speaker 2:Especially this episode.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think you guys are amazing and I love your business and I'm excited to be part of it. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thanks for being here, and I think you may hold the record for most chips flipped off of the board.
Speaker 1:That's what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2:But also you hold the record for popping one of the pegs out.
Speaker 1:I saw a Sam drop like three in a row.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I think you got him All right. Who's the new champ?
Speaker 1:That's you, tom Daddy.
Speaker 2:That's you, is that?
Speaker 1:what you just said. No, I said the champ, but you said Tom Daddy, luke, you're awesome.
Speaker 2:If anybody needs a reference just go check out the latest mess hall video on their Instagram. That's the second time I've referenced that on this show, but he said Tom Daddy, not me. Awesome, mikey. Thanks, dude. Yeah, absolutely, let's go eat some mess hall.
Speaker 1:Let's do it, let's go.
Speaker 2:All right, hey, check out that thing under the shoebox. My dad said there we go. Hm, oh cool, amber has chimed. Dude, I'm going to win, too Sure she is. Whoever steps in first has it right.