Hello and welcome back to another great episode. My name is Sarah Karakaian.

I'm Annette Grant. And together we are. Thanks for visiting.

And this is the hosting hotline if you wanna get your hosting questions answered here on the hotline head on over to hostinghotline.com. Ask your question and we'll answer it here on the Tuesday episode each and every week. Again, that's hostinghotline.com

Dot com

and today we have a great from Winn.

Hi Sarah and Annette. You've been keeping me company as I've been preparing my first vacation rental. I'm learning so much and I'm actually signed up for the May Bootcamp, so thank you. So my question with enough detail, like you ladies like to have high level questions. I'll do my best here. It's a new listing and it's in a country setting off the highway. Two story home. Two and a half acres neighbors aren't too close by. So my question is this about security. Should I install ring cams? Do guests like this? Is it a feature that's important for me to have? And my second question is, what do you do about changing keypad codes? Every guest? Once in a while? I need to know how to take care of this. Thanks so much, Sarah and Annette.

Winnn. Such good questions,

and congratulations on your first

short term rental and I, I, can't,

and to the we can't to see you.

Yes. Yeah. So at the time of recording, the bootcamp hasn't kicked off but depending on when this airs, it might be over. And so if ever interested in our bootcamps, you can signed up at thanksforvisiting.com/bootcamp. There are awesome trainings that are focused on a specific topic, and it just gives you some dedicated time to dive deep

focus on your business.

Yes, but let's answer Winnn's question. So Winn. When it comes to whether or not you should a ring camera, whether you are in a more remote area or a more of a metro setting, it really is personal decision. But the first person we have ask is your insurance company. They might have specific requirements on where you can have camera like that. Usually the front door is fine and. The thing you have to remember is if it's for the guest and them feeling secure, because I, I wanna give this to you. We've heard both sides of the conversation where guests like it 'cause they feel secure, or is a guest gonna feel like you're watching them and are you going to want to watch the ring camera every time you see movement? And of course you want, we want all of our guests to feel like they have privacy while on our property during an active reservation. So. Something that you could do is yes, have the ring camera as long as company allows, and make sure in your listing description you share with the guest that it is there so they can feel secure. Now, usually the person looking at the footage of the ring camera is you the owner. We're not gonna give the guest access to be able to review the footage. So should anything happen, you could get that history from the, from the ring camera, and so you could let your guests know that, that you have it posted is running 24/7, and that you have access to that footage 24/7, 365, but that you are not viewing it. Um, they, they, they know that their, uh, privacy is, is intact unless an you know happens. Um, you could also, I have one of my properties, a security system. Uh, it's more of a metro setting. Not that necessarily makes difference. Things can happen anywhere where a guest can set the security, uh, code when they go to bed at night or when they leave the property during the day. It's really inexpensive. We use Simply safe. So that could be another thing that you, um, offer and install winn, but either way, I would just make sure that it's well outlined in your listing description and let them know it's for their safety, not because you're an overbearing host.

And the good news here also is you can open up your short-term rental, not have the camera, you can install it later. Again, if insurance is cool with it, it's also one of those things you can install. If it becomes a bother, you can uninstall it. So, uh, I think sometimes all, when we're getting started, we weigh so heavily, like these decisions are,

I get it.

Yeah. Forever. So I just wanna give you some, um, breathing room that things are gonna ebb and flow. And you might see once you're open that you wanna have a camera because of deliveries or guests or, or what not. So just for you as, being the owner, it, it, it might behoove you, so just also know that things change. You can, you can install after the fact. So no, no stress there.

And then you asked a second question Winn about your lock. You could get many different answers depending on who you asked, but of course you asked us. So we'll give you our answer. We champion changing code for every guest and I like knoWinng that code is changed if I'm a guest at someone's home, that no one else has this code but me at my party and it was created for the start of my reservation and it will no be active once my reservation is over. So that is what we offer to our guests, Winn now. There is software and automations out there. You know, should you get property 2, 3, 4, 5, or if you are really strapped for time and you kind of like technology and you mind investing in it, you invest in something like that or Winn you have one property, you could do this manually. And so you wanna get a smart lock that has an app. You wanna be careful that you, the guest doesn't need the app to access home. You just need the app to change the code for each stay. There are some automations within airbnb, uh, as it relates to the Schlage smart lock, but if you're gonna welcome guests from who book Via, whether it's direct with you, vrbo, Airbnb, you do wanna make sure you have a system for every online travel agencies where your guests might find you. And so having an app where you can set the start and the end time and be able to send the guest the code is what we recommend for ultimate security Anything else to add to that.

No, let's do it. I'm excited.

We're so excited to meet at the bootcamp hopefully by the time this airs, you've learned so much your pricing and you're gonna be a revenue management guru. But again, if you wanna get your hosting questions answered here on the hotline, hit it over to hostinghotline.com. We answer them every Tuesday, and we love having these conversations

I do have one thing. And for anyone there is a brand new host, we have an on-demand course called the Hosting Handbook. You can dig in and in a weekend, learn everything you need to know about starting your short term rental. And we'll make sure to link to that here in the show notes. But definitely, um, you wanna, you wanna get that, um, in your hands. It's video. You can watch it, you'll have it forever and you can, it's chockfull of resources also.

It's, it's one of the, I mean, were proud of everything we produced, but it's really good. Alright, with that, I am Sarah Karakaian.

I'm Annette Grant, and together we are. Thanks for visiting.

Talk to you next time.