Getting Started

Many people choose to cover the costs of buying and running their property abroad by renting it out. There are two main ways to do this: hiring an agent to rent the property on your behalf, or handling all the rentals yourself. An agent will take a percentage fee, but will handle all the bookings, cleaning and maintenance of your property. Before you sign up with a lettings agent, you should find out about the financial, legal and regulatory matters involved in becoming a landlord.

If you manage the rentals on your own, you will need to find someone trustworthy who can clean and prepare the property for your customers and handle any issues that arise when people are staying in your property. Renting is a very effective way to cover costs, and even to make a profit, but you have to limit the times when you can use the property and be prepared for damage and wear and tear to increase.

Being a landlord does not mean you have to undertake the day-to-day letting workload yourself. You can employ someone else to do it for you; but if you choose to do some or most of the letting duties yourself, you will need to be able to: communicate with others, organise effectively, behave assertively, respond to new situations and stick to rules and guidelines.

Have a local management company look after your home. They can ensure the property is safe and if you wish to rent your vacation home when you are not there they can advise.

With your vacation home overseas it’s a good idea to rent as properties left by themselves can be a temptation to squatters or thieves. Make you sure you have insurance and that your property is looked after.

You may want to pick a country where capital appreciation on your vacation home can make it a valuable asset. You get to enjoy your vacation home and make some capital growth as well.

Since your holiday home is self catering, one of the first questions should concern food. Even if restaurants are available locally, your holidaymakers might want to cook some of their meals themselves. Thus it is important your rental home to have a well equipped kitchen. You can also consider leaving some food in the kitchen. It definitely needs cookware available. The more isolated your rental, the more critical the food question becomes. Self catering in France means something totally different than self catering in Montana, so make sure that you are prepared for any eventuality.

Another area of concern is bedding and linen. Be sure to provide linen in your holiday home for the holiday of your guests is more enjoyable and they to book with you in the future.

Transportation is another important question. If your guests are bringing their car, and planning to do all their own driving, this is not a major concern. If they are going to rely on local transportation, make sure you know all of the details and explain them in an e-mail before they arrive.

Remember that your holiday rental is going to be their home for the duration of their stay. This is the charm of the rental property. You need to be prepared. Every family is different, and each one is going to have some particular items that are needed to make the rental a true home away from home.

Hot offers

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Prices from 126 € pW
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New York City, USA East Coast | The Perfect Haven
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Prices from 0 € pW
Thomastown, Ireland | Waltons Grove
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Perissa, Greece | Santorini Apartments
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Didim, Turkey | Paradise court
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Prices from 245 € pW
Rodney Bay, St. Lucia | Blue Skies Apartments
Prices from 0 $ pW
Atalaia, Portugal | #75-ApartHotel Atalaia
Prices from 350 € pW
San Foca, Italy | Sanfocasavacanze-Salento Vacation house
Prices from 300 € pW
Barcelona Beach, Spain | Beach Barcelona Apartment
Prices from 665 € pW
Ballydavid, Ireland | Cluain Dara
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