How to let a holiday cottage?

How to let a holiday cottage?

There are many ways in which people come into the holiday cottage rental business. Sometimes it's a decision to generate a little extra income by purchasing a holiday rental; sometimes it's a way of funding having your own holiday cottage, and renting the cottage out to help pay some of the bills.

However you have entered the holiday cottage market, you'll need to rent out your cottage. There are a few steps to achieving your goal of getting people to holiday in your cottage.  

Step 1: Set-up your cottage

Once you've got your cottage, you'll need to furnish the property. Holiday cottages are rented as self-catering - which means all the kitchen appliances and utensils need to be provided too.

Step 2: Price the holidays

If you decide to use a cottage holiday agency to market your property, they'll give you guidance about the price you can expect to achieve for bookings at different times of the year. If you're going to promote your cottage yourself, make sure you factor in things like renewing white goods, replacing broken crockery, upgrading furniture and carpets, etc.

Step 3: Start days and cleaning

Back in the olden days most holidays started on a Saturday, nowadays many holidays start on a Friday. The reasoning behind this is to accommodate short breaks. Short breaks tend to run from Friday-Monday and Monday to Friday. If you plan to allow short breaks in your accommodation, you will need to plan your holiday start-days. Short breaks can make you more money compared to weekly bookings, although you'll have to be prepared to do more cleaning.

Step 4: Rent through an agency, or take bookings directly

In this new-fangled age of the internet, it's much easier to market your holiday cottage directly, and not have to pay some of your commission to a third-party to rent your cottage for you.

Should you decide that you wish to market your holiday cottage without the need for an agent, the changes are you'll want to create a website. If you haven't got any skills in the website creation field, one place for you to look is Promote My Place. You pay a yearly fee, and for this get an easy website builder to create your holiday let website.

If you prefer an agency to deal with the marketing of your holiday let, a company such as Hoseasons could be the way to go.

Step 5: Sorting out the money

Whether you deal directly with the owner, or with a cottage agency, you'll need to handle the income and expenses incurred in the running of your cottage business. Although I'm not an accountant, it's highly recommended that you run your business through a separate bank account.

I hope that has given you the basic idea of the 5 major steps in setting up your holiday cottage. If you want a little extra advertising for your cottage, you can email me, and I'll see what I can do.



If you've got any questions or comments to make about this article, please contact John on john@cottage-choice.co.uk.

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