In Episode 28 of The Side Hustle Show I sit down with Scott Bold to discuss how Airbnb bookings pay the majority of his rent.
Just imagine, if a side hustle could cover your living expenses, would that give you a sense of freedom from your job?
Airbnb.com is the peer-to-peer accommodations site where you can rent a room from a local resident instead of paying for a hotel. And similarly, you can rent out space in your house to out-of-town guests, and make some great side hustle cash doing so!
On top of that, it’s a cool opportunity to meet people from around the world and show off your home town.
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Learn:
- How to get started as an Airbnb host.
- Considerations if you don’t own your home.
- How to screen your potential guests.
- The unexpected upsides and downsides of hosting.
- How Airbnb’s liability insurance protects you.
- Pricing strategies to maximize your income / occupancy / happiness.
- Scott’s #1 tip for Side Hustle Nation.
Links:
- Airbnb.com
- Couchsurfing.org
- How I Made Money This Summer Without Working
- Airbnb as a real estate investment strategy
Check out Scott’s blog (offline as of 2018) and connect with him on twitter to follow along with his upcoming adventure.
What do you think? Could Airbnb be a good side hustle for you? Have you tried it already? Leave a comment below and let me know!
Good show! Awesome you’re doing this from Asia. Hope trip is going great!
One note about Air B n’ B in New York City – the city has a law against “running illegal hotels” out of your home/apt. This has been a controversial issue in NYC because a lot of people use the site to….. help pay their rent but the city doesn’t allow rentals for less than 30 days unless you’re licensed as an actual hotel and you pay hotel taxes etc. And of course the problem with the site is that the info is public so it’s been pretty easy for the city tax collectors and such to come after the person renting the room. We’ll see how this evolves in NYC….
Definitely curious to see how it plays out in NYC. Lots of money at stake and powerful, well-funded players involved!
Hi Nick – Just discovered your show recently, and I am listening to this Airbnb episode. Just wanted to tell you it is totally viable, I own my apartment in downtown Budapest, Hungary, and as I moved to London, then San Francisco, I rented it out on Airbnb, totally remote. I had a cleaning lady, a safe deposit box, created a guide for the city and the Apartment, and it went on for 4 years with no major problem!
Oh wow that’s awesome Gabor! Total aside: I’d love to visit Budapest someday — mind sharing your listing?
There is no shortage of listings – I have switched back to a long term tenant before moving to Hong Kong. If you ever come to Budapest, let me know, happy to give a few tips!
I wish I found you when I lived in SF:) Any idea how can I use my current location, HK as an advantage? I thought of selling on Amazon – just have to start it!
Nick – nice one. I landed on this blog after I did your Side Hustle Quiz. it said I was a sharing economy mogul.
What’s really spooky is that although I haven’t really gotten into using AirBnB as a host, I used to host on couchsurfing and hospitalityclub back in the day, and I’m MASSIVELY into crowdsourcing startups and the sharing economy!!
I’ve launched a failed in a couple of online marketplaces previously, but that hasn’t stopped me from getting into new online marketplace ventures.
I won’t do any shameless promoting with URL’s – but my first ever funded startup was a marketplace for unique experiences. Shame it didn’t make it :-(
My new one is an online marketplace for research data – it works like DesignCrowd, but instead of designers, you’re getting researchers to get you data and information :-) Will probably some help with this one though. Want another side hustle? ;-)
Anyhow, am really enjoying your podcasts and your blog writing aint so bad either mate.
If you’re in London – happy to give you some tips and buy you a beer (a warm one too if you prefer).