Spain is top holiday home rental destination

[Editor]

Overseas property buyers can get an idea of where they are likely to find a good rental market for their holiday home from a new survey that reveals Spain has been the top destination of 2011. The quarter three Marketplace Report from holiday rentals specialists HomeAway also shows that there has been an increase in [...]

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[Goldberg Global]

40 million people come to spain, self rental market is growing.

[alex2012]

I also want to be a part of that in the future

[algorfa]

The Spainish holiday market was affected by economic downturn, but will it always be there as either the top or one of the top destinations because it is easy to get too, in most instances you can be from most locations in Europe within 2 1/2 hours.

I do think that the buyers will come back later this year provided the media stop putting Spain down, they only want to know the bad stories and those who want to go back to the UK when there are many thousands who are happy in Spain, do not want to go back to the UK with its high prices, crime, unemployment, and cold weather.

The problem is that good news and success does not sell papers. Spain is a good place in general, it is like many other countries, it has its problems, but the Spanish people in the main are friendly and welcoming. So those who are thinking of making the move, then give it thought, make sure you do and remember you are going to be living there and not on holiday. If you continue the holiday theme, then you will fail and find it expensive, embrace the Spanish way of life and their food, you can not keep paying over the odds for English food or it will be expensive to live.

[gjeffrey]

We have been renting out our holiday properties in Andalucia for the last 10 years and at the beginning bookings were fantastic, however over the past few years things have taken a definite dip! Then we did last years figures and we are back on par with 4/5 years ago

The only thing we find is we constantly update / upgrade ... iPod docking, flat screen TVs, wifi etc todays guests want it all!

[algorfa]

Hi,

I agree, It is about the same as about 6 years ago with us and we are charging less now than we did in 2007, but as you say, those renting want more for their money even though they are paying less now that 2007.

But, don't we all look for a bargain?

One problem is that many of the larger property rental companies are putting up the prices to advertise, we have just had our renewal for one of the big boys and they are looking for £300 to advertise our property for 12 months with no guarantee they will bring us any bookings, so we are now looking for those companies who will charge for success, so no bookings no cost. I dod not mind paying a percentage of the booking if they bring me bookings.

Are there any of these types of advertising companies out there?

[gjeffrey]

I dont know but I agree the rates go up and up and when I query them you just dont get anywhere.

I have to say we have advertised with Spain Holiday for years and they are brilliant and not as expensive as the others.

[algorfa]

Hi Jeffery,

Not as expensive as the others!

What sort of return do you get for your money, we have a property in a small village not far from Guardemar and we get about 8 bookings per year from our present advertiser which works out at £37.00 per booking. If they worked on 10% for each booking, then they would get almost as much as they do now and I would get the same number of bookings, I would feel better because if I dont get any bookings, then I have not lost anything.

Most of our bookings are repeats.

Dave

[gjeffrey]

We pay Spain Holidayabout £180 per property and get bookings resulting in equivalent to 7.5% commission.

Holiday Rentals bookings result in an equivalent of 2.8% commission !!

However this is how it works for us, we have been going 10 years, have good repeat bookings - although the above figures are worked on new business only - and we are 15 minutes drive inland of the coast and offer self catering holidays with hot tubs meaning we have year round business.

Hope that helps.

[algorfa]

Hi Jeffery

It may be worth looking at Holiday rentals, never thought about them in the past. I will have a look. I did find rentproperty-spain a little while ago and have added our property to that site and have had a couple of bookings for over the summer, they do not charge to list but make a charge for each booking, so we will see how they perform.

Dave