Ekabo Home Financial Freedom Mastermind Podcast
A podcast for those who do not believe they were put on this earth to work 40 to 50 hours per week for 40 to 50 years, to hopefully retire at the age of 65.
Ekabo Home Financial Freedom Mastermind Podcast
112. Mid-Year Momentum Explained: Real Estate Asset Protection, Airbnb Optimization, and Sports-Inspired Financial Freedom Strategies
Can real estate investments weather the storm of economic uncertainty? Tune in to this episode of the Financial Freedom Mastermind Group Podcast to find out why maintaining your mid-year momentum is crucial for achieving your financial goals. We start with a lively discussion on the impact of Atlanta's Copa America matches and the excitement leading up to the 2026 World Cup. Liban and I even compare the scorching summer heat of Atlanta to Egypt's weather, and Jay shares his newfound curiosity about the soccer events lighting up the city.
What if safeguarding your real estate assets was simpler than you thought? Our deep dive into real estate asset protection strategies covers everything from the structure of LLCs to their benefits and challenges. Desmond voices his concerns about protecting his investments, and AJ provides invaluable insights into how LLCs function as pass-through entities and when it might be wise to establish one for your rental properties. We also celebrate athletic stars like Sha'Carri Richardson and Noah Lyles, linking their discipline and focus to our own financial endeavors.
Struggling to optimize your Airbnb bookings? Our final segment offers practical tips to help you manage short-term rental properties more effectively. We discuss the complexities of property taxes and short-term rental licenses across various counties, underlining the importance of timely financial management. I share my experiences with instant booking and strategies like adjusting pricing and modifying listing descriptions to boost visibility. We also explore the benefits and drawbacks of minimum stay restrictions, providing valuable takeaways for real estate investors aiming for financial freedom.
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Niyi Adewole is a licensed realtor in Georgia, brokered by EXP Realty. Feel free to reach out at Niyi.Adewole@exprealty.com if you would like to work with an investor friendly real estate agent.
Welcome to the Financial Freedom Mastermind Group Podcast. Here we're all about breaking free from the 40 to 50 year work grind and accelerating our journey towards financial freedom. Join us every Wednesday at 7 pm Eastern as we explore different types of investments that can fast track your path to financial independence. We serve as a hub for connecting with fellow members during our sessions so you can share successes, ask questions and keep the momentum going. You're on the last.
Speaker 2:Wednesday of the sixth month of the year. It's moving along quickly and, guys, you've really got to be getting after your goals every single day because before you know it, the year is going to be over. So we're heading into July next week and I hope that you are attacking your goals with the same energy that you kicked off January with as we head into Q3. And so today is going to be an open session. We've got some individuals coming on board here that are going to be joining as guests in the near future, but until then, we're going to do a couple of open sessions and connect from there. So feel free to drop any questions you may have in the chat and or join live. Looking forward to connecting with you here soon. Levi, how are you doing?
Speaker 3:I am doing good, trying to stay out of this heat.
Speaker 2:It is hot, hot outside, man. They said it was going to be 90 plus all week, I think.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's actually hotter here than it is in Egypt. There's no reason it should be hotter here than where my mom is.
Speaker 2:Let me ask you this Is this Egypt's summer or is it reversed? Is this their winter?
Speaker 3:They're still northern hemisphere, so they're in summer right now.
Speaker 2:That's crazy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's crazy, I mean, but they're good enough to 104 sometimes, so we're not getting that high up. That's the thing, our swings are more even.
Speaker 2:Yeah, true, true, at least not yet, right, we're not getting up there, at least not yet, but we have an open session today, right? And so anybody that's on the line feel free to join via chat or call in.
Speaker 3:But have you been keeping up with a little bit of the happenings around atlanta with copa america coming in town? So a little bit due to my friend. He's a very big fan specifically of the uh world cup and I didn't even know they had separate brackets and all of this stuff. So he kind of explained surface level. But I'm not really too sure what impact it has in atlanta because I know that they're doing some of the qualifiers here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you know, Argentina won the last World Cup, yes, and they're actually based here. So Argentina and US are actually based here. Usa right now, I think, is playing in Dallas, but they're going to come to Atlanta and this is where they're training for the World Cup. And then Argentina actually has been playing in Mercedes-Benz Stadium. I want to say they played last week and they're probably did they play yesterday too. I know they played twice so far right, and so that's kind of cool to have the champs here.
Speaker 2:And so you'll see downtown and see different posts and things of that nature of all the Argentinian fans coming out of nowhere. And so your B&Bs those that own those are going to start getting booked up. Your B&Bs those that own those are going to start getting booked up. And then you're going to see a lot more tourism, because this is just a small, small preview of what the World Cup is going to bring in 2026. And what I get excited about is looking back at 96 and how that spurred the growth of Atlanta with the Olympics and everybody kind of seeing, you know, atlanta on the main stage.
Speaker 3:Imagine what it's going to do when people see. Atlanta on the on the world cup stage for the semifinals. No 100, 100, I mean you saw a huge star, messi's over at kenesaw, you know that all over the place yeah that's what, jay, how you doing, man, I'm great.
Speaker 4:How are you guys? Super good. You guys talking about some soccer stuff, right, I don't follow it too much, but I know US men's are playing tomorrow. Is that for the Olympics? No, is it? Like you know, I'm not. I feel like I'm going to say something stupid. That just lets you know how much I don't follow soccer. So, because they're playing here at the Mercedes Benz, right, and the Olympics are going to be in Paris, but I know a lot of sports that have qualifiers Like I've been following track and field a lot, so obviously they're not running in Paris, but they're running in different locations, like in the States right now, to qualify for the Olympics. So is it the same way?
Speaker 2:Similar, but not for the Olympics the way, and leave on, feel free to chime in here. So the World Cup is every four years, right away. And leave on, feel free to chime in here. So the world cup is every four years, right. And in between that, at the two-year mark, they have the euro cup, the copa america and a bunch of other cups around the world africa cup and a bunch of other cups around the world that essentially decide who's going to go to the world cup. Because it's only the top 32 versus 60. It's 32, right, or 64, I think. It's the top 32 teams around that and around the world go to the world cup and qualify and actually get to play against each other, and so you've got to finish, you know, number one to get a guaranteed spot. If you don't finish number one, then there's other ways to get in as well. But you got to win a bunch of matches essentially. So this is like qualifying for world cup two years from now.
Speaker 4:That's honestly pretty crazy. And that also lets you know how much I know about soccer, which not a ton. Come on now.
Speaker 2:US is not, it hasn't been big in the past, right, just because, like the teams, at least men's, women's have been dominant. But teams the men's teams, haven't been great, right, but like around the world, I mean, you know this but soccer is, that's the main main sport.
Speaker 4:Yeah, they don't even call it soccer, it's football. You know well, you and I know that's not, that's the fake, fake stuff exactly.
Speaker 2:What are your thoughts on it? Man, football and and things growing up?
Speaker 3:I mean, yeah, I have the I guess, different upbringing because I grew up in a country, you know, in which we can hear loved. Okay, I'm gonna say I have, I guess, the difference of uh, I grew up in africa, a kid, so I kind of saw the dominance of soccer. And one of the things that the World Cup is huge on is kind of the countries, because people who don't even have TV somehow find a TV. It's crazy, I mean, it's huge. So I think, yeah, it's the main, main, main sport, to the point where they don't have a lot of other sports even around. Because we have kind of, we're kind of spoiled here because we have baseball, soccer, hockey, basketball, you know, mma, all that. There they have like a lot of country. It's one thing and it's soccer for the most part, just because the ease of access, because all you need is a ball to play. That is true.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I hate to sound so ignorant when it comes to soccer, because I love sports in general. I'm a football man first and foremost, and then I also love track and field. I love basketball too, a little bit of baseball, but regardless of what sport it is, I really love all sports. So I hate when I sound like ignorant when it comes to certain sports. But just my love for sports just always makes me want to ask different questions. You know, even if I'm a bit uncomfortable, like learning more about, like soccer and things like that, and soccer is a really cool sport, honestly.
Speaker 2:So yeah, it's one of those things like I'm a fan of if you have a question, ask it. You know what I mean. Like I think there there's no um, ignorant or stupid questions, like you just want to ask that piece, especially if you're asking from a good heart and things that nature. And that definitely was my question, though, and I never noticed this, I guess, before but why are the olympic trials so close to the olympics? I assume that we already knew this months, or maybe even last year. I guess I didn't pay attention to when people actually quote, unquote qualified, but like last weekend jacarri richardson just qualified right for the world, for the olympics, and the olympics are this summer. Right, like shouldn't they be on a plane right now to paris?
Speaker 4:yeah, I don't have an exact answer for that. I always get really excited every four years when o Olympics comes around, for all sports, but mainly for the track and field. You know I follow that stuff heavily, like Sha'Carri Richardson, one person, noah Liles. He's expected to take the gold in the 200 meters. It's just kind of like always been that way. Just like, a few months before the Olympics I would love to do like a Google search to maybe find out. I'm sure it has to be intentional, but my thing is, you know it probably doesn't need to be like so far beyond, uh, before the olympics, uh, given that it's track and field, it's, you know, maybe just run a run, a couple races here and there, and you know those guys should be good true, this is true.
Speaker 3:Yeah, because it's not like football and basketball, where you have multiple games back to back. You know you have your like 100 meter sprint qualifiers and then you got like another month to recover from it.
Speaker 4:At the end of the day, it is only about 10. Second race. Yeah 20 second race, 47, 45 second race, depending on what event it is. It's pretty quick.
Speaker 2:Wow, this is true. Second race depending on you know what event it is, it's pretty quick. Wow, this is true. And you don't have the element of having like to crash into somebody right, like in football or basketball where you can get hurt. You know ahead of time that makes sense. And soccer, you know they really want to make sure you have your full team. So it's like two years before people get hurt, whatever they can recover before the world cup, you're ready to rock. But desmond, how?
Speaker 5:you doing? Man, I'm driving right now. I'm doing. Can you hear me okay?
Speaker 2:we can hear you. We can hear the car too. I just was making sure you weren't trying to facetime and drive at the same time never.
Speaker 5:I uh, I have a little mobile office in my backpack, so I've actually got my laptop on hotspot right now. I just don't have the camera on because I feel like I'd be probably looking like LeBron on the camera.
Speaker 4:That was a stray.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was. It definitely was, but it was well-deserved too at this point, after like three months of technical issues, we can't figure it out. No, but what's top of mind for you, desmond? I know we connected a little earlier this week, thank you, and I got a couple more coming your way here soon, but what you got going on, man.
Speaker 5:Absolutely, man. I'd love to hear it. For me right now, I think and yeah, we were connecting on this what, like just yesterday, is asset protection. I don't know why I've been increasingly getting nervous just about you know any potential risk or anything you know, trying to come and take what I've got Right. And I think you always have to kind of be in sort of like a guardian, like protectorship mode Right For not only the dollars that you bring in but the assets you acquire. So that's something that's just top of mind for me right now is what is the best structure and setup for asset protection right now, and you know how?
Speaker 3:can.
Speaker 5:I you know, create something or get something that will allow me to grow in the future. And that's kind of what I'm thinking about and focusing on and trying to really hold that down in the next week or two.
Speaker 2:With that in mind, I know I gave my take and I'll give it again for the team, but before that, aj, what's your take on that? I know you have a couple of properties now. Are you doing anything for the asset protection piece on those properties?
Speaker 4:Yeah, so the first first thing that comes to mind when I hear asset protection as it pertains to real estate is credit LLC. Now, I know we have numerous conversations on this. Need is kind of your pet peeve. We have numerous conversations on this. Need is kind of your pet peeve. People always want to get into real estate and they want to grab the LLC first. But really you should jump into the game, just getting into investing, and figure that piece out later. I'm at that point where I've jumped into the game. I didn't do the LLC first, so from my understanding is that that's going to be my next step.
Speaker 4:The only problem that I have with that is I have I hear mixed opinions on this and I've made a couple of posts on BiggerPockets about this, but some, I think, feel that LLC as it pertains to real estate, especially if you own it, really doesn't protect you as much because it still works as a pass through entity and also the mortgage is still in your, in your name. And this is in the event that you're you're buying that residence as an owner-occupied and then want to transfer it into an LLC. Now for a traditional investor loan where you're putting the 20% down and you're putting it in a business name. That's a separate story, but I know there's a lot of controversy around that. In particular, at least from what I've seen, I think that still is not going to prevent me from getting an LLC and putting my properties into that LLC. But, like I said, there's just a few different, varying discussions on that topic.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and this is the age-old argument. It's been going on since forever and you probably saw in the forums even just the messages dating back to probably the early 2000s. But my take on it and again, I'm not a lawyer, this is not legal advice all the disclaimers is when you move out of a property, when you turn that into a rental, you should get an LLC on that property. Now to your point. Yes, that veil can be pierced, quote, unquote, because it's a single member LLC and if they really work hard enough they can trace back that. Hey, this is really just you acting through this LLC.
Speaker 2:But I view the LLC as the first point of protection and I also view it as a delineation, especially when you separate the bank accounts and stop commingling funds as like this is its own entity. And then when you look at public records and things of that nature and have that separate over time and filing on its own over time, it only gets stronger and stronger because you're operating it as a separate business. So when you first move into an LLC, if something were to happen and somebody were to pierce the bill and things of that nature, yeah, it probably would be a lot weaker. But if you've had two, three, four tax returns with that property in that LLC. With the LLC as the owner, it should be pretty strong. That's at least my take on that piece.
Speaker 2:Now, one other thing that you can do with the LLC if you really are nervous about that protection piece is if you add somebody else to that LLC, even as a minority owner like 1%, 2%, 10%, things of that nature that makes it much, much stronger in a full-on other business. That can't touch anything else. It's just being in a single-member LLC in general makes it a little less strong than a multi-member LLC. I think it's something that you should do once you get your second property. Put your previous property that's now a full-time rental into the LLC and just continue to add more to it over time.
Speaker 4:Got you. That's an interesting take. So you brought up two things having a multi-member, these two things strengthen your LLC, the multi-member. And then additionally, it sounds like you say experience with the LLC meaning just time building up.
Speaker 2:Yes, and even when you look at getting credit through your business, if you were to create an LLC tomorrow and try to go get a credit card for it, they're probably going to approve you for like $200, right? Similar to how they would approve your personal unless you personally guaranteed that credit card. But over time they see okay, you've been in business, you filed all these tax returns, we can see the money coming in. This is a full-fledged business. But that doesn't start until you take that first step and move it to the LLC. Now, not to say that you have to. You can definitely do protection through like umbrella policies and things of that nature, but I feel more comfortable having the properties in an LLC. So if anything personally happens, right, it's not in my name, and if anything happens on this property X, it's not in my name, right? So they don't kind of go back to each other. It's going to take some extra legwork to pierce that field.
Speaker 5:Yeah, absolutely, and I think that's the main piece, right, it's not tied to me personally. I've heard another opinion of hey, if you have a mortgage on this property and especially if you're earlier in your mortgage rather than later and you don't have a ton of equity, well, there's not really much to go after anyway, right? So if you know someone, if you do, you know, worst case scenario, end up in a lawsuit and someone or I guess, in the potential of entering into a lawsuit and you know the opposing attorney is, you know, trying to determine is this a person we want to sue? You know, and you hear people want to sue those with deep pockets. Right, so this is someone who is. Is it going to be worth going after this person? Well, if you have 10% equity in your home, then maybe not. And I think that's one opinion I've heard about, not necessarily like rushing into an LLC or it being so crucial starting out and kind of weighing that with the umbrella policy. I think that's like the other, I guess.
Speaker 5:I think there's like a few different takes, a few different groups, right, a lot of people really back the LLC, a lot of people really back the umbrella policy.
Speaker 5:And I'm'm wondering do I do a combination of the two and is it worth the complication of the tax return, of keeping these minutes, of doing the articles and whatever the maintenance that comes with the LLC? Is that worth the protection? But also, am I ready to do that, especially in the the context of commingling the funds? Because right now I mean I move stuff from here to there, from there to here, left to right, like you know to get stuff done, you got to, you know kind of make stuff happen. Sometimes I think right now like if I were to do it tomorrow I would probably easily pierce the veil, just because I'm not in that.
Speaker 5:There are things sometimes that aren't done perfectly right and I think when you have that LLC structure, you do in a way need to make sure you are doing things a little bit more perfect, right or a little bit more to the book, or at least you have someone in your corner, an attorney, you know someone knowledgeable about it, so that you're not doing you know the wrong things. And then you get into court one day and they're like oh well, actually pierced the bell on like day three.
Speaker 2:You took this trip to Tahiti and you transferred all the funds from this account to that account. No, so, desmond, I think there's a couple of things right. One getting your LLC and maintaining it is not as hard as you think, especially a single member LLC. From a tax perspective, it's very easy. It's a pass through, so it's only going to show up on your return. If it was a partner LLC, then they got to split it and file a separate return and things of that nature. With this, with the LLCs that are like single member, it's going to pass right through.
Speaker 2:The other piece I would comment on is you're right about hey, if you only got 10% equity in the property, you're right. It doesn't make sense to go after that property. But therein lies the reason you should get the LLC in my mind. Right, because when somebody sues, they're suing you, so that property is one asset. But if you work at a good company, which I did for many years, hence the reason I kept putting stuff in LLCs afterwards your wage garnishments is a thing. If you're making six figures, even up to mid six figures, that's what people will go after.
Speaker 2:Property is just one piece. But if you separate that out and somebody slicks and falls on your property and it's an LLC and you've had the history and you've kind of built that piece up. Listen, guys, all you can go after is this property. All I've got is 10% equity. But if it's in your name, that's the risk. That's where umbrella policies can come in and things of that nature. But in my mind the first line of defense is an LLC and then, as you get more properties, things of that nature, you could add an umbrella insurance policy in case your insurance doesn't cover the full amount.
Speaker 2:But when people are going after you, it's not just this one property, they're going after you personally and all your assets. And so that's where it becomes very critical that you don't have a veil that can be pierced. For example, I've got an LLC and things of that nature in Louisville for these units that we have and for the storage and the townhomes that we're building and things of that nature, and Lord forbid if anything happens over there. It can't really be pierced. It's a whole separate company, separate accounts, everything is put together, and so what the LLC kind of forced you to do is two things. One, it forced you to get your books in order, because you do need to have everything completely separate and if you need money from the LLC you have to write a check from that LLC to yourself as an owner distribution or transfer it as an owner distribution and then you can move it to another account with you on owner contribution to the other account. But it all has to be separate, so it forces you to kind of make that happen.
Speaker 3:I think we just lost them. So it's still worth it to do because even if, let's say, the protection aspect, it still forces you to act in good business essentially, which is another secondary added benefit.
Speaker 2:In my mind yeah, aj, I know you dropped for a second, but what are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 4:Yeah, so I don't have an LLC for my real estate. I do have an LLC for my Toro business and I don't say so I'm bringing in. I buy economy vehicles, so the revenue that I'm bringing in isn't anything like amazing.
Speaker 4:You know, money coming in and money coming out, but I do believe that having an LLC, as Nii mentioned it, really kind, have a separate business bank account, because otherwise, if you want to for LLCs, if you want to open up a business account, you're going to have to give them your articles of organization. And then also what comes with having an LLC including the articles of organization, you have to do your annual filing. So I think really just having the LLC just is just an added thing. That's like, hey, I have to take this serious, I have to, you know, do my taxes properly, I have to do my annual reporting and filing. So for me I think it provides that benefit just to just to provide structure to my business and then act accordingly, because if I didn't have that LLC, I probably would go about it a little more lackadaisical, sloppily, and wouldn't track my expenses the way I do. I use Google Sheets.
Speaker 2:Absolutely LeBron. Any comments, thoughts on that?
Speaker 3:No, I mean, I was going to say I know people who even buy the house. They'll get an individual LLC per house and then we'll then put all of those LLCs into like, like you mentioned, how umbrella insurance. They'll just put it into like a corp and then it'll like, and then but they do it very like this is at like the highest scale.
Speaker 2:You know, True true, and I'm not one to complicate things, I'm a pretty simple person, and so the LLC is not as hard as you think. And when you do connect with the lawyers that we utilize and things of that nature, they knock it out pretty quickly. They give you the articles, they give you the operating agreement, all that stuff, so that you're good to go day, you know, within like a week, and then you're protected in my mind, right. And then there are some people that do it for every single property I'm not suggesting that I put a group of properties in there and I do it based on the equity that's in that grouping, right? So when the equity hits half a million million, whatever, right, that's when I'm like all right, I need to create another LLC for this state and put more properties in there, and so that's kind of one way to work it.
Speaker 4:Desmond, can you hear this? Go ahead, sir. It looks like he's still loading up, so I'm going to go ahead and ask you a question. So I wanted to know if your response does your response change at all with respect to, you know, having that LLC under, or the property under, the LLC? However, the loan itself is not written for the LLC. It's written to the property owner and in this instance, obviously I'm talking about, you know, owner occupied property that you know gets transferred over to the LLC. So does everything that you said regarding protection with the LLC, with the property under the LLC, does that change at all? Um, given that the, the property itself isn't written or, uh, lend it to to the LLC, it's lended to the uh, you, the owner occupant.
Speaker 2:Not at all. So literally the 30 units that we built up in Louisville, 12 of those units were a commercial loan, but the other 18 units were all under my personal name. Right For the mortgage, because that's how you get the best lending right. Plenty of top investors the people that we listen to and kind of know like and trust are buying properties in their name and then moving it to an LLC, because those are two different things. That's why you're able to get property subject to right, because you can take over the title without actually being on the mortgage or you can take half the title without actually being on the mortgage. They're two separate things. But for the property itself, as far as the title and the owner, that can do whatever they want with that property. That's the piece that you're protecting. Right. You're protecting that piece with the LLC.
Speaker 2:The mortgage is just somebody who has a claim to that property. Let's say you didn't have a mortgage right and the property's owned, free and clear, but you put it up as collateral for a car right. Just because that car now has a lien on your property doesn't mean that you still don't own the property and can move it to another entity. It just means that property gets sold to anybody. This thing has to get paid off first because it's a major lien on there. So that's the one piece.
Speaker 2:A lot of people combine those two, but they're two separate, and so that's why you can move it to an LLC. Now, that being said, they do have a clause within your mortgage documents I think everybody's heard about this where it's a due on sale clause, where if you move it to another entity things of that nature they can in fact call this due. Now, of that nature, they can in fact call this due. I haven't seen it done, nor has many people seen it done, unless you stop paying the mortgage. Then they're like, hey, we need to. But typically mortgage companies don't want to open a can of worms, because if they went back and reviewed every single doc that they have, I'm sure a lot of people would have things A lot of files on how to order yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, as long as somebody's paying right and they qualified you up front, usually they're pretty good with just all right, just keep making the payments, we're good.
Speaker 4:So it sounds like what I just described. You kind of connected the dots a little bit and made it similar to subject to, in a way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's just two separate things, right, and so you can move to LLC. The thing is, you just don't. You don't obviously go shout it to the mortgage company, because then if you do, they're like, all right, I guess we have to do this thing. It's just, hey, keep everything the same but move to the LLC for the protection. And then, worst case scenario, if anything happens down the road, you could always move it back through a quit claim to your name. But I haven't had any issues with that yet and I still continue to do that. Desmond is fighting for his life. Hey, listen, lebron, this is only one time, so we're going to give him a pass, but if this continues, he may have some competition here.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I was going to say my role might've diminished. He might've stolen my role. Yeah, it's the personality guys, come on.
Speaker 4:Hey, come on now. No, that is fair. I wanted to bring up, please. I wanted to talk about homestead exemptions. That's a great one, I feel like, and a lot of people don't know about this.
Speaker 4:I was fortunate to figure out about this, I think, just like surfing on the Internet and I found something about an agent talking about a homestead exemption. So I said what is this? Well, luckily I found out, and if you don't know what a homestead exemption is, it basically reduces the amount of tax liability that you have on a personal residence. It has to be a primary residence. I don't believe it's eligible. Rental properties are eligible, no vacation homes, no second homes. It has to be for your primary residence only.
Speaker 4:But, with that being said, I'm sitting here talking about how much I know about the homestead exemption. I'm sitting here talking about how much I know about the homestead exemption. I filed it for the first year for my first property, but I did actually make a mistake in not transferring it over to my now primary residence and it's still on my previous residence, and I think the issue with that now is that, yes, I can switch that over, but the deadline was April 1st, so I actually made a mistake on that. For anybody who needs to file the homestead exemption, make sure you do that. I'm telling you a little bit late because I believe in Georgia it is April 1st is the deadline, but don't be like me and miss out on that. For me, really, it's not that I missed out on it, I just needed to transfer it over to my now primary residence and I would have greatly benefited from that because now my primary residence now which I'm actually house hacking has higher taxes than my other rental property.
Speaker 2:And AJ don't feel bad. This happens all the time and literally it's one of those things that usually the closing attorney will mention. Like you know, it's a primary home and they'll say, hey, and they'll have it in some of the documents, like, hey, you should file for homestead exemption, it's going to give you X amount things of that nature benefit that is out there and you should file for it. It's helped me with my personal house right now, as they've reassessed taxes, things of that nature. It's going to give you a major break. But I equate it to the election right, like when you go out there to go vote and things of that nature.
Speaker 2:Why is it that we have to vote on a Tuesday of all days and it closes that day? You literally, for most jobs, especially lower paying jobs, you would have to call off a work to be able to go vote or go on your lunch break and make it happen. It's like, hey, are we trying to make this harder for people? And the answer is yes. When it comes to that piece and then the homestead exemption, the fact that you can't just file for it online for next year, you have to do it in this certain deadline. You've got to turn it in like at that time period and you can't like like we're closing our house right now, here in next week, actually like four or five days closing the house, personal presidents, personal residents, and you can't file for that until the next year, right To kind of get that thing going.
Speaker 2:And so I think they make it difficult on purpose is just my personal opinion. So keep some more of those taxes, but yeah, it's definitely a benefit. It's something you should do, especially for your primary, and a lot of people actually leave it on a residence once they leave. If they're leaving like the state things of that nature, they'll leave it on the previous residence and it may take a while before somebody finds out that hey, they're not living there anymore to remove that homestead exemption on my property Cause, like I said, the one that I'm in now significantly surprised to actually see this because Fulton County in Georgia is known to be, you know, very tax heavy.
Speaker 4:but actually you know, now that I'm in DeKalb County, actually found out that the millage rate that they create for the property taxes is actually a bit higher. Like they have so many different itemized sections, like you're playing playing school taxes, all sorts of line items, I was just like what the heck? Fulton County surprisingly didn't have as many. But I did the numbers and I just looked at it and was like wow.
Speaker 2:They just went up recently too.
Speaker 4:It's crazy I missed out on that. I'm kind of banging my head on the wall.
Speaker 2:I guess it happens, come on now no, but appreciate you sharing that. Go ahead please.
Speaker 3:No, I was just saying that now you know for the future.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and it's one of those where you just reminded me that I need to put a reminder in my phone, because it's one of those things where we talk about it but, honestly, when it comes to end of the year, who's going to remember that, that there's a million things going on? So I got to put an active reminder on my phone to check back in and get that done. And also, this reminds me that I need to go ahead and file, because the new house I'm going to house hack as well. So I'm going to go ahead and start filing for the quote-unquote Airbnb papers and transfer that from my current house to the next one as well. So that's two things Putting up some reminders.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that's two things Putting up some reminders.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it'll be gone. Believe me, homestead.
Speaker 4:Yeah, Actually, I put it right on my iPhone calendar. I said I can't forget this again the second time.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so you can transfer your license.
Speaker 2:No, but I'm hoping that it makes it a little bit easier to actually shift it over. Right, and now I'll just call the person. Right, actually shift it over. And now I'll just call the person, because I realized that office is still pretty small. They're still trying to figure it out, so I'm just going to call them. Be like hey man, I'm selling this house moving over here. Can you help me just move this thing over? Is there an expedited way where I can send out letters and just take the same license, something of that nature? We'll see if we can make it work. But I plan to start working on that actually probably this weekend ahead of the closing. Maybe get those letters going out right, so that I can just boom, apply for it, even though the BNB is not going to be up and running for like a month or so. But just go ahead and get ahead of it.
Speaker 4:Yeah, technically, what county is this? This one's going to be.
Speaker 2:Fulton County.
Speaker 4:Okay, and then the previous one was that in Fulton County, or no?
Speaker 2:The previous one is DeKalb County. But I did. I went through the same process, though Like I went through, cause I'm like I'm right in the edge. Literally I'm in East Atlanta and it's right on the edge, maybe like two blocks, or a block up is Fulton.
Speaker 4:And then we're considered DeKalb, so we're like Decatur almost. So I feel you in the Texas Fulton is the. If we're talking about the, are we talking about the short-term rental license or are? We talking about? Yes, yeah, yeah. So, fulton is they're going to tell you that you're going to need a license for each individual property. Now I don't know what contact you may have that. Could you know, maybe work around that or, like you said, transfer the license. But from what I know, each property has to have his own license. That is fair.
Speaker 2:That is fair. We all know it's not being enforced yet, but it's still good to have a paper trail, right? Hey, I did all this process. They sent me this. This is why I'm here. It's going to make it a little bit easier, I think, to get grandfathered in whenever they do finally release it.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I mean it really wasn't too bad. Personally, I know some hosts that reached out to me. I literally had an Airbnb host send it like a booking inquiry so I'm like, oh, it's just another guest that's trying to book. But this person was literally asking me about how I got my short term rental license for Fulton County and I'm just like, okay, I get it's confusing, but like, really just like, if you really need this and you want to go and do it, just just follow the steps.
Speaker 4:You know you're going to make a couple of mistakes, like I know when I originally filed I didn't do it perfectly, but go back and forth on on the email and just like I'm just kind of like a get it done person. Especially something like that, when you have the open opportunity to get grandfather in before the policies actually get in place. I think is well worth it to just you know, put your foot best foot forward and just try to get it done. Because I got mine done. I just actually renewed for my second year and I mean it's pretty straightforward after that.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Once you have, it's pretty easy to renew. But to that point, this is what we're talking about when we talk about, like adjacencies and opportunities, the business opportunity. If people are bold enough to reach out through airbnb and things of that nature I get questions all the time about it as well. If you were to say, hey, guys, listen, five hundred dollars, I'm gonna get you approved right and go through. I'm serious, people would pay that literally. If you were to tell me hey, me, I'll get your other one fully approved, like and handle all that stuff, letters, everything and just just give me a license, I would highly consider it and I've been through it 20 times. I just don't feel like going through it again. So, hey, there's something to think about. If you like paying and dealing with the city to try and get this stuff for people, it could be a business.
Speaker 4:I'm not saying I like it, I'm just used to it. Just being from New York State and how they Hit you yeah, I got Big skin just from Dealing with, you know, the Government processes. Just anything In New York State is absolutely insane. So maybe that's just how I, where I get my perspective from. Just gotta have some patience, just be patient. I think Levon broke up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he did. Where I get my perspective from. Just got to have some patience, just be patient. I think Levon broke up. Yeah, he did Him, and Desmond. Well, aj, you and I are holding it down.
Speaker 3:Anything else to talk about? Can y'all not hear me? No, we could not. Y'all were perfect. Everything about you, guys. Everyone was talking. That's crazy. We got to do something for real. I'm going to make the switch officially, guys. Mark my words. Next week y'all need to ask me hey, do we still have Xfinity? Change is happening.
Speaker 2:Hey, come on now, it all sounds good, at&t check with them.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's what I'm about to do. We're jumping the fence. We're jumping the fence.
Speaker 2:AJ, you got anything else top of mind.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I mean, there's always so many different things that are just going through my head. I know another thing, so I think maybe about a month ago I talked to you guys about doing the instant book and kind of want to update you guys on that.
Speaker 4:Ever since I originally was doing a requested book to now instant book, um, so we've had a few um guests. Uh, take advantage of the, the instant book. Um. One thing I didn't understand early on is that was that um, instant book is only available to a specific guest. So if you don't have like a I think it's like a, I think it's like a five-star rating and um, you don't have like a couple trips already, then you cannot do an instant book. So I still do have those guests and queries or requests to books from people who don't have a five star, but anyway it has. Some of them have. They've came in. I've had no issues.
Speaker 4:I will say June has been a pretty relatively like quiet month for me. So I'm just trying to like look at the market data and kind of understand why that is. I was expecting June to be kind of like a popular month, especially with most people being out of school. But for me personally, I've just been trying to play around with my price settings and figure out like what's actually working, what's not working. But for me, I know June has been like a really quiet month and I definitely have some skepticism with that.
Speaker 2:So yeah, and you're the second person I've heard that from in the last week Ours and again I'm looking at a lot of different and we adjust it kind of weekly and things of that nature. Ours has been pretty steady. I'd say that May was amazing. June it's not been anything out of the ordinary. It's still getting the weeks, getting the weekends, maybe a day here or there, and we've been getting some longer bookings now, like people booking for 30 days or longer, which is always fun. But did you make some adjustments to pricing and see kind of an uptick?
Speaker 4:So what happened basically was that I kid you not, this is the very first time that every single weekend was booked and I've never missed. Ever since starting Airbnb, I've always had weekend booking, so that's great. So I know that's always guaranteed. That's not the difficult part. The difficult part is filling in those weekdays. Monday or Monday, I guess I'll count Sunday, but let's just say Monday through Thursday. I had zero bookings for the entire month from Monday through Thursday, so I started heavily discounting. The weekday prices Seemed like that didn't really work for this month. When you say heavily discounting, how much did you drop it by? I believe about 20, 25%, and I did that on Airbnb. Yes, pretty hefty discounting, actually, I would say 20 to 30%, and what I did was I actually did the discounting on Airbnb directly so that I can get that strike through pricing, or the yeah, the strike through pricing, which kind of encourages getting people to say, hey, I have a, you know, discounted property.
Speaker 4:Let me try to check this one out. Um, I would have done it on price labs, which is the pricing software that I use, but again, if you discount it there you're not going to get the strike through pricing. So'll just do the discount on Airbnb directly, so I can get that. Wasn't really able to turn that into dollars, so just trying to use June as a learning experience. But the difficult thing is is so many different things that you can tweak when it comes to pricing maybe the listing, listing, description, uh, competitors, um, it's really difficult to pinpoint what's the main culprit. Uh, for me, I think I, you know the top thing of mine. Usually, when it comes to, uh, the success of your property, one of the first things I think of is the pricing. Like, does the pricing make sense? Do you need to lower it a bit? Um, and I've done that. Um hasn't really been that great for June, so just back to the drawing board, I guess.
Speaker 2:And sometimes the other things do matter as well, like if you've kept it static for the whole time as far as the listing itself and you move a picture around or you change the title, like those things matter too to our Airbnb. There's something different here and kind of boost it for you again. So that's one thing that we've tried as well. You know in previous years with adjusting the name of the listing. I would try doing that. If you've already done the pricing piece, I would try changing up the name. Maybe throw your name into chat GBT and come up with a remix of it, or just think of another way to describe it. Or look at the reviews that you've gotten and pull a name from that. Like hey, I love this, it's cozy, I love how chic this was and all that stuff. Like pull the name together from that and see if that'll make a difference.
Speaker 4:I was also watching a few YouTube videos on just kind of like some of the main metrics that will affect the property's bookability or interest from guests, and another thing was like having minimum stay restrictions. So, of course, you know, hosts, we don't really like one-nighters. Two-nighters are not so bad, but you know we want three nights, four nights, some longer stays, but the problem that I discovered, at least just from my research, was that when you put all of those different restrictions on the property, then it has less chances to show up in the Airbnb algorithm when people are searching for stays like vacation stays and things like that. So it's kind of a fine line. I'm trying to just understand more about that. It does make sense, though, because if I have a property that has a minimum stay from starting on Thursday that's three nights well, that's just automatically going to rule out anybody who's looking for two night stays. I'm actually interested to see what your perspective on that is and the minimum stays that you have or play around with your properties.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and we are getting close here, so this would be kind of the last comment on this piece. But when you talk about the minimum stays, I'm always playing around with it. So I like Price Labs. I can't believe we weren't using this before, but Price Labs is pretty amazing because you can meet with some of their support team and they'll help you set this up.
Speaker 2:But the way that we have it set up is when you're two months out or a month and a half out, it's going to have a minimum of three-day stays on a lot of our properties the bigger properties for that weekend piece, but then it adjusts down to two-night stays minimum for.
Speaker 2:For when it gets within that you know, call it 50 days or so, I don't remember the exact numbers, maybe 45 days It'll allow you to do two night stays and then from there, as you get really close to it, if there's any gaps in between, it'll switch it over to a one night stay.
Speaker 2:So, for example, say you have a three night stay and then a gap in between and a five night stay, it'll allow somebody to book that one night stay, and at times we've been able to get that piece booked, and so I would highly recommend, if you're thinking about lowering the night, stay just to get with the Price Labs team and figure out a way to automate that piece so that when you're further out you're encouraging people to book for longer and as you get closer you're allowing people to book that two night. But before Price Labs doing all that piece, always put it at a two night minimum just across the board, except for the mansion. Mansion is making enough that we can do one night across the board right and it's fine, but two night minimum everywhere else For sure, I think what you're referring to is orphan gaps.
Speaker 4:I'll definitely more into that. I currently have that staggered structure where it's they don't have a name Up to two weeks. Yeah, they have a name for it. That's great for me. Up to two weeks I'm alone one night, then two weeks, and up to 45 days is two nights, and then 45 days beyond, which is like a month and a half, is three nights. But I think I have to play around with my orphan gaps, which that might be something that's hurting me. So I'm going to look more into that and maybe schedule sessions with the support team, like you said.
Speaker 3:And I just is the time in between your bookings where you have X here and X there and then you have this in between that nobody wants.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's a funny, it's an interesting name for it. I saw it I was like what? But I read it and I was like, oh, okay, that's it.
Speaker 3:I'm not sure if I saw it. I was like what? But I read it and I was like, oh, okay, that's it, it makes sense. Yeah, it makes sense. You need somebody in your home, that's an orphan.
Speaker 2:But, guys, I appreciate you jumping on. This is the last Wednesday of the month. Next week is going to be July, so I'm excited to kick off the second half of the year and hit the ground running man. So I hope everybody has a good night and I will catch you a little bit later.
Speaker 1:Bye y'all.
