As real estate investors are continuously exploring new opportunities, the concept of monthly midterm rentals has emerged as a viable and profitable option. Joie Garcia, experienced in this field, shares her journey and strategic insights into building a successful midterm rental business. In this blog, we'll explore the insights Joie shared during episode 148 of Furnished Finder’s podcast, The Landlord Diaries (opens in new tab), including strategies she employs to maintain high occupancy rates and low stress levels.
Discovering the monthly rental niche
Joie's journey began with an interest in real estate as a means of income during retirement. Having some experience with long-term leases, her curiosity was piqued by midterm rentals, a segment gaining traction due to platforms like Furnished Finder (opens in new tab). Though unfamiliar with midterm rentals initially, firsthand experiences from others provided Joie the confidence to dive into this venture.
**Read more about midterm rentals here (opens in new tab).**
Strategic investment in Palm Desert
Palm Desert was chosen for its appealing lifestyle and seasonal flux of retirees. Joie invested in two-bedroom condos, which provide easier maintenance than larger single-family homes. With Homeowners Association (HOA) offerings such as pool maintenance and landscaping, the stress of property upkeep is alleviated.
Amenities and tenant attraction
Joie's strategic choice of gated community condos with resort-like amenities such as swimming pools, tennis & pickleball courts has elevated her rental offering. These high-caliber facilities attract a niche market of tenants looking for comfort and security, especially female renters and snowbirds booking far in advance.
Systems and learning from early challenges
Initially, Joie made some classic rookie mistakes, such as underestimating the importance of blackout curtains for tenants like night-shift medical workers. Over time, she developed systems for preventive maintenance, learning from mentors to make operational adjustments, like installing air filters to prevent musty smells.
Handling bookings and guest experience
Utilizing tools from Furnished Finder, Joie handles her bookings and legal documentation with efficiency, ensuring a seamless tenant experience. She has streamlined communication methods with tenants, offering hospitality that reflects her experience as a seasoned traveler.
**Explore Furnished Finder’s landlord resources here (opens in new tab).**
Conclusion
Joie's story is an inspiration, especially for those venturing into the midterm rental market. Her blend of strategic planning, community interaction, and the use of technology like Furnished Finder's landlord tools have created a rewarding rental business model. Joie's dedication to continuous improvement and hospitality ensures five-star guest reviews and sustained property success.
For more insights, listen to Joie’s podcast episode to learn about maximizing midterm rental investments.
Episode 148 Transcript
You could YouTube your life away trying to get as much information as possible. But finally just saying, I'm gonna give it a try I had never done a short term rental. I've done long leases before, Your traditional annual lease, but nothing, short term like VRBO.
when I heard about midterm rental, I was like, that seems to fit what I'm looking for. Then I heard about furnish find. But I had never heard about Furnished Finders prior. Only on YouTube videos. I didn't actually know anyone specifically. And I think that's what gives you the comfort level to say, I actually know someone who uses this platform.
one day we had visitors, from Alaska Visiting my husband, good friends of his, we went out to dinner and both of them were telling us about how they use Furnished Finders in Alaska and they run out their rooms to nurses. So now I actually was able to be a front of someone live, not a YouTube video.
Someone's live, he could tell me about their experience and all great experience. And I told my husband, I'm signing up to Furnished Finders and we're gonna give this a try. So that's how I started. Welcome to The Landlord Diaries, where we talk about midterm rentals and the opportunities behind them. We'll share landlord stories, talk about maximizing investment potential, and discuss how to live the very best landlord life.
This podcast is proudly brought to you by Furnished Finder, the leader and largest online marketplace for midterm rentals. Joie Garcia didn't just build a profitable midterm rental business. She built one that fits beautifully into her lifestyle with four midterm rentals, Joie has created a system that prioritizes peace of mind, proactive planning, and standout guest experiences.
In this episode, Joie shares how she books Canadian snowbirds a year in advance, maintains five star reviews and still finds time to travel and work her full-time job. Today's episode is all about building a midterm rental business that runs smoothly without running you ragged.
Joie, how are you today? I'm doing fantastic. Thank you for asking. Well, I'm excited to get started. why don't we start off with, most of your midterm rentals are in Palm Desert. what drew you to Palm Desert, as a place to invest? Well, it started off as an area that we wanted to retire in, so we purchased our first home.
when we moved from Hawaii, we decided to move to Palm Desert. we love playing tennis. Just the resort, living the whole lifestyle. at that time it was mainly retirees that came. we learned about how there's a high season and a low season of Palm Desert.
So that was a learning experience for me. we fell in love with the area and the people because everyone who's in Palm Desert is 'cause they want to be here, most of them being retirees. we planned ahead. Tell us how your choice of two bedroom condos set you up for success as far as keeping your midterm rental investment strategy really low stress.
Definitely. So we did ponder between do we want a larger home or something more maintainable, we're empty nesters. It's just my husband and I. So we decided two bedroom, two bath to start with and about 12 to 1300 is a couple of the rentals. And then we have a larger one around 1600, but all of 'em are two bedroom, two bath, and then it's just furnishing the locations.
We definitely needed the two bathrooms All but one rental actually has a garage. So that was a learning experience for us as well. Being in Palm Desert, you really do want a garage. So after we bought our first rental, that was a carport.
We decided after that we have to have a garage. from the standpoint of a two bedroom, two bath, we also thought, okay, we started off with traveling nurses. There are. nurses who travel with their families, but so far in this area, they're more single. Or maybe they have a partner that happens to also be in the medical field, but they don't necessarily are looking for three plus bedrooms, at least not in the Palm Desert area.
And not only have you chosen two bedrooms, but you've chosen condos, and I think that was a key step in minimizing that stress as well. what's it been like taking care of the condos versus you have one single family home. correct. In night and day, to be honest, because our very first home was a single family home, a front yard, a large backyard, and either you're cleaning it yourself or you have to pay someone to mow the lawn and trim the trees.
I removed all the trees from, the house because I just didn't wanna deal with. The leaves and, any issues with the trees falling down. as far as the HOAs, we prefer the condos with the HOAs. It lowers our stress. We don't have the maintenance of the condo, the outside of the condo, 'cause it's all maintained by the HOA.
So they maintain all the floral, the greenery the sprinkler system. If we ever have any water issues, we just call HOA and they fix it for us. very low maintenance from that standpoint. Nice. And I'm pretty sure you've got some incredible amenities. Have you seen that those amenities at your properties have set your standard to the next level and allowed you to, have a higher rental rate?
Like what have you seen with amenities that have stood out for your travelers? Definitely because we have three condos here in Palm Desert and we strategically bought condos that were in a gated community from a safety aspect, it gives the tenants a comfort of being in a gated area, especially if they're single women.
being in a secure area and the amenities I can offer swimming pools, gym, tennis courts, pickleball, basketball courts, that I couldn't purchase on my own. finding a home with all those amenities would be outside my budget. So being in a,
Desert style resort living community, offers much more, opportunities for my renters. I want to focus on how you have created your business to be as low stress and pain point free as possible. But first, let's talk about how it wasn't so stress free at the beginning.
What were some of your early mistakes or pain points that made you realize that you needed better systems or that you needed to finesse things so that you could really minimize that stress level? Yeah. first going into it, you have your condos, Supplied as though it's your home, but you need to supply it based upon your customers, and your customers are dependent on who you rent to.
I started off with the medical field, and then I branched off to some insurance leads that, were found through Furnished Finders. I've seen an uptick, at least in my area. In Palm desert of, insurance leads finding me through Furnished Finders. So I thought that was a good, uptick in the platform.
But definitely it's setting up your home based upon who your customers are. I started off with the medical field, I didn't have blinds. I had light curtains. the medical field is working second or third shift, so I needed to change that because if they're working at nights and sleeping during the day, they want something darker.
I chose not to put curtains up, but I did install blind on all the condos. So this way the lighting, it would be darker for them. Another one was, is, I was getting complaints because sometimes your homes sit and you might get a musty scent, it isn't that there's anything wrong with your condo, it's just that it's sitting right, there's no air flow going through.
So what I learned was to put in all the condos an air filter. I just keep the air filter running and it keeps a freshness, in the home. There's times where I show the home and I'm not actually present. I get their information ahead of time. a copy of their driver's license, and give them a temporary digital code so they can view the home themselves.
And of course, you know, I get the digital notification and they're coming in and then exiting and then change the code. those were learnings for me from a system standpoint. The biggest one that I learned, and this was through a mentor that helped me in this area, is having all white sheets.
Having all white towels gives the visual of cleanliness especially to your medical professionals, right? So ensuring that everything is matching don't have mis mismatch plates or chips or just those details, and having the mentor just giving me that extra level of information. Then I did, I changed my sheets so I didn't have misprints, or different colors.
Everything is solid. white, it makes it easier because if you have to replace anything, you just go to home Goods or order on Amazon and get quality white sheets. it's always good to know some of those challenges up front then you know what's working, as you continue in your midterm rental business.
And that's something that Katie and I say often you really just have to jump in, do your due diligence, use all of Furnished Finders tools to help set you up for success, but just jump in and you learn things along the way. No one's gonna get it perfect every time, Take feedback. we talk to our guests, we improve our systems.
I'd love to hear how Furnished Finder has helped you secure longer stays, and advance bookings we don't get to talk about snowbirds too often. So I'm excited about that aspect, of, your, clientele in Palm Desert. Absolutely. can I share a little bit of a story as to how I even.
join Furnished Finders. Yes. I think you need to jump right in, do your due diligence, do some research, you could YouTube your life away trying to get as much information as possible. But finally, just saying, I'm gonna give it a try I had never done a short-term rental.
I've done long leases before, Your traditional annual lease, but nothing, short term like VRBO. when I heard about midterm rent, I was like, you know, that seems to fit what I'm looking for. Then I heard about Furnished Finders, but. I had never heard about Furnished Finders prior.
Only on YouTube videos. But I didn't actually know anyone specifically. And I think that's what gives you the comfort level to say, I actually know someone who uses this platform. one day we had visitors, from Alaska Visiting my husband, good friends of his, we went out to dinner and both of them were telling us about how they use Furnished Finders in Alaska, and they ran out their rooms to nurses.
So now I actually was able to be a front of. Someone live, not a YouTube video, someone live. He could tell me about their experience and all great experience. I told my husband, I'm signing up to Furnished Finders and we're gonna give this a try. that's how I started. And that was over two years ago.
And now you have these wonderful snowbirds and longer stays. So tell us what it's like in your area. Yeah, so with the snowbirds, they also found me on French fighters. So they like to book in January, February for the following year. they're booking a year in advance now, but with the snowbirds, at least from the Canadians, you are not able to do a background check.
my neighbor happens to be a Canadian. he wasn't renting his, his unit out with Furnished Finders yet because through me, I got him to start renting it through Furnished Finders. I would ask him some questions like, what should I be looking for? I don't have a means. To do a background check and, he gave me some tips.
He'd get a copy of the driver's license, have them do the application. So I used the tools within furnished finders to do the application, have them fill it out. they filled everything out I did ask them to give me a deposit and the first month's rent during high season in Palm Desert, the rents go up.
They can double to even triple Now I don't raise my prices that high I'm looking for that reoccurring snowbird that's gonna come year after year. this one in particular, she comes down with a family of six other families. So it's not just her. she booked my unit and then mid through, February the month hadn't even ended.
She booked for the following year because bookings get secured very quickly. the longer You wait here in Palm Desert, the higher the prices go
Looking for a simple, professional way to manage your monthly rental. Furnish, finder's, landlord tools brings everything together, tenant screening, lease templates, and online rent payments all in one place. Stay organized, save time, and stay in control. For more information, explore landlord tools today.
Does it make you uncomfortable or uneasy to accept bookings that are so far in advance? And then how do you manage that calendar to minimize those vacancies? So at first, I definitely did. So you talk about lessons learned or how do you adjust to the market? I definitely was feeling scared to book so far in advance because I have to at least have the tenant exit by December 28th.
I usually give myself two to three days between bookings. So I can have cleaning done, I can have service done, and then we will talk about preventative maintenance because I'm huge advocate on preventative maintenance. But before I get into that, that topic, when they reached out to me on furnished binders to see the location or home, I did a video tour.
So, or I shouldn't say that. I did a FaceTime. On the iPhone so I can walk the community, I could show them the home, and then they wanted a book right away. And they literally went to the, to their, their bank and wired me money. I had to tell them, don't wire me money until the lease is signed.
Because I didn't want money ahead of time, I told my husband let's give it a try. It's a year ahead of time. Nurses usually work 13 weeks out so I can control it if the timing isn't exact, I can at least be upfront with them and say, I can rent this location out to you until December 28th, one time it didn't work out because they didn't wanna have to relocate and find another condo.
So I told my husband if we don't rent it out, then we will just use it ourselves because we love Palm Desert. we have that flexibility we'll come down and stay, use the amenities for, our vacation home. But for the most part we rent our places out and now because of word of mouth, it's becoming easier for us.
That's a very interesting approach to let them know that, hey, like you can have this property until a specific date when you know that you have a different lease coming in. I've heard that strategy before, but it's, it's been a while and I think that works probably specifically with, with snowbirds or travelers who have a little bit more flexibility I think that's definitely something you have used to your advantage when strategizing this calendar situation. it can be tough to accept a booking far in the future, knowing that you don't know how all your other bookings will align think about what type of travelers you have and if they're in charge of their dates or not.
with those of us that are nervous to book that far in advance, you've tried it out for multiple years now, and I think your longest gap is one month. Is that correct? That's correct. how has that affected your occupancy and overall value of your midterm rentals?
Like has that affected it or No, it hasn't really affected it for you because you enjoy staying there when it's vacant. I also use that time have a gap and I really haven't had a gap longer than a month, then either I offer it to friends, family, and friends, and we try to make a long weekend of it.
We also host quite a bit, so we just use it for other means during that time that it's not being rented out. Mm-hmm. Okay, great. one of the things that keeps you focused on a low stress midterm rental business is having good systems in place. I'd love to dive more into your systems.
you've hinted you like two to three days in between for turnovers. why is that and what does your cleaning process look like? I do like to leave a two to three day gap either it's because of timing, we're traveling or we live close outside of Los Angeles when we come in to fix the homes, we try to do as much as we can on our own. I also take that time to do preventive maintenance, a lot of that is because of my career background in manufacturing. So the whole key is preventive maintenance. You wanna prevent items from going down so you don't have a lag time.
So I use that same concept when it comes to homes. Do I have an AC service? Do I have the heater service? Do I need to replace filters? I also test out the small appliances or even the major appliances because when you think of, your appliances or items that have water or hold water, it needs to be cleaned or sometimes there's just a, a odor.
So like your washing machine, your house cleaner isn't necessarily going to do the deep cleaning of, servicing your washing machine. So we actually clean the filters, drain the water, clean inside, and run a solution in the washing machine so that it's always clean and fresh.
Same with the dishwashers, same with the garbage disposal. we're also checking all that from preventative maintenance. making sure that it's clean so that when the next tenant comes in, that relieves our stress, We put your work up front so that when a tenant is there, you are not getting phone calls.
that's why it's called preventive maintenance. I'm pretty sure it gets 115, I think you said is your high. part of that preventative maintenance is most of us do our annual AC check and heat check to make sure we're set up for success, but you go above and beyond that.
So how does that give you peace of mind in your area? doing up to three, services per year. Yes. And I know it might seem a little, too much to some people to say you do three. That's a lot, but I have a great AC person that I trust he has his own code to go into my home.
In fact, one of my systems is I have a list of all my NA maintenance people. So for some reason something goes down, my tenants can call them directly. They have my permission because I wanna minimize that downtime for the tenant. from an AC perspective, you're at triple digits and my biggest fear is an AC going down I do up to like three service calls is just to ensure the ACS running has all the fluids, it's clean.
Then you know, peace of mind that the tenant is like, I have any issues during the summer months. How do you use, it Seems like you're very much about peace of mind, right? Your peace of mind, your guest's, peace of mind, knowing that all of your systems are in place to help reduce any stress, any hiccups.
How do you use things like leases and legal docs, especially the ones that we have offered through Furnished Finder and partnership with Rocket Lawyer? To help you have that peace of mind and just keep everything moving really smoothly. Yes, and I do use the extended features through Furnish Fighters, and that's where I do all my background checks, my applications, and my leases.
So just having everything in one place is a peace of mind. I don't have to go through different platforms. To put documents together or to send information, plus it's all housed in one area for me. If I need to reference back a phone number an email, or my lease terms.
It's all in one area I actually ended up learning that because I tried another platform and the lease must have been like 75 pages I was like, wow. this is way too long. I know California is pretty strict but I'm not doing this again.
I'm going back to what I know works that particular tenant wanted to go through this other platform. But after that, I was like, I have my own platform that I use and I will send you the link. Here's the lease signing and I use everything through furnish, find because that's the platform that I'm paying.
So why not use all the amenities that you offer? I love the calendar. That was a huge upgrade for us. If anybody is unaware, we spent a lot of time energy updating our calendar. all you have to do is tell us what dates you are booked, or blocked.
Enter any dates that your property is not available and the minimum length of stay that you can accept sometimes, certain properties can have a 30 day minimum. Sometimes a 90 day minimum we will calculate your availability date.
So that's huge. 'cause you don't have to constantly be updating your availability date. You just tell us when it's not available and we piece those things together. I. Loved that update it just made it more streamlined and automatic, Exactly. I just go in there and block my dates.
I don't have Airbnb or VB to tie them together, but if I'm gonna block it for personal reasons or a family event, then I just use the calendar and block it Absolutely love that feature. It sounds like you have really thoughtful systems that put the guest, at the forefront and peace of mind.
that is what we try to accomplish as hospitality hosts. with your portfolio being, about three hours away from where you live, you have, a full-time job. it's pretty impressive how you have. Found this low stress system, that works for you, but you still are very hands on and you love the area.
So it's probably got tax benefits as well. I'd love to hear how, that idea of not only keeping it low stress for yourself. But for your tenants also, that preventative maintenance, helps with a smooth guest stay, five star reviews are a huge benefit for setting a tenant up for success that is new to the area.
Typically isn't going to tour the property before they book it. It's more like a short term rental where you book it sight unseen. They may be coming from the other side of the country or Canada, how have you emphasized, obtaining those five star reviews and that guest communication throughout the stay to make it a great experience for your tenants?
So you said the key word and that's hospitality. I travel quite a bit with my companies or throughout my career, so I use my experience of hospitality and being on the road for my midterm rentals. it's all about customer service. you can deliver bad news as long as you're communicating and communicating timely.
Sometimes your guests might be upset, but the worst part is if they can't get ahold of you. Right. They wanna be able to communicate their concerns or any challenges and know that they're being heard. I try to respond as quickly as possible as we're going through the preliminary of, do you wanna view the home?
do you want me to send you a link? That's all preliminary discussions and once they decide that they're interested and wanna Move to the next step, we're talking about dates lease and costs. I also ask how do you like to communicate? Some people like to actually talk live.
That depends on your tenants. So for instance, my Canadian tenants, they're older, they're retired, they wanna talk to you live in person, not necessarily through text or an email. Then there's others where they prefer to communicate via text, so that's fine. I let them know ahead of time because of my work schedule.
Either I'm gonna be out of country, but I give them another resource of someone to get ahold of in case there's issues. I give them information of my maintenance people in case there's an issue, and I tell my maintenance people, if something needs to get. Fixed or done, you fix it and I'll work out the payments and details when I return, but that's because I've also established that relationship with them.
So I do feel it's one is establishing relationship, establishing that rapport, and more importantly, having that open communication with the person. it's all about hospitality. if you go to a hotel, you want that service, so we should be giving that same service for midterm rentals. I think I just have one more question before we wrap up with rapid fire questions.
Katie will take lead and let's have some fun with that. for someone that's tuning in, maybe new to the midterm rental space, what would you give them advice wise is like just the first step to get started. I think 80% of your bookings come from Furnished Finder. You said, education and just knowing, what's out there is important.
But really what's the one thing you would say is, Hey, just take this as your first step. I would say, go look at homes. Go look at condos or single family homes or one bedrooms, and see what you think would be your comfort level and just get started. Find that realtor. Find that banker who you have a good relationship with or build a relationship with and determine that this is a market that you wanna do, determine do you want short term rentals?
Do you want midterm rentals, or do you even want a lease? with Furnished Finder, you can do all the above depending on your criteria for me it was reaching out to a person to get that confidence that, they've done this themselves. if someone wants to call me up, I'm more unwelcome from a landlord perspective to, to give them advice or to tell them, just go for it.
Just try it. Yes, it's hard work, but life can be hard work. do we wanna work now or do we wanna work when we're 90? I'd rather work now so that I can live the life that I want when I'm older. You are such a testament to the types of landlords that we have on our platform who are open and willing to talk to anybody and give them encouragement advice and insights.
It's such a huge thing because, there's so much more community in the midterm rental space than there is competition. the demand is so high, And we only need about four bookings a year, we're here to make sure that everybody can do what we are doing.
So on that note, we are doing a new thing to wrap up some episodes where I'm gonna ask you some rapid fire questions. I've got three questions here. I just want the first thing that comes to mind, short and sweet answer, and these are often gonna be some of the most impactful questions that we have, first up, what is a one hosting task that you secretly enjoy, but most people dread talking to the tenants. Ooh. I like that. That speaks to the type of hospitality, right? It's not just hospitality, it's relationship, hospitality. Ready for the next? Yes. What's one small thing that you do that makes your tenants say, wow,
Well, I tell my tenants that if there's anything in my home that you need and I don't have. Text me and I'll Amazon it over to you. And that actually happened with an electric teapot. It's funny how we furnish these homes for ourselves or how we would like them, but it's important to know that everybody lives life a little bit of a different way.
Okay, last one. What's one thing that you used to do daily that now you have streamlined or eliminated or automated? That I used to do daily? Yeah, Like this. Maybe this was a task that you just kind of handled repeatedly or over and over, and now you've streamlined it.
Maybe you've eliminated it all together or somehow you have gotten into a process where you're pretty hands off with it. Would receipts count? Oh yeah. Tell us about that. Yeah, because the receipts were really just like a monkey on my back, right? Because you had to keep all these receipts for tax purposes, and then I had like two or three different credit cards.
So what I do is I have one credit card for each home, and that's how I streamline. So I know this credit card is for this home in Palm Desert, 'cause I name them PD one, two, and three.
And so if anything needs to be paid for. This is a credit card and I have it labeled. So this way when I download my monthly statements or I download that yearend statements, it's more streamlined versus all these receipts that were all over the place. that was a huge monkey on my back.
I was like, I have to take care of this. I have to do something different. That's huge. I love that advice because, we all have different things that we have learned over time in our midterm rental journey. If you have something you wanna share that has made your journey, low stress or really helped with your systems, we'd love to see it in the comments
Appreciate you tuning in, we are here to bring you all things midterm rentals. Stay tuned to your Furnished Finder channels. we just wanna make things easy for you and provide all the tools you need. Joie, thanks for sharing your story today. If someone wants to connect, how would you like 'em to do So?
and of course your Furnished Finder, your Furnished Finder landlord profile will be in the show notes. Oh, excellent. I'm also on Lincoln, but I'm on Lincoln as Johanna Garcia. Parentheses Joie. Awesome. And it's a unique spelling of Joie. So check the show notes for that we'll catch you all again next time.