Working in real estate can be a challenging yet rewarding experience, especially when you are navigating it alongside a partner. The dynamic duo, Mike and Celine Gonzalez, have done just that, turning their passion for helping others into a thriving monthly midterm rental business. At the heart of their success is a partnership built on clear communication, defined roles, and a shared vision.
Embracing real estate as a team
Mike and Celine Gonzalez didn't dive into the world of monthly rentals without some initial uncertainty. After stumbling upon an opportunity with their duplex, they discovered the potential of furnished rentals. Their leap into this venture was greatly influenced by Furnished Finder (opens in new tab), a platform they learned about through the Landlord Diaries podcast (opens in new tab).
As seasoned real estate investors, Mike and Celine have developed a robust portfolio that includes short-term rentals, midterm rentals, and a growing coaching program. They are a prime example of how couples can successfully navigate the complexities of real estate by embracing their unique strengths and interests.
Defining roles and responsibilities
A critical step for any couple working together in real estate is defining roles and responsibilities. For this team, clear communication was key to preventing frustration and ensuring operational efficiency. Mike, who enjoys interacting with guests, naturally took on the role of communicating with tenants. Celine preferred handling the accounting and background logistics, contributing to a seamless operation.
They quickly learned that while overlapping responsibilities are inevitable, staying in their lanes most of the time was crucial. They also discovered the importance of drafting a mission statement to guide their decisions and align their actions with their long-term goals.
Leveraging Tools for Success
To streamline their business, the Gonzalez's utilized various tools provided by Furnished Finder. Tenant screening, state-specific leases, and messaging templates were essential in managing their properties efficiently. These resources not only aided in daily operations but also enhanced the overall guest experience.
Mike emphasized the usefulness of having pre-drafted messaging templates to expedite communications with potential tenants and adjusters. Additionally, leveraging the tenant screening services offered by Furnished Finder allowed them to safely and conveniently vet prospective tenants, offering peace of mind to both parties.
Explore Landlord Tools (opens in new tab) in your Furnished Finder dashboard.
Building a thriving business
For Mike and Celine, real estate is more than just a business; it's an opportunity to make meaningful connections and positively impact others' lives. They've built trust with their guests by maintaining properties that don't feel like rentals.
Their commitment to quality is evident in how they handle inquiries and manage their properties. The Gonzalez's are meticulous about maintaining a comfortable and inviting environment for their guests, ensuring each stay is an experience that guests want to repeat.
Navigating challenges together
While the logistics of managing properties can be complex, having a partner offers unique advantages. It allows for a division of labor that can cater to both the strengths and preferences of each individual. It's important to set boundaries and ensure that work responsibilities do not overshadow personal relationships. For Mike and Celine, mutual respect and understanding have been key components of their successful partnership.
Conclusion
Real estate investing with a partner can lead to great success if approached with clear communication, defined roles, and shared goals. Mike and Celine Gonzalez's journey illustrates how teams can thrive in the industry by leveraging their strengths, using the right tools, and keeping the focus on their mission. Whether you're just starting out or looking to scale your business, Furnished Finder (opens in new tab) offers invaluable resources to guide you on your path to success.
Listen to the full podcast episode now.
Episode 159 Transcript
I don't know if we share this with you, but I put the Furnished Finder up for our property in Orange County a few months before it was gonna be available, thinking it was gonna take me a few months to get leads and people asking for it.
And within days I was turning down three to four month bookings that they needed the property within seven days.
Welcome to the landlord diary. The official podcast of Furnished Finder, your trusted companion for building success and monthly rentals. I'm Kelly Bailey with eight Cash Flowing Monthly Rentals in Texas. And I'm Katie Lyon, marketing director at Furnished Finder and real estate investor with 13 furnished rentals across multiple states.
In every episode, we share real stories, practical tips, and expert insights to help you grow with confidence from securing better bookings to maximizing your rental income. So follow up the show and let Furnished Finder be your partner in building a thriving monthly rental business.
From first responders to real estate rock stars, Mike and Celine Gonzalez are a powerhouse couple who turned their passion for helping others into a thriving monthly midterm rental business. After hearing about Furnished Finder through our podcast, landlord Diaries, they took the leap into monthly rentals and haven't looked back since.
Now, with a portfolio of short-term rentals midterm rentals and a growing coaching program, they're here to share how they've built their business as a couple. Divided responsibilities and leveraged their W twos in fire and EMS to serve their community in a whole new way. So I am very excited to introduce their story to you.
How are you guys doing today, Mike and Celine? We're doing great. Yeah, we're doing good. I got my coffee. All the important stuff. Okay. Black or cream. How do you drink your coffee? It evolves over time, but right now I have Laird Creamer and collagen. Nice. So our theme for today is couples and when it comes to working as a couple in monthly midterm rentals between the two of you who first brought up the idea of investing in furnished rentals and what made you both say yes.
That's a good one. I think so. Celine actually wanted to try short term first. But the opportunity presented itself on, its on its own. When we had our duplex listed and got contacted by an adjuster. And so it it, that's how it got presented to us. And I thought it was a scam initially.
And I was like, all right, he's offering to pay 30% above market some weird timeframe, six to not in six months, minimum options to extend. And, but. Either way. He said the client had to approve of the place and they had to see it. So I was like, all right, what's the worst case this guy comes down and sees it, and I'll at least get a chance to talk to him?
And Celine had heard about that before. But anyway we met him. It was legit. It turned out to be. Awesome. They stayed for nine months. They moved her furniture in and then they liked our place because it also had a garage. And so they stored the rest of her stuff while they were working on her place in the garage.
And then it. When it was over, we were both like, okay, how do we get more of these? And at the time we didn't know about Furnished Finder, we didn't know about any sort of listing platform or resource for this. And then it went into something else before we got a chance to revisit it later. So Mike, I love that your first booking was nine months.
That's every monthly midterm rental host's dream. But I think that actually happened maybe in 2016 or so, and you didn't even know the term midterm Furnished Finder had just been launched in 2014. Now we have over. Decade of business behind our belt. We are the leading platform for monthly midterm rentals across the nation, over 300,000 listings nationwide.
So what happened between that booking and then getting back into monthly midterm rentals? So one of the things I was, we were talking about is every time we've gone and had the opportunity to help somebody, it's opened another door for something else. So I really felt like we were helping that, that lady who she had like a water damage at her house.
And so when they came to look at our place and I had a conversation with her, I could tell she was really stressed out. She didn't know where she was gonna go. She didn't wanna move in a hotel, and it was, there was a lot of tension there with the adjuster. So we felt like we were helping her when that got done.
We had an opportunity to help somebody else that needed a place for two weeks. It was like a transitional thing, and we just told him, Hey, we, they could, he can use it, but we don't have any furniture in the house. And so the congregation he was associated with, they brought everything he needed.
And when the two weeks were done. They didn't want most of that stuff back. It was like, people were upgrading things or it was extra stuff and so that's when Celine was like, Hey, I really, I've been wanting to try this short term thing. I think we had to buy like maybe a fridge and a tv and then it got so busy in the short term world that we never, we didn't get a chance to revisit the, what we wanted to do, which was get more of these midterm.
We I don't even know what I was calling, I think I was calling it insurance bookings at the time. Yeah. And so we were like lots of aliases in the monthly midterm rental space. Yeah. So the short term thing. Okay. We knew we wanted to get back to doing that, like to have those longer stays because the short stays yes, they're fun, but they're a lot of work in between.
So go ahead Mike. So you guys got to explore both the. The people at that would rent your house that needed a place to stay and those that would rent your house because they wanted a place to stay with a visit. Two very different things, right? You're talking insurance claims and relocations versus I'm coming to the area for the weekend.
But, and exactly. You're you have two different sets of people. You have those who are like, they wanna get back to their house and they have one, so then they take really good care of it. And then you have on a short term stay we're here for the weekend, we're gonna party and we're gonna leave.
And we don't care if it's a mess. Yeah it's two. It is two totally different types of Totally, not all the time, not all the time with short term. We've got a lot of success with short term, but you do have two different mentalities and I love how you tapped into the fact that you're helping those people.
You are helping them, giving them a place to live. Okay, so you guys discovered the opportunity behind. Both short term and midterm, which I think is fantastic. Let's talk, take just a second and talk about what does your portfolio look like right now? What properties do you have and what do you, what rental strategies do you use for 'em?
Alright I have my page up right now. So we have a mix of two properties that we own. One is short term and a very. A very and a very busy short term market. And then the other is a midterm that we have on Furnished Finder and one is in Orange County and the other one is in Big Bear Lake out here in California.
And then there's, let's see, 1, 2, 3 three more properties that. We co-host one we, one we manage for a family member that is in both the midterm and the short term market. So we prioritize the midterm and then fill the gaps with the short term. And then two more that I coach on that are strictly short term right now, but.
One of those particular owners has a property here local in Orange County that she's building into the midterm market. So she's preparing it and getting it ready, and that is her primary like objective. So this short term thing, she just happens to have a cabin in the same area that our short term's at.
So I'm coaching her on that, but her main goal is to get the midterm going on her property. Down here by the beach. And then one more property in Mammoth Lakes. That is actually two properties on one, and that is straight midterm. And I'm managing that and coaching the owner who's preparing another property she has in Orange County for midterms.
So I, I don't know where we, and you're missing how many And you're missing one more in Heim Hills. Oh, I missed one. The one in Anaheim Hills. Oh yes, I'm sorry. And then I have another friend that I'm coaching through the and we. Brought them into Furnished Finder. We got them the, I'm basically managing it for him and coaching him into the process so that he can take over.
He'll probably, they'll probably be comfortable in the next two or three bookings that we get to do it on their own. So it is their Furnished Finder page. It's their listing. But we're, we have, I have a contract with them and, coaching, it's all going through mountain air properties, but when I'm done and hand them the keys, so to speak, they already have their listing up.
They already have their own reviews.
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That's fantastic. And, keeping with our theme of couples working together, in case you're new to the show, Katie and I both work with our spouses as well, so we have plenty to pull from on how it is working with a partner or with your significant other. So I'd love to dive into that of, how.
You both have w twos in the community field, we've already said that we've got a fireman and a paramedic which crazy, those are crazy schedules. So how do you divide your roles in business and just life to make sure that both your regular W2 and your properties are taken care of?
I guess I'll start with work. One, one thing I didn't, I really like my W2. I wasn't trying to replace it. I wasn't trying to leave it behind, and I enjoy it. And what I didn't want to do is be doing my Furnished Finder, my midterm stuff at work. So I made like a personal, very clear like, all right, I'm not gonna work on this.
While I'm at work, I enjoy work. There's a lot of things I need to be doing and concentrating on there. That was like my first thing. I wasn't gonna be one of those guys. And Celine and I realized right away, like we had to define our roles to, to get the frustration out of the 'cause. We didn't want our biggest hurdle to be us, right?
We, i'm very visual. I had, this was at our other place. I had a marker board and I was right. We were writing down, thi this year plan, five year plan where we wanted to be and trying to keep track of everything too. Initially, I was trying to find it before today, but we made a mission statement like, okay, this is our mission statement and we were coming to these.
Decisions where we're like, okay, we would get excited about going one direction. And we're like, okay, that, does that really fit what we're trying to do here? Does that really fit like our mission with this property? Because if you try to do everything or you try to accomplish everything at a task or at a property, one of the things that you're not one of those things is gonna be successful 'cause you're just trying to pour it in everything else.
So we split our responsibilities up and yeah, they overlap sometimes at the beginning I think a lot 'cause he's that's my job. And I was like, who said that's your job? Nobody had signed it to you. And then he, I think he read a book and it was like, okay, we need to like, basically. This is your role.
This is my role. You stay outta mine. I'll stay outta yours. So it, so how do you guys decide what role you have and what goes to, who Is it like, I think I'm better at this, or I'm more interested in this, or this is more of a natural fit for my skills. Like how did you guys divvy that out? I think it's what we naturally gravitate for.
So Mike really likes. He loves talking to people. And if you look at our reviews, like everybody says, they put my name in it 'cause it's got, my name on it too. But they're like, Mike and Lene we're great hosts. They're very communative. He's good at that. I'm like more of the person you can figure it out like you're an adult.
So we've realized that he is more of the, he's the one that they call. Yeah, sometimes he'll get like a call at work or like a text and he can usually figure it out right away. But I'm more better at behind the scenes. I'm more better at the accounting part, at the calling and making appointments, paying people, setting a little bit of those things up.
But I think it it came over years of us figuring out what we like to do when managing this. Yeah. And I had to realize too, there's there, obviously there's more than one way to do something. So if it's not, it is like at work, if it's safe and it's, within policy I'm not gonna argue about it.
So when she's got an idea and it falls, it's aligned with our mission and it's serves the purpose of what we're doing, then. That's okay. And if it turns out that we want to change it later, we take it off the wall and we put something else up. So yes, I think this is actually a fun kind of discussion for Katie and I to jump in on as well.
Just the idea of what roles do you take? What have you learned working together? And I'm with you, Celine, that it's great when you can go parallel, right? It's when you have to cross and you bump. And we have a friend in Minnesota that's. Says, what happens when you bump, right? What spills out?
And that's what we constantly work on is how to work together, as you cross, as you work on the things you really value most. And you gotta circle back to that gratitude, right? Of thank you so much for jumping in, doing these parts that I don't want any part of. So that's a nice thing about working with a partner.
And then we've heard a lot of times on our episodes as well. If there's not something you enjoy doing, hire a va, go hire it out because you're gonna, your time is going to be used so much better scaling your business somewhere else. Katie, what have you found is helpful for you and Nate? I think the division of responsibilities is huge.
Kind of knowing like what's in his lane, what's in my lane. And some we do have some things that are just kinda whoever is available to respond. But he's taken over all of like the making sure the bills get paid and the mortgages and things like that. I hate that. I absolutely hate it.
So he can do that all day long. That's great. I don't wanna ever, I don't wanna ever touch it. And he. I like working with leads a lot. So there's just been a lot of. Figuring out what is his task, what's my task, and what is truly like a, who's available. For instance, if we get like a maintenance request that's more urgent, like something's leaking, we need to get there right away.
It's we're both working like, okay, who's got 10 minutes to call? And sometimes it's him. Sometimes it's me. But I think you're right. Just having that understanding of who is going to do what and what role you're gonna play. Before we really established that. He would be messaging someone, and I'm messaging someone and we're saying the same thing, but different.
And it like comes across really weird and it's just, it's like things fall through the cracks and things get duplicate. Like you have to just kinda figure out what is going on. I also think it's key to like protecting our relationship because. I need to see him as my bus. Yes. He's my business partner, but also I don't want to be involved in every single thing he's doing in our rental.
And midterm rentals are simple. They're much, much more simple than something like a short term rental. But, we have 13 properties in our portfolio, so it's multiplied a little bit with scale, but I don't, I wanna look like, just know that he's doing the stuff. And it's gonna be great.
You need, you have to have some boundaries as as a married couple as well. I'd love to know how you guys have handled that as well, because I know that can be tough. It can be tough to be like, not only separating what you do, but separating personal from work, especially when you do have multiple properties and you're working, as different co-hosts and different situations like that.
I think it's important to, 'cause there's three aspects there. There's one with your marriage, one with your business, and then one with your work. And you gotta put the phone down once in a while and if it's an emergency, they're gonna call nine, they're gonna call nine one one and the professionals up there are gonna handle it.
So there's definitely degrees of okay trying to keep it in its place, but we. Learned early, like it's just unprofessional for us to both send a message at the same time. And so she'll check if I'm at work, she knows I am, I'm probably not gonna be able to respond. So she will check with me first Hey, are you able, you want me to handle this?
I just say, yep. And then she'll take care of it. And because we are, we have the same mission and we have, we know what the focus is for each of these. Properties and what our goals are with them. I'm not concerned that something's gonna get processed out of alignment with what we're trying to do.
And the biggest challenge for both of us is we enjoy doing a lot of the things and we try to stay involved and we've had to. We've had to stop ourselves and get ourselves outta the weeds because we have to focus on the bigger picture. We have to focus on managing and moving forward with our business plans as opposed to we're on our way up to Big Bear.
Let's just knock out a cleaning instead of waiting for the cleaner to get done. Now we spent three or four hours cleaning when we should have been planning for. We're building an a DU at one of the properties and there's things we have to go through and get done and plan. And so if we spent four hours cleaning, that's four hours less that we have to work on our business plan, to work on our plans to, go through whatever we had planned on going through that day.
I think those are the most incredible people in the world who like cleaning, right? It's like many of us have to do it. But those that have established really great furnished rental cleaning businesses is because they like what they're doing and they are s. So organized. It took us, if you're getting started in the space, you know you have to plan with monthly rentals to spot check your property after your cleaners until you build that trust, right?
Whether that's in person or you have them send you photos, I. Still have her send us photos. But you want that cleaning cleaner plus team that not only goes through and does the deep clean, but they're, and watching for every hair in the space. You also want them to recogni, recognize things like.
Oh, the shower has no shower curtain. That's pretty important. So let's go buy one. And so like in the restock items, right? So I'd love to talk a little further on when it comes to the systems and tools that really help you. In your monthly rental business, especially any Furnished Finder tools that have you, that you have found valuable because, we have built them for someone to be a brand new landlord that can come in and start monthly rental business.
And you guys coach on this as well. So what are some of those tools that have you, that you have found very beneficial for your monthly rental business? So the tenant screening is absolutely necessary and it's so easy. And the fact that you can decide 'cause some of these properties, people are paying like eight, eight to $10,000 a month for.
And knowing that they're going through, one of the things we learned when they're going through this, a lot of times there's certain out-of-pocket things that aren't gonna get covered by the adjuster or the insurance company. When. A tenant screening when I can choose whether they're gonna pay for it or I'm gonna pay for it.
Normally what I tell 'em is Hey, I'll I'm gonna, you're gonna get charged, but I'm gonna take this $30 off of your security deposit when you if it works out that way. That way they know and understand if it works out and they end up leasing with us that I'm covering the, and it doesn't sound like a lot, but to them, 'cause they've been nickeled and dimed through the whole process and they're concerned about a lot of things.
Knowing that I'm gonna cover the tenant screening, it doesn't sound like a big deal, but. There are a lot of times they're very grateful for that, but getting it back very quickly and I just explain to them, Hey, I'm not gonna see any of your personal information. It's gonna tell me if you passed if your credit is good, if you have any convictions, blah, blah, blah.
And they feel way more comfortable, not just sending me their information, their sensitive information, they know it's going into this third party app and I'm not gonna get any of their, sensitive info. The online rent payment, I've set it up a few times and I've had people who. Feel real comfortable working with that.
And then I've had people who end up just going on my direct booking side and paying me that way. But the state specific leases is another must have, like we, I've used it. It's easy to set up, you get prompted through the entire process and then you can share it with the whether you're leasing with a company or directly with a person.
'cause. Because different companies and different adjusters do it differently. So sometimes you're leasing directly to this person and there's another contract where you're getting paid through a different company, and then sometimes you're leasing with the company or the CFO of the company. And having an option to put either one of those into the state specific lease review it before it's signed is it just makes things so much easier. Yeah. And I think another tool that you use a lot too, Mike, is when those leads come in. He's really good at reading them, checking them, calling them, because we know other people who are also trying to do midterm.
So that has led to like other people, being able to learn about it and to have somebody in their place. Yeah. Yeah that's really big. The urgency when you get a lead, right? Don't let a lead sit there. Even if you think it's a lead that's not gonna work out and pick up the phone, right?
Those travelers will put in their inquiry, their preferred method to get in touch with them. A lot of times it's not. A message. And if you call them, also send a message, right? I think it's, a lot of times it's just different ways to reach people, especially if you're in a competitive market or you're really facing some vacancy, things like that.
You've gotta take some action, you've gotta have some urgency. And your own level of effort is really gonna be reflected in your results there. So that, that brings up another tool that the templates that you guys have in messaging. Where you can pre-draft 'em and then click what property they're apply they apply to, just makes responding so much quicker.
And I always get the same questions from the companies that are. That are searching for the adjuster. So what I did for our properties and for the people I'm coaching is I made a document that answers all of those questions and in the document it's got links to the 3D scan for the property, it's got links to our direct booking site, and then I list on there, Hey, if you guys want to use key check, if you want to use electronic lease, or if you want to, it's all listed there. Everything they're gonna ask me is listed there. And the only thing we're changing are the availability dates and those are highlighted. There's Google Maps links so they could see exactly where the property is and then.
I've got a Matterport 3D camera. I scan all the properties and they can tour them, with VR headsets if they wanted to, but you just literally drag it over and send it to the 'cause sometimes they don't want to get messaged on furnished funder. They want you to email them directly. So just send it right over.
Within seconds. They have everything they've asked for. You're not sitting there typing it, trying to. To type it each time, but that the template is, I have a quick template, Hey, this is our property, these available dates, here's the link to it, and I'm, you'll be receiving an email with the rest of the information.
Yeah. And you can tell if you glazed over this part of the conversation and you're newer to Furnished Finder or just looking to improve your Furnished Finder systems. Mike just gave a lot of great advice and it was little tidbit. So if you want more about any specific section that Mike covered, you can always connect with him in the show notes of the episode.
To get to their Furnished Finder profile link. You can put a comment in there and we'll jump in and help point you in the right direction. But that's some, you can tell that. Mike and their coaching business. Mike and SLE have a coaching business and from what I'm hearing, they have great systems that would be excellent to copy.
And for those of you that have been with us for a while, the nice thing is the key check products are actually being integrated into Furnished Finder, so that you just have to go to your Furnished Finder dashboard, click on the landlord tools section, and what you need is there. So that's really nice that you'll have one login, one dashboard for everything.
Alright hosting as a couple is always fun, challenging, exciting partners apply the same way. So what would you say, I'd love to hear from each of you. What's one piece of advice that you have for if someone's looking to get started in the space, especially if they're looking for a partner to get started in this.
Base, what advice would you give them to get started in monthly rentals?
I would have to say it's know what your goal is because it does make a huge difference if you're just in it for oh, I just wanna make quick money. I don't think that's gonna work. We've noticed that the people that we coach we don't just. We don't just help everybody. Mike does his own screening because he wants to know the people that he's helping, are aligned with how we wanna help people.
And so we want them to take pride in what they do and be nice to people and help them out when we can. Obviously yes yes, we wanna make money like everybody else, but that's not, that's not okay, we wanna make money and that's it. We genuinely wanna help people. So I think before you do it, you need to figure out what it, your goal is, and then once you figure out what your goal is, what your mission statement is, then you can work from there.
And if it's something you do wanna do, you get on the Furnished Finder, like you mentioned, you navigate through it. It took Mike A. Little bit of time to navigate through it. But now. He's so good at how he's doing it. It's really quick. I remember when we first started, it would take him like hours to get something done and I can't figure this out.
But over time and practicing, like he can answer people back so fast now and it's becoming almost seamless, which is really nice. But if you wanna partner again, finding a partner with the same type of goals that that you have. My dad always said if you do it right. If you do it right and you work hard at it's gonna, the money's gonna come later.
And so we were never like. We need to make this much it needs to, of course we, we do need, you need to make money. You can't do it for free. But we set up our property the way we are our best customer, right? We're gonna take care of things we go rent or stay at, but we wanted it to be comfortable for our family and.
That because I have my family in mind. When I send a family there, I wanna make sure it's safe. I wanna make sure their kids are safe. I wanna make sure it's comfortable, I wanna make sure they feel great while they're there. So we've, that's how we've set up our properties. And I've had. Families tell me they're so excited to go home.
But the kids are like, the kids are disappointed. They're going home. They wanted to stay nice. And so we definitely keep our guests in mind and we keep the properties maintained. They don't feel like rentals. And these are not people like most of our midterm rental our midterm guests, they're not renters.
They are property owners. We have learned to accommodate the property owners. Sometimes we, I've had I've had the wives ask, Hey, can I really don't want to use these plates and these, there's nothing wrong with our ware and our cutlery and our plates, but she wants to use her own, so Of course, yeah, we'll box ours up and you could bring your own in.
A lot of 'em. We have very nice high-end mattresses with the high quality mattress covers on them. They still wanna bring their own mattresses. They wanna sleep on their own mattresses. Hey, no problem. Bag 'em up, put 'em in the garage. And they bring, so we accommodate and we make sure that we keep a sharp eye and focused on the property being comfortable for the family staying there.
And. It's the second I, I don't know if we share this with you, but I put the Furnished Finder up for our property in Orange County a few months before it was gonna be available, thinking it was gonna take me a few months to get leads and people asking for it. And within days I was turning down three to four month bookings that they needed the property within seven days, four days, three days, seven days.
And I, and I'm. It was probably somewhere between seven and 10 inquiries that I turned down. And finally, like around the eighth or ninth, the I was telling a lady who called me that it wasn't ready. And she said what's not ready about it? And I, and she was a neighbor. She was going through remodel.
She thought she was gonna be able to stay in her property while. And it wasn't working out. She needed some, a place to rent. So she came, she walked through and in my mind, I needed everything perfect. I was working on like the stair railing and I was mounting cabinet doors and she just walked through the house.
She said, Mike, I don't care about any of this. And she pulled her credit card out and she paid for three months and. I was trying to show her how to, work the pool equipment because I didn't, my remote wasn't set up yet. And she's we're not going in the pool. We're not we're just, we need a clean place where I can use the kitchen and my son and husband can work on their computers.
And she came in for three months. I planned, I, I scheduled a bunch of work that I was planning on doing be for two weeks after she left, and I already had the rest of the year booked before she even left. That was your first midterm rental back into the game. You had seven to nine inquiries or so is what recapping what you said, I believe, and that you didn't even have it furnished yet.
And from there, you've now scaled. To your portfolio of short term and midterm rentals you have a coaching business. So guys, if you're listening, this is great advice of how to get started in space and why Furnished Finder is a huge tool for your monthly midterm rental business. Without further ado, I'd love to close this out with.
Rapid what we call rapid fire, and it's whatever comes to mind. Let us know a real quick answer, and they're just fun questions. Katie, why don't you take it away? All right. What is one rental task that you secretly wish the other person would just take over for good. Decorating.
Decorating, but decorating the way I want it to be decorated, not the way he wants it to be decorated. We have a totally different eye for what should be on the walls and what, and we, that's probably the biggest, if that's the biggest difference, that the biggest thing we fight over. I'll take that, but I think we're, that's awesome.
The next one, we're just gonna hire someone and whatever they do, we're just gonna say, okay, that's it. Oh, that's it. See, I love the decorating because I'm like, it's not my money. It's not my house. It's my money. Yes. But I'm not buying it for my house. And I, I do argue with my brother. He likes to mount TVs so high on the wall that it says if you are in a hospital.
See, I would love that. I would love that. My God, no, it's gotta be eye level. It's gotta be eye level. Yeah. I'm talking in the corner. It's insane. Yeah. All right. And Mike, what would you stop doing? In, in one of our markets you have to go and pay the taxes every month, and they're literally and you get charged.
You get charged a a small interest fee for. If you skip a month and I will never not pay, but sometimes I'll be like, you know what, I'll just pay the dumb interest and I'll next month, I'll pay both months. 'cause I hate, and it only takes three minutes. But getting on there and making sure it's correct and I just, for whatever reason it, I despise that operation.
It does sound like a pain in the, but. For the last one, just the name. If you could each host a dream midterm rental guest for one month, they can be dead or alive like some. If you have a hero from the past that you wanna highlight, who would it be? And we're gonna leave out the why. Just who would it be?
I'm gonna leave it for curiosity. I would have the family from the Incredibles. I wouldn't stay at our place. Five. Ooh. Take a big deposit. I think they have a lot of stories. I'd have King David. Oh, that's a good one. Nice. Love it. Okay. All right you guys. This is awesome. Kelly. Wrap us up. Yeah. As always, we are the podcast for monthly midterm rentals.
We have been coming to you for two to three years with the Furnished Finder podcast, just really telling stories of why the monthly midterm rental space is so incredible and how you can get involved. So jump in if you're new to the game, if. You've been in the game for a while. We'd love to hear in the comments just what you have found valuable from this episode or just in 2025 or 2026 that you're really focusing on for this next year.
Thank y'all so much for joining us, and we'll catch you again next time on Landlord Diaries. Bye everybody. Thanks for having us. Thank you.
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