Holiday let start up

[ahandmaiden]

I'm looking for general advice/information from anyone who has started up a holiday let as a diversification to their business or anybody who uses a holiday let!

We are looking to diversify on a family farm and one of the options we are considering is building a lodge to use as a holiday let. I haven't looked much into it yet but I am wondering what people look for in one and peoples experiences of starting up. We are rural but a short drive to shops/beach and many other attractions. I know initial costs would be high but have read that it could take 1-2 years to start making a return.

TIA

The first thing I would think about is planning. I would speak with a planning consultant and perhaps also see if you can get in touch with anyone locally who has done something similar and get there advice. We are currently in the process of looking to re-build a fallen down barn on our farm (purely to use as a barn for storage) and planning is much more complicated than I'd anticipated it would be.

The second thing I'd do is to look up on Airbnb or similar for lodges offering similar, see what they are charging, what amenities they have to offer. And who your market would be. I know a lodge probably wouldn't appeal to me, but it will appeal to a certain segment of the market and you might figure out how you can target those.

The holiday let next to us does weekly lets only, no weekends or short stays. So 95% of their guests are what I'd describe as 'pensioners with dogs' as most families can't do 7 days except in school holidays. We are in the process of setting one up and it will be aimed more at 'couples' or potentially 'couples/adult with small children' as only 1 bedroom and a living area. We wouldn't do weekly lets as we'd like to be able to pick and choose bookings a bit more as it's also on our farm and close enough to the house that we'd notice them there (and we don't want someone there all the time). I think how flexible you are with bookings will likely impact on who is likely to be attracted to staying there. What's nearby? I'd imagine there's walking if you're rural, you mentioned the beach, anything else you could play up in how you market it? We are in a national park so walking, climing, wild swimming are big here, so we get lots of outdoorsy sort of tourists.

Isn’t there an organisation who helps and advises on farm diversification? I think it’s called Cartwheel or something. I think it would be well worth your while trying to track them down.