Calling parents and self catering fans: your must haves please!

[Dexy007]

Hi

We plan to invest in a second home / holiday let on the beach (3 hours south of Sydney in Huskisson) this year.

We are big fans of air b n b holidays (just us two or with friends) so have a fair idea of what appeals, amenities and decor wise, but some outside perspectives would be great. Especially from parents as we don't have kids but are hoping to invest in a 3/4 bed place, so likely to appeal to families with kids.

What are your must haves? What are your bugbears? What would make you recommend to friends or rebook for next year?

We are planning that it will be dog friendly too (fenced yard).

Please assume the finances and logistics (agent / bookings) are in hand - just grateful to hear about facilities and practical tips.

Thank you in advance 🙂

A good Hair dryer

Bedrooms not directly off the living area, so kids can sleep in peace while adults watch TV.

Twin beds so kids don’t have to share a double.

If you want to make it disability or wheelchair friendly. Then go around the house\garden\driveway etc pushing a large box around.(obviously it doesn't need to be full)

This is due to steps that regular people do not notice are there, as their legs automatically go up and down without thinking about it

Also give measurements of things like doors & heights of beds etc

Good luck with your venture

WiFi
Decent cooking utensils including a good knife (cannot tell you how many times we've been left with a blunt paring knife) and pots/pans.
Tea towels.
Foil.
Decent blinds/curtains in the bedrooms.
Plenty of bedroom storage and somewhere to put suitcases.
Plug sockets near the bed and more than one so you don't have to unplug a lamp to plug your phone in to charge.
Somewhere to do hair/make up etc with a mirror, light and plug sockets (stayed in a five star hotel last year and this one even seemed to evade them).

Tin opener

A travel cot is handy, one that you can pack away into a cupboard.

A bath not just a shower as I find it easier to wash younger children in the bath.

A high chair, IKEA do a decent, cheap one.

A stair gate if there are stairs.

One kids bedroom with 2 sets of bunk beds so that families with 3+ kids don’t have to take 3 rooms when sharing with friends.

Also adult bed sizes - I like a listing with king size beds instead of standard doubles.

Outside - something for kids to play with/on so swingset / table tennis / trampoline. Inside toys - board games / games console.

Bathroom - provide toddler step stool to help smaller Kids reach the sink.

Kitchen - oven, coffee machine, kettle, fridge with freezer compartment, enough plates & cutlery to do more than one meal without having to clean, ideally a dishwasher.

Most importantly- washing machine - it makes my day when I can keep on top of the laundry situation and not return home with suitcases full of dirty clothes.

Thank you these are great suggestions and mostly ones I had thought about which is reassuring!

YY to kitchenware (I'm a very keen cook so despair at shitty peelers and blunt knives! They're really not dear!)

Lots of Australian homes are bungalows so possibly could be or could be made disabled friendly, thank you for flagging that.

One room will have twin beds, I will have a think about the bunk beds. Id be happy to take the twin room if travelling with husband and friends but less happy to take a bunk bed. Would a rollaway bed be a better compromise?

Re travelcots: as parents do you expect to bring the mattress and bedding or just the latter (or neither!)

Re travelcots: as parents do you expect to bring the mattress and bedding or just the latter (or neither!) I expect to bring bedding and there be a mattress and sheet there but I always check. So I'd just make clear in the listing what is provided and the size of the mattress. I usually bring my own sheets.

More than enough cutlery plates and cups per person (not one for each bed). Plus plastic beakers for kids.

If it’s near a beach a cool box would be handy

Decent storage in the bathroom, especially by the shower or bath. It's incredibly frustrating staying somewhere with family and there's nowhere in the bathroom to put toothbrushes/wash bags/bottles of shower gel etc.

A proper inventory - I would presume you keep one for your own purposes so I don't know why people don't share it (with usual caveats re: not being held responsible if items are not there due to circumstances outside owner's control, e.g previous guest nicking/breaking something which is yet to be replaced).

Decent, basic kitchen equipment, not cast offs collected over the year - we went to a place last year which had an electric carving knife and a couple of other random 70s cast offs but only had one (blunt) kitchen knife and a really odd sized selection of pans.

A pack of cards and some basic board games are a nice-to-have. We really appreciated the basic pool/beach kit that came with the last house we rented in France - again, nothing fancy, pool noodles, snorkle masks, a cheap body board, the sort of thing you could pick up for not much at the supermarket/beach shop but wouldn't be able to take home if you were flying so nice to not waste the money buying something that would probably end up being chucked at the end of the holiday.

Mainly though, I'm looking for extremely clean and well maintained. Everything else is extra.

A bookcase with a range of books, local leaflets and maps. Boardgames, a few outdoor toys, and something to sit on on the garden. Directions to local shops/amenities and public transport. A washing machine!

Plastic kids plates, cutlery and cups. Travel cot with mattress and enough room in at least two of the rooms to put a cot in.

Board games, puzzles and books. Tv with Netflix installed.

I wouldn’t stay somewhere advertised as dog friendly do that would put me off.

Also agree with pp about bed size. King size is a must, standard double way too small for a relaxed holiday.

Dishwasher. But, it either needs to be a smaller one so that you don't end up running out of pots/crockery and having to wash by hand anyway, or a standard one but make sure you have plenty of pots, pans, crockery and cutlery.

The cooking we do on holiday is usually simpler than at home so there wouldn't be enough to fill a standard dishwasher every day, and for environmental reasons I wouldn't want to have to run it on a half load just because there are no plates left.

Maybe a few food storage boxes for leftovers or if guests want to make a packed lunch. I always forget to take enough.

Games and books for rainy days.

Clothes horse.

I look for proper thick curtains or (ideally) shutters. Trying to put kids to bed with the sun streaming through thin curtains or around a roller blind is not ideal.

How hot does it get where you are? In hot countries I look for AC in the bedrooms.

Yy to twin beds, mine won’t sleep much if they share a double. Zip and link divans are probably the most flexible option.

Some kind of kids play equipment (a swing or basketball hoop or box of toys/games or whatever) would bump you up my list.

Good wifi

Oh definitely definitely a dishwasher!

A washing machine with a quick rinse cycle for swimwear makes a massive difference for beach holidays as does the provision of a washing line and pegs.

Washing machine and some means of drying the washing.

The most frustrating holiday home we have stayed in had a washing machine, but nowhere to hang wet washing and no dryer. Not even a clothes horse!

A table to eat at, not just a breakfast bar (I hate sitting on stools) with chairs that are easily cleanable. I keep staying places with lovely velvet cushions and backs on their dining chairs or bar stools and it’s a nightmare with kids. Before you know it a sticky hand is touching the fabric.

Lots of towels. Big towels, not the tiny postage stamp sized ones you can’t wrap round yourself.

One tea towel is not enough for a family for a week's holiday

Twin beds as my kids would not share a bed (being opposite sex)

Curtains that don't let the light in.

Kids beds that are not creaky (we ended up putting the mattress on the floor for ds once when the bed which was little more than a z bed creaked every time he made the slightest move

Washing machine (I'd prefer a washing machine over a dishwasher if it came to a choice)

Decent parking so that you can load/unload the car without having to trek miles with kids.

Consider that not all families have little kids - so a three bed house might mean 6 near adults so make sure that pots/pans etc are large enough to actually cook enough pasta/rice etc for 6 adults, and a frying pan is large enough etc.

Personally I wouldn't rent somewhere that allowed dogs, so maybe consider whether you would get more bookings by allowing dogs, or more by not allowing them.

An oven glove...last time we went self catering there wasn't one... more annoying than you could imagine!

Agree about a decent hairdryer...not those tiny underpowered ones.