Your own site for your apartments, with no commission.
The platforms bring guests, but every booking through them carries a commission. Your own site gives a guest who already knows you a direct way to you.
A guest stayed with you last summer. They liked it and want to come back. They open Booking, type in the name of the apartment and book, because they don't know another way. You get the same guest as last year, and the platform charges a commission as if it had found them.
A rental website exists for that guest, and for anyone who finds you on Google, on Instagram or through a recommendation. The site shows the apartments, the photographs and what a guest wants to know before arriving. Once they have decided, the guest enters the dates they want and sends an enquiry on WhatsApp, and you reply.
What a guest sees on your site.
On a platform your apartment is one of many, in the same frame as all the others. On your own site there are only your photographs, your description, your house rules and your phone number, in the order you want to show them. The site can also be in your guests' languages. It's fast on a phone and prepared so that Google and AI tools can read it. I don't promise a ranking, because nobody honest can.
Every apartment on its own page.
If you have several units, each gets its own page, with its own photographs, equipment and the number of people it sleeps. The guest knows exactly what they are choosing and doesn't have to ask whether the apartment has a balcony or how many beds are in the room. When they send an enquiry, the message says which apartment they mean, so you don't have to guess.
The enquiry arrives complete.
When the guest enters the dates and the number of people and picks the unit, the site writes the message for them. You receive one WhatsApp message with everything you need to know: from when to when, how many people, which apartment and who is asking. You check whether the dates are free wherever you keep your bookings, reply as you would to any other message and agree payment the way you always have. How that message comes together I explain in orders and bookings on WhatsApp.
No commission and no payment on the site.
I take no commission, from you or from the guest, on any booking. Nothing is charged on the site: no card details, no payment through the site. The money goes straight from the guest to you, however you agree. For the site you pay the build and the care plan, not a percentage of bookings.
Honestly, the limits.
- The site doesn't show free dates. The guest enters the dates they want, and you check them wherever you keep your bookings. That way a guest can never see a week as free on the site when it has already been sold.
- An enquiry isn't a booking. The dates are booked only once you confirm them by message. The site sends no automatic confirmation.
- No card payments. If you need card payment on the site itself, this product doesn't do that.
- It doesn't replace the platforms. Booking and Airbnb still bring new guests. Your own site is one more way to you, not the only one.
How a guest comes back directly.
A guest who has stayed with you finds you most easily if something stays in their hand when they leave: a card on the table, a link in the guest guide, or the site's address in a thank-you message. Next summer they can then write to you directly, instead of looking for you on a platform.
A guide alongside the site.
A guest who booked directly needs the same answers as any other: how to get the key, the Wi-Fi, parking. That's why a guest guide goes with the rental website. The hosts' package, with the rental website, the guest guide and a guide card, costs from €1,380 instead of €1,535.
What it costs.
A rental website costs from €1,000. The care plan costs €150 a year from the first day and covers the domain, hosting, small changes within 24 hours, visitor statistics and monitoring. You get the exact price in a written offer, once I see how many units you have and what the site needs to do.
What I need from you.
Photographs of each unit, how many people it sleeps, what's in the apartment, the house rules and the languages your guests most often write in. I write the copy; you just approve it.
If you're wondering whether the site is yours and what happens if you leave one day, the answer is in who owns your website.
What I can make of this for you.
If you want guests to come back to you directly, tell me how many units you have and which languages your guests write in. I'll put a proposal together from that.