A vacation rental is both a fun place to stay and an investment opportunity. And a part of that responsibility is ensuring that you run your business smoothly. When you own a vacation rental, you want to have good cash flow, avoid tax penalties, stay organized, have a great presentation, minimize risk and ensure your customers are satisfied.

To LLC or not to LLC

That is the real question when you start a vacation rental at yacht charter. This is a personal and legal decision. In my experience, I do not worry about having an LLC with only one home. With one home, it is unlikely you will have enough cash flow to recover the costs of the LLC fees. Regardless of whether you choose sole proprietorship or LLC, it is important that you have at least$1 million liability insurance on your property. Make sure that your property is safe and clean to prevent injury. Once you have two or more properties, I suggest you split them into LLCs for every two or three homes based upon value and risk. This protects your assets and your investment.

Establish a checking account for your VR

Separating your business into its own checking account helps you to properly record and report your income and expenses. It can also help you to maximize your tax advantages. You may also want to use a different bank or credit union than you use for your personal purchases. This is what I did to help prevent any commingling of personal and business funds. Unless you setup an LLC or establish a DBA for a sole proprietorship, you will not be able to open a business account, but you don’t need to. You just need to make sure that you keep your accounts separate.

Review your listing monthly

Anytime that you use third-party booking agencies, review your listings at least once per month. It can help you find errors, address changes, update rates or notice that some entries are not showing correctly. So check your listings out regularly, and address any issues/changes immediately.