Interview with Janelle OFC

Jae Seok An18min

Delia

00:02

Welcome back to another episode of Into The Airbnb, where we talk with Airbnb hosts about their short-term rental experience. Today's guest is Janelle Hicks from Carlsbad, New Mexico, who has been an Airbnb host since 2017. She manages some listings in Carlsbad and Ruidoso, New Mexico and today, she will share with us her experience being an Airbnb host and also some very useful tips. So without further ado, let's get into it! Can you tell me how did you get started on Airbnb?

Janelle Hicks

00:38

Sure! So we moved to Carlsbad, New Mexico for my husband's job and I was home with a newborn baby and a two year old. And we had some extra money from the sale of our house in Arizona. So there was this little house on the gate. It was I think 40,000, it's only 600 square feet. So I just took a look at it and thought, you know, let me turn this into Airbnb. So I did, we bought it, we fixed it up and did a little bit of like rehab on it and then listed it on Airbnb. And it's been kind of building ever since then we started with that one and then, seemed like each year, we bought another one and then the next year, we bought two more, etc.

Delia

01:38

Oh, so how long ago was that?

Janelle Hicks

01:41

That was, I think 2017 when we bought our first one.

Delia

01:46

Okay, great. So in the areas you're hosting because you told me you were hosting in two cities, how is the seasonality like in those cities?

Janelle Hicks

01:59

So Carlsbad to me is more of like a year round thing. It seems like there's a little bit of a low in January and February. And then it's otherwise, I mean, it's a little slower in September right after school starts. But otherwise, we're right near the National Park. So people come pretty much year round and it's a cave, so it's not like it's not good certain times of the year, so people come all the time. In Ruidoso, that one is a lot more seasonal because people come specifically for the snow or they come to get away from the heat. So like Christmas is really big, February is pretty slow. Although it was pretty good this year, so it's much more like the weekends tend to book versus the weekdays lower.

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